Revelation 8 (Part I)

By Odon Bulamba (17^th June 2005)

Revelation 8:1-2

“When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour”.

This is the last of the seven seals (the sixth seal).

John is still in heaven and everybody looks different from him, he is the only human being there. He was taken there at an unusual time, neither after death nor at the resurrection of those who died in Christ. He looked strange in an environment full of holiness.

Imagine, if you or I are visiting a palace or an unfamiliar place, our first impression will be to look around and appreciate things, what we like and what we don’t. John also saw different things in heaven and God had already taken him through different stages of His revelation. But here again, God told him this was another new thing, he must be careful and look properly.

That day, he saw the seventh seal opened. On that scroll there were seven seals and as the last one was opened, everybody was curious to know what will happen. At last, they will know the message on the scroll. So when this was open, the Bible tells us there was silence for at least thirty minutes: it was time to listen, everybody was expecting the Lord to start reading.

But something strange happened when God created the world: He didn’t work on the seventh day, the sun came up but God rested. The heaven, angels or other creatures that were working with Him were surprised at God not working on that day. God said: “I’m not working today. It’s a day I keep for my glory.”

And here on the seventh seal, everybody was expecting something to be read and … it was not the right time to read. Instead of someone reading it, there was a big silence. According to God, 2 Peter 3:8,”with the Lord, one day is like a thousand years”. If I think 1 day is 24 hours, half an hour is almost 20 years and 8 months and during that time, everything was quiet, no one moved. This is that time now, the world is in that situation, we are waiting for Jesus to come back and we ask ourselves day after day when will the Lord come back? The signs are already here and servants of God are still preaching about Jesus’ return.

We count on a calendar, from Adam to Abraham, 2,000 years, from Abraham to Christ, 2 000 years, from Christ to now, 2,000 years. Six days (6,000 years) have been already covered and we are waiting now for the morning time to come. In every church pastor’s preach and warn us; this is the evening time. It means that the end of time is now, time to expect the Lord to come and see the new day, the 7^th day.

But don’t forget that when the ten virgins were waiting for Jesus, Jesus didn’t come at 7am, but at 2am, the time they expected him the least. Although it was the 6^th day, and Sabbath was the next day, he appeared any way and they knew about his coming because of the noise people made: people were yelling and screaming, ‘The Lord is here! The Messiah is here!’ and the other women were foolish enough to go outside, far from the house. Then Jesus entered the house and locked the door.

This is a picture of the church. Everywhere, people of God and pastors are saying Jesus is here! Jesus is coming back. Some of us will say that ‘Jesus is coming back soon, but it’s not morning time yet, we can still enjoy life on earth for a few hours’. But what a shock if Jesus comes today, unexpectedly! Let’s say for example, if Jesus knocked at the door of the sky today and said ‘Here I am, I am taking the people who are ready’, would we really feel ready to go with him? If today we hear the trumpet, all of us will remain silent, we will know that it is not a trumpet from an army, but the sound of God’s trumpet. What shall we do? There will be a big silence everywhere around the world because this event will shake the world.

So we must be ready because the time is here. Some people today want to teach others about Moses or Elijah and it’s good but remember it’s now time to remind people Jesus is now knocking at the door. The seventh seal has already been removed and we are just waiting for the day of judgement. Whoever really believes in God sees that there is no time left under the sun. If today God gives half an hour of silence, there is no time to lose because Jesus says he will come back and people will go in a split second, “tic, tac”. It will not even take 5 seconds, just whoever is ready will go with Him and that will be it.

If it is so, will we be ready? Let’s admit that we often wait for God to talk to us personally or we wait for Him to touch us or push us to start moving, but that day we might be distracted!