The Beginning of the End - Revelation 8:1-5

Revelation chapter 8, if you saw the announcement on Facebook, we have officially been in Revelation

Revelation 8 · chapter mention

for one year.

Woohoo.

And we've made it to chapter 8.

There are 22 chapters in Revelation, so you do the math and figure out when we'll be done.

The math will not work.

It's going to follow a consistent pattern.

But we have been out of Revelation for a little bit of time.

We had some guest speakers come, and then we took a break for Christmas.

And so we're kind of just jumping right back in.

And it's hard to do that without reorienting ourselves.

So remember that we started this section where Jesus is talking about the seven seals, and

we see that the lamb is beginning this process of opening the seven seals, and it begins

to go one, two, three, four, five, six.

And you see the six seal, and it's just catastrophe, right?

I mean, you remember the sun is darkening, stars are falling, the people are begging

mountains to fall on them so that they can hide from the face of the lamb.

It's a terrifying situation, and that calls us to pause, and we're like, okay, well, if

that's really going to happen, and it is, how are God's people going to be saved from

all this?

And so the Bible does this interruption where it talks about, well, here's how they're

going to be saved, because God has sealed all of His people with His Holy Spirit, and

because they are sealed by God, they are safe from God's wrath.

And that's encouraging for us, right?

Like, we will never experience the wrath of God, even though we deserve it.

We'll never experience it because we have been sealed by the Holy Spirit.

And so they gave us this picture of this multitude in heaven, this innumerable multitude that

no one can number from every tribe, tongue, nation, language, and they're standing there

in their white robes, they're praising the lamb, and they are giving all glory to Jesus

for salvation because we said, He is the one who brought about that salvation.

And so that led us all the way through the six seals, and you're wondering, okay, where's

the seventh one?

Well, it's coming.

That's what we're getting to now.

So look at Revelation 8.1.

This is what the Bible says.

When the lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.

Now we're going to pause there, okay, because we're studying the Bible together.

And we're reading this verse, at least when I'm reading it, two questions become immediately

obvious to me.

So if we're studying the Bible together, trying to be good Bible readers, I see this,

I see two immediate questions.

What do you think this question's on?

What questions come to your mind when you see this verse?

Okay, that's a good question.

Yeah, was it really 30 minutes?

Another way to say that, like why?

Why 30 minutes?

That seems odd.

So yeah, that's actually my second question.

There's a question I had before that.

Yeah, why is there silence, right?

So if I'm reading this, those are the two questions I'm asking.

The lamb opens the seventh seal.

Got it.

There was silence in heaven.

Why?

What does that mean?

And also for about half an hour, that's oddly specific.

Why 30 minutes?

So let's address the first one.

Why is there silence in heaven when the lamb opens the seal?

Well, a number of explanations have been given for this, as you can imagine, it's revelation.

So everybody has a say on this.

Some have suggested that there's silence because the seventh seal is an empty seal.

There's nothing there.

There's no content.

And so there's silence because people see the seal opened and they have seen this process

six other times and they know that something is always going to happen, but now nothing

happens and they're just like, I don't know, what's going on?

They're waiting for it.

That's one suggestion.

Others have suggested that there's silence because God is now resting.

Now the seventh seals are open, God can rest after he rested on the seventh day.

And so they're kind of picking up on some biblical theology that way.

That's a good suggestion.

Others have suggested that there's silence because there's a halting of divine revelation.

So there's been all this revelation up to this point.

Now the seventh seal is open.

They believe that this means here comes the end of all things.

And so there's no more divine revelation.

So those are all these suggestions.

But the problem is that's not really how silence is used in the Bible, especially with relation

to God.

So what you have to do, and this is actually going to come out on Monday in a podcast I

just did, is you have to see something, a passage, and go, okay, well, where is this

word or phrase used elsewhere in Scripture?

Because that's going to give clarity to what we're studying.

One of the primary things I try to teach people is not just that context is king, that's probably

number one, context is king, but also Scripture interprets Scripture.

That's how we learn the Bible, Scripture interprets Scripture.

So if you're reading a passage that is unclear, go to a passage that is clear and compare

the two.

And it gives you insight.

So normally in the Bible, silence with relation to God is usually a response of God acting

an act of judgment.

So people in creation or even all of creation itself will respond with silence when they

witness a great act of God, especially an act of judgment.

So for instance, Isaiah 47, verses three through five, the Bible says, your nakedness shall

be uncovered and your disgrace shall be seen.

I will take vengeance and I will spare no one.

Our Redeemer, the Lord of hosts, is His name, is the Holy One of Israel.

Sit in silence, go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for you shall no more be

called the mistress of the kingdoms.

Now notice what's happening there.

God's taking vengeance and He says, I'm not going to spare anyone.

So what should they do?

God says, sit there and silence.

That is the appropriate response to what He is about to do.

Or Amos chapter eight, verses two through three, and He said, Amos, what do you see?

And I said, a basket of summer fruit.

Then the Lord said to me, the end has come upon my people Israel.

I will never again pass by them.

Whole lot of biblical theology there relates back to Exodus three.

The songs of the temple shall become wailings in that day declares the Lord God.

So many dead bodies, they are thrown everywhere.

Silence.

I mean, this was a movie, it would just be cut to black right there, right?

It's chaos, it's madness, dead bodies are everywhere.

Silence.

I mean, you've ever been so terrified that you can't even scream?

You can't even make a noise?

I mean, this only happened to me a couple of times, normally in relation to like one

of my children.

If something bad happens to them, like I remember one time Judah was in a swaddle, rolled off

our counter in our bathroom, which is like, you know, it's a counter, it's about this

high.

And he's in a swaddle, he's a baby, he's like maybe six months old, rolls off smack

on our tile floor.

And I was on crutches, I just had knee surgery and I thought, our baby's dead.

And I was so terrified.

I mean, he immediately started wailing and screaming.

I was so terrified, I couldn't even make a sound.

I couldn't even call for Anna because I was just that overwhelmed.

And so that's how the Bible uses silence in relation to God.

When people behold the judgment of God, there is complete and utter silence.

It's a silence of horror and awe.

And it makes sense for there to be silence here, right?

Like if you're thinking back, I know it's been a while since we've studied the six

seals, but if you think back, especially to the six seal, and you see all that stuff happening

again, right, where you see the sun darkening, you see the stars are falling, people are

begging mountains to fall and then they're hiding from the lamp, you look at all of that

and that was just number six.

And things have just gotten worse.

And then you see seven being opened.

Aren't you going to be in stunned silence as well?

You're just standing there in absolute awe and horror of God's judgment upon the wicked.

And so that explains the silence, but then there's question number two.

Why 30 minutes?

Why half an hour?

Anybody have any suggestions?

Well, normally in Scripture an hour usually refers to a climactic event, right?

So who wrote the book of Revelation?

John, yes, you all kind of mouth it and then weirdly you all said it at the same time after

you mouth it, so that was interesting.

But okay, John wrote Revelation.

John also wrote the Gospel of John.

And interestingly enough, throughout the Gospel of John, one of the key phrases is, my hour.

Jesus always says, my hour, my hour, my hour.

So think back to the wedding at Canaan.

Jesus says first miracle where he turned water into Welch's grape juice, Baptist.

He turned water into wine, right?

And so do you remember what Jesus said to his mother there?

They run out of wine at this wedding and she says, hey, you've got to do something.

And he says, woman, my hour has not yet come.

That's right.

And he says this through out, the book of John.

You can trace it throughout.

And normally he's referring to this climactic event, which is the full revelation of his

glory, especially as seen as dying on the cross for our sins.

And so an hour represents a climactic event.

Well we have another climactic event here, something that creation has been heading towards

ever since the fall.

Ever since mankind rebelled against God in the garden, mankind has been on this destination

aiming towards something, this final climactic event, which is going to be the final judgment.

When God will judge all of humanity.

He said he was going to do it in the garden though, right?

Day this fruit, you're going to die.

And as mercy and as grace, he did not allow them to die then, but he appointed a day for

judgment and that is where we have been on this trajectory course heading towards this

event.

We finally are here.

The hour has come, it's the climax of God's judgment.

It's so horrifying, so awe inspiring that people stand there in silence waiting for the

climax to come.

And here's the interesting thing.

There's this literary thing happening here where we reach the climax and you're expecting

it to be like, okay, here we go, final judgment time.

God's coming back.

You know, Jesus is coming back.

God's going to judge everybody.

Here we go, but we just get a little taste of it.

A little 30 minute taste of it.

We're just standing there in silence.

It's not the full payoff.

Anybody know why we don't get the full payoff here?

Why do we just get a taste of this climax and not the fullness of it?

Couldn't stand it?

Okay.

Anybody else?

It's because later this silence is going to be broken, but not yet.

We're hanging in anticipation.

It's a great literary storytelling device and what the Bible is going to do now is revert

time.

So we notice this.

We've been working towards this, right?

We've been in the six seals leading towards the seventh seal.

We know this means the end.

We know this means the final judgment.

We finally reach there.

You're in it.

You're 30 minutes in it.

And then the Bible takes a step back and goes back in time because notice what verse two

says, then I saw the seven angels who stand before God and seven trumpets were given to

them.

So here's what we've just done.

We've gone back in time and now we're starting all over again because you remember we're

moving away now from the seals and we're going to begin to discuss the trumpets.

So let's remember something that we talked about earlier.

We said that there's this idea that these three things, the seals, the trumpets and

the bowls, there's this idea that a lot of people have that these occur chronologically,

just one after the other.

So you have seals, then you have trumpets, and then you have the bowls, right?

And all of this leads to the FJ because I ran out of room, the final judgment.

So this is the most popular belief and people believe this primarily because as you read

in a book, you read them in this order.

But just because you read them in an order doesn't mean they happen necessarily chronologically.

So there's this belief that this is what's going on.

But we have discussed in an earlier lesson how this is impossible because the trumpets

will start talking about things like stuff happening with the sun and the moon, but

you look back at the sixth seal and you're like, hold on a second, I thought the sun

fell already and the stars had already fallen.

How are they back in place now?

It doesn't make sense if it's chronological.

It only makes sense in a different way.

Do you remember how we said you need to view this?

Not as chronological, but as something else.

The same event, so the seals, the trumpets and the bowls are recounting.

They're describing God's judgments throughout human history that are ultimately leading

to the final judgment.

And they are all describing the same thing, but with different perspectives and emphases.

It's a really cool literary device.

So I actually, I really like it when movies and books do this.

I saw a movie not too long ago where you're following one storyline the whole time and

it's working towards a climax.

Because every single story does.

And it finally gets to the climax and you're like, oh man, it's going down.

This is it.

And right at the height of the action, the screen cuts to black.

And it says 15 minutes earlier.

And you go back in time, 15 minutes.

But this time, you're following a different character.

And it's the same event that happens, but now you're just seeing it from a different

character's perspective.

And it works back towards that climax.

You're like, okay, we're definitely going to get it now.

We've saw character one, now we've seen character two.

Going to get it now.

Screen cuts to black.

15 minutes earlier.

And we do the same thing again, but from a different person's point of view, which is

exactly what this is doing.

It's also one of my favorite songs.

It might be my favorite song ever.

It does a really good job of this.

It's called Ocean by John Butler Trio.

Really obscure band no one's ever heard of.

There's no singing.

There's no words.

It's just a guy and a guitar.

And what he does the whole time is in the beginning, he like establishes these things

that are going to be in the song.

And it builds and builds and builds.

And it gets to this tension.

Amazon knows this as a musician.

It gets to this tension and you're just begging, resolve it, resolve it, resolve it.

It has to be resolved.

And he doesn't.

Instead, he goes back and he starts another thing.

And he's working up and working up and working up.

He's just like, okay, here's the tension.

Here's the tension.

We've reached it.

Resolve it.

Do it.

And he does it.

And you're begging.

Let's reach that resolution.

Let's reach it.

And he finally does.

And when he does, you're like, that was beautiful.

But the whole composition, it wasn't three different compositions.

It was like three different themes, part of one composition that was leading towards the

ultimate resolution.

That's what this is doing.

So like rather than viewing them like this in terms of arrows that are happening chronologically,

what we need to do instead is view these as like three events that all work together to

lead us to an ultimate resolution, the ultimate climax, which is the final judgment.

That's how the seals and the trumpets and the bowls need to be read and understood.

That's how they work together.

Three things all describing human history and they're all leading us.

They're all pointing us to the final judgment that's going to occur.

That is the climax that we're headed towards.

So here's what's going to happen now.

Look at verses three through five.

And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censor.

And he was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden

altar before the throne.

And the smoke of the incense with the prayers of the saints rose before God from the hand

of the angel.

And the angel took the censor and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the

earth.

And there were pills of thunder and rumblings and flashes of lightning and an earthquake.

So what's happening here?

He's recalling Old Testament imagery, right?

In the Old Testament you'll remember that the people they would offer up sacrifices to

the Lord and the aroma of that burning sacrifice was said to go up to God and he would breathe

it in and it was pleasing to him.

And it wasn't in any sort of like weird sense like, oh God enjoys the smell of dead flesh.

That's not it at all.

But it's in the sense that this was a command that he had given his people and when they

followed through with that command with this heartfelt obedience, it was pleasing to God.

That when the people came and they didn't just see this as something that they had to

do but they joyfully submitted to God in obedience, it was a pleasing sacrifice to him.

And what's interesting is Paul picks up on that in the New Testament in 2 Corinthians

2 Corinthians 2:14–15

chapter 2 verses 14 through 15, this is what he says, but thanks be to God who in Christ

always leads us in triumphal procession and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge

of him everywhere.

So listen to this, for we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved

among those who are perishing.

That's such a cool image.

You know what you smell like to God?

Jesus.

Those who are covered by his blood, who have been redeemed by the Lord, you don't smell

like a stinky no good failure that you are.

You smell like Christ.

It's pleasing.

It's this idea that we are to be living sacrifices for the Lord that our whole lives are to be

laid down before him in obedience and submission to him.

And so that's the idea that's going on here, but with relation to our prayers.

You have to understand what's going on.

The people are suffering.

People are being persecuted.

People are facing wickedness and evil in this world and God's people are crying out.

They're begging God to do something.

I mean you've probably been there before.

You said, God where are you?

When are you going to do something?

And people think God's just sitting there idly ignoring his people and the Bible says

here that all those prayers come up to God and it's a pleasing aroma to him.

They come to the altar of the Lord and he hears the prayers and the good news for us

is he doesn't just hear those prayers.

He actually acts upon those prayers.

Notice what's happening here.

He instructs the angel to take the censer to fill it with fire and from the altar and

he throws it on the earth and the result is that there are pills of thunder.

There are rumblings, flashes of lightning and earthquake and all of these are things

that are going to happen and be described by the seven trumpets that are going to sound.

When the seven trumpets sound we're going to see these things take place.

So don't miss what's happening here.

The resounding judgments of the seven trumpets are God's direct answer to the prayers of

his people.

He has heard their crying and their begging and now he acts in accordance with his plan

on their behalf.

So you might be wondering as we pause there and we'll get into the seven trumpets more

next week but you might be wondering what does that have to do with me?

What bearing does that have on our life?

Like we read about the silence in heaven the thirty minutes.

We see how these things go together but what bearing does that have on our lives now?

Well, I think one obvious one that we need to take away from this is that God always

hears and takes notice of the prayers of his people.

I mean you'll know why we have a prayer service on Wednesdays.

It's not because there's anything in the Bible that says have a prayer service on Wednesdays.

There's nothing in the Baptist faith in message two thousand that says you have to have a prayer

service on Wednesdays.

The reason we have a prayer service on Wednesdays, the reason that I pray every single day of

my life, the reason that we are praying big prayers this year and asking God for things

that are way beyond us is because God hears the prayers of his people.

When we meet here, whether there's ten of us, whether there's fifty of us, when we meet

here and we pray as God's people, he hears those prayers.

He is not ignoring those prayers.

He is not aloof from us.

He hears and takes notice of all of our prayers and the reason we continue to go to him time

and time and time again is because he doesn't just hear those prayers, he actually does

something about it.

Prayer works and it amazes me how many people today call themselves Christians but they

don't actually pray.

It makes no sense.

It's like being a human who says he doesn't breathe.

You're dead.

How can you have a spiritual life in a relationship with God apart from prayer?

I mean it amazes me.

I shared this not too long ago that you go to any church and nobody wants to be part of

a church that doesn't pray but very few people actually want to come to a prayer service.

If I were to announce on Sunday morning, no more prayer.

We're not praying in this church.

It's not a part of who we are.

It's not who we want to be.

People would walk out and leave, rightly said.

But if I invite someone, hey, we pray every single Wednesday, every request that's made

we pray for, every concern you have we will pray for you.

We'll lay hands on you if you want us to.

We will do whatever we are going to pray and ask our God to intervene.

To invite someone to come to that service, how many show up?

Why do you think that is?

Because they don't think God actually listens to them.

They don't think God actually does something.

So many people are like I said before where they've just been praying and praying and

praying for so long and they have this request and they're begging God, do this thing and

God doesn't do it.

And so what do people do?

They give up on God, don't they?

Turn their back on them and say well he must not be good, he must not be listening.

Where are you?

I needed you.

And this passage is reminding us that no matter what we go through, no matter how long we

have to pray, God is listening and he is collecting those prayers in that censor at the golden

altar and they are a pleasing aroma to him and he will act upon those prayers.

That's not saying he's going to answer every prayer you pray.

Sometimes the answer is no.

And listen, if the answer is no, it needs to be no.

That's hard for people to come to terms with but God knows best, right?

Like are we willing to admit at this point that God knows better than we do?

Amen.

If the answer is no, it needed to be no.

So you're not going to get everything you ask for.

That's not how God works, he's not a genie.

But that doesn't mean that he's not listening.

It doesn't mean that he doesn't care.

It's Bible is telling us here that you can trust that when you go to the Father in the

name of the Son and in the power of the Holy Spirit, he will listen to you.

So don't stop praying.

Don't be afraid to pray big prayers because again, something I really want to reinforce

to our church this year.

We pray big prayers because nothing is impossible for our God.

All things are possible with him.

Last thing I want you to take away from this and I hope that this is a comfort to you is

that God will judge the wicked and the wicked will not go unpunished.

And that's comforting because we look around our world and what do we see but wickedness

everywhere.

I mean, just the worst stories you could ever read of people doing the most despicable things

right here that could ever be done.

I mean, we're literally waiting on a list to be published right now of all the people

who visited Jeffrey Epstein's Island where they were molesting young children and on

this list, politicians, leaders, kings, princes, celebrities, people that we have entrusted

our lives to, that we are entrusting our country to, to make decisions.

And they are doing these acts of evil and wickedness and they're getting away with it.

That should rub us the wrong way, Christians.

When you see evil being done, when you see wicked prospering, when you see the righteous

suffer, we're not supposed to just sit back and go, well, I guess that's just the way

the world is.

You look forward to the day when this will be no more.

This may be the way the world is now but it's not the way God designed the world to be.

We messed it up with our sin.

You wouldn't have ever had an Epstein Island had Adam and Eve never rebelled against God.

This is our fault, not God's fault, but he is good and he promises that one day he is

going to open that seventh seal, that seventh trumpet is going to be blown, that seventh

bowl is going to be poured out and when that happens, he is going to answer all of his

saints prayers.

He is going to literally throw the prayers and the fire back on the earth.

He is coming back.

He is going to judge the wicked and the judge of all the earth will do right.

That's right, we can count on it.

Not one evil deed will go unpunished.

There's nothing wrong with Christians warning that to happen.

You look at the Psalms, you see imprecatory prayers all over the place, don't you?

You see the Psalmists praying God's destruction upon evil.

Christians have stopped praying this way.

They think, well that's harsh.

We're in the new covenant now.

It's all about love and grace and mercy.

No, it's all about God's will and God's kingdom.

That's what it's about.

And when we pray those imprecatory prayers and we say, God, judge the wicked.

God let them befall the consequences that are coming to them.

When we pray like that, what we're praying is nothing other than what Jesus prayed when

he said, your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.

Do these things exist in heaven?

Do evil and wickedness, murder, molestation and rape and all that kind of thing, does

that exist in heaven?

Absolutely not.

When we pray those prayers, we are saying, God make it be here as it is there.

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

So take hope in that Christian.

This passage should encourage us to pray and it should encourage us to pray for God's

will to be done, for this world to be rid of evil and wickedness and it should cause

us to hope.

Hope in that day when Jesus will return and he will make all things right.

And the best part about that day is, while everything else is suffering the wrath of

God, we will be with the Lamb.

And we will have comfort and peace.

And we will be like Him because we will see Him as He is.

And that's a good day to look forward to.

Christian crews, how about giving us a word of wisdom to close out the service?