“The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up” (Revelation 8:7).

John gives us no clue as to what the Trumpet sounded like. It certainly wasn’t a plaintive sound or a sweet melody! If you could imagine having to warn someone far away and had only a trumpet, what would it sound like? How long would you blast it?

The immediate result of that trumpet sound was devastation. The way this occurs is interesting. First, what God’s destructive weapons were are described. Then, the nature of the destruction is presented. To understand what God is telling us, we must look at those issues in just that order.

Before we do that, it is important to grasp when this comes in the end time. The Bible is clear. The Seals occur in sequence (they are numbered) – and – you will soon note how the Trumpets come in order (partly), meshed right with them:

Seal one        Beginning of Latter Rain (144,000)      

Seal two         Persecution begins (Babylon)

Seal three      Saints waiting to be called out of Babylon

Seal four        Babylon prepares to kill God’s people

Seal five         Martyrs cry out for vengeance of their blood

  THEN – A DIVINE RESPONSE TO THAT CRY

  Trumpet One: Hail – fire – blood

Seal six          Earthquake – celestial signs – coming of Jesus

Seal seven    Silence in heaven – saints en route to their celestial home

How do we know that this is accurate? Let’s first remember the coals in verse 5. They were cast to the ground in a dramatic commentary insert. The coals purified. They also brought judgment. What judgment? The Trumpet plagues. That commentary was a “preface” to the Trumpets. That imagery was telling us that the coal judgments would be the overall consequence of the Seven Trumpets. We also learned that the Altar setting from which the coals came was in sequence with the Altar setting of the fifth Seal. Thus, the weight of evidence suggests that the Trumpets begin between Seals five and six.

But – God has given us another clue in the Old Testament: “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit [Latter Rain/time of the first Seal] upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke [Trumpets]. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood [sixth Seal], before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come [sixth Seal]” (Joel 2:28, 30-31).

Now we know that the Seals and Trumpets have a partial overlap. Before the sixth Seal, when probation has closed, comes the final Trumpet warnings – just like ancient Israel acted out in the Feast of Trumpets. And – that was 1500 years before!

What about those tools God used?

THE TOOLS:

Hail – Fire – Blood

These weapons struck and destroyed a large part of the earth – “they were cast upon the earth.” For a final appeal to be effective, the world must see that such a scourge is supernatural. It must be seen as God’s wrath. It has to appeal to the dullest imagination. People must sense how helpless they are in the face of such terror. But why hail, fire and blood?

Here is an interesting principle that expositor White gave to us over a century ago:

“God has a storehouse of retributive judgments, which He permits to fall upon those who have continued in sin in the face of great light. I have seen the most costly structures in buildings erected and supposed to be fireproof. And just as Sodom perished in the flames of God’s vengeance, so will these proud structures become ashes. I have seen vessels which cost immense sums of money wrestling with the mighty waters, seeking to breast the angry billows. But with all their treasures of gold and silver, and with their human freight they sink into a watery grave. Man’s pride will be buried with the treasures he has accumulated by fraud. God will avenge the widows and orphans who in hunger and nakedness have cried to Him for help from oppression and abuse.

“The time is right upon us when there will be sorrow in the world that no human balm can heal. The flattering monuments of men’s greatness will be crumbled in the dust, even before the last great destruction comes upon the world [Seven Vial Plagues]….

“Only by being clothed with the robe of Christ’s righteousness can we escape the judgments that are coming upon the earth.–Letter 20, 1901.”[1]

As in the plagues of Egypt, God has an arsenal of supernatural ways to punish and wake up the evil heart. It also brings to an end part of their earthly treasures. Those especially who have irrevocably resisted God’s last call of mercy come to their end.

Hail – Fire

There are many illustrations in the Bible where God warns, punishes and destroys using fire, hail or both. Fire and brimstone destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:24). Hail was an essential part of God’s war against wickedness (Job 38:22-23, Isaiah 30:29-32, Haggai 2:14-19).

Occurring together, they are portrayed in many references as bringing total devastation. “He gave them hail for rain, and flaming fire in their land” (Psalm 105:32, Exodus 9:23-24). The imagery is one similar to the Egyptian plagues.

It is most interesting to listen in on an observation E. G. White made: “Egypt was nearly ruined by lightning. And the hail mingled with fire [from the lightning] had broken down their forests,” and destroyed their crops and cattle.[2]

Blood

In Egypt the great Nile River was considered sacred. Pharaoh revered that river. Each morning he punctually came to its banks and offered praise and thanksgiving to it: “telling the water of its great power, and without it they could not exist.”[3]

Moses met Pharaoh at the river in the morning hours, just as God commanded, and it became blood. In this first Trumpet, why is the hail mingled with blood? The martyrs had just cried out, “How long? … dost thou not judge and avenge our blood” (Revelation 6:10). Recall that the two altar messages were sequenced together – now, the blood imagery (6:9 and 8:3-5).

In a terrifying rebuke, the wicked are not only scourged with hail and fire but, in a stinging reprimand, blood surrounds the hail. We recently saw why these plagues had to be literal. Thus, the first Trumpet sound begins one of earth’s most frightening calamities.

The Consequences

Trees and Grass Burnt Up

John was introduced to the Trees in the interlude between Seals six and seven (Revelation 7:1). Four angels were holding the four winds of strife back to prevent hurting the:

Earth:     Literally and symbolically (the wicked)

Sea:       Literally and symbolically (peoples, nations and lanes of commerce – Revelation 17–18)

Trees:    Literally and symbolically (leaders, especially of the wicked in Revelation’s context)

Grass:    Literally and symbolically (people claiming to be God’s children but are in rebellion)

Here we see destruction of one third of the trees and all of the grass. Does this picture the four winds of Revelation 7 being loosed? At first it seems that way. But – there is something most important to observe.

When the four winds are completely let loose, terrible destruction comes in full. “The whole world will be involved in ruin more terrible than came upon Jerusalem of old.”[4] In the first four Trumpets, only a portion of the earth is destroyed.

That distinction – partial ruin, warning versus complete ruin, final punishment – helps us to grasp what now unfolds.

“Four mighty angels are still holding the four winds of the earth. Terrible destruction is forbidden to come in full. The accidents by land and by sea; the loss of life, steadily increasing, by storm, by tempest, by railroad disaster, by conflagration; the terrible floods, the earthquakes, and the winds will be the stirring up of the nations to one deadly combat, while the angels hold the four winds, forbidding the terrible power of Satan to be exercised in its fury until the servants of God are sealed in their foreheads. Get ready, get ready, I beseech you, get ready before it shall be forever too late! The ministers of vengeance will pour all the terrible judgments upon a God-forsaken people.”[5]

“The time of God’s destructive judgments is the time of mercy for those who have no opportunity to learn what is truth….  Large numbers will be admitted who in these last days hear the truth for the first time (RH July 5, 1906).”[6]

What is destroyed, then, in this first Trumpet plague? The setting invites us to view the havoc as mainly literal. Based on the ten plagues in Egypt, we must conclude that this Trumpet describes real fire, hail and blood that destroy one third of the trees and grass.

Gardens, vegetation and trees that support mankind are lost. The food supply is disrupted. Is it any wonder that one of the restrictions that is placed on God’s people is to prohibit them from buying and selling (Revelation 13:17)? “Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her” (Revelation 18:8).

The story of the “grass” doesn’t stop there. Grass symbolically represents people (Isaiah 40:7, 51:12; I Peter 1:24). It says that the “green” grass was burned up. The Greek word here for “green” is chloros, suggesting pale green. Amazing! That is the same color given the “pale” horse of Revelation 6. They represented the “Christian” people who brought harm, even death, to God’s people.

Do you think – just maybe – that God is now reacting to the martyrs’ cry, and their destruction has now begun (especially of their leaders, represented by trees)? The evidence supports that conclusion.

“To our merciful God the act of punishment is a strange act. ‘As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live.’ Ezekiel 33:11. The Lord is ‘merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, … forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.’ Yet He will ‘by no means clear the guilty.’ Exodus 34:6, 7. While He does not delight in vengeance, He will execute judgment upon the transgressors of His law. He is forced to do this, to preserve the inhabitants of the earth from utter depravity and ruin. In order to save some He must cut off those who have become hardened in sin. ‘The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked.’ Nahum 1:3. By terrible things in righteousness He will vindicate the authority of His downtrodden law. And the very fact of His reluctance to execute justice testifies to the enormity of the sins that call forth His judgments and to the severity of the retribution awaiting the transgressor.”[7]

                Literal                                                     Symbolic

              (famine)                                                  (judgment)

1/3 trees destroyed (famine)                  1/3 apostate leaders destroyed

1/3 grass destroyed (famine)                 1/3 apostate wicked destroyed

Do both occur? The contextual imagery and exegetic ties invite a “yes.”

Revelation 8:7 “echoes Ezek. 38:22, which refers to the final end-time defeat of Gog by the Lord: ‘I will judge him … with blood, and sweeping rain, and hailstones. And I will rain fire on him.’ Jewish tradition used Ezek. 38:22 in connection with the hail–plague imagery of Exodus and applied it to end-time events.”[8]

That Strange Third

The destruction of one third of the vegetation draws on the influence of Ezekiel 5:2, 12 (cf. Zechariah 13:8-9). There, judgment is symbolically related to “scales for weighing.” Israel’s fate is divided into thirds:

• 1/3 burned with fire

• 1/3 struck by the sword

• 1/3 scattered into captivity

This prophetic fraction usually alludes to the wicked. In the Trumpets alone it is used twelve times:

• 1/3 of the earth will be burned up

• 1/3 of the trees will be burned up

• 1/3 of the sea will turn into blood

• 1/3 of the sea creatures will die

• 1/3 of the ships on the sea will sink

• 1/3 of the rivers and springs will become contaminated

• 1/3 of the light from the sun will be taken away

• 1/3 of the light from the moon will be taken away

• 1/3 of the light from the stars will be taken away

• 1/3 of the day will be without light

• 1/3 of the night will be without light

• 1/3 of the troops will be killed in the sixth Trumpet war

This unveils two divine messages:

1.   God’s desolating wrath has begun

2.   God’s mercy is still extended to two thirds

If the Trumpets could be explained by natural phenomena, then the reason for God’s authoritative intervention would be lost. There is now only a few months remaining in earth’s probation. Opportunity is closing. The eternal destiny of the world is about to be fixed. Through the first four Trumpets, God is nudging the minds and senses of man toward an irrevocable decision.

Like Pharaoh of old, the opportunity to repent was wide open. But – and here is a sad commentary – with every resistance, the heart is hardened all the more. So it will be at the end. The Trumpets are so dramatic, so devastating and so final, they bring man to an eternally moral decision that will never again change.

“The time of God’s destructive judgments is the time of mercy for those who have no opportunity to learn what is truth.
Tenderly will the Lord look upon them. His heart of mercy is touched; His hand is still stretched out to save, while the door is closed to those who would not enter.”[9]

“The purpose of this Trumpet demands that it be viewed as an act of God on the people of the earth, so that they will turn from ignoring Him, get ‘off the fence,’ and begin to make a definitive decision to follow God or to reject Him. Since it occurs in close conjunction with the Latter Rain, it is accompanied by the beginning of the Loud Cry of the 144,000. As God uses this natural disaster to get the attention of the people, He sends them a call to repentance through His prophets.”[10]

Are you surprised at what God is doing? Don’t be. Ever since sin broke its unwelcomed way into our space, God has had a plan to bring it to an end. In the dramatic story of the Trumpets, the curtain is drawn back and we are given a preview of just how He will bring it all to a climax.

Can’t you see Him, however, so painfully slowly, releasing the wicked to their doom? We can hear His heart throb extra hard now. He let us even glimpse into His thoughts of anguish, “How can I let thee go?” But He does – little by little. He yearns and watches a lover leave, trying to get a last glimpse. As she almost disappears into the horizon, what does He do? Uses a Trumpet call – “Come home!” “I’ll take you back!” Might He even weep with a torn heart?

Well, He’s not satisfied with one Trumpet. A second one is about to sound. Is it louder, more shrill and penetrating? It seems that way. Let’s see what that call does.