Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #29 of Revelation, chapter 11, and we will be reading Revelation 11:14-15:

The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly. And the seventh 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 for ever and ever.

We are continuing to go carefully through this chapter, verse by verse.  Verse 14 tells us: “The second woe is past and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly.” 

The word “past” is often translated as “went” or “gone” or “departed.”  Only two times is it translated as “past,” and the other time it is translated as “past” is in Revelation 9:12: “One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.”  So it is not really the word “past,” but it just means that one woe is “gone” or “went.”

We realized back in Revelation 8 that the first four trumpets were dealing with God’s judgment on the churches.  You can read Revelation, chapter 8, to see that.  Then we read this in Revelation 8:13:

And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound!

Here God is making that transition: the first four trumpets dealt with the judgment which began at the house of God, the corporate churches, and the last three trumpets begin after it says: “Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth,” and this is the “target” of the woes.  It is the nations of the world or the unsaved people that inhabit the earth.  And just as the first four trumpets identified with the Great Tribulation period (the time when judgment was on the churches), so, too, the last three trumpets identify with Judgment Day.  We have to be careful that we do not get thrown off course by thinking there is some sort of chronological order – that the first woe comes and then it is past; then the second woe comes and then it is past; and then the third woe comes, and so on.  This could lead people to think these are references to different periods of time, but they are not.  They all identify with the same Judgment Day, which began on May 21, 2011.  All three “woes” deal with that point in time and with the prolonged judgment which follows, and this will very likely be for a period of 1,600 days.  Then the judgment would be complete, if we are correct. 

Another thing to remember is that each one of the “woes” identify with a trumpet blast.  This is why, beginning in Revelation 9:1, it says, “The fifth angel sounded,” and that was the fifth trumpet; then we read about the smoke coming out of the pit and the locusts coming out of the smoke, and so forth.  Then following all that information, it said in Revelation 9:12: “One woe is past; and, behold, there comes two more woes hereafter.”  Well, when did that “woe” begin?  It began at the sounding of the fifth trumpet and it ends when God says it ends.  So the fifth woe, or the fifth trumpet blast, ends in Revelation 9:12, and then it foretold, “There comes two more woes hereafter.”  Then in Revelation 9:13, it says: “And the sixth angel sounded,” and that begins the “second woe.”  Then we go through the rest of Revelation 9 (to the end of the chapter) and we read of the “two hundred million” and the slaying of the “third part of men” and the rest of men would not repent.  Then it goes into the entire chapter of Revelation 10 and into Revelation 11 and up until Revelation 11:14: “The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly.”  We went over all this ground and we covered all the information from the conclusion of that first woe, through the second woe and now we are going to begin discussing the third woe, which cometh quickly.  It comes in the very next verse, in Revelation 11:15:

And the seventh angel sounded;

Again, this would be the “third woe.”  The fifth trumpet was the “first woe.”  The sixth trumpet was the “second woe,” and now the seventh trumpet identifies with the “third woe.”  This is the third and final woe.  God is continuing to discuss the judgment upon the inhabiters of the earth.  He is continuing to discuss Judgment Day itself.

It says in Revelation 11:15:

And the seventh 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 for ever and ever.

This seventh angel that sounded is the last of the seven.  He is the last trumpet.  The Bible tells us in 1Corinthians 15 what is to take place at the sound of the last trumpet.  It says in 1Corinthians 15:51-52:

Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

So the last trumpet is the seventh trumpet that sounded and we will see that it sounded on May 21, 2011.  If that is true that the last trumpet sounded on May 21, 2011, then why were we not changed?  This is the obvious question because it says in 1Corinthians 15:51:

… but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

Here is the definition of what it means to be “changed.”  It is to be raised from the dead and to receive a new resurrected body.  That should happen at the last trump.  According to what EBible Fellowship is teaching, May 21, 2011 was Judgment Day and the “three woes” sounded simultaneously and they all identify with Judgment Day, then why were we not changed?  It is an obvious question.  It is a good question that deserves an answer.

The answer is that Judgment Day, which began on May 21, 2011, is not finished yet; that is, the Day of Judgment is under way.  God began to blow the trumpet, just like He began to bring judgment and He has continued to bring judgment all the days since May 21, 2001, spiritually, as the door to heaven has remained closed this entire time in these days after that great tribulation.  Therefore, the trumpet has continued to sound. 

In 1Corinthians 15:52, where it says, “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,” the Greek word translated as “in.”  It should be translated as “in,” but when it gets to the next phrase, “at the last trump,” the English word “at” is a translation of the same Greek word that is translated as “in.”  Then it would correctly read, “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, in the last trump.”   Just think of a trumpet sound you have heard.  Maybe you have heard someone blow a long blast on a trumpet and it was not just a short toot, but he put the trumpet to his lips, put his head back and sounded as long as he could – he held the note.  This is the idea, but, of course, this is spiritual and God can hold this trumpet blast for as long as He desires, just as He can identify a long period of time (like the 1,600 days) as a single day, if He so pleases to do so. 

Here is a Biblical account (an historical account) of the idea of this last trumpet sounding in a long manner.  We read in Exodus 19:13-14:

There shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether it be beast or man, it shall not live: when the trumpet soundeth long, they shall come up to the mount.

Then it says in Exodus 19:18-19:

And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because JEHOVAH descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice.

Here we have an historical illustration of this idea of a prolonged trumpet blast: “And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder.”  This is the idea that 1Corinthians 15 has in view.  And here we are in the judgment period, the final judgment of mankind, and the trumpet has begun to sound and is sounding throughout the days we have been living upon the earth in the Day of Judgment.  It will continue to sound up until the very last day.

Let us suppose we are correct in our understanding that God will complete His judgment after 10,000 days (the 8,400 days of the Great Tribulation, plus the 1,600 days of Judgment Day), and on the 10,000^th day on October 7, 2015 it will also have been the last day of Tabernacles and the last day of harvest; on that 10,000^th day the trumpet completes its sounding that has been ongoing for four years, four months and sixteen days (1,600 days); and the trumpet finishes blowing and, immediately, “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

So that last day is the day of the resurrection, as the dead in Christ rise first, as taught by 1Thessalonians 4:16:

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Now we have complete harmony between 1Corinthians 15, 1Thessalonians 4 and our verse in Revelation 11:13.  The seventh angel sounds on May 21, 2011; it is a prolonged trumpet blast.  The messenger of God “soundeth long,” and at the end of these days of judgment and the completion of the wrath of God, it will be the “last day.”  That day identifies with the language of the Bible that says, “And I will raise him up at the last day,” or where it says “the resurrection at the last day,” or the judgment at the last day.  They all fit together and harmonize once we understand that Biblical principal concerning what God has done with time.  It is Biblical because the Bible tells us how the Lord identifies the forty years in the wilderness as “the day of temptation in the wilderness.”  That is God’s prerogative, if He wants to identify a long period of time as “a moment,” or as an “hour,” or as a “day.”  There is no hindrance.  There is no one that can say, “You cannot do that.”  When we read the Bible, we see God has done this and that is what He has done at this time.  That helped God to lay the “snare” when He said Judgment Day begins on May 21, 2011.  Everyone was looking for that 24-hour period and when it passed, what a relief it was for some people: “Oh, nothing happened.  We told you that no man can know the day or the hour.”  Then everyone went back to their sins, back to the world, back to the churches and to their former doctrines.  Everyone now is “at ease,” and when man is at ease he returns to what he knows best – his sinfulness.  That is exactly what has happened and, yet, God did, indeed, bring the Day of Judgment and He has continued to bring it.  It is really not that difficult a concept to understand and, yet, when you hear individuals who ought to know better and they point to 1Thessalonians 4 or 1Corinthians 15 and they say, “Well, look.  It says at the last trump, which is Judgment Day, it is also the resurrection and the time of being raised up.”  Then they ask the question, “Were we resurrected on May 21, 2011?  No – therefore that was not Judgment Day.”  They are completely missing what God has done and unless God opens their eyes, they have been ensnared in the way God hid Judgment Day from the eyes of the natural man. 

Let us go back to Revelation 11:15:

And the seventh 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 for ever and ever.

This is a wonderful, glorious and beautiful verse that really helps us a great deal to see the good and the positive thing that came out of May 21, 2011.  We have spent a lot of time taking about the end of God’s salvation and that is very grievous, sorrowful and tragic.  But, here, God looks at another aspect of Judgment Day and this is super glorious; this is the point when the kingdoms of this world became the kingdoms of our Lord.  Some might say, “Well, hold on, did that happen on May 21, 2011?  I look around and I do not see God ruling; I see incredible wickedness and evil all around.  Things are getting worse.”  Yes, that is true, but that does not mean the kingdoms of this world have not become the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ.

When we get together in our next Bible study, we are going to spend some time with this wonderful topic.  The Lord Jesus has been exalted.  He has been victorious and He has conquered Satan and his kingdom and now reigns over all that Satan previously reigned over.