11.12 | After Six Comes Seven
Revelation 6
‘Now I watched when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say with a voice like thunder, “Come!”’
Revelation 6:1
We need to talk about numbers.
Because we can’t get far through Revelation without some conversation about them. Because, in prophetic literature, numbers are often saturated with meaning.
And today gives us one number that has already stood out in Revelation, and will appear again and again before we finish. It is the number seven. Revelation is written to seven churches, envisioned as seven lamp stands, with seven stars (angels) alongside them. The Lamb from yesterday’s reading has seven horns, and seven eyes. We’re going to go on to read about seven trumpets and seven bowls and seven angels with seven plagues. Large parts of the book are organised around these rhythms of sevens.1 And today, we begin opening the seven seals of the scroll.
To grasp what Revelation is wanting to show us, we have to understand the number seven.
Most Christians know that there is something significant about seven, knowing it as a number of perfection, or wholeness. And yet the roots of the significance of seven need a little teasing out. Because the number seven flicks back all the pages of our Bible, right back to the very beginning. It takes us back to the creation stories of Genesis 1-2, with a world that is formed and filled by the Creator God in six days, before He rests on the seventh. And yet, when the author of the letter to the Hebrews talks about this sabbath rest of God, he articulates it not merely as one day of God resting, but as a permanent state of rest, into which humanity is endlessly invited.2 Rest was not just what God did, but what He does. Humankind was created into this place, and yet has endlessly moved as exiles away from this place. Entering the rest of God becomes a description in the Scriptures of entering His time zone, His ways, His kingdom. Rest is where God is; rest is the state of all things in the future. Rest is where we get to at the end of our journey. Six, then, describes the flow of things in this age; seven describes the eternity that is soon to come.
If this stretches your mind, don’t worry. It should. We speak of heavenly wonders here. And yet, when we bring these words back to the seals of the scroll today, it tells us something.
It tells us that, rather than Jesus’ victory leading to the immediate rest of the heavenly seven, it leads to a time marked by conflict and poverty and famine and pandemic and death, as the weather system of heaven collides with the weather system of hell, creating a resultant hurricane. Jesus’ victory won the war, but it also initiated the great battle of history—played out in these rhythms of six that all pre-empt the inevitable certainty of the coming seven. This battle will be global,3 and the battle will be hard.
Friends, this is not a common teaching in our churches. And yet as we stand in our moment watching the nations shake and crumble, we need this reminder, for the Scriptures we hold in our hands today tell us that the inbreaking victory of Jesus will come into such times as these. They tell us that the shaking that we see does not speak of a failed Cross or a failed Messiah. Quite the opposite.
For every one of us knows this simple truth.
That after the raging and fighting and war and famine and pain and poverty and every last rebelling of the earth and hell against the coming peace of God—God’s perfect rest is surely coming.
For the numbers are very clear.
Because after six, always, forever, beautifully and powerfully and peacefully, comes seven.
Reflect:
What does this stir up in you? Bring this to the Father. And as you do so, remind yourself this: that the trajectory of history is moving rapidly and inescapably towards His rest.
Pray:
Father,
I can both see all this,
And yet,
It is hard to see.
For as the nations rage and shake and fall,
As I see such poverty and division and confusion,
As I see such injustice and sickness and pain and death,
My eyes can sink downwards,
To see only the six days.
And yet, Father
I ask you to kindle in me
The burnings of hope,
To raise the warmth of coming joy in me,
And the fire of prophetic resilience,
That I may keep my eyes upon the certainty
Of Your coming Rest.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Amos 4-6 | Psalm 142
Revelation 1-3 is directed to the seven churches; 5:1-8:5 is devoted to the seven seals of the scroll; 8:6-11:19 to the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls of wrath form chapters 15-16.
If you want to explore this further, spend some time with Hebrews 3:7-4:13.
The first four seals release four horses, echoing similar visions in Zechariah and Ezekiel. Four, in the Scriptures, describes that which goes global, to every point of the compass. The point is that these challenges will be felt right across the globe.