It is always a blessing to speak with you but I am not able to agree with you brother.
I do not agree that the Seal judgments were opened as soon as Jesus ascended.
The 1st Seal is the appearance of the Antichrist. If Jesus opened the Seals when He ascended then WHO IS THE A/C??????
As I read the book it says to me that the world won’t recognize him as such, but will think of him as a great peacemaker.
Dan. 8:25 says he will deceive many this way, and in 1 Thess. 5:3, Paul said the world will believe peace has arrived, but then destruction will come upon them suddenly. So at the beginning of the Seal judgments, there will be a short period of peace that the whole world will notice.
That is not the case today and it hasn’t been the case for a number of years. I believe this peace will come right after Ezekiel 38-39, a war that God will use to draw Israel back into their covenant with Him. It will be through that war that the A/C and the Jews will end with a 7 year peace treaty.
If so, then the Seal judgments can’t begin until after Ezekiel 38-39.
Now if we read Ex. 39:9 we will see something very telling............
'Then those who live in the towns of Israel will go out and use the weapons for fuel and burn them up-the small and large shields, the bows and arrows, the war clubs and spears. *****For seven years they will use them for fuel.*******
It seems to me that the people wanting to see the Seals opened today do so out of impatience prompted by the dissatisfaction people feel about the current condition of our world.
My Friend, you can disagree and be wrong! ;-) It is OK to be wrong, but it is better to write truth.
You IMAGINE the first seal is the antichrist. But HOW COULD HE be in 32 AD? ONLY if you pull that first seal out of its context.
Follow as I take you through how God taught me.
I began to meditate on chapters 4 & 5. Finally I got stuck in John weeping much, and I could not get away from that. I began to bug God about that, asking Him why we needed to know why John wept, and why it was “much.” Finally God spoke and said,
“it shows timing.” Again I spent days reading and meditating and praying in tongues, and I could not find timing anywhere, so continued to bug Him about it. Finally, perhaps two more weeks, and He said,
“it also shows the movement of time.” Again I studied, read, meditated, prayed in the spirit, and again I could not find any “movement” of time! (At this point in time, today, I cannot remember if these were audible words, or if this was the still small voice; all I can say is I very clearly heard God speak these words to me.)
I kept bugging God about this, telling Him I could not find timing or the movement of time anywhere. Finally, God had great mercy on my slowness, and spoke to me:
“Son, I will ask you three questions about this passage of scripture. Until you can answer these questions correctly, you will never understand this vision.
1. “Why did John not immediately see Me at the right hand of the Father in chapter four? I ascended back into heaven years before John saw this vision. There are over a dozen verses showing that I went to be at the right hand of the Father. Why then did John not immediately see Me at the right hand of the Father?”
As before, when He spoke, I was “in the spirit” and could not answer by thinking of an answer and speaking. However, my spirit man answered, “I cannot answer that question.”
Again He spoke.
2. “John watched a search to find one worthy to open the seals—a search that ended in failure—and that is the reason John wept much: no man was found worthy. However, if you read ahead, you find that I was found worthy to break the seals. Why then was I not found in that first search?”
Again my spirit man answered, “Lord, I cannot answer that.” Then He asked me the third question:
3. “If you notice in chapter 4, the Holy Spirit was still in the throne room. I told the disciples that as soon as I ascended, I would send Him down. Why was the Holy Spirit still in the throne room in chapter 4?”
Again my spirit man said that he could not answer this question. The Lord did not say more at that time. I studied diligently on that vision of the throne room, trying to answer His questions. I
could not see any timing. I could not see the movement of time. I could not figure out why Jesus was not at the right hand of the Father. I could not figure out why “no man was found.” I could not figure out why the Holy Spirit was still there. I spent weeks looking and asking God for help.
Finally after three or four more weeks of study, I heard His voice again. He said
, “go and study chapter 12.”
When I turned to chapter 12, He spoke and gave me a synopsis of that chapter.
“This chapter was Me introducing John to the dragon, and in particular, what the dragon would be doing during the last half of the week; but I also chose to show John what the dragon did when I was born. The first five verses were a ‘history lesson’ for John. Count how many times the dragon is mentioned, including pronouns.”
I counted 32 times. I could see that chapter 12 was certainly about the dragon! Then He said,
“you can go back and study chapters 4 & 5 again.” I would guess this interlude on chapter 12 was less than one hour. At first I could not understand why He sent me there. But now I know: it was to get “history lesson” into my brain! You see, the first five verses of chapter 12 was Jesus showing John what the dragon did to attempt to destroy Him when He was born. These events were before John was born, so was certainly a “history lesson” for him!
I turned back to begin meditating again on chapters 4 & 5, but suddenly it was different than before! It one instant of time, I could answer all three of His questions! To this day I am not sure that was a “download” or if just having “history lesson” in my mind made the difference. I immediately knew that this was a vision of the past, or another “history lesson” for John: he was seeing into the throne room of the past, before Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus was not seen at the right hand of the Father, because He was still on earth. “no man was found” worthy to break the seals, because Jesus had not yet risen from the dead to become the redeemer worthy to break the seals. And the Holy Spirit was still in the throne room, because Jesus had not yet ascended to send Him down.
Then, in chapter 5, we see the movement of time; another search was started as soon as the first one ended in failure. But in this second search, someone was found! Time was moving, and at this time, Jesus had risen from the dead, and was immediately found worthy. So John got to see, in this vision, the very moment Jesus ascended into the throne room, after telling Mary not to hold onto Him for He had not yet ascended. Then we see, the moment Jesus arrived in the throne room, the Holy Spirit was sent down. This then, Jesus ascension, sets the CONTEXT and timing of the first seal. One cannot find 2000 years between these verses!
Now for what I pasted in.
For years pretribber have tried to force a rapture upon Rev. 4:1. It is my guess, if we took 100 5th graders that had never been to a church and had them read this verse and tell us what they thought it means, NONE would come up with a rapture. They would all say that this was John being caught up to heaven, for the purpose of being taught things to come. It is truly sloppy exegesis to make this the rapture, and has opened to door wide for massive criticism, and rightly so. This was NEVER intended by the Author, to be the rapture.
Next, it has long been the thought of pretrib that the 70th week starts with the first seal. Again, it is very sloppy exegesis, and again, NOT the intent of the Author, the Holy Spirit. The truth is, the vision of the throne room is the CONTEXT for the seals, and must be understood before the timing of the seals will ever be known. But many ignore this vision and claim the first seal to be the antichrist, when there is NOT ONE WORD about him to portray evil. John used the color white 17 times in Revelation, and the other 16 all to portray righteousness - yet some can believe that in this ONE instance, white must mean something else.
If we study the vision of the throne room, chapters 4 through 5, and not just skim over it, some things become clear. First, WHY was Jesus not immediately seen at the right hand of the Father? We have a dozen verses telling us that is where He should be. Yet, He was not there. Next, John watched a search for one worthy to break the seals, and saw that search END IN FAILURE - which is why John wept much. This vision was seen around 95 AD. But WHAT was the time portrayed in the vision? Was it past, present, or future? (A vision can be any of these.)
We must determine, WHY this first search ended in failure. Next, we see in Chapter 4 that the Holy Spirit is there in the throne room, when Jesus said that as soon as He ascended He would send Him down. So we have another conundrum. I must emphasize again, unless we understand these things, we can NEVER understand the timing of the seals, for this is the context of the first seal. If we get into Chapter 5, we can begin to find the answers. Another search was begun as soon as the one John watched ended with failure. But in this NEXT search, suddenly someone was found! So what changed? TIME was the only thing that changed. John wept MUCH. This does not mean a little. TIME passed. Then, John saw a NEW entity in the throne room - one who was NOT there a moment before! And then an interesting thing: the Holy Spirit is SUDDENLY sent down to earth!
The ONLY conclusion one can come to with these clues is the passing of time made a difference! First Jesus was NOT in the throne room, and then He suddenly appeared. First NO MAN was found, and then Jesus was found. First the Holy Spirit was IN the room, and then He was sent down. What is the answer? When John first looked into the throne room, it was the throne room of the PAST, looking back in time to a time just before Jesus rose from the dead. He was NOT at the right hand of the Father, because He left that exalted state to become a man - and He had not yet returned to the Father. From eternities past to eternities future, there has been only one tiny portion of time where the second member of the Godhood was NOT at the right hand of the Father – and that was the short 32 years He was on the earth.
NO MAN WAS FOUND because at this moment in time, Jesus had NOT YET risen from the dead, to be found as the REDEEMER of man. The Holy Spirit was there simply because Jesus had NOT YET ascended to send Him down. But John wept...not a little but MUCH...and during that time of John weeping, Jesus ROSE FROM THE DEAD! He was immediately found worthy to break the seals. Then, after Jesus told Mary not to hold onto Him, He ascended to the Father, and the Holy Spirit was INSTANTLY send down to the church.
So after all that, WHAT TIME WAS IT? It was around 32 AD when Jesus ascended to the throne. What was the first thing Jesus did?
He took the scroll from the Father's hand and began IMMEDIATELY to break seals. No one can find 2000 years there anywhere, because that is only man's idea. Therefore, there can only be one conclusion: the first seals were broken about 32 AD. The first seal was a WHITE horse and rider. John used the color white 17 times in Revelation. You expect someone to believe he would use white 16 times for righteousness and then once of evil?
NEVER HAPPEN! White was to represent righteousness. What was the ONE THING on earth in 32 AD that was righteous? Of course, the infant church was righteous. This first seal was and is to represent the church sent out to make disciples of all nations. He rides alone. He conquers and overcomes. Today there is no country anywhere where the Gospel has not been at some time or other. And today, thanks to the internet, the gospel is EVERYWHERE the internet is.
Note, if you study the 4th seal, you will see that the seals 2 through 4 ride together, leaving the first seal out.
It is impossible that the first seal is the Antichrist. If he was, then the Red, the black and the pale horse riders would be with Him and they are limited to only 1/4th of the earth. Sorry, but the Antichrist is not going to have such limits!
Therefore, it is impossible the first seal is the Antichrist because of TIME (32 AD), and the real Antichrist is not revealed until the midpoint of the week; Next, if this was the Antichrist he would have authority for the ENTIRE WEEK, not just the last half. Next, because of the limits of 1/4 of the earth, and because there is just not one single word about him that is evil. OF COURSE if the Antichrist got to choose his color for the book of Revelation, He would choose white: But God did not allow that. God chose fiery red for him!
Finally, the Stephonos crown is the crown of total and complete victory given to the winner at the end of the context. it does not fit the Antichrist. He is doomed to the lake of fire before he begins.