Notes on Revelation 8:2-11:19

Although the imagery of the trumpets can be drawn from various places in the Bible, the seven trumpets may mimic the seven trumpets that symbolize the Canaanite conquest in that the fall of Jericho is the key event that represents the event. John is using lots of imagery from  the exodus and conquest accounts, and so it would make sense that the trumpets are drawn from this event. If true, the judgment of God upon the world, i.e., all the plagues poured out upon it, is God taking away the earth from the wicked and giving it to His people in the same way that He takes away the land from the Canaanites and gives it to His people. This would bring more color to the proclamation at the end of the cycle, which states, “the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and His Christ, and He will reign forever and ever” (11:15). God is not swooping His people away to some other place. He is making the world He created for them their eternal home. Hence, it becomes His kingdom and He reigns over it forever.

The judgment that removes the wicked from the world and breaks their oppression over God’s people mimic the Egyptian plagues (hail fire, waters of blood, darkness, locusts, the destroyers unleashed to kill them) with the exception of the waters being turned foul like wormwood. This may mimic the judgment of God over the idolaters who worship the golden calf among the visible community, where Moses makes the people drink the waters with the crushed golden calf within it, and a plague follows (although this water is not called bitter). This event itself was a type of the bitter water ordeal where a woman who is suspected of adultery undergoes a trial where the drinking of water is only a judgment if the woman is guilty of unfaithfulness. It allowed the Levites to identify who was guilty of spiritual unfaithfulness. This would inform the end scene where they do not repent of their idolatry and unfaithful behavior even after the plagues, and hence, are guilty and many die from it. Both of these have to do with God’s visible community, however, and not the secular world. This added element is significant to John’s overall point in the book, which is that both the world that has no confession to belong to Christ and those who claim it but deny Christ with their false theology or evil ethics are not a part of God’s salvation, but His judgment. This is rather a subtle point at this stage of the book, even though when read in light of the letters in Chapters 2-3, its meaning may show more of its significance.

The plagues overall, of course, are the reversal of creation, as the original Egyptian plagues are. Instead of flourishing land and vegetation, the land is pummeled by hail and fire. Instead of waters that support life, the waters kill all of its livestock and are undrinkable. Instead of light, darkness. Instead of man ruling over the creepy crawly things on the earth, the creepy crawly things rule over man. All of this indicating that those who have rejected God’s sovereign rule over their own lives and reject His ordering of their own chaos, will receive none of His sovereign rule over chaos in general. Hence, He no longer holds back the forces of chaos from destroying mankind that wanted God’s ordered world without the God who orders it.

The plagues are likely meant to display God’s spiritual judgment upon the wicked that lead up to final judgment, and not necessarily physical judgments. This seems likely when the locusts are understood to be demonic powers ruled by the Destroyer (often referred to as the Angel of Death in the exodus), i.e., the Angel who rules the Abyss/Realm of Chaos (likely the devil). The horses themselves are a combination of different wild animals that breath elements of destruction and chaos (fire, sulfur, and smoke). This means that the judgment of God that torments and kills men may be more internal than external. It may lead eventually to external judgment, as it often does, and this cycle, therefore, may be a more symbolic way to represent the conquest, war, famine, and death in the first cycle. Either way, none of these disasters are merely physical. They are demonically empowered, and it is likely that the judgment of God begins with God giving the wicked over to Satanic and demonic rule and destruction. In fact, this is likely why the people do not repent after all of these plagues. They simply cannot recognize them as judgments from God because they have so indulged themselves in sin that they are blinded to it and have been given over to their blindness and demonic deception.

The angel who stands on the waters and the land in Chapter 10 may also be the destroyer. In 1 Chron 21:14-16, the destroying angel stands between heaven and earth and is sent to destroy the unfaithful in Israel. This would make sense since John is about to prophecy against the world and the false church, and the destroyer stands ready to carry out God's judgment upon the wicked. However, the angel may just be an archangel of some sort, proclaiming the judgment of God through John, and not necessarily carrying it out. The scroll handed to John by the angel and that is eaten by John here mimics that of Ezekiel’s scroll that he must speak to the visible covenant community of God and warn them to repent of their sin. His duty is to be a watchman over God’s people in this way. Likewise, in Chapter 11, John’s responsibility is to warn and protect the true people of God through the very book he is writing. The measuring of the temple is also linked to Ezekiel’s temple, which may be why the temple in Chapter 11 was introduced by a passage in Ezekiel.

The visible church is viewed as both the holy sanctuary for which John is responsible (measuring has the idea of one who has a managerial responsibility over a possession), and the compromised church that is given over to the world and its judgments. The true church is encouraged through the imagery of the Law and Prophets which proclaim the gospel being personified as something that both gives testimony to the wicked world and speaks against worshiping the beast, and that which overcomes the beast and the wicked world. Hence, John’s protection of the true church is warning them to remain faithful to the Word of God and the gospel of Christ in the midst of pressures from the wicked world to compromise.

The entire section, therefore, is meant to relay the idea that the false church is under the judgment of God as it is actually a part of the world and not the true church. The true church, however, will be protected if it heeds the words of the book John has written, as the people of God are warned in the beginning and end of the book (1:3; 22:7, 9).

The second cycle ends with God judging all of the living and the dead, and giving the inheritance promised to the prophets and the saints who listen to them. God takes over the world and reigns forever, which is a fulfillment of Daniel 2, where the kingdom destroys all other kingdoms and only it remains forever.