This message is quite crucial in our fellowship on the apostles’ teaching concerning God’s New Testament economy from the incarnation of God to the consummation of the New Jerusalem. In this message we want to see the seven seals, the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls in relation to the rapture of the saints—as the secrets of the universe concerning man from the time of Christ’s ascension to eternity in the future without ending. If we are going to understand the rapture, we must understand these three sets of “sevens”—the seven seals, the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls.
The seven seals are the mystery of God’s economy (Rev. 6:1-17; 8:1-2). The first four seals are the course of the four horses: gospel preaching, war, famine, and death (Rev. 6:1-8; Matt. 24:6-8, 14). The course of these four horses is the course of the world in the present age of the church. Immediately after Christ’s ascension, these four things—the gospel, war, famine, and death—began to run like riders on four horses and will continue until the end of this age. Beginning with the first century, the gospel has been spreading throughout all these twenty centuries. The gospel takes the lead. War among the human race has also been proceeding simultaneously. War has always caused famine, and famine has issued in death. These four seals began from the ascension of Christ and will continue to the supernatural calamities in the sixth seal (Rev. 6:12-17).
The fifth seal is the cry of the martyred saints for vengeance (Rev. 6:9-11). While the gospel is being preached, as indicated by the first seal, there is always the martyrdom of the faithful saints. Now we need to consider the rapture of the overcomers. We can consider this as an insertion between the fifth and sixth seals.
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Before the sixth seal is opened, there will be the rapture of the overcomers. Before the supernatural calamities come in, God will take away His faithful ones. They will be raptured to Zion in the heavens where the throne of God and Christ are today, and the time of their rapture will be before the beginning of the great tribulation in the sixth seal. The great tribulation begins from the sixth seal and ends with the seventh bowl.
According to the Bible, we can classify the overcomers into five categories. First, there is the man-child, composed of the resurrected martyrs who should participate in “the extra resurrection,” “the better resurrection” (Rev. 12:5; Phil. 3:11; Heb. 11:35). Paul said in Philippians 3:11 that he wanted to attain to the extra resurrection. In Greek, the prefix ex is added to the Greek word for resurrection. Paul wanted to attain to such an ex-resurrection. In Hebrews 11:35 the term “the better resurrection” is used. The man-child will participate in this extra resurrection, the better resurrection.
The second category of overcomers is the firstfruit (Rev. 14:1, 4). The third category is the Philadelphia overcomers (Rev. 3:7-8). The watchful and beseeching overcomers are the fourth category (Luke 21:36). Finally, the fifth category is the watchful one of the two saints (Matt. 24:40-42). The two saints in Matthew 24 represent the living saints at the time of the Lord’s parousia. In Matthew 25 the ten virgins represent the dead saints. Ten is the majority of twelve, whereas two is the remainder. At the Lord’s parousia, at His coming, a majority of the saints, represented by ten-twelfths, are the dead ones, and a minority of the saints, represented by two-twelfths, are the living ones. Among the living ones, some will be taken away, raptured, and some will be left.
The above five categories of overcomers will be raptured before the opening of the sixth seal. After the rapture of the overcomers, in the midst of the last week (seven years) of the seventy weeks revealed in Daniel 9:24-27, Antichrist will break his one-week (seven years) covenant with Israel, and the great tribulation (Matt. 24:21) will begin and last for three and a half years—forty-two months—one thousand two hundred and sixty days, in which period of time the following evils, supernatural calamities, plagues, and woes will take place. First, Satan will be cast from heaven to the earth to cause, with great rage, woes to the earth and the sea and to persecute God’s people, those who still remain on the earth, and he will war with the Jews, who keep the commandments of God, and the believers, who have the testimony of Jesus (Rev. 12:7, 12b-13, 17). Second, Antichrist, who will come up out of the abyss (Rev. 17:8), will exalt himself above all that is called God or an object of worship, seating himself in the temple of God and proclaiming that he is God (2 Thes. 2:4; Dan. 9:27b; Matt. 24:15). Third, all those dwelling on the earth will worship Satan (the dragon) and worship Antichrist (the beast) and his image; those who would not worship him and his image will be slain (Rev. 13:3-4, 8, 15). Some Christians surely will be slain because in Revelation 15, these slain ones will be resurrected and raptured. They become the ones standing on the glassy sea (Rev. 15:2-4). Revelation 20:4 also mentions these martyrs in the great tribulation who would not worship the beast and his image. Fourth, Antichrist will war with the saints, overcome them, and act as he wills for forty-two months (Rev. 13:7, 5). During that time, an angel will announce an eternal gospel to those settled on the earth, charging them to fear God and worship Him, that is, not to worship Antichrist and his image, because the hour of His judgment has come (Rev. 14:6-7, 9-11). Because of this gospel, some among the nations will not worship the Antichrist or his image. Instead, according to Matthew 25, they will treat God’s people, the Lord’s brothers, kindly. When the Lord comes to earth, He will consider them as ``sheep’’ and make them the people on the earth in the millennium. Fifth, the false prophet (another beast) will do great signs to deceive people to make an image for Antichrist and worship it (Rev. 13:11-15; 16:13; 19:20). Sixth, in addition to all the devastations caused by the satanic trinity— Satan, Antichrist, and the false prophet—God will mete out His judgment in His wrath to men on the earth with supernatural calamities, killings, a malignant sore, and darkness, as woes in the sixth seal, the first six trumpets, and the seven bowls of the seventh trumpet. Now we come to the opening of the sixth seal.
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The sixth seal is the shaking of the earth and heaven (Rev. 6:12-17). It is the beginning of the supernatural calamities to damage the inhabitable earth and heaven with its hosts (Luke 21:11), as the beginning of God’s answer to the martyrs’ cry in the fifth seal (Rev. 6:9-11). The sixth seal is also the initiation of the great tribulation (Matt. 24:21) of three and a half years (Dan. 12:7; Rev. 11:2; 13:5), the hour of trial to come on the whole inhabited earth (Rev. 3:10). It is also a warning to the inhabitants on the earth (Rev. 6:15-17). After the sixth seal comes the seventh seal, which is the ushering in of the seven trumpets (Rev. 8:1-2).