SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/23/2015
10:39 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Introduction
to the Seventh Trumpet
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
11:15-19
Message of the
verses: “15 Then the seventh angel
sounded; and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, "The kingdom of the
world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ; and He will reign
forever and ever." 16 And the twenty-four elders, who sit on their thrones
before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, 17 saying, "We give You thanks, O Lord God,
the Almighty, who are and who were, because You have taken Your great power and
have begun to reign. 18 "And the
nations were enraged, and Your wrath came, and the time came for the dead to be
judged, and the time to reward Your bond-servants the prophets and the saints
and those who fear Your name, the small and the great, and to destroy those who
destroy the earth." 19 And the temple of God which is in heaven was
opened; and the ark of His covenant appeared in His temple, and there were
flashes of lightning and sounds and peals of thunder and an earthquake and a
great hailstorm.”
As I was doing my exercise yesterday
by taking a walk with a little light jogging I was listening to John MacArthur’s
sermon on this section that is before us today in order to be better prepared
to do my Spiritual Diary. One of the
things that, at least for me, is hard to discern is putting chronological order
the things found in the book of Revelation.
We have thus far looked at almost half of the book of Revelation and it
seems that we are almost finished with what is going to happen in the
Tribulation Period and that is why it was so important for me to include the
last quote from John MacArthur’s sermon in our last SD, a quote I wish to again
put into this SD: “: “Now as we come then to the seventh trumpet,
we come to the very end. You say, "Why does the book go on and on from there?" Because it recapitulates and
goes back and describes the career of Antichrist, describes the one-world
church, describes the one-world economy, goes back historically in ways that
fill in that seven-year period, and we'll be looking at that in the future.
Next time, in a few weeks, we will look at the seventh trumpet that is blown
starting in verse 15.” Now in his sermon
introduction for our verses today he goes on to bring more light into what he
said in the quote above. I believe that
it is important for us to know where we are in the study of the Tribulation
Period as best as we can discern and we will try to get a handle on it in this
SD.
Let us go back and look at
Revelation 10:7 “but in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he is
about to sound, then the
mystery of God is finished, as He preached to His servants the prophets.” MacArthur writes “The mystery is the full
revelation of the consummation of God’s plan.
It was prophesied by the Old Testament preachers, but its fullness was
never revealed until the book of Revelation.
That the seven bowl judgments, which represent the final outpouring of
God’s wrath, are included within the seventh trumpet is evident from 15:1: ‘Then
I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvelous, seven angels who had seven
plagues, which are the last, because in them the wrath of God is finished.’ Those ‘seven plagues’ that finish God’s wrath
are the seven bowl judgments: ‘Then I
heard a loud a loud voice from the temple, saying to the seven angels, ‘Go and
pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God’ (16:1). Since both the seventh trumpet and the seven
bowls are said to finish God’s wrath, the bowls must be part of the seventh
trumpet judgment.”
We have learned that these last
three trumpet judgments were called “woes” from Revelation 8:13, and we have
seen the fifth judgment (first woe) being finished in Rev. 9:12 “The first woe
is past; behold two woes are still coming after these things.” In Revelation 11:14 we read “14 The second
woe is past; behold, the third woe is coming quickly.”
We can determine that this seventh
trumpet judgment (the third woe) will complete the judgments that God will
bring upon planet earth and then the Lord Jesus Christ will return to planet
earth to set up His earthly kingdom. His
return is seen in the 19th chapter of Revelation during the battle
of Armageddon, in order to stop that war from actually ending life on planet
earth as seen in Mt 24:22 "Unless
those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake
of the elect those days will be cut short.”
So the question is how do we look at
chapters 12-15 in the book of Revelation?
MacArthur writes “Although the seventh trumpet sounds in 11:15, the judgments
associated with it are not described until chapter 15. Chapters 12-14 are a digression, taking
readers back through the Tribulation to the point of the seventh trumpet by a
different path. They describe the
Tribulation not from God’s perspective, but from Satan’s. Chapters 4-11 focused on Christ’s taking back
what is rightfully His by means of the seal and trumpet judgments. Chapters 12-14 focus on the ultimate human
usurper, the final Antichrist, whose career spans from the same time period as
the seal and trumpet judgments.
“The scene as the seventh trumpet
sounds unfolds in four stages: praise for sovereignty, paroxysms of rage, plan
for judgment, and promise of communion.”
We will look at these in our
upcoming SD’s.
One thing we need to understand is
that God is in control of all things that go on, on planet earth, but Satan
does have a kingdom here on planet earth, a kingdom that even Christ did not
deny when He was here on planet earth the first time. “5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the
kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6 And the devil said to Him, "I
will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to
whomever I wish. 7 “Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be
Yours." 8 Jesus answered him, "It is written, ’YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE
LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY (Luke 4:5-8).”
Jesus, of course, did not fall into what Satan wanted Him to do, but
when we come to the end of the seventh bowl judgment we will see that Jesus
will receive His kingdom and Satan will be chained in hell for 1000 years only
to come out for a short time and then put in hell for eternity.
I for one am glad for what I have
learned in how to better understand chapters 12-14.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: I know
that we are living here on planet earth in darkness as we live in a world controlled
by Satan’s kingdom, but I also know that I am not of that kingdom, but of God’s
kingdom through the blood of Jesus Christ and I look forward to the day when
the trumpet of God sounds that will take me to heaven in the Rapture, for that
trumpet is much different that the 7th trumpet we see in our passage
today.
My Steps of Faith for Today: To love the Lord with all of my
heart, soul, mind and strength, and to live in the love of Christ.
Answer to yesterday’s
Bible question: “Damascus” (Acts
9:22-25).
Today’s Bible
question: “Who was Absalom’s sister?”
Answer in our Next
SD.
5/23/2015 11:26 AM
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