Revelation: Fire

 Revelation: Justification by Faith

Fire

Revelation 8:5

“Then the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there were peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.”

The fire that is thrown onto the earth is clearly connected to the prayers of the saints.
This act of casting fire is again an image of judgment:

Ezekiel 10:1–2

“Then I looked, and behold, on the expanse that was over the heads of the cherubim there appeared above them something like a sapphire, in appearance like a throne.
And he said to the man clothed in linen, ‘Go in among the whirling wheels underneath the cherubim. Fill your hands with burning coals from between the cherubim, and scatter them over the city.’ And he went in before my eyes.”

Here, the city of Jerusalem is judged after the sealing has taken place.
The trumpet judgments will follow this example until we ultimately reach the Second Coming — the final judgment.

Again, we see the same elements: voices, thunder, lightning, and an earthquake.
At the beginning of the seven seals in Revelation, we already encountered thunder, lightning, and voices —
This was a reference to Mount Sinai, where God Himself spoke. Hebrews speaks about this:

Hebrews 12:25–29

“See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven.
At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, ‘Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.’
This phrase, ‘Yet once more,’ indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain.
Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe,
for our God is a consuming fire.”

Now we also see the return of the earthquakes. God will shake kingdoms and powers in judgment connected to the Gospel.
Grace is being rejected — therefore they will shake and fall.
There is only one kingdom that will remain standing.

We will witness a great shaking during the sounding of the trumpets, where things will waver and collapse.
But although many things of this world will fall under God's judgment, those who take refuge in the Kingdom of God, which Christ has established, will not fall.

Even in the midst of these judgments, they will be protected by God.
And even if they do fall and die now, God’s justice will still be carried out after death — and so the resurrection will come.