Rev 8:2-13 - The Beginning part of the Cycle of Trumpets (today we're looking at 4 out of the 7 trumpets to be exact)
Zooming out to view the book as a whole, 8:2 starts the de-creation section, which runs all the way through 22:5. De-creation meaning God the creator lifting His hand of protection and order and allowing chaos to re-insue on the earth. Then spoiler alert, we get a RE-creation after that which is the new heaven and new earth at the end of the book.
(read 8:2-13)
Now let's look at it a sentence or two at a time.
8:2 I saw seven angels who stand before God, and they were given seven trumpets.
The Bible itself does not name exactly who these angels are, but the apocryphal books Enoch, and Tobit, name seven chief-messengers (aka archangels) of God, so these might be those same seven. A lot of scholars say these are them - because Jewish tradition tends to hold the view that these were who carried out a lot of the plagues in Egypt back in the day, and as you'll see in this judgement/de-creation section, John very much ties in the Egypt plagues. So these could be those same angels OR similar angels that have similar assignments of destruction, judgement etc.
And then, if you believe the angel of each church in chap's 2-3 is a literal angel, then the question rises, are these seven angels those same ones that have charge over the churches mentioned? Some people think so, some people think they're a different seven. I personally don't think we're talking about the same 7 angels here as we are in chapters 2-3.
8:3-4 Then another angel with a gold incense burner came and stood at the altar. And a great amount of incense was given to him to mix with the prayers of God's people as an offering on the gold altar before God's throne. The smoke of the incense mixed with the prayers of God's holy people, ascended up to God from the altar where the angel had poured them out.
The censer (aka the incense burner) was the vessel that held incense at the golden altar. When God instructed the early Israelites on how to worship Him, He told them to have an altar in a temple, and to put live coal into a censer and put incense on top of that during the ritual of worship to God.
There was a brass censer for everyday use, but a golden censer for the Day of Atonement - Yom Kippur, where once a year the high priest entered the holy of holies and performed very solemn, sacred sacrifices for the people's sins. Heiser teachers that the Day of Atonement was the reset button - very fitting to weave into this story.
Here in Rev, John is taking that picture from the Hebrew Scriptures, and emphasizing the symbolism that the smoke is our prayers rising up. The people of God pray and intercede for this groaning world, especially the martyrs, who we've seen are right under the altar praying for justice, and these prayers help trigger God's action and movement - which in this case is going to be divine justice both on the wickedness of hell/hades, and the humans who spend their one life partnering with it.
So if you need a reminder in your own life that prayer matters, take in this mental image - that your communication with God rises up as sweet smelling incense to Heaven, He's eager to receive it, God hears you, and it's considered a right act of worship. And God is moved by the prayers of His people. Don't ever let that incense and coal go out. When you burn a small amt of incense or one tiny candle, you don't always see where the smoke travels, in fact it seems to just disappear, that smoke IS traveling. To Heaven. To the altar. In the throne room of the Creator. And it effects the story line.
8:5 Then the angel filled the incense burner with fire from the altar and threw it down upon the earth; and thunder crashed, lightning flashed, and there was a terrible earthquake.
We haven't even gotten to the bowls judgements yet and here's already a bowl being poured out onto the earth. Judgement has definitely begun.
The occurrence of thunder/lightning/earthquake happens 1) here at the seventh seal, 2) will happen again at the 7th trumpet, and 3) will happen again at the 7th bowl.
8:6 Then the 7 angels with the 7 trumpets prepared to blow their mighty blast.
The Life Application Study Bible asserts that the trumpet blasts here are going to serve 3 purposes: 1) to warn that judgement is certain, 2) to call the forces of good and evil to battle, and 3) to announce the return of the King/Messiah.
Obviously we see the first purpose there in the text, the other two I feel are more implied.
8:7 The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up.
Here's where some allusions to the plagues in Egypt come in, and it's been said that they might be getting used as symbols here - pointing to the plagues not to use them as a literal repeat, but to say God will use nature as a weapon to punish His enemies.
8:8-9 The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.
Something ominous and disruptive impacts the oceans here, and causes a lot of death. And of course when modern readers read "something like a huge mountain all ablaze" being thrown into the sea, we tend to think: is that an asteroid??
8:10-11 The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter.
A star with a name, this sounds like it could maybe be an entity. The word Wormwood means: Bitterness.
Wormwood is a real tree that's been used for a long time all over the world as medicine. It definitely has bitter qualities, and too high a dose certainly could kill people.
Something is happening to the fresh water and water supply here. Got Questions .org states this:
"The word wormwood is mentioned only here in the New Testament, but it appears eight times in the Old Testament, each time associated with bitterness, poison and death. The Revelation passage may not be saying that the star falling to the earth will actually be called Wormwood by the inhabitants of the earth. Rather, wormwood was a well-known bitter herb in the Bible times, so by naming the star Wormwood, we are told that its effect will be to embitter the waters of the earth, so much so that the water is undrinkable. It won’t be a matter of simply a bitter taste to the water; it will literally be poisonous."
That's a really confident sounding answer on the internet and while i don’t disagree with it, the truth is it's just one well-known interpretation and contains speculation.
8:12 The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night.
Not only is the earth experiencing huge changes but the skies as well.
8:13 As I watched, I heard an eagle that was flying in midair call out in a loud voice: “Terror, terror, terror to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the other three angels!”
Some Bible teachers say that this separation of the first 4 judgements (the ones we just read today) and the next three that this eagle warns us about is that the first four happen to everybody - believers and unbelievers - and the next three are for the people "of the world" meaning just unbelievers.
I don't see that in the text; it just says "the inhabitants of the earth" so I'm not sure if it means that. But the distinction they point out is that the next three are about SPIRITUAL harm as opposed to physical, and believers are promised protection from spiritual harm - which is a pretty great point.
Why is there a random eagle here? Let's look at the OT. Habakuk 1 is about a time when the Lord allowed the literal Babylonian Empire - the Chaldeans if you will - to swoop in and overtake Israel, and Habakuk 1:8 says "They fly like an eagle swooping to devour; they all come intent on violence."
In Deut. 28:49, where Moses informs Israel of the curses that will happen if they break their covenant with God, he says, “The Lord will bring a nation from far away, from the ends of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle.” and that's exactly what happened with Babylon.
Also in Hosea 8:1, it says: “[P]ut the horn to your mouth! One like an eagle comes against the house of the Lord, because they transgress My covenant and rebel against My law.”
The greek word for eagle here in Rev is aetou which is seen two other times in this bk: in chapter 4 when one of the 4 cherubim is described as being like an eagle, and coming up in chapter 12 when we'll learn about a vision of a woman who is given eagle wings to escape a serpent.
So in this episode we've seen massive destruction, which is disturbing to read about anyway and extra weird to do so right now as so many people I know just had to evacuate for a week and so many lost their homes and churches in LA county, and the chapter ends with an announcement of what sounds like even worse things just ahead.
The de-creation section (Rev 8:2 - 22:5) is not for the faint of heart. But I guess no one can ever say God didn't warn us, and give us a lot of time to start following Him and His ways.
We'll wrap up the trumpet judgements next time.