Revelation 8:2
r08b
"And when he had opened the
seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given
seven trumpets. And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a
golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should
offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was
before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers
of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. And the
angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it
into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings,
and an earthquake. And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared
themselves to sound." (Rev. 8:1-6).
This is followed, in the
text, by the sounding of the trumpets. "The first angel sounded, and there
followed hail and fire mingled with blood. . . ." (Rev. 8:7).
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In seeking to understand verses
1 to 5, two problems present themselves: 1) From the seventh seal in verse
1, we move into angels being given trumpets. There is only a brief transition,
"I saw," and no apparent connection. 2) The throwing down of the fire seems
out of place here. It occurs, in the text, before the blowing of the trumpets
whereas it would seem more appropriate for it to follow them as the pouring
out of God's wrath, the end to which they warn.
Looking at three structural patterns often used in the book of Revelation
will help us understand.
In one structure, a new general topic is developed from the conclusion
or a final element of the preceding one. 0401a.
Thus we may expect the trumpet calls of the next four chapters to develop
from the silence in heaven. This feature is not as strong in this case
as in others, but there is a relationship, as we will see.
A more significant structure is similar to the first one. In it a topic
is introduced by a brief view of a situation, then developed by an expanded
view which generally provides more and different information 0100i&e.
1303b.
Verses 1 to 5 here form an introductory block setting the stage for the
trumpet calls.
A third structure is the chiasm
0100ch.
This introduction is in the chiastic pattern, confirming that it is a unit.
There are five blocks of text. The first and fifth each have two lines.
Matching blocks are shown by their degree of indentation.
8:2b
Silence and noise
"And when he had opened the
seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given
seven trumpets. And another angel came. . . . And the angel took the censer,
and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there
were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake. And the
seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound."
(Rev. 8:1-6).
We have discussed the meaning of silence in heaven (See
on verse 1). It is the time of Jacob's trouble when the righteous long
for the assurance that all is well with their souls. It is the final work
of their sealing. (The lightning photo is from Carney, Kansas
and is copyrighted by the photographer.)
Just as silence comes
at the end of the seals, we find noise at the end of the trumpet call:.
"And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven,
saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord,
and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever. . . . And the
temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple, the
ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings,
and an earthquake, and great hail." (Rev 11:15, 19). The noise and lightning
from the censer fire here in chapter 8 is thus a prediction of what is
coming at the time of the last trumpet. It shows the importance of the
trumpet calls which we will shortly read about.
When we get to chapter
11 we will have opportunity to look closely at the call of the seventh
trumpet. Here we notice that the ark of the "testament" was seen. The testament
is the ten commandments written on tables of stone. It is significant thought
that, when Christ takes over the kingdom at the end of time, the testament
will not only be still important. It will be as God wrote it, and will
provide a standard for condemning the wicked.
Before God spoke the commandments,
the trumpet sounded at Sinai. "And it came to pass on the third day in
the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud
upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; so that all
the people that was in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people
out of the camp to meet with God; and they stood at the nether part of
the mount [the part below it]. And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke,
because the LORD descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended
as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly." (Ex. 19:16-18).
8:2c
The angel with
an incense burner
Here again is the introductory chiasm. Let's notice the inner three blocks.
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I have shown the second and fourth blocks in two lines each. Here is the first pair.
Angel with censer goes to altar, and (3a)
is given much incense (3b)
This is Christ's special
work for the righteous shortly before they experience the time of silence.
He began as our intercessor after His sacrifice on Calvary (which is represented
by the altar of burnt offering in the courtyard (the earth). Only recently,
near the end of time, has He entered the second phase of ministry in the
most holy place seen here as the time of "much incense." In the symbolism
of the sanctuary, each time the congregation sinned and realized it and
repented, a bull (representing Christ) was slain. Blood from it was taken
into the holy place and sprinkled at the altar of incense (or the golden
altar). This altar was a link to the ark which was concealed behind the
veil, in the most holy place le0413ff.
On the day of atonement,
a special offering was made and incense was burned. This is what we see
here in chapter 8. Note the description in the book of Leviticus:
"And he shall take a censer
full of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the LORD, and his
hands full of sweet incense beaten small, and bring it within the veil:
And he shall put the incense upon the fire before the LORD, that the cloud
of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is upon the testimony, that
he die not:" (Lev. 16:12, 13)
8:2d
Seven angels
before God
^ And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets. (Rev. 8:2)
In part, the trumpet calls are introduced by the breaking of the seventh
seal. The sealed scroll had been received from the One on the throne. "And
out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices: and
there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the
seven Spirits of God. And before the throne there was a sea of glass like
unto crystal. . . ." (Rev. 4:5, 6).
We identified the seven spirits
as the Holy Spirit 0405b.
What do we know about the angels associated with them?
The first and last parts
of our chiasm are double blocks, as you can see: 
silence, trumpet angels, then
noise, trumpet angels. Do the angels somehow receive trumpets as a result
of the silence? No, but likely in preparation for it. As I see it, those
who receive the latter rain de1114,
jl0223
are sealed
before others. They then spread the light of the powerful angel of 18:1,
witnessing to those who have not had opportunity to hear the full message
of salvation. See
table.
We can view the angels here
as messengers (the same word in Greek, aggelos). We saw each angel
of the seven churches as the group of God's faithful people the particular
church epoch 0120.
We may likewise see the seven trumpet angels as groups of faithful humans
who communicate truth relevant for their time. In chapter 14, the three
angels are, in the same way, messengers of light. The giving of trumpets
in our verse is apparently drawn from the story of Gideon.
"And he divided the three
hundred men into three companies, and he put a trumpet in every man's hand,
with empty pitchers, and lamps within the pitchers. . . . And the three
hundred blew the trumpets, and the LORD set every man's sword against his
fellow, even throughout all the host: and the host fled. . . . (Judges
7:16, 22).
As you remember, the Lord
had tested the army and these 300 out of 10,000 men had shown their commitment
by how they drank water from the brook. (verses
4, 5). For the end-time trumpet soundings, we see that the faithful
ones who sound their trumpets will communicate light like the 300 who uncovered
their torches.
8:2e
The trumpets,
significance and relation to the plagues
^ And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets. (Rev. 8:2)
One cannot avoid noticing
that the trumpets are described very much like the plagues. In 15:7 we
read, "And one of the four beasts [living ones] gave unto the seven angels
seven golden vials full of the wrath of God. . . . " Are these simply two
accounts showing the same set of events, perhaps from a different viewpoint?
At the risk of oversimplification, we will sketch the identifies of the
two series.
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8:7 Hail, blood ... burning | 16:2 on earth sores for beast & image worshippers |
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8 Burning mountain into sea - as blood | 3 sea as blood, death |
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10 Star falls - water poisoned | 4 rivers as blood |
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12 Sun, moon, stars darkened | 8 sun fire, heat |
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9:1 Locusts for 5 mo. | 10 seat of beast darkness, pain |
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13 Four angels released | 12 river Euphrates dried up for kings |
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11:15 God takes power | 17 voice from heaven It is finished |
The trumpet calls are significantly
different from the plagues in a way not shown in the chart. They result
in curses on "a third" of the involved trees, sea, waters, and so on. No
such limitations are mentioned for the plagues.
Read the following
passages about trumpets to look for principles.
". . . When I bring the sword
upon a land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts, and
set him for their watchman: If when he seeth the sword come upon the land,
he blow the trumpet, and warn the people; Then whosoever heareth the sound
of the trumpet, and taketh not warning; if the sword come, and take him
away, his blood shall be upon his own head." (Ezek. 33:2-4).
"Blow ye the trumpet in Zion,
and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the
land tremble: for the day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand. .
. . Therefore also now, saith the LORD, turn ye even to me with all your
heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning. . . . Blow
the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: Gather the
people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children,
and those that suck the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber,
and the bride out of her closet." (Joel 2:1, 12, 15, 16).
One more source for
symbolism is the conquest of Jericho which we will look at soon.
Trumpets were also used for some other occasions, but these passages are significant to the trumpets in Revelation. They were to warn the people of danger and, in Joel, they warn about the day of the Lord.
The big picture
I understand the trumpet
calls to be warnings about the devastation of seven last plagues, which
Joel calls "the day of the Lord." I also believe them to picture apostasy
through the New Testament era to our day and beyond, although this has
yet to be demonstrated.
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