"The Seventh Seal" Series

“The Seventh Seal”

November 29, 2009

1When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.

2And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets.

3Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar before the throne. 4The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of the saints, went up before God from the angel’s hand. 5Then 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.

6Then the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to sound them.

7The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down upon the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up.

8The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.

10The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— 11the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter.

12The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, 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 turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night.

13As I watched, I heard an eagle that was flying in midair call out in a loud voice: "Woe! Woe! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the other three angels!"

In our study of Jesus’ Revelation of the end times to the apostle John, we started with Jesus’ letters to the churches. Jesus begins this look into the end times by asking the churches to look at themselves. Judgment begins with the House of God. I think it is important for every church and every Christian to take time periodically to examine themself; to have times of introspection. It is easy to get off track and out of focus. The Bibles says,

“Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves.”

(2 Corinthians 13:5)

One of the seven churches we looked at represents us – and each individual church there is. We are represented by one of these churches. In fact, a church may progress from being in one category to another – depending on if they grow or if they fall further into decline. It might be an interesting study to see which church represents us – here in Mount Shasta.

After studying the churches, we saw, through John, a door standing open in heaven, (4:1) and we caught a glimpse of the throne room, surrounded by 24 elders and a multitude of angels. We then saw Jesus, who sat on the throne, had a scroll in his right hand and it was sealed with seven seals. Jesus was the only one worthy to open the seals, and He did. With the first seal came a rider on a white horse bent on conquest. With the second seal came a rider on a red horse with power to take peace from the earth. The third seal revealed a rider on a black horse holding a pair of scales, ushering in a great famine. The fourth seal had a horse that was a sickly pale with a rider named death. Hades followed close behind and this rider had the power to kill a fourth of the earth by sword, famine, plague and wild beast. The world population right now is about 6.8 billion. That means almost a 175 million people will die at this time. The United States has about 300 million people in it. Europe has about 700 million and China over a billion people – or over 100 million. A billion seconds ago it was 1959. b. A billion minutes ago Jesus walked the earth. That a lot of people.

The fifth seal revealed those who had been killed because of the Word of God and their testimony. The sixth seal ushered a great earthquake. The sun turned black, the moon turned red, stars fell to the earth, the sky receded like a scroll rolling up and ever mountain and island was removed from its place.