Response to Prophecy. Rev. 8:1
There are several reasons in Scripture for why God has revealed certain
aspects of the future to us and they don’t have anything to do with satisfying
our curiosity or stimulating our interest in terms of trying to figure out
where we are on some prophetic timetable, or what time it is in some prophecy
stopwatch countdown. There are various things that we can learn from studying
prophecy about how we should be responding to the truths that we are studying.
Revelation 8:1 is one of those verses that give us a clue as to the kind of
response that we should have.
Chapter seven focuses on what happens within the same time frame as the
initial seal judgments. Chapters eight and nine focus on what happens on the
earth in the next series of judgments. So when the seventh seal is opened it
reveals seven more judgments, identified as the trumpet judgments.
Revelation 8:1 NASB “When the Lamb broke the seventh seal,
there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.” What this shows us is the
heavenly response to the prophetic revelation that occurs at this particular
time. This indicates one of the responses we should have to prophecy. It is
believed that this silence in heaven that we see at this time is related to
several passages in the Old Testament that relate to this time period, the most
specific of which is found in Zephaniah 1:7 NASB “Be silent before
the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near, For the LORD has prepared a sacrifice, He
has consecrated His guests.” That term “day of the Lord” is a technical term
that is sued in the Old Testament to refer to a time of divine judgment. When
we come to various prophetic passages the term “day of the Lord” can have a
broader and a narrower meaning. Here it has the narrower meaning which is
descriptive of those final judgments that occur at the end of the Tribulation
period. But before that period occurs there is a time of silence that precedes
those end-time judgments, culminating in the campaign of Armageddon. This
terminology from Zephaniah 1:7 focuses our attention on that final period at
the end of the Tribulation. This silence precedes that as the judgment
intensifies in the trumpet judgments and the vial judgments, everything
focusing on preparing for the return of the Lord Jesus Christ at the end of the
seven-year period.
Psalm 76:8 NASB “You caused judgment to be heard from heaven;
The earth feared and was still.” This tells us that
this silence related to judgment is a pattern that we see in Scripture, for
Psalm 76 focuses back on God’s deliverance of the Jews from the slavery in
Another passages that reflects upon this is
Habakkuk 2:20 NASB “But the LORD is in His holy temple. Let
all the earth be silent before Him.” So we see that one of the responses that
we should have to prophecy is
that of silence, that of reflection, that of realisation of the seriousness,
the significance of God’s judgment. Many people, though, have a problem with
prophecy. They think that this has to do with satisfying people’s curiosity, doing
newspaper exegesis trying to figure out how close we are to the end times, with
all the people trying perhaps for some sort of wor4ld solution to the collapse
of the markets, problems in international economics, etc. This is the kind of
scenario (not saying it is) that will transpire prior to the Tribulation as
there is international crisis that propels people to seek a one-world leader
who can solve their problems—the economic problems, the political problems—and
bring peace upon the earth. But we don’t study prophecy for that reason.
When we ask the question, Why study prophecy? we ought to be aware of a couple of statistics. First of
all, 28 per cent of the Bible was prophetic when it was revealed—more than pone
quarter of the verses of Scripture were unfulfilled prophecy when they were
initially given. Fifteen per cent of the Bible is still unfulfilled prophecy.
So we have to have an understanding of these to be able to truly understand and
interpret the rest of Scripture. Eighteen per cent of the New Testament, almost
one out of every five verses, is unfulfilled prophecy. So to understand almost
20 per cent of the New Testament we have to have an understanding of God’s
prophetic plan. One in twelve verses in the New Testament refers to the second
coming of Jesus Christ. One in ten verses in the epistles refers to the second
coming of Jesus Christ. Sixty per cent of the verses in the New Testament are
affected in terms of their interpretation by eschatology in order to be
properly understood. So prophecy is an extremely important area of theology to
be aware of and to study because of its impact on the rest of Scripture.
Prophecy is given to us to remind us of God’s character. As it focuses
on God’s character it then works itself out in terms of God’s plan and purpose
for His creation. It reminds us of His sovereignty, that God is the one who is
the ultimate ruler in history. Kingdoms will rise and kingdoms will fall,
empires will rise and fall, nations will rise and fall, ultimately at the
determination of God. This is seen especially in the prophecies in the book of
Daniel in the Old Testament.
The second thing we are reminded of is God’s faithfulness. As Daniel
writes his prophecies he is no longer in
Prophecy also emphasises God’s righteousness and justice, for in the
prophecies there is a focal point on God’s ultimate judgment of sin and evil,
and for the rebellion of Hid creatures against Him, both angelic and human. But
in these judgments there is still the emphasis on grace, and in prophecy we are
reminded of God’s love and goodness, and we are reminded of His grace. So for
us as believers we are to study prophecy because it motivates us to prepare for
eternity. We are living today in light of eternity. What we will be in eternity
is determined by the decisions that we make today. So this specifically
challenges us to get our priorities straight, to make the study and application
of God’s Word the highest priority in our life. This also emphasises that it is
through the study of prophecy that our confidence in the Scripture and in the
Lord is strengthened.
There are several responses given to prophecy in the Word of God, and
these responses are not responses related to people who are just interested
about what God is going to do in the future or what is going to happen in their
future. In the book of Daniel we see a number of different responses. The first
was in the dream that was given to Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel chapter two.
Nebuchadnezzar was deeply troubled. Eventually Daniel came forward and because
of his relationship with God, God revealed to Daniel the meaning of the dream
and the meaning had to do with the destiny of the
What we see is that he is like a lot of unbelievers when they hear
anything about Christianity or the Bible they may be somewhat impressed, become
a little bit curious, but it is only a superficial level, it never impacts the
way they think, they never decide to trust God, it is just a very superficial
response. Unfortunately, after salvation, there are a lot of believers who are
like that. They are saved, they know they are going to go to heaven, they are
glad they are going to go to heaven, but they don’t have any deep response to
anything else in the Word of God. So their lives are often no different from
unbelievers. They know that the Bible is true but unfortunately they let the
details of life crowd out their spiritual priorities. Before long they just
sort of let their relationship with God float completely to the back burner in
their life and they never develop any kind of real change.
The seven letters of Revelation were written to the church and each of
the letters was the divine report card for these churches. The Lord was saying:
“You need pay attention your strengths and weaknesses here,” and then He would
say: “Repent.” The idea was they needed to change, i.e. Now that you know what
is good and what is bad you need to change, and then there is a reward for the
one who is the overcomer, to one who continues to persevere in spiritual growth
and application, and the one who actually changes. The response to the Word of
God is such is that it changes the way they think and the way they live.
Otherwise they are left in the trap of arrogance, which is what we see in
Nebuchadnezzar. He is a perfect depiction of one who has mastered the arrogance
skills.
Arrogance begins with self-absorption, being focused on self. We come
out of the womb like that, we are totally consumed with our own needs and
getting them fulfilled. Self-absorption leads to being self-indulgent. Because
we have this need we want to indulge in it. Then we justify it: it’s right;
it’s good. We figure out all kinds of rationales to justify our
self-absorption. This leads to self-deception; we begin to generate false views
of reality that ultimately allow us to justify all of our self-absorption and
self-indulgence. Ultimately this leads to self-deification. All of this is
described in Romans chapter one but it is displayed in an incredible way by
Nebuchadnezzar. In Daniel chapter three he is going to construct this enormous
statue of himself and he is going to demand on penalty of death that everyone
in his kingdom bow down and worship this idol of himself—the ultimate in
self-deification. So we see that he has had no real change, no response at all
for what God revealed to him in the vision of Daniel chapter two, and so he
goes on to expressing his own self-deification.
The penalty for not worshipping this statue was death, death in a fiery
furnace, and there were three who did not submit. Daniel apparently was not in
the country at the time for he is not mentioned at all in the chapter, and so
these three friends of his refused to bow down and worship the idol and God
miraculously preserved the three men. When Nebuchadnezzar looked into the fire
he saw four personages and said that the fourth was like the Son of God. So
again he has been impressed with the revelation of God and he has a slightly
more intense response. He is impressed now but no so that he changes.
Daniel 3:28 NASB “Nebuchadnezzar responded and said,
‘Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, who has sent His angel and delivered His servants who
put their trust in Him, violating the king’s command, and yielded up their
bodies so as not to serve or worship any god except their own God. [29]
Therefore I make a decree that any people, nation or tongue that speaks
anything offensive against the God of Shadrach, Meshach
and Abed-nego shall be torn limb from limb and their
houses reduced to a rubbish heap, inasmuch as there is no other god who is able
to deliver in this way’.” He is so
impressed that he is going to legislate that everybody needs to treat their God
with honour, but notice it is “their God.”
In chapter four there is another dream, and this dream relates to what
God is going to do personally to Nebuchadnezzar because of his arrogance. For a
period of seven years God disciplined and judged Nebuchadnezzar so that he
became insane. He was completely psychotic and at the end of the seven years
God gave him back his right mind. At the conclusion of that event
Nebuchadnezzar praises God and expresses his praise in terms of his own
personal salvation. So prophecy is also given for the purpose of evangelism.
Daniel 4:37 NASB “Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise, exalt and honor the King of heaven, for all His works are true and
His ways just, and He is able to humble those who walk in pride”—his personal
testimony.
A fourth response to prophecy is seen in the fifth chapter of Daniel.
This is the opposite response to what Nebuchadnezzar gave and that is a
complete rejection of God coming out of pure arrogance. This is seen in
Nebuchadnezzar’s great, great grandson Belshazzar who
was co-regent with his father Nabonitus. This is the
situation of the handwriting on the wall. Daniel 5:5 NASB “Suddenly
the fingers of a man’s hand emerged and began writing opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace,
and the king saw the back of the hand that did the writing… [25] Now this is the inscription
that was written out: ‘MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.’” MENE refers to that which is
numbered; TEKEL indicates something that is weighed out; UPHARSIN indicates
something that is divided. The interpretation of the meaning is then given by
Daniel. Daniel has been ignored by Belshazzar. He
knows all the stories about Nebuchadnezzar, he knows about Daniel and has heard
it all but he has completely rejected God. He doesn’t have anything to do with
the truth or with God’s Word, he is completely hostile to the truth and so now
God is going to judge him. He is scared to death when he sees this, and this is
one response to prophecy.
Daniel tells him that MENE MENE means that his
number is up; TEKEL means you don’t measure up; PEREZ (upharsin)means that your kingdom is divided, you will be divided up.
What was Belshazzar’s response? It was a lot like
Nebuchadnezzar’s the first time. He is going to honour Daniel and dress him up
but he has no interest in believing what Daniel says. Belshazzar
is not going to change in response to God’s Word, he
is going to keep on doing what he wants to do. This shows us that there are
many people who seem to have an external positive response toward Christianity
but they really don’t have anything to do with it.
There are two other responses that we see in Daniel and both of them are
seen in Daniel himself. After the vision in chapter seven, which again relates
to this progression of kingdoms, and it is all over with and Daniel has seen
how things are going the culminate in history, the coming of the son of man,
His destruction of the kingdoms of man and the establishment of His own
kingdom, he writes in v. 28 NASB “At this point the revelation
ended. As for me, Daniel, my thoughts were greatly alarming me
and my face grew pale, but I kept the matter to myself.” The word translated
“alarming” is the word that indicates to be frightened, to be terrified. He is
not terrified for himself but as he sees and understands and comes to grips
with what God is going to do to bring sin and evil to its final culmination and
judgment it is extremely sobering. It is frightening to realise how horrible
sin is and the horrible consequences of evil, and what
must be done in order to bring that to ultimate judgment. Daniel’s response is
that he is profoundly disturbed as he realise what God must do to judge sin and
evil. This same word that is translated “alarming” is also expressed in Daniel
4:19. When he understood the dream for Nebuchadnezzar he was also appalled,
frightened and alarmed.
In Daniel chapter eight is another expression of his response. Daniel
was exhausted and sick for days. Probably none of us have read the book of
Revelation and walked away sick for days because we really understood the
depths and horrors of what God’s judgments would bring. Sometimes we think much
like the martyrs expressed it in their prayers and Revelation 6, that we pray
that God would finally bring this judgment on earth, but then to come face to
face with what that means what happens in Revelation 8:1, there is silence in
heaven.
One other thing that happens as a result of prophecy is that we as
believers are strengthened and encouraged spiritually. When Daniel sees the
prophecy in Daniel chapter ten that is expressed in Daniel chapter eleven an
angel appears to him, and in 10:18 NASB “Then {this} one with human
appearance touched me again and strengthened me. [19] He said, ‘O man of high
esteem, do not be afraid. Peace be with you; take courage and be courageous!’
Now as soon as he spoke to me, I received strength and said, ‘May my lord
speak, for you have strengthened me’.” What we see in this
passages is several words that all reflect the same Hebrew
word—strengthened, to be courageous. These indicate in some passages to be
strengthened and in other passages it has the idea of courage (physical or
moral or spiritual). It is the same idea as in the promise that we frequently
claim in Philippians 4:13 NASB “I can do all things through Him who
strengthens me.” Actually, the verb there should be translated, “I am
strengthened to do all things through Christ who empowers me.” That word
“empower” is the same word we find in Ephesians
As we look at what is going on in our world today—and we can go through some horrendous crises—it is only believers who have answers, who are going to be able to look at whatever happens, whatever the circumstances may be, and who are going to be able to relax and to have joy in the midst of these crises, because of trust in the Lord and the principles they understand from God’s Word.