The Seventh Seal Opened - The Seven Trumpets: Revelation 8 - Revelation: The Apocalypse

You're listening to the road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

No, Emma, if you have not repented, if you're playing around with Jesus, you don't want to walk in wholehearted devotion to him.

May God convict your heart to go into the Christmas season.

And in 2017, go all in.

Go all in and all out of Christ.

Today, Pastor Steve continues his series on the book of Revelation.

At The Road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ.

For more information on The Road, visit theroad.org.

We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

Turn in your Bibles.

We're in the book of Revelation today, and we're in a very interesting chapter.

We're in Revelation chapter 8.

Revelation 8 · chapter mention

But before you turn there, I want you to look at Revelation 4.

Do you realize that heaven is, I sometimes think my house is so loud.

I have a loud house.

For 28 years, my house, every year, has gotten louder and louder.

And one of the reasons I moved to Black Forest and have a fire pit in the back is I can escape from them.

And I have another hidden place.

Even my wife doesn't know my hidden place.

But I have a hidden place.

I go on my property back in some trees, and nobody can find me.

Not even you.

There's no cell coverage.

I'm gone.

I leave this earth sometimes for about one hour.

Okay?

But heaven is loud.

And my house is loud.

Anybody who's got a lot of kids, your houses are loud.

And God must like loud.

From time to time, people complain that our music's too loud.

That's because we're practicing for heaven.

And you need to stay in practice or get earplugs.

So look at look at Revelation chapter 4.

Revelation 4 · chapter mention

I mean, look at this.

How would you like to live in this?

This must be what God likes.

It's his living room.

It's where he hangs out.

I mean, he could make it really quiet, like a monastery.

He could make like, ooh, you know, like everybody, little candles and everything.

No, it's not like that in heaven.

So God likes loud.

Um, look at verse 5.

And from the throne proceeded lightning, thunderings, and voices.

That's my house.

I'm in better practice than some of you for heaven, because there's a lot of voices.

Seven lamps of fire with burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of God.

Folks, that's loud.

Then look at verse 8.

The four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes all around and within.

They do not rest day or night.

I mean, this is getting a little spooky, wouldn't you say?

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come.

It must be so loud and so crystal clear that John gets up there, he sees this vision, he can hear exactly what they're saying.

And then verse 11 You're worthy, O Lord, receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they exist and were created.

They're throwing thrones before the throne, they're throwing crowns before the throne.

Then look at verse 5, verse 11, and then I looked and I heard the voice of many angels.

And remember we went through verse five.

I said, many probably means tens of thousands.

That's the translation in Greek.

Meaning tens of thousands of angels around the throne, living creatures, the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000.

That's extremely loud.

Then look at chapter 7, which we covered last week when I was talking about the rapture of the church.

7 verse 10.

Crying out with a what?

Loud voice saying, Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.

That's loud.

That's loud.

And that's why chapter 8 is so strange.

It's one of the strangest verses in the entire book of Revelation.

Look at 8.1.

When he opened the seventh seal, so we've covered.

If you're new to our church, you can go back, listen to the tapes on it, you know.

But 6 and 7, the precursor to, I believe, the great tribulation, which begins now in 8.1.

That's the reason I believe the rapture of the church occurs somewhere in that latter part of chapter 7.

Look what he says.

Silence in heaven, 8-1.

Silence in heaven for about a half an hour.

There's never been silence in my household for a half an hour.

Until everybody's in bed.

And then something always happens with one of the dogs.

We've had more dog poop in the living room the last several weeks, and we had gone months where we were.

I thought we had trained these dumb dogs.

And I walk in and oh, I stepped in it one time.

No peace.

No peace.

Never.

So something's happening here, men and women, where in chapter 6 and 7, the earth is being devastated, but it's nothing like what's about to happen in chapter 8 onward.

So as I've said before, it's like birth pangs.

It's Matthew 24.

It's the birth pangs of the coming of the Lord.

But then in 8 1, there's silence in heaven for a half an hour.

There is, listen, deafening silence.

I would argue that this is the only time in the history of the creation of the universe, not just the globe, not just the earth, but the entire universe, that there's been silence.

This will be the one and only time ever where there's silence in heaven.

What is going on?

Well, at the opening of the seventh seal, at the opening of this, probably a scroll, some kind of a scroll, that seventh seal across that scroll is broken, and the seal is about to be open that is going to unleash the most devastating wrath of God that the world has ever known.

We saw a portion of it with Sodom and Gomorrah.

We saw a portion of it with the flood.

We saw a portion of it in dealing with Egypt and Pharaoh with Moses.

But now I would call this the PNR.

The PNR, which is the, which is what is what the map and the captains of the ship in the 170 and 1800s, I don't know if they did it in the 1900s, but I know in the 1800s they did it.

In the 1700s, in the 1600s, they would write on the map, on their route to the New World, PNR.

In the middle of the Pacific or the Atlantic Ocean on their travels, meaning point of no return.

Meaning that they can't turn around now because it's the same distance as to continue to go forward.

And so they would write P and R.

And I believe this is the point of no return.

And there's now going to be handed to the angels seven trumpets.

For God so loved the world.

And I believe that the silence is the Lord brooding over what he's about to have to do to the human race.

He has given opportunity after opportunity after opportunity for men and women to repent, and they will not repent.

You remember I've said this several times.

God measures time morally.

God does not measure time chronologically, he measures time morally.

And I believe, church, that we are on that precipice in America.

With our pornography and abortion, and partial birth abortion.

And the things that we do in our cities with the crime and the and the growing sex trade.

He's waiting, he's measuring time.

And I've said this before that I believe the only thing that holds America from the judgment of God is the praying church.

What a joy to come here at 8 o'clock on Sunday mornings, and we've got a room back there that's packed with people praying.

We pray, we pray for this service, we pray for America, we we pray for the church called the Road, we pray for the churches of Colorado Springs, we pray for revival, we pray for awakening, we pray for this particular service.

We we pray that as the word is opened, you would be equipped and challenged by the Holy Spirit.

We have to have that.

And I believe God is brooding, Jesus, Jesus is brooding, God the Father's brooding about what's about to happen, and there's just stone silence.

Imagine stone silence.

Imagine if you knew your son or your daughter was about to die, how you would feel.

And Jesus feels that He's about to, he's about to unleash the wrath of God upon sin.

Millions are surrounding the throne.

We just looked at that last week in in uh chapter 7, worshiping the Lord, praying, crying out to God.

And then I believe Jesus comes on the scene.

This is this is just my kind of version of what might be happening, but they're before the throne.

We're all there, we're the church, we're there, we're lifting up our prayers like incense before the Lord.

And then Jesus comes, and tears are flowing out of his eyes, and I think everybody's shocked.

This is not a time to worship.

And all worship stops, all the bands stop, all the angels stop, and there's this stunned silence that nobody knows, and nobody understands, but Jesus Himself and God the Father, in their hearts, they know they're about to have to unleash wrath upon sin because God hates sin.

And he's tried again and again to give opportunity for repentance.

Men and women, if you have not repented, if you're playing around with Jesus, if you don't want to walk in wholehearted devotion to him, may God convict your heart as we go into the Christmas season.

And in 2017, go all in.

Go all in and all out for Christ.

That's where the joy is, that's where the excitement is.

You know what I believe the greatest sin on earth is not lust, not envy, not jealousy, boredom.

If you're bored, then you need to jump on the wagon.

You need to get on with Jesus.

You need to start opening the word and asking God to empower and strengthen you to love him with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

And that's an adventure.

We're gonna have to have that as the days get on.

And I saw the seven angels who stand before God.

I want you to notice something here.

The seven angels.

Look at verse 6.

The seven trumpets of the seven angels.

The fact that we're about to read the use of the definite article here seems to indicate that these particular seven angels are unique.

Some have called them presence angels.

The idea that these angels have the privilege, these seven angels have the privilege of being in the presence of the Lord all the time.

And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets.

Then another angel having a golden censor came and stood at the altar.

This reminds me of Solomon's temple.

He was given much incense.

Has anybody ever wondered around here like what that incense smells like?

Because I know Buddhist incense, having lived in Japan.

I've just always wondered, you know, what this is like.

Because I love incense.

I think incense are so cool.

And I know it sounds like I'm like weird and everything, but I like the incense they use at Buddhist temples.

I do.

Um I know it's weird, but I do.

I like incense.

And I don't have any incense, but all you essential oil people, everybody giving me incense now.

Um I'll receive it, you know.

I don't know where to light it, but I love it.

And the smoke of the incense, verse 4, with the prayers of the saints ascended before God from the angel's hand.

So, guys, we're there.

You that are saved, if you're not saved, you're not there.

But if you're saved, you know, we're there.

And this incense, they throw this incense upon this cauldron, this fire, I guess, it starts to burn it up, and then our prayers ascend to the Father with the incense.

Then the angel took the censor, filled it with fire from the altar, and threw it to the earth, and there were noises.

So here we go, we're picking it up again.

There were noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake.

So the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.

So silence, 30 minutes, and then this angel comes, these seven angels are there, they each get a trumpet.

Everybody's got probably a shofar, a ram's horn handed to them.

Then this incense is thrown forth, and then this fire is thrown toward the earth, and suddenly, like I guess an electrical storm.

Some kind of an electrical storm, thundering, and then an earthquake opens up now the beginning of the great tribulation.

This is the beginning of the great tribulation on the earth.

And here's what I think is happening is that the prayers of the saints right now are crying out for justice.

This is not a loving, compassionate, oh Lord, forgive them kind of prayer at the altar.

I believe this is a cry for justice.

How many of you have cried out for justice before?

How many of you have cried out?

You know what that person is doing is absolutely wrong.

And it's like, God, do something.

Some of you come out of families where it's like everywhere you've turned, you've seen prejudice and you've seen stuff said about you that's not right.

It's injust.

Where's God?

What's he doing?

Where is he?

That's the prayers, and it's now time for the judgment of God to come and the justice of God to come.

It's all been about love since the cross.

Now it's about justice.

And Jesus feels those prayers.

He's always hearing those prayers, and he's been tolerant and tolerant and tolerant, and now the tolerance and the grace of God has reached its limit.

And the incense, I believe, reminds him that it is time for equity on the earth.

And it breaks his heart.

And so the seal is opened.

With the seven trumpets, over the next few weeks, we will see something different than what we saw in chapter six.

We've all seen wars.

We see wars and rumors of wars in chapter six.

We've seen wars and rumors of wars in our lifetime, and we will see it increase even before Christ takes us out.

But we will see a one-world government, we will see a one-world dictator.

But something an eight-on is hugely different, and it becomes a supernatural judgment of God.

The first four trumpets are unleashed upon ecology, and the next three trumpets are gonna be sounded against humankind.

No human explanation.

We're gonna see two witnesses soon that come forth and suddenly show up in Jerusalem.

And I'll tell you what I believe is the identity of these two witnesses.

They will call fire down from heaven.

And those that are on the earth will see it on Fox News and CNN and uh MSNBC.

The whole world will see it, and we'll see it from the mezzanine called heaven.

And then the angel took the censer, verse 5, and he filled it with fire from the altar and threw it to the earth, and there were noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake.

Now here's the question: men and women, are we even now this year entering some kind of a new phase of the work of God that we're actually studying in Revelation right now?

We're gonna watch a short video which occurred on the Sabbath Shabbat, October 1st, 2016.

Before the beginning of Rosh Hashanah 2016.

Rosh Hashanah occurs on the first and second days of Tishri.

In Hebrew, Rosh Hashanah means literally head of the year or the first of the year.

It's the Jewish New Year.

That word's not used in the Bible, but it's called the Remembrance Day, and it was instituted in Leviticus 23.

Quote, a memorial of blowing of trumpets of a holy convocation.

The shofar is a ram's horn.

You've heard it here.

We've sounded that horn before here.

The short video you're about to watch occurred on the Sabbath Shabbat, October 1st, 2016, in Jerusalem.

And someone caught it on just their, it looks to me like an iPhone or something.

They caught this.

And as you watch this, you're going to hear trumpets sounding.

And the person is going to explain both from a scientific perspective what might be happening, but then she also leaves open, I don't, I don't know what's going on here.

And I don't know if this is a person who's a believer or not, but I want you to watch this because it's unbelievable that we're in this chapter, and then this has come to be noticed across the YouTube in recent weeks.

So let's watch it.

What you are seeing is an aerosol metallic particulate reaction to atmospheric sounds.

They're being trumpeted possibly by frequencies emitted by technological means.

TTAs, Tesla Techarase, located within a quarter of the Earth's mass away, as I have shared with you before.

It is definitely this type of reaction.

But where are the trumpet sounds coming from?

Are they merely emitted frequencies?

What if they are not?

What if you are seeing and hearing a sign from God?

Has he ordered the first trumpet to be blown?

Look at the clouds.

I mean, do you see how the clouds are?

I mean, it's just super weird, man.

It's like, yes! What is God saying to us?

There will always be an explanation.

There's always gonna be an explanation.

You guys know that?

There's always gonna be an explanation.

Scientists will always give us an explanation.

That's why we're in the book of Revelation, because we have God's briefing of the last days being handed to us.

And what we're gonna see in these latter days is people filming stuff, videotaping stuff.

There's movies out right now.

There was a movie three years ago that was dealing with ghosts and stuff and they're in the paranormal and what's going on with that.

And I just think God keeps saying, hello, smell the coffee.

I love you.

I'm alive.

I care about you.

I'm lining things up with what's here, with your reality.

But then there'll be a point where it's the end.

And there's now time for the judgment of God.

Verse 7.

The first angel sounded a trumpet blast.

That's what it's gonna say here.

A trumpet blast, and hail and fire followed, mingled with blood, and they were thrown to the earth, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up.

So first, the first trumpet hits the trees and the grass.

A third of all the trees and a third of all the green grass are burned up.

That's what I mean.

It's now getting supernatural.

In chapter six, with the with the what I call kind of the spiritual Braxton Hicks of the coming of the Lord, you could say that, oh, we've experienced some of these things before, but now it's getting supernatural, and I believe what we're seeing is what happened with Moses and Pharaoh, where God supernaturally rained hail upon the land of Egypt and destroyed, what does it say, every herb of the field and broke every branch of the trees except in the land of Goshen.

So Exodus 9, let me read it to you.

Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand toward the sky, so that hail will fall all over Egypt, on men and animals and on everything growing in the fields of Egypt.

When Moses stretched out his staff toward the sky, the Lord sent thunder and hail and lightnings flashed down to the ground.

So the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt.

Hail fell and lightning flashed back and forth.

It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.

Throughout Egypt, hail struck everything in the fields, both men and animals.

It beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree.

The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen, where the Israelites were.

And so a third, can you imagine, a third of the trees and a third of the grass is destroyed?

That means it's like the earth has become a moonscape.

That means we're now seeing dust storms.

We're seeing erosion across the earth.

Remember in the Persian Gulf in the first, the first Persian Gulf War, they talked about smart bombs.

Smart bombs.

Well, these will be smart hail.

These are gonna be smart hail.

This is gonna be this is gonna be smart lightning coming from heaven.

And it's like God is stepping back.

Remember, we talked about this in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, about the Lord stepping back and moving away from what is it called, the restrainer of the Holy Spirit.

2 Thessalonians 2 · chapter mention

So God steps back a third.

He doesn't fully step back, that's gonna come later.

He just steps back a third, and he begins to allow this judgment to come upon the earth.

Then the second angel sounded, and something like a great mountain burning with fire was thrown into the sea, and a third of the sea became blood.

Again, reminding us reminiscent of Moses with Pharaoh.

And a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.

So one asteroid, the size of one kilometer, if it hit the earth, scientists tell us, it would be more destructive than all-out nuclear war.

And would wobble actually the earth in its movement, and there would be 200-foot tidal waves all over the earth.

Did you know there's 1,800 meters per second that come into our atmosphere but are burned up?

1,800 per second come into our atmosphere and are burned up.

Now we can talk scientifically about all that's going on, but I'm telling you, the Lord protects the earth.

And God is gonna step back a third and start watching things happen.

How many of you have um used either a telescope or a pretty good binoculars just to look at the moon?

Because I don't have a telescope, so I always use binoculars, and so I'm looking at the moon from time to time.

And have you seen all the craters that you can even see with just a binoculars on the moon?

All the craters?

I mean, that just getting devastated all the time by asteroids and stuff in space.

Imagine just one of those.

By God releasing some of his protection over the earth, hitting the earth.

That's what's going on.

You know, when I think about that, I think about how many people are into saving the environment.

Now, I'm not against that completely because, man, I love the outdoors, and I know we've done a lot as human beings to devastate our trees and to devastate our landscape from time to time.

I mean, I hate that.

I have the scars upon the earth because of man's stupidity.

We've got plenty of that.

But the reality is this is what's devastating the earth is less about the ozone and more about sin.

Do you realize, men and women, if we saw a revival and awakening across the globe, we'd probably clean up the ozone.

I mean, really, the issue of the destruction of the earth is a sin issue.

And so, and so God is now moving.

He has given us as his most blessed creatures opportunity after opportunity to repent.

Some of you today need to repent.

You need to come to Christ.

And repentance comes from the Greek word metanoia.

It means to turn, 180.

Not a 360.

I've known some believers that said, metanoia, that means 360.

No, it doesn't, it means 180.

A third of the living creatures of the ocean now die.

That's gonna cut down 20 to 25 percent of the oxygen on the earth.

A third of all the ships, can you imagine a nuclear sub going down?

And the pollution that that's gonna create over hundreds of miles from just one nuclear sub.

Then the third angel sounded, and a great star fell from heaven, burning like a torch, and it fell on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water.

The name of the star is wormwood.

I don't know if you guys know that the name of Chernobyl is wormwood.

The name of the star is wormwood, and a third of the waters became wormwood.

It means bitter.

And many men died from the water because it was made bitter.

So not only do you have an oxygen issue beginning to happen, now you have a struggle for fresh water.

Two-thirds of the trees are left, dust storms, erosion, a third of the creatures of the ocean are dying, washing up on the shores.

Can you imagine the stench?

Oxygen is down by 25% across the globe.

Then the fourth angel sounded, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them were darkened.

A third of the day did not shine, and likewise the night.

So the whole world's becoming muggy, dark, stench filling the atmosphere.

And everything that we took for granted is being taken away.

Don't you take, we take that for granted, don't we?

That we have a moon, that we have a sun, and that we have uh that we have seasons of the year.

That's being pulled out.

It's gradually being taken out.

Reminds me of Jeremiah 31.

This is what the Lord says.

He who appoints the sun, did you know that God appoints the sun to shine by day, who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar.

The Lord Almighty is his name.

The Lord gives us the sun, the Lord gives us the moon, the Lord gives us the beauty of the stars, the Lord gives us the tides, the Lord gives us the ocean roar, it speaks of his glory, it speaks of his majesty, it speaks of worship.

Now we don't worship the sun, we don't worship the moon, we don't worship the stars, but the reasons why peoples throughout history have worshiped the sun and worship the stars and worship the moon is because it's so majestic and it's so beautiful and it speaks of a reflection of the glory of God with such majesty that people who don't know Christ have worshipped it.

It's gonna be taken away.

And I looked and I heard an angel flying through the midst of the heavens.

I like flying angels.

Seems like recently we've been having a lot of angels that are worshiping and stuff at the altar.

Now we get a flying one.

I don't know, something about angels flying around is really, really cool.

I mean, we all why for you that are a little older and you like this show, Touched by an Angel, they're never flying.

So this one's flying.

But this one carries a message of judgment.

And I looked and I heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven saying with a loud voice, woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth because of the remaining blast of the trumpet of the three angels who are about to sound.

So these first four are about ecology.

The next three will be judgments upon humankind.

In other words, these this angel is flying and saying, Whoa, woe, woe, you haven't seen anything yet.

If you think this is bad, watch out.

The love of God is incinerating the earth because of sin.

This angel is flying over the U.S., this angel is flying over Europe, this angel is flying over Argentina, this angel is flying over Brazil, this angel is flying over Russia, South America, Latin America, Asia.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

And God is gracious and God is warning you today, church.

If you're living in sin, if your heart knows that the place where you're living is in rebellion to God, He loves you.

And you're here this morning because it's another chance, another opportunity, another opportunity to become a whole-hearted disciple.

You know, I was a missionary for 10 years, my wife and I, and when we'd go raise support, we'd always hear, oh, what a tremendous sacrifice you guys are making.

I never, ever felt that one moment.

It was so much fun.

I love being a missionary and I love being a pastor.

And I I loved getting up to get the opportunity to be up here and teach God's word.

I love to see lives changed, and I love having no money sometimes.

Because God always shows up and he always provides.

Don't you want to be wholehearted?

It is so boring to have everything taken care of.

Some of you, I feel sorry for you.

And I said that one time to a guy who had a whole lot of money, and he was gonna hand me a whole lot of money.

And it got into a conversation, and he talked about basically how bored he was.

He had inherited his dad's company.

He lived in this really fancy area of Atlanta, and we had befriended the family, and he was, and he I could tell he was begrudgingly giving me$3,000.

I was like, Well, you didn't you didn't raise it all, did you?

And that's the first thing he said.

I went, no, I didn't.

I said, so it's an opportunity for you to be blessed by giving me the rest.

And he said, The dude was bored.

He had millions, and he could$3,562 or whatever it was, something like that.

It's like, ugh.

It's like, seriously, it was like the guy was giving me an heirloom that had been in the family since the 16th century or something, and it was 3,000 bucks.

Ooh.

For a millionaire.

And I remember walking out of there so sad that he was, that his life was so taken care of and he was so bored, and he was so lifeless.

And I got to do, I got to go to Japan and eat sushi and reach Japanese for Christ and not know where the next paycheck was gonna come from.

Being wholehearted, men and women, is where it's at.

And when you look at those players on the field, they love being athletes.

They're being wholehearted.

And when you and your company, if you're struggling, but you're wholehearted disciples of Jesus, he's gonna come through for you.

He will.

It's an exciting time.

You cry out to him, you call out to him.

If you're here and you're not whole-hearted, you're half-hearted, or you're compromising, get right with God.

It's a smart thing to do.

Get into the excitement, the adventure following him.

You've been listening to The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

We hope you have been blessed by today's message.

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Thanks again for tuning in today, and be sure to listen to the next edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.