Seven Trumpet Warnings (part 1 of 2)

They Are Happening Now!

Don’t say you weren’t warned. When the seventh trumpet sounds it will be too late to give heed to the preceding six. Unfortunately, very few people have heard the trumpets. They give no credence to their warning. The only way to be prepared for the seventh trumpet is to acknowledge God’s eternal plan and trust Jesus as Savior, Lord, and coming King. When the last trumpet sounds the saints will be gathered up to be with the Lord and the nations will be judged. God will begin to set up his eternal, perfect kingdom. And that kingdom will not include any who refuse to believe His truth and trust His love. Surrender to the God of the universe. That is your ticket to enjoy His love and presence forever.

The seven trumpet warnings are found in Revelation, chapters 8 to 14. Some interpreters think that they are trumpet judgments, apocalyptic foretelling of God’s coming wrath. Not so. His wrath and judgment are revealed in the seven bowl judgments (Rev. 15-16) that follow the seventh trumpet. The seven successive trumpet warnings are catastrophic events that man himself initiates, not God, events that should sound a desperate warning that we are bringing upon ourselves the end of the world, the coming judgment of God. But once again, no one is paying attention. Even in the description of the seven trumpets it says that no one pays attention (Rev 9:20-21). No one turns from their evil ways to trust God – not in mass, that is.  

Trumpets have long been the means by which warnings were sounded. In ancient days a walled city was built on a hill. A watchman could survey the surrounding landscape and watch for approaching danger. If needed he would sound the trumpet to gather all the city’s dwellers to come in from the surrounding fields to be safe inside the walls. During wars such as the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, the bugle would sound to give orders and warnings.

Trumpets have not always been the brass instrument that we are familiar with. But in whatever shape and form was common to a people and an era, the trumpet has been the means by which to send out a signal, far and wide. And the most crucial signal to send and to heed is that of a warning of impending danger. That is why the imagery of seven trumpets is used in Revelation. They are warnings to mankind.

Trumpet Warning #1

The first trumpet in John’s apocalyptic vision (Rev 8:7) describes hail and fire mixed with blood falling to the ground, and approximately 33% of all of the grass and trees in the known world destroyed. During World War I, large amounts of artillery shells and chemical agents were released on troops for the first time in history through modern warfare, killing as many as 18 million people. Soldiers on both sides burned vast tracts of land in order to eliminate any natural or man-made items that their enemies could use.

Trumpet Warning #2

The second trumpet foretold another great war, World War II (Rev 8:8-9). The Bible explains that a third of the ships involved in the conflict would be destroyed. During World War II, that is what occurred -- approximately one third of the ships that participated in the conflict were sunk. Additionally, the nuclear bombs deployed upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki resembled “something like a great mountain burning with fire” (Rev 8:8), a sight that was phenomenally new on the world stage. Death toll estimates range as high as 70 million, the deadliest in world history.

Trumpet Warning #3

The third trumpet (Rev 8:10-11) prophetically describes the nuclear age which we live in, with the 1986 nuclear disaster at Chernobyl being the flagship. Apocalyptically, this disaster is described as a star, called Wormwood, falling and affecting a third of the waters. Take note that “chernobyl” is the Ukrainian translation for the word “wormwood”. Furthermore, the nuclear radiation that emanated from the Chernobyl meltdown contaminated more than 33 percent of the water supply in Europe and Western Asia, killing thousands and affecting hundreds of thousands of other citizens with diseases caused by the radiation.

Since the beginning of the nuclear age at the beginning of the 20^th century, mankind has lived with the fear of nuclear contamination, nuclear meltdowns, and nuclear warfare. While recently touring the Reactor B plutonium site at Hanford, I noticed a quote made by J. Robert Oppenheimer, the leading scientist on the Manhattan project.  When the first atom bomb was detonated on July 16, 1945, in the Trinity test in New Mexico, he remarked that it brought to mind words from a Hindu writing: "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

Fearful that the Germans would beat the allies in developing a nuclear weapon, physicist Albert Einstein wrote to FDR, urgently pushing America's atomic bomb development. But after the devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he and many scientists on the project publicly expressed deep regret. “I made one great mistake in my life”, he wrote in 1954, “when I signed a letter to FDR recommending that atom bombs be made.”

The atomic bomb is such a significant warning to mankind of the impending end of the age that it is actually mentioned at least three times in the prophecies of Revelation – 8:8; 8:10; 13:13; and possibly 9:18 (although that war seems to be conventional -- tanks, artillery and aircraft).