Thunders, voices, lightings, and an earthquake imply the answer to the prayers of the saints, including the prayer mentioned in Luke 18:7-8. The prayers of the saints in Revelation 8 must be for the judgment of the earth, which opposes God’s economy. To cast fire to the earth is to execute God’s judgment upon the earth. Therefore, the thunders, voices, lightnings, and the earthquake come as signs of God’s judgment.
God’s judgment upon the earth is the answer to the prayers of the saints with Christ as the incense. Although the sixth seal has been opened and the seven trumpets are ready to be sounded, nothing happens until Christ comes to offer the saints’ prayers to God with Himself as the incense. At that time, there are thunders, voices, lightnings, and an earthquake. This indicates that while God has the intention of executing His judgment upon the earth, there is still the need of the saints to cooperate with Him with their prayers. God needs His saints to pray so that He might execute His judgment. If we read Luke 18, we will see that the Lord Jesus says that at a certain time the saints on earth will cry to God to come in to deal with the situation and to vindicate Himself. At the end of this age, people will be so rebellious against God that some will even declare to the whole universe that they are God. While God has been tolerating this, some of the faithful saints will no longer bear it and will pray, “O sovereign Lord, how long will You bear with this? Will You tolerate this rebellion forever? How long will it be before You come in to vindicate Yourself and avenge us? How long will it be until all the earth will know that You are the Lord?” Eventually, there will be a need for this kind of prayer. The time is coming when we will all be pressed to pray like this. This will indicate that the end is at hand, because our spirit will not tolerate the situation any longer. Then we will pray to the Lord to vindicate Himself and to let all the rebellious ones know that He is God. When we pray like this, the Angel sent by God will minister to God with our prayer, adding to it Himself as the incense. God will certainly answer this prayer, and there will be thunders, voices, lightnings, and an earthquake. That will be the beginning of God’s judgment upon this rebellious earth. This will take place at the opening of the seventh seal when Christ, another Angel, will minister as our High Priest to bring our prayers mingled with His incense to God and will be the One sent to execute God’s judgment on earth.
Revelation 8:6 says, “The seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to trumpet.” The seven trumpets were given to the seven angels (v. 2). But it is after the prayers of the saints in verses 3 through 5 have been answered that the seven angels are prepared to trumpet. The answer to the saints’ prayers is the execution of God’s judgment upon the earth by the seven trumpets that followed. In other words, the seven trumpets are the answer to those prayers. God’s will in heaven requires the saints’ prayers to carry it out on earth. The offering of the saints’ prayers to God by Christ brings in the seven trumpets.
In Revelation 8 Christ is depicted as another Angel, offering the prayers of the saints to God (vv. 3-5). For His administration He needs our prayers. Our prayer is the response to His heavenly ministry. As we pray, He administrates. As He administrates, we are praying. He offers these prayers to God, and then He pours out God’s answers to them on this earth. The pouring out of God’s answers to our prayers is equivalent to His universal administration. This Administrator is qualified in every way, yet He needs our prayers. We may say that Christ is administrating the whole universe through our prayers. The executing of God’s administration is motivated by the prayers offered to Him from the incense altar. The prayer offered at the incense altar governs the universe.