Some time ago, I came across a prayer from an unknown author that I’ve learned to appreciate more and more the longer I live. It goes like this:
Dear God,
So far today,
I've done all right.
I haven't gossiped.
I haven't lost my temper.
I haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish or over indulgent.
I'm very thankful for that.
But in a few minutes, God, I'm going to get out of bed;
And from then on, I'm going to need a lot more help. Amen. (Bill White, Paramount, California; www.PreachingToday.com)
If you’re like me, you’ve learned that you need a lot of help in life, so prayer becomes very important. But do you ever wonder if your prayers really make any difference beyond just helping you feel good. Do you ever wonder if God truly acts in answer to prayer, especially since He, as the Sovereign Lord of the Universe, has everything already planning out?
Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Revelation 8, Revelation 8, where we see the difference our prayers DO make in God’s sovereign plan.
Revelation 8:1 When the Lamb opened the seventh seal [Jesus is still opening the 7-sealed scroll given to him in chapter 5]… When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.
When we saw Jesus break the other six seals in chapter 6, there was increasing calamity with each one. Now, with the opening of the 7th seal, there is silence. Or as one commentator suggested, “It’s like the hush in a courtroom right before the jury foreman announces the verdict” (Walvoord). You know something big is going to happen, and it almost takes your breath away.
Revelation 8:2 Then I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. (ESV)
The 7th seal encompasses the 7 trumpet judgments of the Tribulation. But before the angels play their trumpets heralding judgment, something else takes place, something that is quite remarkable in light of God’s sovereign plan.
Revelation 8:3-4 And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, 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. (ESV)
Before the angels play their trumpets of judgment, the saints pray. The prayers of God’s people drift up to God’s throne like a fragrant incense. My friends, when we pray, it creates a pleasing aroma to God, so…
PRAY.
Come to Him often with your requests, because our prayers are precious to the Lord. They are very special to Him. He enjoys them like the fragrant aroma of a special perfume. And our prayers are powerful for him, as well. He uses our prayers to accomplish His will on earth. Our prayers really do make a difference.
Revelation 8:5 Then the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there were peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake. (ESV)
Our prayers, when they’re mixed with the fires of heaven, have real power here on earth. They really do accomplish great and marvelous things.
In Revelation 6:10, the martyred believers cried out, “O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth.” They asked God for justice. They asked God to judge the wickedness of this world, and God is doing just that right here in answer to their prayers.
He uses their prayers to send thunder, lightening and an earthquake to this earth, and they prepare the way for the seven angels to sound the trumpet calls of judgment. Our prayers have real power on earth!
Dr. E. V. Hill, who pastored Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles for years, tells the story of how “Mama's” love and prayers changed his life. During the height of the Depression, Hill's real mother, who had five children of her own, didn't have enough food to go around. So she sent four-year-old Ed to live with a friend in a small country town called Sweet Home. Ed just called this friend, “Mama.”
As he was growing up in Sweet Home, Mama displayed remarkable faith which led her to have big plans for young Ed. Against nearly insurmountable obstacles, Mama helped Ed graduate from high school (the only student to graduate that year from the country school) and even insisted that he go to college.
She took Ed to the bus station, handed him the ticket and five dollars and said, “Now, go off to Prairie View College, and Mama is going to be praying for you.” Hill claims that he didn't know much about prayer, but he knew Mama did. When he arrived at the college with a dollar and ninety cents in his pocket, they told him he needed eighty dollars in cash in order to register. Here's how Hill describes what happened next:
“I got in line… and the devil said to get out of line… but I heard my Mama saying in my ear, ‘I'll be praying for you.’ I stood in line on Mama's prayer. Soon there was [another new student ahead of me], and I began to get nervous, but I stayed in line… Just about the time [the other student] got all of her stuff and turned away, Dr. Drew touched me on the shoulder, and he said, ‘Are you Ed Hill?’
“I said, ‘Yes.’
“‘Are you Ed Hill from Sweet Home?’
“‘Yes.’
“‘Have you paid yet?’
“‘Not quite.’
“‘We’ve been looking for you all this morning,’” [Dr. Drew said].
And E.V. Hill asked, “Well, what do [you] want with me?”
Dr. Drew replied, “We have a four-year scholarship that will pay your room and board, your tuition, and give you thirty dollars a month to spend.”
And E.V. Hill remembered Mama saying, “I will be praying for you!” (Martha Simmons & Frank A. Thomas, editors, Preaching with Sacred Fire, W. W. Norton & Company, 2010, pp. 707-708; www.PreachingToday.com)
Mama’s prayers were powerful! Sure, God had planned for E.V. Hill to go to college, but God used Mama’s prayers to accomplish His plan.
And God will use your prayers, as well. He will use your prayers to accomplish His sovereign will. You see, your prayers really do make a difference! God uses them to change lives. God uses them to affect nations. God uses them to change the course of world events just like He will do for the tribulation saints in the future.
So if you really want to make a difference in this world, then pray. Get on your knees before God and ask Him to accomplish His will. Like Jesus taught us to pray, say to Your Heavenly Father, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
When the course of your own life needs to be altered, when you see our nation headed in the wrong direction, or when the whole world seems to be on fire, commit these things to God in prayer. Ask God to intervene, and He will! He’ll use your prayers to accomplish His will. For when God’s people pray…
THE ANGELS PLAY.
The heavenly messengers sound their trumpets, and God dispatches them to carry out his plan.
Revelation 8:6-7 Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to blow them. The first angel blew his trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mixed with blood, and these were thrown upon the earth. And a third of the earth was burned up, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up. (ESV)
The first angel sounds his trumpet, and there is a horrendous hail-storm. Lightning strikes, hail falls, and it is so great, there is blood-shed as the hail strikes both people and animals.
When God sent the plagues on Egypt in Moses’ time, the 7th plague was a horrendous hail storm. Exodus 9 says, “Then Moses stretched out his staff toward heaven, and the LORD sent thunder and hail, and fire ran down to the earth. And the LORD rained hail upon the land of Egypt. There was hail and fire flashing continually in the midst of the hail, very heavy hail, such as had never been in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation. The hail struck down everything that was in the field in all the land of Egypt, both man and beast. And the hail struck down every plant of the field and broke every tree of the field” (Exodus 9:23-25).
That was pretty bad in Moses’ day, but it is going to be even worse when it happens again during the Tribulation. A third of the earth will be burned up. A third of the trees will be destroyed, and all of the grass will be scorched as well. We’re talking about hail storms unlike anything we’ve ever seen before, creating wildfires all over the world!
Today, there are a lot of politicians and scientists concerned about global warming. So there have been several “global climate modifications programs” implemented around the world.
According to Geo Engineering Watch, “Artificial/chemical ice nucleation is now constantly used in the covert weather modification programs. The use of these materials cools down the clouds and thus the air mass below the clouds. But what happens when these unnatural elements cause ice formation at far above usual temperatures and in far greater concentrations?
Much more frequent hail storms and exceptionally large hail stones are the expected result. According to ABC News, “Insurance claims from hail-storm damage increased 84 percent in 2012 from their 2010 level” (http://abcnews.go.com/Business/ damage-hail-increases-84-percent/story?id=19681676). And those levels are still rising. In addition, there were ice boulders on the Great Lakes never before seen until the last few years. (www.geoengineeringwatch.org/climate-engineering-fuels-devastating-hail-storms/)
It is no longer hard to believe that storms of the magnitude talked about here in Revelation are just around the corner. The first angel sounds his trumpet, and there is a devastating hail storm.
Then the second angel sounds his trumpet, and there is a huge volcanic eruption.
Revelation 8:8-9 The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain, burning with fire, was thrown into the sea, and a third of the sea became blood. A third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. (ESV)
There will be dead fish floating in all the harbors around the world and dead sailors, as well, from all the downed ships.
On December 26, 2004, we had a taste of what this might look like when an earthquake off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia triggered a series of devastating tsunamis in South East Asia. This Asian Tsunami, with waves up to 100 feet, ended up killing more than 230,000 people. The furthest recorded death occurred at Port Elizabeth in South Africa, 5,000 miles away from the epicenter.
The earthquake itself was the second largest ever recorded, measuring between 9.1 and 9.3 on the Richter scale. It triggered earthquakes in other locations as far away as Alaska, and it was so powerful that it caused the entire planet to vibrate at least half an inch, or over a centimeter. (Wikipedia, “2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_ earthquake)
And this is just a prelude to what’s coming when the second angel sounds his trumpet during the Great Tribulation. There will be a huge seismic eruption, killing a third of all sea creatures, downing a third of all ships, and turning a third of the sea red with the blood of all the dead.
When the saints pray, the angels play their trumpets of judgment. The 1st angel sounds his trumpet, and there is a great hail storm. The 2nd angel sounds his trumpet, and there is a great volcanic eruption.
Then the third angel sounds his trumpet, and a great comet falls to the earth.
Revelation 8:10-11 The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, blazing 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. A third of the waters became wormwood, and many people died from the water, because it had been made bitter. (ESV)
This blazing star will turn a third of all the drinking water bitter. That is, it will make it unsafe to drink, killing millions of people around the world. Again, this is not as farfetched as we once thought.
On July 16, 1994, a massive chunk of rock and ice crashed into the planet Jupiter. It was clocked at 134,000 mph before it hit, and when it did, the impact produced a brilliant fireball 1,000 miles high and 4,000 miles wide. It was the first of 20 chunks of the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet which hit Jupiter in July 1994.
Fragment G was one of the comet’s biggest chunks. It produced a fireball 12 to 16 hundred miles high and 5,000 miles wide. Its impact had the force of 6 million tons of TNT – 100,000 times the power of the largest nuclear bomb ever exploded on earth. One astronomer said, “It was like God striking the planet.”
In the fireball itself, astronomers reported seeing some “strange chemicals,” which could have come out of Jupiter’s interior or from the comet itself. (US News & World Report, August 1, 1994, pp.54-61)
Now, scientists predict that just such a comet could strike the earth at any time. The comet that hit Jupiter was not discovered until a little more than a year before it hit. Who’s to say there is not another comet lurking in the shadows of space awaiting the third angel to sound his trumpet?
In fact, just a little over two years ago (February 15, 2013), a meteor streaked through the sky and exploded over Russia’s Ural Mountains with the power of 300,000 tons of TNT – essentially that of an atomic bomb. Its sonic blasts shattered countless windows and injured around 1,000 people.
Margaret Campbell-Brown, an astronomer at the University of Western Ontario, said that it was the largest impact on Earth since 1908. According to Sky & Telescope magazine’s Senior Contributing Editor, Kelly Beatty, “The meteorite may have been as large as 50 feet across and 7,000 tons when it came into the atmosphere.”
It broke up 18-32 miles over the Chelyabinsk region, causing windows to shatter and leaving a crater about 20 feet across. Beatty commented, “We’re lucky that it didn’t hit a little bit lower down or over a truly populated area because the damage could have been much more substantial.” (WBUR: Here and Now, “Top Scientist: Russia Meteor Biggest Impact in a Century”, February 15, 2013, http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2013/02/15/meteor-explosion-russia)
Not too long ago, people laughed when Bible preachers warned them about the judgments described here in Revelation 8. Now, most people see them as very real, distinct possibilities.
God will indeed “strike the planet” just as He said He would. When the 1st angel sounds his trumpet, there will be a great hail storm. When the 2nd angel sounds his trumpet, there will be a great volcanic eruption. When the 3rd angel sounds his trumpet, there will be a great comet.
And when the fourth angel sounds his trumpet, there is great darkness.
Revelation 8:12 The fourth angel blew his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, and a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of their light might be darkened, and a third of the day might be kept from shining, and likewise a third of the night. (ESV)
Again, this is not too hard to see. A great comet hitting the earth will not only blast a crater and spawn tidal waves. Scientists say, “It will cloud the atmosphere with sun-blocking dust” (US News & World Report, August 1, 1994, p.61). The skies will indeed be darkened!
That’s the power of prayer, my friends. When believers pray during the tribulation, the angels play their trumpets of judgment. In answer to prayer, God sends a great hail storm, a great volcanic eruption, a great comet, and great darkness to the earth.
And these are only so-called “natural disasters.” There are some “super-natural disasters” coming when the next three angels sound their trumpets.
Revelation 8:13 Then I looked, and I heard an eagle crying with a loud voice as it flew directly overhead, “Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth, at the blasts of the other trumpets that the three angels are about to blow!” (ESV)
Our prayers are powerful, my friends, to affect the world! So keep on praying, because your prayers really do matter.
The International Justice Mission (a.k.a. IJM) is a Christian organization that works to rescue victims of slavery and sexual exploitation. Well, in April, 2011, they heard some incredible news. In a village near Chennai, India, a local government official, S. Kandaswamy, summoned the courage to rescue the captives in his own community. He organized a raid against a brick kiln where 143 families, a total of 522 people, had been kept as slaves. Police under his direction freed the laborers, commandeered a local high school to provide them with health care, and arrested the owner of the brick kiln. On that day, hundreds of men, women, and children were set free.
Now, just a few weeks before the raid, one thousand staff and friends of IJM gathered in a Washington, D.C., hotel ballroom for a weekend of prayer. They spent an agonizing, energizing night praying specifically for the end of bonded labor in the countries where it persists – countries like India. It seemed like an audacious and impossible thing to pray for – and it was, because to pray for the end of bonded labor is to pray for nothing less than an institutional revolution. And yet everyone in the room dared to ask God that bonded labor be eradicated. The Spirit came with extraordinary power, moving them to pray for something none of them could possibly bring about with their own resources or power.
Is it only a coincidence that four weeks later a local official, who had not acted with courage before, dared to set free 522 slaves? (Andy Crouch, Playing God, InterVarsity Press, 2013, pp. 208-209; www.PreachingToday.com)
I don’t think so. You see, God really does work in answer to prayer. So don’t stop praying until He comes through. As Jim Elliot put it so many years ago, “God is still on His throne and man is still on his footstool. [But] there’s only a knee’s distance in between.”
