Silence in Heaven
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Let's pray:
Lord,
We have now reached the lesson about the seventh seal, and we turn to You once again,
asking You to explain the meaning of Your prophetic Word.
May Your Holy Spirit be our only guide during this lesson.
In Jesus Christ our Savior we pray.
Amen.
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Revelation 4:1
After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing
open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me,
saying,
«Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this.»
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Revelation 5:5
Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the
Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals.
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The opening of the seven seals, which Jesus made possible, reveals to us «things which must take place after this».
Now, let's study the seventh seal.
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Revelation 6:15-17
And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men,
the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the
caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks,
«Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of
the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?»
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First, before beginning to study the seventh seal, let's recall how the sixth
seal ended.
Confronted with the glory of Jesus' return, the unrepentant nations try to escape and to
hide themselves in the rocks.
Filled with fear as they behold this spectacle, they cry: «Who is
able to stand?»
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Revelation 7:1-4
After these things I saw four angels standing at the four
corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow
on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree.
Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And
he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and
the sea, saying,
«Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God
on their foreheads.»
And I heard the number of those who were sealed. One hundred and forty-four thousand of
all the tribes of the children of Israel were sealed.
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Just after the sixth seal, Revelation chapter 7 answers the question: «Who is able to stand?», first pointing out the one hundred and
forty-four thousand, a group which we will discuss in a future lesson.
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Revelation 7:9,14
After these things I looked, and behold, a great
multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues,
standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes (...).
«These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and
made them white in the blood of the Lamb.»
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In addition to the 144000, Revelation chapter 7 tells us that a great multitude
of faithful believers will also stand at the return of Jesus.
We will come back to this group too in a future lesson.
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Revelation 8:1
When He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in
heaven for about half an hour.
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After this digression answering the question: «Who is
able to stand?», Revelation presents the seventh and last seal.
Since the sixth seal covered the same period as the letters to the churches of
Philadelphia and Laodicea, the seventh seal has only to describe the last moments of this
world to complete the whole picture.
Its short message is limited to this one verse, reporting a silence in heaven for about
half an hour.
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This silence in heaven contrasts with the noise and confusion of the
other seals:
«It was granted to the one who sat on [the red horse] to
take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another (...).
And power was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, with hunger,
with death, and by the beasts of the earth. (...)
The souls of those who had been slain for the word of God (...) cried with a loud voice,
saying, "How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood?"
(...)
Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was
moved out of its place. And the kings of the earth, the great men (...) said to the
mountains and rocks,
"Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the
wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to
stand?"» (REVELATION 6:4,8-10,14-17)
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Revelation 8:1
When He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in
heaven for about half an hour.
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Habakkuk 2:20
The Lord is in His holy temple.
Let all the earth keep silence before Him.
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What does this silence in heaven mean?
A superficial analysis could suggest that such a silence marks the solemnity of the
moment, as the world is going through the last hours of its history.
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Zephaniah 1:7,8
Be silent in the presence of the Lord God; for the day of
the Lord is at hand, for the Lord has prepared a sacrifice; He has invited His guests.
«And it shall be, in the day of the Lord's sacrifice, that I will punish the princes and
the king's children, and all such as are clothed with foreign apparel.»
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Zechariah 2:13
Be silent, all flesh, before the Lord, for He is aroused
from His holy habitation!
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Indeed, a silence precedes the punishment of those «clothed
with foreign apparel», those who have rejected the white robe of Jesus'
righteousness.
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Psalm 76:7-9
You, Yourself, are to be feared; and who may stand in
Your presence when once You are angry?
You caused judgment to be heard from heaven; the earth feared and was still, when God
arose to judgment, to deliver all the oppressed of the earth.
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By carrying on our superficial analysis, we could suggest that, at the time God
proclaims His sentence, «the earth feared and was still»,
thus explaining the silence of the seventh seal.
But there is a flaw in this analysis: this silence takes place in heaven, not on earth...
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Psalm 50:3-5
Our God shall come, and shall not keep silent; a fire
shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous all around Him.
He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that He may judge His people:
«Gather My saints together to Me, those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice.»
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In fact, the Bible tells us that, when Jesus returns to gather His faithful who
have made a covenant with Him by His sacrifice, the earth will be the scene of a very
noisy spectacle!
The silence will thus take place in heaven only.
Now, what causes this silence in heaven?
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Matthew 25:31
When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy
angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory.
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The answer is very simple: the silence in heaven is caused by the fact that
there's no one left there.
And why is heaven empty? Simply because Jesus left it, accompanied by «all the holy angels», to come and gather His people eagerly
waiting for Him on the earth.
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When He returns, Jesus will be accompanied by His armies of angels:
«Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse.
And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and
makes war. (...) His name is called The Word of God. And the armies in heaven, clothed in
fine linen, white and clean, followed Him on white horses.» (REVELATION 19:11,13,14)
«Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the
earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with
power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and
they will gather together His elect from the four winds.» (MATTHEW 24:30,31)
«For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He
will reward each according to his works.» (MATTHEW 16:27)
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Numbers 14:34
According to the number of the days in which you spied
out the land, forty days, for each day you shall bear your guilt one year, namely forty
years.
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Ezekiel 4:6
You shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty
days.
I have laid on you a day for each year.
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Let's move on to the length of the heavenly silence: the seventh seal indicates
that it will last about half an hour.
What do we obtain by applying the system used in prophecy, that is, «one day = one
year»?
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Revelation 8:1
When He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in
heaven for about half an hour.
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What does «about half an hour» represent?
- In Bible prophecy, one day represents a year.
- One hour, that is, 1/24th of a day, thus represents 1/24th of a year. The Hebrew
year containing 360 days, we obtain: 360 ÷ 24 = 15 days.
- «About half an hour» thus represents «about»
half this period of 15 days, that is, one week.
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Matthew 24:37-39
But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of
the Son of Man be.
For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in
marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came
and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
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This period of a literal week, that is half an hour in prophecy, can also be
found in the account of the Flood, which Jesus compares to the day of His return.
Where can we find a period of a week in the Flood account?
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Genesis 7:4,9,10
For after seven more days I will cause it to rain on the
earth forty days and forty nights, and I will destroy from the face of the earth all
living things that I have made. (...)
Two by two they went into the ark to Noah, male and female, as God had commanded Noah.
And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were on the earth.
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Between the moment when Noah, his family, and the animals entered the ark, and
the moment when the Flood began, one week went by.
Is this week similar to the one contained in the seventh seal?
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Genesis 7:16
So those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went
in [the ark] as God had commanded [Noah]; and the Lord shut him in.
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God Himself shut the door of the Noah's ark. During the following week,
although the Flood had not yet begun, it was already too late to go into the ark.
Likewise, God will soon put an end to His offer of salvation: Jesus will stop making
intercession for the sinners, and will return to gather His people.
During His trip from heaven to earth (the week of the seventh seal), it will be too late
to repent and accept salvation.
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Revelation 22:11,12
He who is unjust, let him be unjust still; he who is
filthy, let him be filthy still; he who is righteous, let him be righteous still; he who
is holy, let him be holy still.
And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according
to his work.
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At the end of the book of Revelation, Jesus calls to mind this period during
which no one can be saved any more, since Jesus has ceased His intercession in the
heavenly sanctuary, and is heading for the earth to gather His people waiting for Him
there.
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2 Peter 3:5-7
For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God
the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which
the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water.
But the heavens and the earth which now exist are kept in store by the same word, reserved
for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
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Let's not wait until the week of the seventh seal to follow God, because no one
knows when this period will begin, when God will close the door of grace, just as He
closed the door of the Noah's ark, one week before the Flood.
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Genesis 2:1-3
Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them,
were finished.
And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh
day from all His work which He had done.
Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His
work which God had created and made.
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The week of the seventh seal will lead to the end of this world, just as the
week of Creation marked its beginning.
Then God will create a new world, where there will be no more sin, no more evil.
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2 Peter 3:7,10,13
But the heavens and the earth which now exist are kept in
store by the same word, reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of
ungodly men. (...)
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass
away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and
the works that are in it will be burned up. (...)
Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which
righteousness dwells.
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When the week of the seventh seal begins, may we have already chosen to follow
God, to inherit the new world «in which righteousness dwells».
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Revelation 8:1,2
When He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in
heaven for about half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets.
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After the seven letters to the churches and the seven seals, a third set of
prophecies was immediately showed to the apostle John: the seven trumpets. This set of
prophecies will be the theme of our next section.
But first, we will conclude this section, in our next lesson, with a summary of the seven
seals.
Don't miss it!
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We invite you to pray with us:
Father,
The study of the seven seals was really fascinating.
The message of the last two seals especially made us realize that time goes by very
quickly, and that Jesus could come back much sooner than we think.
Please help us to make, right here and now, the firm choice to follow You until the end,
so that, when You put an end to Your offer of salvation, we may be numbered among Your
children.
In the precious name of Jesus we pray.
Amen.
The test of Lesson 37 is waiting for you!