[7] The trumpet call of God – revealing Bible explanation

Trumpets were used for 7 different reasons in the Old Testament, each relevant to the second coming of Christ.
This article looks at the seven ways trumpets are used in the Bible and then looks at the seven trumpets of judgment in Revelation.

Matthew records Jesus saying that a trumpet will be sounded at the end of the world:

And He will send His angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.”

Matthew 24:31 NIV

1. Trumpet call of God – time to meet God for a very solemn occasion.

We read in the Old Testament at the giving of the Ten Commandments;

On the morning of the third day, there was thunder and lightening, with a thick cloud over the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast.
Everyone in the camp trembled.
Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the Lord descended on it with fire.”

Exodus 19:16 NIV

What an awesome picture!
The trumpet announces; ‘Come you people, it is time to meet God for a very solemn occasion!’ See the Ten Virgins meeting the Bridegroom.

People may push God aside, but there will be a day when they will have to attend His awesome Presence:

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Philippians 2:9-11 NIV

A trumpet will be blown at the end of the world to announce it is time to meet the living God.

2. Trumpet blasts to meet together as a joyful community.

Make two trumpets of hammered silver, and use them for calling the community together.”

Numbers 10:2 NIV

Again what a picture for the end of the world, it is for calling God’s people together, all the saints throughout history and the ones living at Christ’s return, a vast gathering of His people.

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.
After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord for ever.”

1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 NIV

3. A trumpet blast – it is time to go into battle.

When you go into battle… against an enemy who is oppressing you, sound a blast on the trumpets“

Numbers 10:9 NIV

At Jesus Christ’s second coming at the end of the world, it will be the final battle against the forces of evil.

No trumpet is mentioned in the following verse, but it is interesting to think that God commands that a trumpet be sounded when the Israelites go into battle and here is the Lord of Glory going into battle at the end of the age:

And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulphur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown.
They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.”

Revelation 20:10 NIV

I reckon the trumpets will be blown on that Day because it will be the last and final battle!

4. Trumpets to assist in worship.

In Psalm 81 it tells us that the trumpet assists in worship:

Sing for joy to God our strength; shout aloud to the God of Jacob!
Begin the music, strike the timbrel, play the melodious harp and lyre.
Sound the ram’s horn (trumpet) at the New Moon, and when the moon is full, on the day of our festival;
this is a decree for Israel, an ordinance of the God of Jacob.”

Psalm 81:1-4 NIV

The sound of the tambourine, harp and lyre was the JOYFUL part of the worship time, but the sound of the trumpet was the SOLEMN announcement to balance that joyful worship with reverence and fear.

Here, in the Book of Revelation a trumpet is blown during the worship at the end of the world which announces that it is a solemn time of worship:

The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said:
‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign for ever and ever.’
And the twenty-four elders, who were seated on their thrones before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying: ‘We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign.’ “

Revelation 11:15-17 NIV

5. Trumpets are required to be blown over the sacrifices.

You are to sound the trumpets over your burnt offerings and fellowship offerings.“

Numbers 10:10 NIV

Those offerings would have been brought with weakness and failings.

Jesus, our High Priest, will blow the trumpet over our duties and good deeds that we have done.
All our good deeds and labours due to faith in Christ will be acceptable and pleasing to God.

6. Trumpets announce the crowning of a king.

Zadok the priest took the horn of oil from the sacred tent and anointed Solomon.
Then they sounded the trumpet and all the people shouted, “Long live King Solomon!”

1 Kings 1:39 NIV

At the end of the world, Jesus will be proclaimed as King.
We can be sure that the trumpets will sound when Jesus is crowned!

7. The Trumpet call of God, a day of release.

Leviticus 25:8 speaks of blowing the trumpet every 50 years, in the year of Jubilee.
It was the year of release, when any land that had been sold, was returned to it′s original owners, slaves were released, etc.

All the believers will be released from the bondage of corruption and will be given new resurrection bodies at the second coming of Jesus. Paul wrote:

Listen I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, (that means die) but we will be changed – in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”

1 Corinthians 15:51 NIV

That passage describes how believers will receive our new resurrection bodies.
We have been released from all our debt of sin.

So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the desert,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it.
For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.
Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather. Immediately after the distress of those days ‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’
At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn.
They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory.
And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.
Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.
Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.”

Matthew 24:26-35

The fig tree represents Israel and the generation that sees the fulfilment of these prophesies will be the generation that sees the second coming of Jesus Christ and the end of the world.

8. The seven trumpets of judgment in Revelation.

When trying to interpret the strange imagery of Revelation we need to look at the clues within the rest of the Bible.
Also, we must not put our own interpretation on the Book of Revelation.

So what follows is a simple, but biblical look at the seven trumpets of judgment, which may provide some clues, but will not give us a complete answer.

When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.
Then I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them.
And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and he was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne, and the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel.
Then the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there were peals of thunder, rumblings flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.”

Revelation 8:1-5 ESV

These trumpets form the seventh seal that the Lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ, opens.
There is silence in heaven for half an hour in deep and solemn expectation of the sombre things that are about to take place.

There is, in this section on the seven trumpets, a strong allusion to different parts of the temple worship.
Does this mean that the temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem and that the regular service of God will be carried on?
Or is this just symbolic of what used to happen in the temple before 70 A.D?
Or is this talking about Jesus the High priest – ‘a minister in the holy places, in the true tent that the Lord set up, not man’ in heaven (Hebrews 8:1-5)?
We do not know and all may be true.

The silence can refer to the time when the priest went in to burn incense in the holy place and all the people continued in silent prayer outside until the priest returned. (See Luke 1:10).

The angels mentioned here in Revelation appear to execute a priestly office as we progress through the seven trumpets.

Are the seven angels who stood before God the same as those called the seven Spirits in the first chapter of Revelation? “Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness the firstborn of the dead…” ²

Another angel performs the office of a priest with a golden censer which is a picture of the prayers of the saints—the genuine Christians.
David has this thought when writing a Psalm: “Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!” ³

The judgments of God are about to be executed, therefore the Christians pray a lot for God’s protection.

The first trumpet of judgment in Revelation.

Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to blow them.
The first angel blew his trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mixed with blood, and these were thrown upon the earth.
And a third of the earth was burned up, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up.”

Revelation 8:6-7 ESV

The Lord wanted the angels to blow trumpets and we know, from earlier in this article, that trumpets announced a very solemn occasion, or a joyful celebration, or a time for battle, or for worship, or to be blown over a sacrifice, or the coronation of a king, or a celebration of being released.
A lot, if not all from that list, apply to this time of the seven trumpets of judgment in Revelation.

The judgment in Revelation of the hail and fire mingled with blood is very similar to the ninth plague of Egypt:

Then Moses stretched out his staff toward heaven, and the Lord sent thunder and hail, and fire ran down to the earth.
And the Lord rained hail upon the land of Egypt.
There was hail and fire flashing continually in the midst of the hail, very heavy hail, such as had never been in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation.
The hail struck down everything that was in the field in all the land of Egypt, both man and beast.
And the hail struck down every plant of the field and broke every tree of the field. Only in the land of Goshen, where the people of Israel were, was there no hail.”

Exodus. 9:23–26 ESV

The second trumpet and a great mountain was thrown into the sea.

The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain, burning with fire, was thrown into the sea, and a third of the sea became blood. A third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.”

Revelation 8:8-9 ESV

We could interpret that the object resembling a great mountain was a meteorite.
But it could mean something different.

A mountain in Scripture can represent, in prophetic language, a kingdom.
Here in Jeremiah, we see the kingdom of Babylon described as a destroying mountain:

Behold, I am against you, O destroying mountain, declares the Lord,
which destroys the whole earth;
I will stretch out my hand against you, and roll you down from the crags, and make you a burnt mountain.”

Jeremiah 51:25 ESV

If speaking symbolically, a mountain being thrown into the sea is a kingdom being thrown to a vast number of people.
We are told what the sea, or waters in general, represent here:

And the angel said to me ‘The waters that you saw, where the prostitute is seated, are peoples and multitudes and nations and languages.’ “

Revelation 17:15 ESV

Later in Revelation, where it says there won’t be any sea, this could be pictural language to say that there will no longer be masses of different peoples, nations all in turmoil because all rebellion will be put down and the believers will be one people:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”

Revelation 21:1 ESV

“A third of the sea became blood” is another allusion to the Egyptian plagues:

Moses and Aaron did as the Lord commanded.
In the sight of Pharaoh and in the sight of his servants he lifted up the staff and struck the water in the Nile, and all the water in the Nile turned into blood.
And the fish in the Nile died, and the Nile stank, so that the Egyptians could not drink water from the Nile.”

Exodus 7:20-21 ESV

The third trumpet and the star Wormwood.

The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, blazing like a torch, and it fell on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water.
The name of the star is Wormwood.
A third of the waters became wormwood, and many people died from the water, because it had been made bitter.

Revelation 8:10-11 ESV

This description certainly fits a meteorite burning through the atmosphere and hitting the land along with its springs of water and contaminating them.

The word ‘wormwood’ is used in the Old Testament, and in Deuteronomy we see the potential of many being poisoned by the ‘bitter fruit**’, literally ‘wormwood’ of someone turning away from the Lord:

Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the Lord our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit**”

Deuteronomy 29:18 ESV

And in Jeremiah, because God’s people had forsaken the Lord, He will feed them with ‘bitter food**’ literally ‘wormwood’:

Because they have forsaken my law that I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice or walked in accord with it, but have stubbornly followed their own hearts and have gone after the Baals, as their fathers taught them.
Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will feed this people with bitter food**, and give them poisonous water to drink.
I will scatter them among the nations…”

Jeremiah 9:13-16 ESV

If the third trumpet and the star Wormwood are taken symbolically the star signifies an angelic being which departs from God, falling from heaven. ⁴
For the star to make a third of the rivers and springs of water signifies the contamination of spiritual truth as waters in the Bible signify the Holy Spirit and His outworking:

Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’
Now this he said about the Spirit whom those who believed in him were to receive for as yet the Spirit had not been given because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

John 7:38-39 ESV

The fourth trumpet of judgment and the stars go dim.

The fourth angel blew his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, and a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of their light might be darkened, and a third of the day might be kept from shining, and likewise a third of the night.
Then I looked, and I heard an eagle*** crying with a loud voice as it flew directly overhead ‘Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth, at the blasts of the other trumpets that the three angels are about to blow!’ “

Revelation 8:12-13 ESV

We do not know whether the sun and other stars will be dimed, or whether something on the Earth obscures them.
For example, during the Gulf War, the oil fields of Kuwait were set on fire which created so much smoke that it literally obscured the sun, moon, and stars over a large area of the Earth for a long time. ⁵

Some translations use the word ‘angel’ for the ‘eagle***’ but that is not correct, the word is used five times and can only mean an eagle or a vulture.

The eagle in scripture is a symbol of vengeance:

The Lord will bring a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth swooping down like the eagle, a nation whose language you do not understand, a hard-faced nation who shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young.”

Deuteronomy 28:49-50 ESV

And again in Habakkuk:

Their horsemen come from afar; they fly like an eagle swift to devour.
They all come for violence, all their faces forward.
They gather captives like sand.”

Habakkuk 1:8-9 ESV

Some say that the eagle represents the Roman Empire, or the Nazis but here in Revelation, we do not see the eagle carrying out the judgment, the eagle is warning the inhabitants.
The eagle does not fly in the heavens, or heaven itself, it flies in midair.

The eagle cries in a loud voice, “’Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth” There are two words in Greek that describe those who dwell* on the earth.

• One is paroikeo, which means to dwell as a stranger and is used in this verse: “By faith he (Abram) went to live* in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations whose designer and builder is God.” ⁶
• The other word is katoikeo* which means to settle down. ⁷

The latter word, ‘katoikeo*’, is used in Revelation to show on whom the judgment is about to fall – those who are firmly attached to this world and who do not want God in their lives.
They will be damned, not because a place in heaven is unavailable, but because their treasures are here, along with their hopes, desires and dreams.

The fifth trumpet and an angelic being opens the bottomless pit.

And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit.
He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft.”

Revelation 9:1-2 ESV

This star that falls from heaven is an angelic being because he is given a key to open the bottomless pit and is in all probability Satan himself:

How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn!
How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low!
You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.’
But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit…”

Isaiah 14:12-15 ESV

Jesus also said about Satan falling from heaven:

I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.
Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you.
Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”

Luke 10:18-20 ESV

But Satan has only fallen from heaven, he is not permanently thrown out of heaven, because this will come later when all power and authority will be put down:

Now war arose in heaven Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon.
And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven.
And the great dragon was thrown down that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan the deceiver of the whole world— he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down who accuses them day and night before our God.”

Revelation 12:7-10 ESV

What is the abyss, Hades, sheol and the bottomless pit?

Here are the different words used in the New and Old Testaments for the place we loosely call ‘hell’:

• ἄβυσσος (abussos) ‘abyss’ is used 9 times in the New Testament. (Often translated as the abyss, bottomless pit and the deep.)
• γέεννα (geenna) ‘hell, Gehenna, Valley of Hinnom’ is used 13 times in the New Testament. A place of permanent punishment for the wicked.
• ᾍδης (hadēs) ‘Hades’ is used 10 times in the New Testament. A temporary place for the wicked.
• κατώτερος (katōteros) ‘lower’ is used once in the New Testament.
• ταρταρόω (tartaroō) ‘Tartarus’ is used once in the New Testament.
• ‘lake of fire’ is used 4 times in the New Testament. This is termed the second death (Revelation 20:14). The final place for all people, demons and spiritual forces that do not submit to God.
• Hebrew: שְׁאוֹל (she.ol) ‘Sheol’ is used 65 times in the Old Testament. The place of the dead including the grave.
• Hebrew: שַׁ֫חַת (sha.chat) ‘Pit’ is used 13 times in the Old Testament.

Satan comes down to the Earth with the key to the shaft of the abyss, which God has permitted him to do.
It is interesting that it states the key to the shaft and possibly not the abyss itself, otherwise, Satan could release all the occupants of the abyss.

The abyss may be the prison for the demons and spiritual forces.
When the man with many demons was questioned by Jesus, the demons named Legion pleaded with Jesus:

And they begged him not to command them to depart into the abyss.”

Luke 8:31 ESV

The apostle Peter uses the word ‘Tartarus’ (only used once in the Bible), which is from ancient Greek mythology, to describe the prison for demons, the fallen angels.
Is Peter talking about ‘the abyss’?

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell [‘Tartarus’] and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment…”

2 Peter 2:4 ESV

Whereas Hades may be the place where the souls of humans go:

And the sea gave up the dead who were in it Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.”

Revelation 20:13 ESV

And Simon Peter on the day of Pentecost quotes King David from Psalm 16:

For you will not abandon my soul to Hades”

Acts 2:27 ESV

‘Sheol’ is the Hebrew term for Hades.
When Jesus was teaching about the Rich Man and Lazarus, he told us that the rich man went to Hades, the place of torment.
But the poor man died and went to be with Abraham.

The apostle John was told by Jesus in a vision who holds the keys to Hades:

Fear not I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.”

Revelation 1:17 ESV

It is Jesus who holds the keys to Death and Hades.

When Jesus died on the cross he descended to the ‘lower’ regions of the Earth:

When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.
In saying, ‘He ascended,’ what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth?
He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.”

Ephesians 4:8-10 ESV

Jesus went to the place where the departed souls of the unbelievers were, presumably Sheol:

After being made alive, he [Jesus] went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits – to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built…
…they will have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.
For this is the reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead, so that they might be judged according to human standards in regard to the body, but live according to God in regard to the spirit.”

1 Peter 3:19-20 & 4:5-6 NIV

He sought out all those people of the Old Testament right up to that moment in time who had died, he proclaimed the gospel and then he released those who turned to him, and led these captives to freedom to be with the Lord in paradise.

All believers from then on will go to be with the Lord (Luke 23:43).

Those who resist God are kept in Hades until the final judgment (Revelation 20:11-15).

What are the scorpions in Revelation?

Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth.
They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any green plant or any tree, but only those people who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads.
They were allowed to torment them for five months, but not to kill them, and their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it stings someone.
And in those days people will seek death and will not find it.
They will long to die, but death will flee from them.
In appearance the locusts were like horses prepared for battle: on their heads were what looked like crowns of gold; their faces were like human faces, their hair like women’s hair, and their teeth like lions’ teeth; they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the noise of their wings was like the noise of many chariots with horses rushing into battle.
They have tails and stings like scorpions, and their power to hurt people for five months is in their tails.
They have as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek he is called Apollyon.
The first woe has passed; behold, two woes are still to come.”

Revelation 9:3-12 ESV

These are no common locusts because they eat no plants, and they have a king (whereas natural locusts do not).
Also, with the plague of locusts in Egypt we are told: “The locusts came up over all the land of Egypt and settled on the whole country of Egypt such a dense swarm of locusts as had never been before, nor ever will be again.” ⁸ whereas in Revelation we are talking about a world-wide phenomena, not just in Egypt.

These locusts were granted the power to hurt, but not kill, the people living on Earth.
The fact that those people sought to kill themselves but could not is a warning that we are all spirit beings and that death is not the end.
We live on after our death to face the consequences of our lives.

To try and speculate as to what these locusts are, whether helicopters or whatever, is naive.
We will know as the prophecy comes nearer when suddenly the veil is removed.

The sixth trumpet and releasing the four horsemen.

Then the sixth angel blew his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God, saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet,
‘Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.’ “

Revelation 9:13-14 ESV

The ‘bound angels’ could be four of the most powerful, sinful angels mentioned in 2 Peter 2:4.
These four angels are bound at the great river Euphrates.
The prominence of this area in Scripture cannot be overlooked:

• The Garden of Eden was there.
• The sin of Adam and Eve began there.
• Cain committed the first murder upon Abel (Genesis 4:8).
• Nimrod began his kingdom there (Genesis 10:8–12).
• The only inhabitants to be saved from the flood were Noah and his family who lived in this area.
• Here is where the Tower of Babel was erected.
• The Israelites were brought here when the Babylonians became the superpower.
• Babylon was the fountain of idolatry (Revelation 18).
• The prophet Zechariah locates Babylon as the last stand of false religion (Zechariah 5).
• This is where Satan’s last stand will take place. ⁹

So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, were released to kill a third of mankind.
The number of mounted troops was twice ten thousand times ten thousand; I heard their number.
And this is how I saw the horses in my vision and those who rode them: they wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire and of sulfur, and the heads of the horses were like lions’ heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths.
By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of their mouths.
For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails, for their tails are like serpents with heads, and by means of them they wound.
The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.”

Revelation 9:15-21 ESV

The number of mounted troops given is twice ten thousand times ten thousand which is 200 million troops.

According to Statistica, China has 2 million active troops ¹⁰ which is a long way short of 200 million troops.

The answer to this massive number is that we are probably not talking about just a human army, but demonic forces which may explain the strange pictorial language that is used.
This is all of Satan’s forces being released to attack all of humanity and a third of mankind is to be killed.

Jesus told us that Satan only seeks to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10) but God restrains Satan and so limits his work until this point.
Then all restraint is removed and Satan is released to do his worst upon those who refuse to submit to God.
We are not told what this restraint is.

At some point during this tribulation, the Christians will be removed to meet Jesus in the sky at his second coming, (see the next section for the different possibilities):

Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.
For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.
For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.
When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’ by ‘O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?’ “

1 Corinthians 15:51-55 ESV

This period is known as the Great Tribulation and will be cut short by the Lord Jesus Christ to signify the end of the world.
The apostle Paul explains this mystery:

…the man of lawlessness is revealed the son of destruction who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God proclaiming himself to be God.
Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time.
For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work.
Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way.
And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming.
The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.
Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

2 Thessalonians 2:3-12 ESV

When will the true Christians be removed from the Earth?

This event is known as the Rapture.
There are three main theories that relate to when this rapture will happen:

1. Pretribulationism places the rapture before the tribulation. The thinking is that all the judgments are part of the wrath of God, and the church must be raptured before the beginning of the tribulation.
2. Midtribulationism states that the rapture is halfway through the tribulation. The first three-and-a-half years will be the ‘wrath of man,’ or the dominion of the Antichrist, then the church will be raptured, and after that is God’s bowl judgments. ¹¹
3. Posttribulationism places the rapture at the end of the tribulation. In this view, believers are not removed and given new, resurrection bodies, but are protected from the judgments and the battle of Armageddon.

The first theory that places the rapture before the tribulation is unlikely because of the way Paul explains to the church at Thessalonica that the rapture has not happened because the man of lawlessness had not yet come, see the article ‘The Day of the Lord is to be a separating day’.
In other words, he could have said that the rapture has not happened because he, and the church, are still present on the Earth, but he chose to say that the man of lawlessness must come first before the rapture.
Also:

One perceived weakness of pretribulationism is its relatively recent development as a church doctrine, not having been formulated in detail until the early 1800s.
Another weakness is that pretribulationism splits the return of Jesus Christ into two ‘phases’—the Rapture and the Second Coming—whereas the Bible does not clearly delineate any such phases.”

‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the pretribulational view of the rapture (pretribulationism)?’ Got Questions. ¹²

The second theory believes that when the seventh trumpet sounds (Revelation 11:15), the church will meet Christ in the air, and then the bowl judgments are poured upon the earth (Revelation 15—16) in a time known as the great tribulation.
This makes the rapture and Christ’s second coming to set up his kingdom two separate events, having a three-and-a-half-year gap.

According to this view, the church goes through the first half of the tribulation but is spared the worst of the tribulation.

If we see the trumpets and the bowl judgments (Revelation 7–16) as the wrath of God against rebellious people, wouldn’t the church be exempt from those judgments?

For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ…”

1 Thessalonians 5:9 ESV

Another way of looking at this dilemma is that the first six seals that are broken are not to do with God’s wrath:

…the first six seal judgments (Revelation 6) are not considered the wrath of God; rather, they are viewed as ‘the wrath of Satan’ or ‘the wrath of the antichrist.’
This is because there is no direct mention of God’s wrath until after the sixth seal is broken (Revelation 6:17).
According to the pre-wrath rapture theory, the church will be present to experience the first six seals.”

‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the pre-wrath view of the rapture?’ Got Questions. ¹³

Therefore believers will go through most of the tribulation enduring Satan’s and man’s hatred, but they will not experience God’s wrath involving the seventh seal, because they will have been removed to heaven.

The third theory, Posttribulationism, teaches that the Rapture occurs at the end, or near the end, of the Tribulation:

At that time, the church will meet Christ in the air and then return to earth for the commencement of Christ’s Kingdom on earth.
In other words, the Rapture and Christ’s Second Coming (to set up His Kingdom) happen almost simultaneously.
According to this view, the church goes through the entire seven-year Tribulation. Roman Catholicism, Greek Orthodoxy, and many Protestant denominations espouse a posttribulational view of the Rapture.”

‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the posttribulational view of the rapture (posttribulationism)?’ Got Questions. ¹⁴

The seventh trumpet in the midst of the Great Tribulation.

Because this article is getting rather long, I will miss out on one chapter and a half which is an interlude between the sixth and seventh trumpets.
A mighty angel comes down and announces:

that there would be no more delay, but that in the days of the trumpet call to be sounded by the seventh angel, the mystery of God would be fulfilled, just as he announced to his servants the prophets.”

Revelation 10:6-7 ESV

In this part of Revelation, we are in the midst of the Great Tribulation and the angel states that there ‘would be no more delay’.
This fits with what Jesus told us:

For then there will be great tribulation such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be.
And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved.
But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.”

Matthew 24:21-22 ESV

The seventh trumpet brings us to the conclusion of the Great Tribulation and it is now that the mystery of God is finally made clear.
We have many questions, such as why God allows evil, etc. and in this life we do not know all the answers but we do know the Creator God and He will reveal it all one day.

…The second woe has passed; behold, the third woe is soon to come.
Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, 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 shall reign forever and ever.’
And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying,
‘We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, for you have taken your great power and begun to reign. The nations raged, but your wrath came, and the time for the dead to be judged, and for rewarding your servants the prophets and saints, and those who fear your name, both small and great,
and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.’
Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple.
There were flashes of lightning, rumblings peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail.”

Revelation 11:14-19 ESV

The judgments have not finished, but at the blast of the seventh trumpet there is a brief time of encouragement for those who have turned to the Lord, or those believers who remain and are reminded that Jesus shall reign forever and ever, etc.

The third woe is not the blowing of the seventh trumpet which will come next, as that leads us beyond the Great Tribulation into the Millennium.
The seventh trumpet likewise opens up to us the seven personalities of Revelation chapters 12 and 13.
The third woe begins when Satan, one of the personalities, is cast down to the Earth (Revelation 12:12). ¹⁵

The symbolism of the woman and the child in Revelation

And a great sign appeared in heaven:
a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth.”

Revelation 12:1-2 ESV

The clue as to who the woman is comes from Joseph’s dream.
Joseph told his family ‘Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.’ ¹⁶
Jacob and his offspring represent the twelve tribes of Israel, so, the woman in Revelation represents Israel.

Israel, out of all the other countries, gave birth to Jesus Christ, who is the Child.
The apostle Paul tells us about Israel:

They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption the glory the covenants the giving of the law the worship, and the promises.
To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.”

Romans 9:4-5 ESV

The great red dragon

And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems.
His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth…
And the great dragon was thrown down that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan the deceiver of the whole world— the was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.”

Revelation 12:3-4 & 9 ESV

He is called ‘great’ because of his immense power and has nothing to do with his character – which is far from great.

Satan tries to influence Christians but he is limited because of God’s Holy Spirit indwelling them.

For all non-believers, it is a different story because he exerts control over them because they are ‘following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience’… (Ephesians 2:2 ESV).

Paul tells us that we were all like that once, chasing after ‘the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind’ (Ephesians 2:3 ESV).

Satan has controlled nations throughout history and is still doing that.
He tried to offer the nations to the Lord Jesus when he was being tempted in the wilderness if he would worship Satan (see Matthew. 4:8–9).
Satan wants to be worshipped, that is his ultimate goal.

He was originally created Lucifer, son of the morning:

You were the signet of perfection full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.
You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle; and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings.
On the day that you were created they were prepared.
You were an anointed guardian cherub.
I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; in the midst of the stones of fire you walked.
You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you.
In the abundance of your trade you were filled with violence in your midst, and you sinned;
so I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and I destroyed you, O guardian cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.
Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.”

Ezekiel 28:12-17 ESV

‘His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven’ shows the large rebellion in heaven when one-third of the angelic hosts followed Satan against God which ended in their own destruction.

Then there was war in heaven.

Now war arose in heaven Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon.
And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven.”

Revelation 12:7-8 ESV

How amazing that there will be a battle in heaven itself, but we know from the Bible that Satan is allowed access to heaven to speak with God.
See Job 1:6 and 2:6 where Satan presents himself before God in regard to Job.
Also, Satan must have gone to God to get permission to sift Simon Peter like wheat prior to him denying that he knew Jesus three times, see Luke 22:31.

Satan still has access to heaven and all Christians that put their head above the parapet are likely to have Satan seeking to do mischief in their lives.

But remember that the Lord allows this and Peter tells us to:

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.
To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

1 Peter 5:6-11 ESV

Michael, who leads the good angels against Satan, is one of the chief angels, an archangel along with Gabriel and possibly others.

Satan is defeated and there will be no place for him in heaven, Jesus presumably refers to this when he said that he saw Satan falling as lightning from heaven (Luke 10:18).

More detailed articles covering: 
[1] Does God turn away from us?
[2] How to guard against being deceived?
[8] The Day of the Lord is to be a separating day

References and credits – open in new tabs:

1. Image by LoggaWiggler from Pixabay ↩

2. Revelation 1:4-5 ESV ↩

3. Psalm 141:2 ESV ↩

4. ‘Wormwood (Bible)’ Wikipedia. Last edited on 21 September 2023. ↩

5. ‘Revelation 8:12’ by Charlie Garrett. The Superior Word. 1 January 2021. ↩

6. Hebrews 11:9-10 ESV ↩

7. ‘I heard an eagle — Revelation 8:12-13’ Once Delivered.10 May 2012 ↩

8. Exodus 10:14 ESV ↩

9. J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible Commentary: The Prophecy (Revelation 6-13), vol. 59 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1991), 106–107. ↩

10. ‘Largest armies in the world ranked by active military personnel in 2022’ Statista. October 2022 ↩

11. ‘Is midtribulationism right? Will the church be raptured at the mid-point of the tribulation?’ Compelling Truth. ↩

12. ‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the pretribulational view of the rapture (pretribulationism)?’ Got Questions. 4 January 2022. ↩

13. ‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the pre-wrath view of the rapture?’ Got Questions. 4 January 2022. ↩

14. ‘What are the strengths and weaknesses of the posttribulational view of the rapture (posttribulationism)?’ Got Questions. 4 January 2022. ↩

15. J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible Commentary: The Prophecy (Revelation 6-13), electronic ed., vol. 59 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1991), 138. ↩

16. Genesis 37:9 ESV ↩