Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Revelation 8 before reading the devotional below.
You’ll notice there are a lot of groups of seven in the book of Revelation — seven churches, seven seals, seven trumpets. It is unclear whether these sevens are all parallels or whether the book is describing sequential events. You’ll also see multiples of 12 (12; 24; 144,000) which is often symbolic in the Bible as well (like Jesus choosing 12 disciples). Again I am going to draw us back to this question: What does this tell us about who God is? It seems clear from Revelation and other parts of the Bible that God has deep meaning for all that he does — symbolic and deliberate.
In the actual events of chapter 8, I am struck by the dramatic half hour of silence in heaven when the seventh seal is broken. The scene is so striking because of the previous description of busy, loud worship that never stops in heaven. It’s a silence that means something. It also reminded me of the events that happened when Jesus died on the cross (Matthew 27:50-52). The curtain blocking the Holy of Holies split in two from top to bottom, there was an earth quake, and bodies started walking out of graves. You can’t miss the significance of a moment like that.
There is constant spiritual activity around you. How aware are you of what is happening? If there was something supernaturally significant happening, how would you know? Christians have been given the Holy Spirit and we are able to see and discern spiritual things through his power. That gives us a certain level of connection to the spiritual realities around us if we are discerning and sensitive to the Spirit. The rest of Revelation 8 describes these trumpet blasts that almost read like a reversal of the creation story in Genesis 1-2. Things become undone. I don’t know if there will be an apocalyptic unfolding like we see in the movies, but no matter what I know that if I am not spiritually discerning and listening to the Spirit I will be easily swayed by earthly ideas of what the “end times” will look like. I’m holding all that loosely so that I can focus on who God is and what is doing around me right now.