seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
Revelation 8:1 When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.
2 And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them.
3 Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all God’s people, on the golden altar in front of the throne. 4 The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of God’s people, went up before God from the angel’s hand. 5 Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake.
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Here's the link to the commentary I read. I posted it all here for your convenience.
When He opened the seventh seal: The sealed scroll was introduced in Revelation 5, and the seals were opened one by one up to the sixth seal in Revelation 6. We waited for the last seal to be opened and the contents of the scroll to be revealed — but then were given a pause with Revelation 7, the revealing of the 144,000 and the great multitude out of the great tribulation. Now the idea of a pause between the sixth and the seventh seal is emphasized by this silence in heaven for about half an hour.
This silence is striking; some have seen it as “breathing space,” or, that the angels are silent so the prayers of the saints can be heard, perhaps even the cry of the martyrs of Revelation 6:9-11.
More likely, this silence in heaven demonstrates a sober, awestruck silence at the judgments to come, now that the seals are off and the scroll can be opened.
Silence in heaven for about half an hour: A half-hour silence is not long, but things seem long or short in their context. If a preacher were to stop his sermon and remain silent for ten minutes, it would seem like an eternity. Since heaven is a place of constant praise and worship to God (Revelation 4:8-11), silence for about half an hour is a long time.
The seven angels who stand before God: According to Jewish tradition, there are seven angels who stand in God’s presence. Apparently, based on this verse, that traditional idea was accurate.
And to them were given seven trumpets: In the Old Testament, trumpets sounded the alarm for war and threw the enemy into a panic, or they called an assembly of God’s people. These seven trumpets will sound as God’s battle-alarm during the great tribulation.
Then another angel: Some see this angel as Jesus, functioning as a mediator and because of Old Testament references to Jesus as “the Angel of the LORD.” Others say it could only be a mere angelic being because the specific ancient Greek word for another means “another of the same kind.”
A golden censer… the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God: Prayer and incense are often associated in the Bible. The idea is that just as incense is precious, pleasant, and drifts to heaven, so do our prayers. So here, before anything happens at the opening of the seventh seal, the prayers of God’s people come before the Lord God.
Significantly, the prayers of God’s people set in motion the coming consummation of history. “More potent, more powerful than all the dark and mighty powers let loose in the world, more powerful than anything else, is the power of prayer set ablaze by the fire of God and cast upon the earth.” (L. Morris quoting Torrance)
2 Peter 3:10-12 indicates that there is a sense in which we can hasten the Lord’s coming by our holy conduct and godly lives. But here we see that we can also hasten the Lord’s coming through prayer, even as Daniel asked for a speedy fulfillment of prophecy regarding captive Israel (Daniel 9), we can and should also pray Even so, come, Lord Jesus! (Revelation 22:20)
“It is not said that the angel presents these prayers. He presents the incense, and the prayers ascend with it. The ascending of the incense shows that the prayers and offering were accepted.” (Clarke)
Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and threw it to the earth: As God’s people pray for the resolution of all things, their prayers were touched by the fire from the altar in heaven, and then “thrown” back down to earth. All things will not be resolved on this earth until judgment comes, and when the prayers of God’s people “come back” to earth, they bring the groundswell of judgment (noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake).
So the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound: We waited for the seven seals to be opened and saw them loosed one by one. But when the seventh seal was finally loosed, the end did not immediately come. It set in motion seven trumpets that would sound upon the earth.
In considering how the seals and the trumpets relate to each other, some believe they are poetic and repetitive, and John describes the same events with different words and details in both the seal and trumpet judgments. “This is typical of John’s method. He goes over the ground again and again, each time teaching us something new. There is more to the End than we can readily take in. Every series of visions brings out new facets of it.” (L. Morris)
In considering how the seals and the trumpets relate to each other, some believe they are sequential, and that the seventh seal contains the seven trumpets, and the seventh trumpet contains the seven bowls of judgment. Yet there are problems with a sequential approach. For example, are the people of Revelation 6:15-17 mistaken about Jesus’ return? They don’t seem to be. But if the trumpets simply follow in sequence to the seals, then it is a striking display of God’s mercy in stretching out the end and allowing repentance.
Since John brings a report from eternity, it is difficult to assign a chronological and sequential element to these judgments. It is most important to emphasize that they are real, even if their sequence is hard to pin down with certainty.
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John was stuck out on a rock island. When I typed that this morning, I thought of Alcatraz. He was doing hard labor, busting rocks on a solid rock island. He had a vision of Heaven.
We've been reading along as John has described the scene and the events. Jesus has just popped the Seventh Seal. The document is ready to read. The Battle Plan is now ready to take to the field.
When that Seventh Seal popped, everything became silent in Heaven.
Was this because everyone on earth, who was going to beg for forgiveness, had already expired or was this silence because there were no more prayers to be heard?
Was Heaven silent to make sure they didn't miss the tiniest of voices that could be heard?
Was Heaven silent so Jesus could listen for one last Confession of Faith?
At that point another angel... moved to the Altar in Heaven. He had in his hand one of those golden sensors we see the priests in the Catholic Masses swing back and forth.
When the time had passed to get right with God.... The angels got back to work.
The angel filled the sensor with fire. Fire, not incense.... That's important. The prayers went up to Heaven. Everyone who was going to be saved has already confessed Jesus as the Messiah, their personal Savior. No one else was going to be saved in this go round.
In the Old Testament, the horn was used to call the Israelites into worship as well as battle.
As Jesus popped the last seal, the trumpeters with their horns were ready to sound the battle cry! All Seven Seals had been removed; the plan was afoot!
There is a Mesquite Tree right across the street from my apartment. The landscapers have turned off the irrigation water because of a malfunction and the tree has suffered significantly. But before that happened, the birds in the area used that tree as shelter in the storms. Hundreds of birds would fill the long branches of this beautiful tree. And then... right before the storm was about to hit.... all those birds would go silent.
That angel in verse 5 is about to rain fire down on the humans on earth. Heaven is silent. So many lives are going to be ended! They won't have a chance of saving themselves. If they don't cry out now, they are lost forever.... stupid stubborn humans!!!!
So, for the Lost, there is a moment. It's that last moment before the fireball is hurled to earth! There was a half hour of Silence... and at the end of that half hour, there was that last moment, that last second, for all the stupid stubborn humans on earth to make it right.
A moment of Silence!
