THE SEVEN TRUMPETS
Lesson 14
Part 1 of 2
Review
Our previous study
focused on the seven seals.
Because the seals are chronological
in nature, it is critically important
that we establish when the seals
begin to open if we are to identify
their relationship to time. In
our last lesson, we saw how Daniel
and Revelation harmoniously combine
and bring us to the conclusion that
1844 is the year that Jesus received
the book sealed with seven seals. The
harmony of the sum of prophetic parts
brings encouragement and
enlightenment to students of
prophecy! Even more, we shall see in
this lesson that Revelation’s
sequences internally harmonize with
1844.
The issue of the
worthiness of Jesus as our High
Priest also brings us to 1844.
Remember, in the Old Testament, the
High Priest had to be found worthy
and his sacrifice accepted before he
could officiate on behalf of
Israel! Leviticus 16
The previous lesson
also suggested that three seals were
open within a short period following
1844. As the drama requires a
stage, the first three seals prepare
the earth for the next three
seals. In addition, there is
historical evidence supporting the
interpretation given to the first
three seals. The cumulative
influence of the first three seals
has been steadily growing. We
will discover in this lesson just how
well the senior angels of the first
three seals have been at their work!
The fourth seal
Carefully review the
fourth seal: “When the Lamb
opened the fourth seal, I heard the
voice of the fourth living creature
say, ‘Come!’ I
looked, and there before me was a
pale horse! Its rider was named
Death, and Hades was following close
behind him. They were given
power over a fourth of the earth to
kill by sword, famine and plague, and
by the wild beasts of the
earth.” Revelation 6:7,8
The strongest internal
evidence that the fourth seal is the
next to be opened is that the
devastation described in this seal
has not yet occurred. The fourth seal
indicates that 25% of the earth will
be destroyed by these four dreadful
judgments. Why will Jesus open
the fourth seal and send these four
terrible judgments throughout the
earth?
An angry God
There is much
confusion about the character of God
in the world today. By
misrepresenting the character of God,
the devil has lead many to either
hate or ignore God. Even worse,
the devil has lead most of the
Protestant world to regard Jesus much
like a heavenly Santa Clause. By
over-emphasizing the great compassion
and mercy of Jesus, and diminishing
the legitimacy of God’s
commandments, many are ignorant of
the teachings of Jesus that require
obedience. As the bumper sticker
says, “Jesus is either Lord over
all or He’s not Lord at
all!”
Think about your own
character for a moment. Have
you ever had someone misrepresent you
before people that didn’t know
you? Even worse, has someone
spread lies about you among those who
knew you? How hard is it to
overcome slanderous falsehoods.
The Bible declares
that God is love. Divine love
is the balance between justice and
mercy. Jesus is all-merciful,
and yet, He requires justice.
He wants people to live as He
lives. The prophet Micah wrote,
“He has showed you, O man, what
is good. And what does the Lord
require of you? To act justly
and to love mercy and to walk humbly
with your God.” Micah 6:8
The Bible tells us
that Jesus is very capable of anger,
and in times past, his wrath has
broken out upon individuals, cities,
nations, and even the world!
Review these four stories in your
Bible that demonstrates the wrath of
Jesus:
- Individuals:
Korah, Dathan and Abiram
(Numbers 16)
- Cities: Sodom
and Gomorrah (Genesis 19)
- Nations: The
Philistines (Joshua
5:13-6:27)
- Earth:
The flood (Genesis 6,7)
Each of these stories
brings out a very important
truth. Jesus rises up in anger
and wrath when His mercy and patience
no longer has a redeeming effect.
The truth hurts
Satan is delighted
when people believe that salvation
comes by assumption. Many
popular preachers and evangelists
preach “Christ without the
cross” and consequently become
popular. They excite multitudes
with stories of powerful
miracles. They proclaim
ecstatic messages about the power of
Jesus and talk extensively about
healing from sickness. But few
clearly define sin and say that we
can and must obtain victory over
it. People don’t like to
have their sins pointed out!
Think about it. If Jesus were
alive were alive upon the earth
today, His teachings would be meet
with the same rejection as when He
walked upon the earth. When it comes
to sin, the truth hurts today just
like it hurt when He walked upon the
earth.
The problem is that we
human beings have a hard time seeing
our own faults. Without a clear
definition of sin we can’t
appreciate or understand the
malignancy of sin. By watering down
the high standard of righteousness,
Satan has led this nation (and all
the others) into greater sin.
Consequently, problems without
solutions escalate.
We cannot appreciate
the salvation of Jesus without an
understanding of the offensiveness
and power of sin. Until we
comprehend some of the magnitude of
sin, we cannot appreciate the meaning
of “being saved.” Until we
admit our helplessness to overcome
sin, we cannot appreciate the
transforming power of Jesus nor can
we realize our desperate need for His
great love. Satan has cleverly
worked through the large religious
systems of the world to disguise
sin. In general, people
don’t understand what sin is,
nor do they know how to obtain
victory over it! But the
everlasting gospel has the
answer! This is another reason
why the gospel must go to the
world. It must expose the
religious systems of the world for
what they are!
The devil has
encompassed the 7 great religious
systems in the world so that they
serve his purposes. In very general
terms, the premise of each system is:
1.
Atheism: This system
teaches there is no God. Man is
supreme.
2.
Heathenism: This system
is ignorant of the living God and
creates its own god(s) as needed.
3.
Eastern Mysticism: This
system teaches that man is immortal
and can become God.
4.
Judaism: This system
teaches that man is saved by
obedience to the laws of God.
5.
Islam: This system
teaches that man is saved through
obedience to the teachings of
Mohammed.
6.
Catholicism: This system
teaches that man is saved through
obedience to the teachings of the
church.
7.
Protestantism: This
system teaches that believing that he
is saved saves man.
As you look at these
seven systems, you’ll notice
they neatly fit into one of three
categories:
- There is no
salvation, for there is no
God.
- Man saves
himself through obedience.
- Assuming he is
saved - saves man.
The world’s 7
religious systems are built on false
assumptions. (This is not
saying that God does not have sincere
people within each system. God
claims those living up to all they
know to be right as his
children. (Review lessons 5 and
6.) But falsehoods, once assumed or
accepted, lead people away from
God’s truth and ultimately,
people do terrible things in the name
of God. Jesus warned his
disciples, “They will put you
out of the synagogue; in fact, a time
is coming when anyone who kills you
will think he is offering a service
to God. They will do such
things because they have not know the
Father or me.” John 16:2,3
Back to the fourth
seal
Jesus has prepared a
final test for the world to find out
who loves Him and His truth.
The test is carefully made to test
our love for principles of
righteousness. It will not be
enough to be sincere and dedicated
when the test is applied. Hitler
was sincere and dedicated to his
terrible ideas and the world suffered
at his hands. Sincerity is not
the most important element in life.
The most important point is
Truth. Who loves and seeks for
more of God’s Truth? Who
lives up to all the truth he
knows? Who loves the truth of
God so much that he would be willing
to suffer or die for its sake?
John saw the saints
struggling to defend truth at the end
of the world. He say, “The
dragon was enraged at the women and
went off to make war against the rest
of her offspring – those who
obey God’s commandments and hold
to the testimony of Jesus.”
Revelation 12:17 As he watched, John
saw the martyrdom of the saints that
occurs during the fifth seal and John
was told, “This calls for
patient endurance on the part of the
saints who obey God’s
commandments and remain faithful to
Jesus.” Revelation 14:12
In 1844, Jesus began
judging the dead. Their deeds
and actions are recorded in the books
of record. But how does Jesus
judge the living? Their lives
are still being lived out. They
continue to make choices.
Because the world is so diverse with
languages, cultures and religious
beliefs, God designed the judgment of
the living in such a way that the
living wills choose their own eternal
destiny. As each person makes
his decision about the gospel, Jesus
eternally seals him or her in
it! Here’s a brief
scenario:
Jesus sends His four
dreadful judgments to awaken and
arouse the earth to the sinfulness of
its course. These four judgments
(also described in Ezekiel 14) arrest
the indifference of the people of
earth to the gospel so they can hear
the final gospel. These four
judgments are so extensive that every
mind on earth is forced to consider
them. While people are
considering the meaning of the
judgments, they will be open to hear
the everlasting gospel that contains
an explanation of the
judgments. As the people of
earth contemplate the full gospel,
they are invited to do something that
most have never done – yield
their lives to the truth contained in
the Bible. The gospel clearly
calls for obedience to the King of
kings. This is how the Bible becomes
the center of a great
controversy. This is why John
says of the saints, they
“…obey God’s
commandments and remain faithful to
Jesus.” Revelation 14:12 Satan,
on the other hand, sees to it that
circumstances will be so difficult
that no one will be able to obey
God’s commandments unless they
are willing to live by faith!
The saints won’t be able to buy
or sell! Much more will be said about
this in lessons 17-19. The
point is that salvation will only
come by faith and the saints will
have the faith to obey!
Trust and obey
James clearly saw the
true relationship between obedience
and faith. He says, “You
see that a person is justified by
what he does and not by faith
alone...I will show you my faith by
what I do.” James 2:24
So what moves God to
send judgments upon peoples and
nations? Notice what Jesus said
to Isaiah, “see, the Lord is
going to lay waste the earth and
devastate it; he will ruin its face
and scatter its inhabitants…the
earth will be completely laid waste
and totally plundered. The Lord
has spoken this word. The earth
dries up and withers, the exalted of
the earth languish. Its people defile
the earth; they have disobeyed the
laws, violated the statutes and
broken the everlasting
covenant. Therefore a curse
consumes the earth; its people must
bear their guilt. Therefore
earth’s inhabitants are burned
up, and very few are left.”
Isaiah 24:1-6 Isaiah was well aware
of the hardness of the people’s
hearts. He said, “When
your judgments come upon the earth,
the people of the world learn
righteousness.
Through grace is shown
to the wicked, they do not learn
righteousness; even in a land of
uprightness and they go on doing evil
and regard not the majesty of the
Lord.” Isaiah 26: 9,10
Jesus loves mercy and
He loves justice
Jesus holds each
person accountable for his or her
deeds. When people get away with
murder, lying, stealing and cheating,
evil rapidly grows. It’s
like nuclear fission. It’s
a chain reaction that can’t be
stopped. The runaway result is
that sin spreads until almost every
person is controlled or contaminated
with it. When peoples, cities,
nations or even the world reaches a
point where love has no redeeming
effect, Jesus sets His mercy aside
and steps in with redeeming
judgments. These judgments are
sent to arouse people with the
sinfulness of their course!
Ezekiel 14:12-27 gives
a very clear explanation of the four
judgments used in the fourth
seal. “The word of the
Lord came to me: ‘Son of
man, if a country sins against me by
being unfaithful and I stretch out my
hand against it to cut off its food
supply and send famine upon it and
kill its men and their animals, even
if these three men – Noah,
Daniel and Job were in it, they could
save only themselves by their
righteousness, declares the Sovereign
Lord.
Or if I send wild
beasts through that country and they
leave childless and it becomes
desolate so that no one can pass
through it because of the
beasts… Or if I bring a sword
against that country and say,
‘Let the sword pass throughout
the land’…Or if I send a
plague into that land and pour out my
wrath upon it through bloodshed,
killing its men and their
animals…
How much worse will it
be when I send against Jerusalem my
four dreadful judgments – sword
and famine and wild beasts and
plague; to kill its men and their
animals. Yet there will be some
survivors – sons and daughters
who will be brought out of it.
They will come to you, and when you
see their conduct and their actions,
you will be consoled regarding the
disaster I brought upon Jerusalem
– every disaster I have brought
upon it. for you will know that I
have done nothing in it without
cause.” Ezekiel 14:12-23
Notice the prophecy of
Hosea: “The days of punishment
are coming, the days of reckoning are
at hand…because your sins are so
many and your hostility so great, the
prophet is considered a fool, the
inspired man a maniac.”
Hosea 9:7
Through Moses, God
warned the Israelites, “If you
obey the Lord your God and keep his
commandments and decrees that are
written…the Lord thy God shall
bless you in the land you are
entering to possess. But if your
heart turns away, and you are not
obedient, and if you are drawn away
to bow down to other gods and worship
them, you will certainly be
destroyed.” Deuteronomy
30:10-18
New Testament warnings
If you think that the
above warnings only apply to Old
Testament days, consider the
following warnings from the New
Testament:
Peter said, “For
if God did not spare angels when they
sinned, but sent them to hell, (the
Greek word translated hell is
“tartarosas” – the
Greek equivalent to the bottomless
pit), putting them into gloomy
dungeons to be held for judgment; if
he did not spare the ancient world
when he brought the flood on its
ungodly people, but protected Noah, a
preacher of righteousness, and seven
others; if he condemned the cities of
Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to
ashes, and made them an example of
what is going to happen to the
ungodly…the Lord knows how to
rescue godly men…and to hold the
unrighteous for the day of
judgment.” II Peter 2:4-9
Revelation says,
“Come out of her (Babylon), my
people, so that you will not share in
her sins, so that you will not
receive any of her plagues; for her
sins are piled up to heaven, and God
has remembered her crimes.
Therefore in one day her plagues will
overtake her: death, mourning and
famine. She will be consumed by
fire, for mighty is the Lord God who
judges her.” Revelation
18:4,5,8
John says, “I saw
in heaven another great and marvelous
sign: seven angels with the seven
last plagues – last, because
with them God’s wrath is
completed.” Revelation 15:1
From the above
examples, it is evident that god has
sent and will send judgments upon the
world either in an effort to save or
to punish. We need to notice
two specific points.
First: In a case
of corporate judgment (judgments upon
groups of people), God initially
offered mercy to those who would turn
from wrong. In Noah’s day,
the ark was opened to whomsoever
would get on board. In Sodom
and Gomorrah, God couldn’t even
find ten righteous people, but did
save Lot and some of his
family. In Jericho, the harlot
Rehab and her family were
saved. In Nineveh, the entire
city was saved through repentance!
While cities, nations
and earth itself may fill up their
cups of iniquity, God seeks to save
those who love Him and spares them
from His judgments. II Peter
3:9 say that “(Jesus) is patient
with you, not wanting anyone to
perish, but everyone to come to
repentance!”
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