Fiery Prayers and Smokey Rooms: On the Seventh Seal of Revelation 8
Dissidents Guide to Revelation, Part 29
After all the noise and bluster of the first six, we arrive at the seventh seal. When he opened the seventh seal, heaven had silence for about half an hour.
Revelation 8:1-4
“And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all God’s people, on the golden altar in front of the throne. The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of God’s people, went up before God from the angel’s hand.”
In chapter 4, we looked at the throne room of God and explored the ancient throne room at Knossos, complete with a throne, seats, and four creatures painted on the walls. In front of the throne was what looked like a basin, actually an altar for burning incense, as people offered requests and prayers to the king before them, who they often viewed as a god.
When the Seventh Seal is opened, a half-hour of silence commences. An angel brings incense to place on the altar before the throne, and the smoke, representing the people's prayers, rises before God.
John depicts a God who not only acts in the interest of his people but also listens to them to understand them. This starkly contrasts the gods of Rome. In ancient times, gods were seen as distant rulers, issuing decrees from afar. But Christian theology presents a God who listens and seeks to know His creation through presence, experience, and listening.
Revelation 8:5-6
“Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake. Then the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to sound them.”
This marks the start of a great upheaval on earth; the fabric of the empires of this world begins to break apart and fall into turmoil as the fire from the altar falls upon the earth.
While this is all very dramatic, I want you to notice that the fire hurled upon the earth is not a terrifying attack, a meteor, a hail of fire, or any weapon fashioned by God. It is simply the prayers of the people. These prayers in John's Revelation story become the catalyst for change. It is prayer, not violence, uprising, or grasping for power that ultimately takes down the evils of Babylon.
Prayer as Catalyst in the Scriptures
The history of Israel is a repeating circle. It starts with a King who leads the people into idolatry, idolatry leads them into exile, and the pain of exile eventually brings widespread prayer and repentance, which results in God acting to free and restore them under a new king. Then the cycle repeats over and over again.
Throughout scripture, prayers and appeals to heaven often break the powers of this world. The books of Psalms, Lamentations, and Mary’s Magnificat all contain the cries of people in tribulation. These prayers set the stage for God's intervention, and that seems to be what John has in mind in Revelation 8 as well.
How Prayer Forms Us
Prayer is an act of spiritual formation. It shapes us, whether we practice it well or not. Modern Christianity often reduces prayer to a good luck charm for personal success, but true prayer aligns our hearts with God's kingdom and away from the influences of Babylon.
The early Christians prayed—not for job promotions or lottery numbers—but to be formed toward Christlikeness and God’s kingdom. Rome reminded them daily of their status: hated, low, unworthy, and disgustingly associated with a man crucified by Rome. But daily prayers helped these Christians resist becoming too Roman and embrace their identity in Christ instead of shunning it. It was a daily discipline of setting aside time to align their hearts and minds with God's kingdom and away from Rome’s.
The Difficulty of Prayer
N.T. Wright says of Prayer1:
“Christian prayer is about standing at the fault line, being shaped by the Jesus who knelt in Gethsemane, groaning in travail, holding heaven and earth together like someone trying to tie two pieces of rope with people tugging at the other ends to pull them apart.”
Prayer is the greatest move of the church because it forms us. It is the catalyst for all of God’s work in the world. Prayer transforms us from a weed-filled mess into a beautiful oasis-like tending a garden. And like the gardener, the point of the work of prayer is to bear fruit: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23).
The greatest defense against Babylon is the spiritually disciplined Christian. The Christian who is Christ-like.
Eugene Peterson says:
“All the water in all the oceans cannot sink a ship unless it gets inside. Nor can all the trouble in the world harm us unless it gets within”
~ Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, 39.
Every Christian lives in Babylon, a timeless force that divides and destroys. Our most powerful tool against Babylon is prayer. Setting aside time daily to contemplate Jesus and align our hearts with him forms us toward Christlikeness.
Prayer prepares us to stand against the evil, oppression, and violent nature of this world. It keeps us from being sucked into “the patterns of this world” (Rom 12:1) by cultivating the fruit of the Spirit, which keep us from becoming like the nations in which we live, and, instead, help us remain faithful to Christlineness.
We can’t address our enemies until we have prayed to establish love in our hearts for them.
We should not rise up against hatred until we have learned to do so with joy.
There is no use in addressing war until you truly desire peace.
Tumultuous situations cannot be remedied until we have learned to be patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, and self-controlled.
This spiritual formation makes us resilient against Babylon's destructive tendencies and allows us to resist them effectively. John’s vision in Revelation 8 reminds us that the power of prayer is not just a ritual; it is a profound act of spiritual formation that aligns us with God’s kingdom and empowers us to resist the forces of Babylon.
Let us embrace prayer as a vital practice in our daily lives, allowing it to shape us into vessels of God’s love and agents of His transformative work in the world.
N.T. Wright, Simply Christian, 164
Striving to truly desire peace and pray for love to fill our hearts for our enemy. Powerful words