Revelation Chapter 8:1-6
Joshua 2:12-19, "Now therefore, I pray you, swear unto me by the Lord, since I have shown you kindness, that you will also show kindness to my father's house, and give me a true token: And that you will save alive my father, and my mother, and my brethren, and my sisters, and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death".
And the men answered her, "Our life for yours, if you utter not this our business. And it shall be, when the Lord has given us the land that we will deal kindly and truly with you.
Then she let them down by a cord through the window: for her house was upon the town wall, and she dwelt upon the wall. And she said unto them, "Get you to the mountain, lest the pursuers meet you; and hide yourselves there three days, until the pursuers have returned: and afterward may you go your way".
And the men said unto her, "We will be blameless of this your oath which you have made us swear. Behold, when we come into the land, you shall bind this line of scarlet thread in the window which you did let us down by: and you shall bring your father, and your mother, and your brethren, and all your father's household, home unto you. And it shall be, that whosoever shall go out of the doors of your house into the street, his blood shall be upon his head, and we will be guiltless: and whosoever shall be with you in the house, his blood shall be on our head, if any hand be upon him".
Notice, Rahab had to have the Token or earnest of her inheritance on display. It wasn't sufficient just to have it. It had to be on display like the blood on the lintel at the first Passover. And we must have the Token on display. Our Token is the Life of Christ.
Rahab was a type of the Gentile Church. We were in spiritual fornication, but every predestinated member of the True Church will be under the scarlet thread of Christ's blood before the Seventh Trump sounds the end of our dispensation. And the Token by which we were saved will be on display before the earthquake rolls that Stone cut out of the mountain without hands into those denominational walled cities (Daniel 2:45).
You'll remember God instructed Joshua to command the priests to carry the Ark before his army as it marched around the walls of Jericho once each day for six days. Those priests were to blow on their shophars or rams horn trumpets, but the people were not to utter a single word. Those trumpets represented the Voice of God. When He speaks, we remain silent. On the seventh day, they compassed the wall seven times. The seventh time, as the priests blew a long, loud trumpet blast, Joshua commanded the people to shout, and the walls of Jericho fell with the exception of the portion beneath Rahab's house. At the Seventh Trump, for the Feast of Trumpets, the Bride is sealed into the Body of Christ or born-again, before the earthquake, and does not go through the tribulation.
Joshua 6:20, "So when the people heard the priests blow with their trumpets, when they heard the long, loud sound of the trumpet they shouted with all of their might. Suddenly the wall of Jericho fell down flat, so that the people of Israel poured into the city from every side, and they took the city".
Revelation 8:1, "When Christ had opened the Seventh Seal there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour".
At Jericho, the priests blew their trumpets each day and the people kept silent. But on the seventh day, they compassed the city seven times and sounded their trumpets seven times. These were the rams' horn trumpets or shophars that were blown on the Day of Atonement which the 144,000 are to fulfil. When they spiritually hear the revelation of the Seven Trumpet mysteries, they will separate themselves and mourn in repentance.
It is important we distinguish between the manifestation of the seven Trumpet plagues since Calvary, their sounding through the three and a half year teaching ministry of the Moses and Elijah, and their revelation to the 144,000 in one day after the martyrdom and visible resurrection of these two prophets.
The Feast of Trumpets type the teaching of Israel's two witnesses who are to expound the Seven Trumpet mysteries during the first half of Daniel's Seventieth Week of seven prophetic years. This will be Israel's 'former' or teaching rain (Joel 2:23-27; Zechariah 14:8). It will commence at the end of the harvest of the wheat crop which types the Gentile Bride; after she has been quickened, brought to maturity and gathered into the Lord's garner following the manifestation of the Sons of God. At this time Israel, represented by the fig tree and the vine, will have borne its full crop of fruit. This is the end of the last generation: there can be no increase at harvest time, just a ripening of the fruit that is already on the tree and the vine.
Now when the Lamb opened the Seventh Seal, there was silence in heaven. Nobody knew what lay under that Seal. It wasn't even written, for no one was worthy to open and look upon the mystery of the Seven Seals. The Seventh Seal is the revelation of the previous Six Seals perfecting or completing "that which was in PART." The Seventh Seal is Christ's 'parousia' Coming as the Son of Man, in WORD Form, as the Bible promised. Six Seals were revealed to John out of heaven through the visions he recorded under Old Testament symbols (Revelation 6). When the Seventh Seal was opened, there was neither symbol nor voice recorded, "just silence in heaven about the space of half an hour."
In Revelation 10:1-4, the Word descended to earth with the Book open, and when He had placed judgment upon His enemies�the Beast from the sea and the Beast from the earth�the Voices of the seven portions of the Spirit that had anointed the seven Church Age messengers declared the meaning of these symbols and placed them in the context of future, unfulfilled Scripture. But John was forbidden to write this revelation since the Book was to remain sealed and the mystery of God hidden until the days of the Voice of the seventh angel to the Church.
Revelation 2:17, "He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches; "To him that overcomes I will give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knows but he who receives it".
Only the elect or overcomer has Spiritual hearing. Hidden manna is the mystery of God, the secret things. Deuteronomy 29:29, "The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the Words of this Law." A white stone means a pure witness, the Word, and the revelation is in not on that stone.
That Name within the stone is the Word for your day, your part of the Bible; the PRESENT Truth that baptizes Christ's elect into His Body; that and that alone, for no man can know it except the elect who receive it. Amen! Praise the Lord! It's all of grace through faith�not he who learns, or wills, or runs, for no man can say that Jesus is the Christ but by the revelation of the Holy Ghost (John 15:26; I Corinthians 12:3).
Revelation 19:12, "His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns; and he had a Name written, that no man knew, but he himself".
Again, only those who have the revelation can comprehend what it is. It cannot be conveyed by man to the non-elect, no matter how effectively and faithfully it is taught.
When the Lamb opened the Seventh Seal in Revelation 8:1, there was silence in heaven. Revelation 10:1 � 11:13 is in parenthesis or brackets, and is an aside or soliloquy, like the explanation of a narrator; it explains what happens under the Seventh Seal before the Seventh Trumpet is revealed to Israel. The silence was in heaven whilst on earth Seven Thunders uttered their voices, and the mystery of what they said through the Seven Church Ages is revealed by the Seventh Angel. What were these mystery voices but the revelation of the fullness of that which was in PART, the PART Word or Spirit which made the seven Church Age Messengers and their converts "a flame of Fire".
Now this "Silence in heaven" continues until the last elected member of the END-time Bride is called out from man-made denominational teaching and baptized into the Body and the Shout and Voice of I Thessalonians 4:16 are fulfilled (Matthew 25:6-7 and Revelation 18:4).
The Silence is broken by the Seventh Trump.
Revelation 11:15, "And the Seventh Trumpet angel sounded; and there were great Voices in heaven [that's the end of the silence], saying, "The dominion of the world has now become the kingdom of our Lord. [That's us Gentiles: Israel is not numbered among the nations. God does not deal with Israel until the tribulation after He has translated His Church. (Read Luke 22:11-27)]. And of His Christ; and He shall reign forever and ever".
Revelation 8:2, "And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven Trumpets".
Who or what are these seven Angels?
Hebrews 1:7, "Of the Angels He said, Who makes His angels Spirits and His ministers a flame of Fire."
Revelation 1:4, "John to the seven Churches which are in Asia: [the natural attributes of] Grace be unto you, and peace, from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before His throne".
The seven Angels are the seven Spirits. According to John 4:24, "God is a (ONE) Spirit." But like I Corinthians 12:8-11 where we see one Spirit manifested in nine different ways, this is the One Spirit of God manifested in seven different portions. They are called 'lamps' in Revelation 4:5, "And out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices: and there were seven LAMPS of Fire burning before the throne, which are the seven Spirits of God".
There you have it. Hebrews 1:7, "And of the Angels He said, "Who makes his Angels Spirits, and His ministers a flame of Fire".
Proverbs 20:27, "The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord, searching all the inward parts of the belly." (Compare Hebrews 4:12). Of John the Baptist, Jesus said, "He was a burning and a shining Light: and you were willing for a season to rejoice in His Light" (John 5:35). The Spirit is found to be associated with man. When they have the Spirit upon them they become a flame of Fire, "burning and shining Lights." Lamps!
Revelation 5:6, "And I beheld, and in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth." Zechariah 4:10, "For who has despised the day of small things? For they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel with those seven; they are the eyes of the Lord, which run to and fro through the whole earth." These Scriptures speak of the seven portions of the Spirit which anointed the seven earthly angels or messengers, inspiring them to preach the Word which gave the new birth to the elect of their dispensation.
So the sevenfold Spirit of God which anointed the seven Church Age messengers is the Seven Trumpet angels of Revelation 8:2, and the Vial Angels of Revelation 15:1, 8. "And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvellous, seven Angels having the seven last plagues; for in them is filled up the wrath of God . . . And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God, and from His power; and no man was able to enter into the temple, till the seven plagues of the seven Angels were fulfilled." Like the Seven Trumpet judgments on Israel, the Seven Vials which are poured out upon the false church are largely past history.
The scenario is this: a Seal begins to manifest and God anoints a man. This angel or messenger begins to catch the revelation. His Message sounds a Gospel Trumpet which is a spiritual War for us Gentiles but a natural war of judgment for the Israelites who reject the Message of grace in each Church Age. A Vial pours upon rejecters who claim to be Christians. A Church Age opens, the new Message denominates and the cycle repeats.
March 1963 saw the close of the Laodicean Church Age, the fulfilment of Christ's Mediation and the completion of redemption (Revelation 3:22). In Revelation 5 Christ claimed the Book of Redemption and in Revelation 8:1 He opened the Seventh Seal.
In Revelation 8:2 we see the seven Angels or sevenfold Spirit of God that anointed the Seven Church Age Messengers sent forth into all the earth as Messages spoken by the lips of these godly men, to quicken the Church Age saints. In Revelation 4:5 and 5:6 we find these Spirits having done their work are back before the Throne of God. With all Seven Church Ages fulfilled "that which was in part is done away," and the Angels prepare to sound or reveal the seven Trumpet mysteries to Israel in Daniel's Seventieth Week through the ministry of two prophets.
In Revelation 8:3 another Angel, William Branham veiling Christ the Angel of the Covenant Who "discerned the thoughts and intents of the heart" revealing the Son of Man "as it was in the days of Lot" (Genesis 18; Luke 17:28-30; Hebrews 4:12). He indicted the apostate Gentiles through this ministry as He indicted the apostate Jews through Paul's ministry and "proclaimed the Day of Vengeance of our God" (Isaiah 61:2b).
In Romans 15:16 Paul said, "I am the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the Gospel of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost." That was the morning offering of the Church but you'll recall we learnt from the Pentecostal Feast of Leviticus 23 that in the evening two identical loaves baked with leaven were to be waved before God. The apostolic faith lost during the Church Ages was restored by the evening Light of Brother Branham's Message as per Joel 2:25; Zechariah 14:7; Malachi 4:5, 6b; Matthew 24:27, and Revelation 10:7, and the same Light that shone from Jerusalem in the East has been restored in the West. The same Message that sanctified Paul's group and made them acceptable to God makes us holy and acceptable to God. In his translation beyond the curtain of time the Prophet said, "Everything Paul preached, I preached exactly the same" and the saints responded, "We're resting on that".
In Revelation 10:1, after the opening of the Seven Sealed Book, we see another mighty Angel descend from heaven to earth with a Shout and with the Voice of the Archangel. This was Christ on earth, not in heaven for heaven is silent. This was His parousia Coming�in WORD Form�through the mouth of the prophet of Revelation 10:7 to unite with His end-time Bride. We can only unite with Christ as we receive the Word by faith (or a clear understanding). When the Seventh Trumpet manifests at the end of the Gentile dispensation, there will be a resurrection, the Sons of God will be manifested (or waved before the Lord as the bread of Life) and translated (I Thessalonians 4:16; I Corinthians 15:52).
Revelation 10:7 speaks of the angel to the Seventh or Laodicean Church Age who was the prophet William Branham; but the Spirit of Elijah in this day was the Fullness of the Spirit�our Lord Jesus Christ veiled behind the flesh of the seventh angel (Luke 17:30) whose voice still speaks.
Now let's continue and examine Revelation 8:3. "And another Angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto Him much incense, that He should add it to the prayers of ALL the saints upon the golden altar which is before the throne".
The task of this other Angel is to give a heavenly completeness to the earthly and imperfect prayers of the saints. These prayers represent the revelation of the individual members of the whole Body of Christ or Church of all ages. The incense ascends to God from the close of Laodicea to the end of the Gentile dispensation, terminating the days of man and ending God's grace toward sinners."
This incense is the fullness of the Word, the complete revelation (which is Christ), added to the imperfect revelation or PART Word of the Church Age saints for whom Christ was Mediator. "When that which is perfect has come, then that which was in PART is done away" (I Corinthians 13:10). God allotted a portion of Word and Spirit to each dispensation of the Church since Pentecost. In these last days He came in the Fullness through the Seven Seals that were revealed by the Message of the seventh angel. Here's how He revealed Himself.
Revelation 1:1-3, "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John: who bore record of the Word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that He saw. Blessed is he that reads, and they that hear the Words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand".
"The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him." When Jesus was here on earth the contents and revelation of this Book were unknown to Him. In Matthew 24:36 He said, "But of that day and hour knows no MAN, not even Me, no not the angels of heaven" for it was sealed unto the time of the end, and no one was worthy to take the Book or even look thereon. Then, when it was opened, there was silence in heaven. No one knew its contents but My Father ONLY".
God gave this revelation to Jesus after His earthly ministry. The Book contains the names of the elect and the saved. It is the Book of Revelation, or Holy Bible, the Book of Life and the Lamb's Book of Life, revealing Jesus Christ and His attributes�who are the redeemed, and how He redeemed them through the Ages.
God gave this revelation to Jesus, "to show unto His servants," the earthly angels to the Seven Church Ages, the Word for their day: "things which must shortly come to pass." John 16:13, "When the Spirit of truth is come, He will guide you into all the truth for your day for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear (from the Father), and that shall He speak: and He will show you things which must shortly come to pass".
Only as we walk in the Light of the PRESENT Truth or "things that must shortly come to pass" can we come under the Blood or be born-again (I John 1:7). God is only writing epistles of the Word He is fulfilling NOW.
"And He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John." Jesus SIGNIFIED or re-presented these things in SYMBOLS by His Messenger to the prophet John in a series of visions over two years on the Isle of Patmos. Jesus' 'angel' was the messenger to the Laodicean Church Age, the prophet William Branham. God showed these things to Jesus, and Jesus revealed them to one man only, the prophet of Revelation 3:14 and 10:7. John was caught up in the Spirit into the Day of the Lord that follows the Gentile dispensation; in the visions he saw and heard the 'angel' Brother Branham preach the mysteries. Nobody could know these things except by the ministry of the seventh angel, for the interpretation of the prophecy of this Book was sealed unto the time of the end (Daniel 12:4, 9; Revelation 10:3-7). "But in the days of the Voice of the seventh angel, the mystery of God should be finished".
John "bore record of the Word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that He saw"�not all things that he heard because he was forbidden to write what the seven thunders (voices of God) spoke through the angels to the Seven Church Ages. "Blessed is he that reads, and they that hear (or understand) the Words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand" [for these prophecies to manifest progressively through the successive dispensations of the Church].
Jesus clearly states in Revelation 1:8 that He is Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending. He was the Word or faith once delivered unto the apostolic fathers at Pentecost, and He is that same Word restored to the end-time Bride, but He is not the PART-Word and guesswork that was in between. He was a Mediator through the Church Ages because the Book was sealed, and the faith was lost when Rome martyred the saints. Without a Mediator for error taught as Gospel truth�trinities, false baptisms in titles, catechisms, etc., those Brethren could not have been born-again.
Brother Branham's ministry was to gather up all the loose ends of the incomplete revelation unfinished in the previous six Church Ages and then reveal the fullness of Redemption's story through History, showing the position of each Age in the Word by the revelation of the Seven Seals so that the end-time Bride will know the Scriptures that must be fulfilled in her life. This is not a new Gospel it is the original apostolic faith restored and made complete by the Seals so that the offering-up of the Gentiles in the manifestation of the Sons of God or new wave offering after the close of grace might be acceptable to God. This was typed by the manna God sent down from heaven for six days to sustain Israel's natural life in the wilderness. There was no new manna on the seventh day. Heaven was silent! And Israel ate of the remnant of what had already been given them on the sixth day.
In Revelation 8:1 the Lion of the tribe of Judah opened the Seventh Seal. Then He gave "much incense" of the end-time Message that "finished the mystery of God" to the seventh angel. During the silence in heaven of about half an hour"�the "much incense" (Revelation 8:3) of "the Revelation of Jesus Christ" added to the faith of the PART-Word saints in the censer on the golden altar ensures the finished Body is "a sweet savour of Christ" when offered back to God as two wave loves.
Once God has received the revelation of "all the saints," grace is ended and He responds by casting His wrath upon the earth in the Seventh Trumpet under the Sixth Seal.
Revelation 8:4-5, "And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the Angel's hand. And the Angel took the same censer that offered the incense, and filled it with Fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake".
The tribulation period under the Sixth Seal serves a threefold purpose. Firstly for the purification of the foolish virgins, to purge them of their carnality; secondly, God purges Israel's 144,000, and thirdly, the whole earth, moon, stars, and all nature will be purged. Earth is cleansing herself for the Millennium. Everything that has any uncleanliness is to be purged during the Sixth Seal.
The climax of the Trumpet judgments announces Christ's Coming to Israel as in Egypt they announced the appearance of Joseph. It is also the climax of the Vials upon the false church. The Feast of Trumpets reveals Christ to the 144,000 under the Sixth Seal and as Joseph's Gentile Bride and children were hidden in the palace when Joseph revealed Himself to his brethren, Christ's Gentile Bride will be in the palace when He reveals Himself to His brethren.
". . . and there were Voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake" (Revelation 8:5; 11:19; 16:18). This will be the sinking of Los Angeles in the unprecedented convulsion of nature at the end of the Gentile dispensation and the "silence in heaven about the space of half an hour".
Revelation 11:15-19, "And the Seventh Trumpet Angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying: The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign forever and ever. [The Gentile dispensation and silence in heaven are finished]. And the four and twenty elders, which sat before God on their thrones, fell upon their faces, and worshipped Him, saying, We give You thanks, O Lord God Almighty, who is, and was, and is to come; because You have taken to Yourself Your great power, and have begun to reign".
"And the nations were angry, and Your wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that You should give reward unto Your servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear Your Name, small and great; and should destroy them which destroy the earth. And the Holy Place and Holy of Holies of God in heaven was seen to be opened because there was no veil separating and concealing the Most Holy Place, and there was seen in His Holy of Holies the ark of His testament: [which is Jesus Christ] and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail".
Revelation 16:15-21, "Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame. And He gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon. And the Seventh Vial Angel poured out his vial into the air; and a great voice out of the Most Holy Place of heaven, from the throne, said, "It is done!" [That ends the silence in heaven, and the Gentile dispensation (Revelation 11:15; 15:8)]".
And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great.
And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath. And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found. And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great".
The earthquake marks the opening of the Sixth Seal at the manifestation of the Seventh Trumpet. Los Angeles and 1,500x3 � 400 miles of California will sink beneath the Pacific. The Gentile dispensation is closed and the Seventh Vial pours out the final plague upon the false church.
"And the seven Angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound" the mystery in the antitype of their Feast of Trumpets to gather Israel to the Day of Atonement prior to the Feast of Tabernacles (Revelation 8:6). [Once again God's Holy Bible declares the Israelites have not yet returned to the Land of their Covenant which has been stolen by non-Semitic, anti-Semitic self-styled Jews].
As the revelation of the first five Seals of Revelation 6 revealed mostly what has happened in the past, the seven Trumpet mysteries of Revelation 8-11 will reveal Israel's history of the past 2,000 years during which their forefathers rejected the announcements, "Messiah is coming, bend the knee".
In John 14:3, Jesus said, "I go to prepare a place for you." That place is the temple or dwelling of God�New Jerusalem which will come down from God out of heaven as a Bride adorned for her Groom. It is our own glorified bodies. Christ 'prepared' our places by mediating for the ignorance of the Church Age saints, and offering up "much incense" of the fullness of the Word with us all. bb960508.htm
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