Revelation Chapter 16
Further Explanation of Symbols
The Joshua account of the siege of Jericho contains other interesting symbolisms. In one sense, the ark symbolizes God’s presence amidst His people, but in another sense the journeying ark and the priests carrying and accompanying it represent the transit of the Christ class from the wilderness state toward the house of rest above.
The seven priests who blew the trumpets correspond to the seven individual messengers to the Church (Rev. 1:20), but in a secondary sense they represent the message of the Church.
The “armed men” who preceded the trumpet-bearing priests assumed the appearance of a protective shield or vanguard to the entire marching procession; on second thought, they emblemize the guardian angelic host (under the instruction of the risen Lord), without whose aid the fallen angels and legions of demons would frustrate and abort God’s purpose—a thing not to be tolerated. These are the “watchers” of the Israel of God (Dan. 4:13,17). “They that be with us are more than they that be” against us (2 Kings 6:15–17; Compare Psa. 34:7; 91:11; Matt. 28:20; Heb. 1:14).
It is again stressed that the seven trumpets and the seven plagues of the Apocalypse occur under very different circumstances. The trumpets sound down through the age, but the seven plague-message pourings of the seventh day commence during the harvest period shortly after the return of the antitypical Moses, the invisible risen Lord—during the seventh trumpet era.
A Confirmation
The Hebrew sacred year was marked by blowing the ram’s horn at the appearance of the new moon each month (Num. 10:10; Psa. 81:3). But the blowing of the ram’s horn on the first day of the seventh month was something extra special. It was styled “a [climactic] day of blowing the trumpets” (Num. 29:1) and “a memorial of blowing of trumpets” (Lev. 23:24). This day is generally called the Feast of Trumpets. The term “feast” is frequently associated with the number seven, such as the seven days of the Feast of Passover, the Feast of Weeks, the Feast of Tabernacles, etc.
The blowing of trumpets on that particular day not only signified that the beginning of the seventh month memorialized and included the previous six first-day-of-the-month soundings as an accumulative total of seven, but also signified that on the first day of the seventh month, there were a recognizable seven soundings of the trumpet, setting it apart from other months of the year. The Hebrew sacred year new-month soundings coincide with the theme of the Joshua scenario.
Midnight Hour Correspondences
A helpful correspondence exists between the seventh Revelation plague and the tenth or last plague of the Exodus. Viewed from a dispensational standpoint and in a collective sense of fulfillment, the blood-spattered doors of the Israelite households imply the demise and the translation of the Very Elect firstborn, from earth to the spirit realm, at the midnight hour of the Gospel Age Passover night. From a similar perspective, the unmarked doors of the Egyptian households signify the demise of the Second Death firstborn class when the destroying angel (Satan) goes throughout the land in his hour of power near at hand. Moreover, the seventh or last plague is synonymous in fulfillment with the midnight hour of the parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins and the twelfth hour of the parable of the Penny (Matt. 25:1–13; 20:1–16).
With this we conclude here with our study of Chapter 16 of Revelation.
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