Release, Redemption and Rescue in the Seventh Seal
Then the eighth angel with a golden incense burner came and took his place at the incense altar. He was given a great quantity of incense to offer up, consisting of the prayers of God’s holy people, upon the golden altar that is before the throne. And the smoke of the incense with the prayers of the holy ones billowed up before God from the hand of the angel. Then the angel filled the golden incense burner with coals of fire from the altar and hurled it to the earth, releasing great peals of thunder, voices, lightning flashes, and an earthquake.”
The breaking of the seventh seal initiated a great release. It started with a half hour of complete silence. What causes you to stand in silence in anticipation for what will come? After the silence, the seven angels who stand before God lined up in a procession to blow their trumpets in succession according to the initiation of each progressive stage.
Incense was offered and coals were hewn down upon the earth, releasing great power. Offering up incense is the prayers of God’s people. As commentary notes, the prayers of His holy people are mixed with the intercession of our High Priest, Jesus. [1] Prayers that have been accumulated before the altar of God are being released with power. As they were, there was a great manifestation of power to accomplish God’s will as noted by the “great peals of thunder, voices, lightning flashes, and an earthquake.”
Peals of thunder, lightning and earthquake have frequently represented the glory of God manifesting powerful action. Exodus 19:16 says, “On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled.”
And David proclaims in Psalm 29:3-9, “The Glory-God reigns as he thunders in the clouds. So powerful is his voice, so brilliant and bright, how majestic he thunders over the great waters! His tympanic thunder topples the strongest trees. His symphonic sound splinters the mighty forests. Now he moves Zion’s mountains by the might of his voice, shaking the snowy peaks with his earsplitting sound! The lightning-fire flashes, striking as he speaks. God reveals himself when he makes the fault lines quake, shaking deserts, speaking his voice. God’s mighty voice makes the deer to give birth. His thunderbolt voice lays the forest bare. In his temple all fall before him with each one shouting, ‘Glory, glory, the God of glory!’”
Coals of fire from the altar represent, as commentary notes, purification of God. [3] The coals from the altar cleansed and atoned for sin. Isaiah 61:1-13 speaks about this. The year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah had a vision of the Lord seating on his throne, filling the temple. The seraphim encircled Him and called, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.’ As His glory filled the temple with smoke and the ground shook, Isaiah saw his sinfulness and cried out in woe. A seraphim touched his lips and said, ‘See, this [coal] has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.’”
As God’s presence and power is released upon the earth in unprecedented ways, there are trumpets that begin to sound. One by each of the seven end time angels. Each trumpet is tied to actions and further manifestation of God’s power. And the release is enveloped in prayers being powerfully answered.
The trumpets sound at the initiation (ushering in God’s manifested power) rather than the completion of activities. Isaiah prophesies about a day when a great trumpet is blown as a wake-up call that brings salvation to those who are about to perish:
“The great trumpet will be blown;
They will come, who are about to perish in the land of Assyria,
And they who are outcasts in the land of Egypt,
And shall worship the LORD in the holy mount at Jerusalem.”
Also, Matthew 24:30-31 speaks of trumpets before He returns. It says that He will come with mighty power and great splendor, “And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect…”
After the sixth trumpet, Revelation 11:7 says, “No more delay! For in the day when the seventh angel is to sound his trumpet, the mystery of God will be fulfilled, just as he announced to his servants the prophets.”
The final, seventh trumpet, by the seventh angel, ushers in the return of Christ. After the trumpet sounds, a loud voice from heaven declares His reign, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our God and of His Anointed One! He will reign supreme for an eternity of eternities.”
The seventh seal releases unprecedented power and glory. He is releasing His power, freedom and provision just as it is needed—at the time of greatest difficulty. While it seems frightening, as the seal is broken, prayers are fulfilled, purification of His bride and powerful manifestations as the glory of God spills forth, filling the earth with His presence. Ultimately, it brings fulfillment of what our hearts have been longing for all along.
It is not a day of our reckoning, but a day of release. Our day of reckoning happened when we accepted Jesus into our lives as our Lord and Savior –He paid the price on the cross for all our sin so we do not have to at any point in time. He is with us in any difficulty that we face in life. He goes through it with us and will bring us out of it.
Perhaps it is also a day of deliverance. Another time that it speaks of glowing coals, smoke, a thick cloud, thunder, lightening and the earth quaking is in Psalm 18 when God reaches down to rescue David from all his enemies. It was the day of David’s great distress but also the day of his great rescue.
David proclaims in Psalm 18:6-19, “I called on the Lord in my distress.
I cried to my God for help.
He heard my voice from his temple,
and my cry for help reached his ears.
Then the earth shook and quaked.
Even the foundations of the mountains trembled.
They shook violently because he was angry.
Smoke went up from his nostrils,
and a raging fire came out of his mouth.
Glowing coals flared up from it
He spread apart the heavens
and came down with a dark cloud under his feet.
He rode on one of the angels[as he flew,
and he soared on the wings of the wind.
He made the darkness his hiding place,
the dark rain clouds his covering.
Out of the brightness in front of him,
those rain clouds passed by with hailstones and lightning.
The Lord thundered in the heavens.
The Most High made his voice heard with hailstones and lightning.
He shot his arrows and scattered them.
He flashed streaks of lightning and threw them into confusion.
Then the ocean floor could be seen.
The foundations of the earth were laid bare
at your stern warning, O Lord,
at the blast of the breath from your nostrils.
He reached down from high above and took hold of me.
He pulled me out of the raging water.
He rescued me from my strong enemy
and from those who hated me,
because they were too strong for me.
On the day when I faced disaster, they confronted me,
but the Lord came to my defense.
He brought me out to a wide-open place.
He rescued me because he was pleased with me.
Isaiah knew of this kind of deliverance. He cried out in Is. 64:1-4, “ Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you! As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you! For when you did awesome things that we did not expect, you came down, and the mountains trembled before you. Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.”
The Psalmist in Psalm 53:6 knew God was the only answer to times of distress. He prayed for a quickening to the season of great deliverance,
“Oh, I wish our time of rescue were already here.
Oh, that God would come forth now—
arising from the midst of his Zion-people
to save and restore his very own.
When God fully restores his people,
Jacob will rejoice and Israel will be filled with gladness!”
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