Seven Cycles of Judgment

2404 words long.

Published on 2024-07-12

This article is based on ideas from the chapter "Revelation 16: Judging the World" of Plague, Precept, Prophet, Peace. It divides the judgments found in Revelation into seven parts and shows how each is instigated by a different one of the Seven Spirits of God listed in Isaiah 11:2. Revelation 5:6 tells us that God sent the Seven Spirits of God out into the earth. Read ahead and find out what each of them will be up to.

Meet the Seven Spirits of God

The identities of the Seven Spirits of God and the order in which they are listed in Isaiah 11 play a vital role in Fractal Historicism.

And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,

the Spirit of wisdom

and understanding,

the Spirit of counsel

and might,

the Spirit of knowledge

and the fear of the Lord.

- Isaiah 11:2

The words do not do these spirits justice. Wisdom is the spirit that communicates to us through our suffering. Understanding is tied up in worship and in evaluating the true worth of things, putting heavenly treasure ahead of material gain. Counsel not only gives advice, it knows how to deal with our emotions and desires. Might is about more than raw power. It is about acquiring focus, establishing priorities, adopting good habits, careful planning and time management. Master those and your strength will not be squandered on foolish pursuits.

Each Spirit is associated with one of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom, hence with one of the Bible's seven key wisdom books:

Lordship with Psalms (which uses the word Lord 717 times, most of any book)
Wisdom with Job (for the heart of the wise is in the House of Mourning),
Understanding with Proverbs (with 43 uses of understand and understanding, the most)
Counsel with Song of Songs (for the Bride counsels her friends about love)
Might with Ecclesiastes (because it takes careful planning to not dissipate your strength)
Knowledge with Matthew (for all the treasures of knowledge are hidden in Christ)
The Fear of the Lord with Revelation (where the wrath of God will cause all people to fear)

Likewise, each Spirit is associated with one phase of the Harvest Pattern and with one phase of the Growth Pattern. In each case, Isaiah's order is followed. God has meticulously assembled and configured His wisdom. Even so, despite finding how the Seven Spirits pop up all over the place, it was a delightful surprise to find that God also shaped His plan for the judgment of the world according to the same Seven Spirits. Each spirit has a distinct role to play and again, their efforts proceed in the canonical order. Those spirits really know how to take turns!

In concluding his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus compared people who built their house upon rock or sand. The seventh bowl judgment includes not a storm but a massive earthquake. That cataclysm is guaranteed to level every house not built upon the rock of God’s law. It is our firm foundation, but it is not everything. The foundation of the Law protects the house from threats below, the roof of peace covers it and keeps out the wind and rain of our anxieties above. The pillars of wisdom hold up the roof and define the structure of the rest of the house. The beasts are slaughtered and wine prepared for the final banquet. But all those elements are there to protect us and provide a place where we may live together in harmony, peace, and joy as we celebrate what our Savior has done. Every stone, plank, shingle and fixture is there to remind us of who the Lord is. He is love, joy, peace, order, protection, wisdom and strength, and we enjoy all that because He gives Himself to us forever.

While we are on the subject of earthquakes, there is an earthquake in Revelation 11 that always struck me as out of place…

Spirits of Judgment

Revelation describes five earthquakes, in 6:12, 8:5, 11:13,19, and 16:18. Respectively, they accompany these events:

opening of the sixth seal (6:12)
opening of the seventh seal (8:5)
blowing the sixth trumpet (11:13, aka the second woe)
blowing the seventh trumpet (11:19, starting the third woe)
pouring the seventh bowl (16:18, ends the third woe)

The severity of the middle three are downplayed, but the first is described in cosmic terms:

… the sun became black as sackcloth,

the full moon became like blood,

and the stars of the sky fell to the earth

as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit

when shaken by a gale.

- Revelation 6:12b-13

The last is called “a great earthquake such as there had never been since man was on the earth, so great was that earthquake.” (Revelation 16:18b)

It is tempting to equate the first and last, but we do not have enough to go on for that, and making the sixth seal and seventh bowl simultaneous is problematic. What is interesting is that in the third earthquake account, seven thousand people die. Checking on Wikipedia, there are sixteen earthquakes listed with over one hundred thousand dead. That suggests that it is not the fact of an earthquake or the relative severity that is important. What is important is the number seven thousand. This event is intended to be among the many sevens of Revelation. Why? What special thing does this earthquake signify?

Without this earthquake, an important pattern would be absent. We would not see the critical role of the Seven Sprits of God in the design of the outpouring of God’s wrath upon the world. There is an order and a symmetry which helps us understand the big picture behind the last plagues. When you see this pattern, you will agree that God shall pour every facet of His wisdom and strength into the prosecution of the final judgment. His plagues and His precepts are one.

In Peace, like Solomon Never Knew, it was shown that each of the Seven Spirits of God has gone out multiple times, to fulfill different plans at different scales of time. Thus they went out into the seven millennia of history, one per millennia in Isaiah’s order, accompanying a different one of the seven swords of God. They also went to the seven churches of Revelation, one per church, again in order. Each spirit was also involved in the opening of a different one of the seven seals on the Lamb’s scroll, again in order. It should come as no surprise that there are seven principle cycles of judgment in Revelation. These seven cycles are also ordered and designed such that a different spirit infuses it. Here is the proof.

The Seven Churches: Spirit of Lordship. Though there is one Holy Spirit, in Revelation that one Spirit is called seven spirits of God. Consider the implication for this verse:

He who has an ear,

let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

- Revelation 3:6

That reference is singular. Could it mean that one of the seven spirits in particular is indicated? If so, it would be the Spirit of Lordship, aka the Spirit of the Lord. Jesus is addressing the churches as their Lord and commanding more complete obedience from his faithful ones.

Seven Seals: Spirit of Wisdom. The image of a scroll with seven seals speaks of secret wisdom to be revealed. Also, wisdom is associated with suffering, as in the person of Job, whose book corresponds to this spirit. The opening of each seal is accompanied by suffering, but also the impartation of wisdom, as civilization progressed by these first judgments.

Seven Trumpets: Spirit of Understanding. Understanding comes to us through worship. The third sword that God drew was wielded by the angel who served as the commander of the hosts of the Lord, likely the pre-incarnate Christ. Joshua’s response was to kneel in worship. Victory over Jericho came to Israel by circling the city for seven days, blowing trumpets. In Revelation, God is marching around the whole earth blowing his trumpets. Peace showed that the Lord’s battle plan is hidden in Proverbs, the pillar of wisdom book that is associated with the Spirit of Understanding. Soon the walls of this world will tumble down and Jesus will be victorious.

Seven Thunders: Spirit of Counsel. The words spoken by the seven thunders were sealed up. We don’t know what was said. They are the secret counsel of God, thus it is fitting that they be paired with the Spirit of Counsel. Peace showed how the seven thunders have spoken before, in Psalms, Exodus and Job, as well as throughout Revelation. Not all those secrets are hidden, but searching out what they have told us requires patience and commitment.

7,000 casualty Earthquake: Spirit of Might. The five earthquakes of Revelation collectively are examples of God displaying His raw might. They are scattered throughout. Our attention is focused on this earthquake in Revelation 11:3. The death toll provides the focus and causes the earthquake to appear fifth in the series of collections of seven. However, in this chapter it is not the earthquake that best exhibits God’s might, it is the courageous service of His saints, the Two Witnesses:

These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands

that stand before the Lord of the earth.

And if anyone would harm them, fire pours from

their mouth and consumes their foes.

If anyone would harm them, this is how he is doomed

to be killed. They have the power to shut the sky,

that no rain may fall during the days of their prophesying,

and they have power over the waters to turn them

into blood and to strike the earth with every

kind of plague, as often as they desire.

- Revelation 11:4-6

Who are these witnesses? Some say Israel and the Church. Others say Enoch and Elijah. Perhaps it is both, for we see after the witnesses are killed their glorious fate:

And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that rises from the bottomless pit will make war on them and conquer them and kill them, and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city that symbolically is called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified. For three and a half days some from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations will gaze at their dead bodies and refuse to let them be placed in a tomb, and those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and exchange presents, because these two prophets had been a torment to those who dwell on the earth. But after the three and a half days a breath of life from God entered them, and they stood up on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them. Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up here!” And they went up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies watched them. And at that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth of the city fell. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven.

- Revelation 11:7-13

The real earthquake was not the ground shaking, it was the resurrection of at least some of the righteous. This may be “the” rapture or merely “a” rapture, such as when Enoch and Elijah were long ago told to “Come up here!” The difference is that no wicked unbelievers ever saw those resurrections or those raptures. When the wicked see this resurrection, the earthquake will be in their hearts. Then nobody will be able to question the reality of God’s Spirit of Might.

Seven Crowns: The Spirit of Knowledge. A seven-headed beast shows up in many passages in Revelation, in chapters 12, 13, and 17. In chapter twelve, those seven heads are said to wear seven diadems or crowns. God dispatched the Sprit of Knowledge to a terrible agent. Those crowns represent Satan’s corruption and mastery of science. By the knowledge that deceives us into thinking we are gods, mankind will in part destroy itself. God’s judgment is to hand us that knowledge, stand back and watch.

Supporting this idea is the first reference in the Bible to man’s early advancements in metallurgy, animal husbandry, engineering and music. Those discoveries were made by the wicked line of Cain in Genesis 4:17-22. Likewise, it was the pagan Greeks and Romans who made many discoveries in math, astronomy and engineering. Today it is often scientists who most fiercely attack belief in God and the Bible. This knowledge will destroy us. Even so, God’s secret Spirit of Knowledge will be at work among those being saved.

Seven Bowls: Spirit of the Fear of the Lord. With the final plagues that are poured out, mankind will finally fear the Lord. Amid these plagues we see a restoration:

And I saw what appeared to be a sea of glass

mingled with fire—and also those who had conquered

the beast and its image and the number of its name,

standing beside the sea of glass with harps of God

in their hands.

- Revelation 15:2

In Genesis 4:21, we were told that Jubal, son of wicked Lamech, “was the father of all those who play the lyre and pipe”. Now we shall have righteous players, with a heart like David, playing something new. People make fun of Christian ideas of the afterlife, depicting chubby cherubs on clouds playing harps. Those are not the harps we will be playing. What are “harps of God”? We don’t know, but I am betting that the sounds they produce exceed the finest music ever composed and performed by mortals.

We can speculate about when these plagues will occur, the order in which they will occur, and what they symbolize if they are not literal (since many are figures). What we should not do is paint God as an angry bully throwing a temper tantrum. The outpouring of His wrath is measured, subtle, crafted with all His ingenuity and imbued with every facet of His Spirit. It has already begun and is proceeding in an orderly fashion. The details are disguised but the animating force and spirit behind each stage is open for our inspection. May we take it to heart.

May we also find hope…