Trumpets and the Book of Joshua

If you were going to turn to one book in the Bible that relates a story of this Holy Day, the Feast of Trumpets, where would you turn? Don't answer that quite yet. It would have to include stories about... well, they have sevens in it. Seven trumpets and plagues and other plagues. You would have to discuss the overthrow of man's society, the overthrow of a leader of that society. It would deal with some initial steps as far as the salvation and restoration of Israel. And it would deal with the story of the beginning, at least, of the spread of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God to all the world. And if I were to throw into the mix that it's not Revelation, where would you turn? Why don't we go to the Book of Joshua? And that probably is puzzling to you. The thing about God's Holy Days that just has always fascinated me is that as soon as we get to one, that Holy Day has woven into its fabric markers that point us forward. God's plan always goes forward. Not that long ago, it seems, we gathered to keep the Passover immediately followed by Unleavened Bread. We follow the story of Israel as they made their way toward Sinai and the receipt of the law. Of course, in the New Testament, the establishment of the church, in every step along the way, there's something that says, look onward, and tucked away back in Joshua, there was a time, and I looked it up. It was in Unleavened Bread of 2008. I don't expect anyone in this congregation to remember the sermon I gave, except Mrs. Dobson, because she may have heard versions of it six or eight times. I kid you not. Pray for ministers' wives. But we looked at some of the lessons that God taught to His people around the little place called Gilgal. Lessons of Gilgal. And we followed the story from the death of Moses to the lifting up of Joshua as the next tool through whom God would work. God told Joshua, Be strong and of good courage. No one will ever be able to stand before you. Just follow me and do as I say. They sent spies across in those earliest chapters. The first order of business was going to be a place called Jericho. And two spies were chosen. They crossed. Somehow they got across the river. It was flood stage. God held the waters back later when all of Israel crossed over. And the spies ended up. It's one of those unanswered questions. How did they end up at a harlot's house? But anyhow, what is is what is. And God had a plan and God took her and not only brought her into the stock of Israel, but put her into the very lineage of Jesus Christ.

And Rahab saved them in the sense of hiding them. And she lied. And here came the king of this city with his mighty men of valor looking for the spies. And she sent them the wrong way, told them, Go to the mountains, wait three days. You know the story. Then you're safe. Go on back across. So we follow the story of on the 10th of Nicin, which is when the Passover lambs are set aside. They were sanctified. And they followed the instructions. Consistently they were told, Keep your eyes on the ark.

Because the ark is a type of Jesus Christ, as we know now. When the ark moves, you move. Where it goes, you follow. The events led to where the day came when the priests buried the ark walked up to the Jordan.

When their feet touched the waters, the waters began to pile up above them. And they then, Israel, two and a half, three million, how many there were, crossed over on dry ground. The ark went down to the middle of the riverbed and waited until everyone was across.

Then they came on up. That led to circumcision, keeping the Passover. That led to the fact that they actually began to sink their teeth into the produce of that land that God had held out to them for a long time back to Abraham. He told them, here is the land I'm going to give to you and your descendants.

And they finally set foot on it, set up camp around Gilgal, and it says they ate the produce of the land that year. And we kind of abruptly stopped that sermon. And I want to pick it up there. Because Passover, and we realize as they circumnavigated Jericho, that it had to have been during the days of Unleavened Bread. But isn't it curious that woven into that story, you have seven priests with seven shofars, the shofarim, the rams horns. And they were to lead Israel, blowing the trumpets, marching around the city.

As they began to assault the world, the first order of the business was Jericho, and that was the beginning. And in many respects, tucked away in that little story, we not only find a message, a story of Unleavened Bread, Passover, and Unleavened Bread, but we... You see, the rest of the book of Joshua is a fascinating book because it's a story of how the people of God made a conquest of the Holy Land. And the Holy Land has always been one of those marvelous types that God has held out.

The land of promise, the promised land, is a type of the kingdom of God. And when we get to the fulfillment of trumpets, we're looking right square in the eyes. It's not on the distant horizon. It's right there. We're looking at the establishment of the kingdom of God and the beginning, just like they began the conquest of the land. And who knows how long it took? And frankly, they never finished the job.

But it was a story of Israel taking their inheritance. And it points us to what is yet ahead. A time comes when those who spiritually are grafted into Israel will receive the kingdom. And the kingdom, kind of like some of those little kingdom parables, the kingdom's like leaven. A little's put in the lump and it spreads. It permeates. The kingdom's like that... it wasn't the grain of mustard seed that grew to be essentially this great tree that all the fowls of the earth came and lodged in her branches, typifying how all peoples will come and follow the example of Israel and receive the blessings and have the opportunity to choose to come into harmony with the kingdom of God.

Part of what we'll cover steps on into the next holy days as well, with atonement and with tabernacles. Let's begin in chapter 6. And then we're going to go back a little and then we'll go forward. Joshua 6, now Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel. None went out and none came in. We could go back. There's a reference back in chapter 2, oh, around verse 9-10, where it says that they were in sheer dread of the Israelites.

Now, tell Jericho. Tell is an archaeological mound. The rubble of old Jericho covers approximately six to eight acres. That's not very big. Now, as we follow the story, there was a cursed place on anyone who would rebuild Jericho, and the city over there now called Jericho is just a little distance away. But the rubble has been excavated. I suppose the major archaeological digs took place back in the 1930s under the British archaeologist Catherine Kenyon. Who would have funked what they found as they went down through all the layers? They found an ancient city with double walls. Houses had obviously been on the tops of those walls. All of it pushed down with the stones strewn in every direction. And yet, amazingly, there's one section. You can go and look at it. In one section, the stones are still on top of each other, kind of like one area wasn't destroyed. I wonder if somewhere in that little area is where a lady named Rahab and her family lived. So you have... How many people can you get into a city that can cover six or eight acres? Tens of thousands you can get in there. But they had to be in dread of Israel because they realized there are three million people. And three million people, how many men of war would you have? Hundreds of thousands. And they had to realize we are about to be creamed. They thought they could be safe behind those walls for a while. Verse 2, The Lord said to Joshua, See, I have given Jericho into your hand. It is king and the mighty men of valor. You shall march around the city, all you men of war, and you shall go around the city once, and this you shall do six days. And seven priests... Alright, let's file these sevens away because I think you were there in part this morning. Seven priests. And as we go to the book of Revelation, we realize there are seven angels, and they have trumpets.

These seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark. But the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets. It shall come to pass when they make a long blast with a ram's horn. And when you hear the sound of the trumpet, that all the people shall shout with a great shout. Then the wall of the city will fall down flat. The people shall go up every man straight before him. Keep your place. Let's go back to Leviticus 23. We usually on a holy day get around to Leviticus 23. But let's just notice one phrase in verse 24. Leviticus 23 verse 24, toward the end of that verse, it says, A memorial of blowing of trumpets. And so here is a festival. Here's an annual holy day. And a part of the observance of that is that it includes a particular musical instrument. The trumpet, the Hebrew shofar. And these seven priests in the days of Joshua were to have the seven shofarim, or the shofars. And back to Joshua. Let's back up just a little bit. We've kind of broken in on the story to a degree.

But the first thing God did was select a very special tool, a human instrument. He had had a marvelous tool he used for a long time. His name was Moses. Moses, as we know from being students of the story there of Israel, Moses made a mistake one day and God said, You can see the Holy Land. I'll take you to the point where you can look across, but you're not going to set foot there.

Israel, that younger generation that grew up in the wilderness, they will go in. And so God chose a new leader. Now already, Joshua had been set apart. If we just go back a few pages to the last little bit of Deuteronomy 34. In chapter 34 of Deuteronomy, Moses has died, but then it refers back to something that happened earlier.

Verse 9. Now Joshua the son of Nun. Joshua was a name that was around for a long time, 40 years. He was Moses' servant. When Moses was up on the Mount receiving the tablets of stone, his servant Joshua went a certain distance and waited there for him. So Moses ended up being up there a long, long time, many weeks. Joshua was gone from the people too, and then they came back and they heard the sound of tumult down among the camp, and they realized the cats had been away in the Meisser plain.

The story of the golden calf was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him, and so there had been a formal recognition and ordination, if you will, where Joshua was to be the one to take the mantle of responsibility in leading Israel after the death of Moses. And Joshua was told, as we get to the book of Joshua, just notice chapter 1 verse 9, Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of a good courage. Do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

So he reminds Joshua, it's my work, I'll be the one to lead you. It is not your job to be faint-hearted. Follow where I lead you. In chapter 4, after certain events take place, chapter 4 verse 14, after they had crossed over the Jordan, verse 14, on that day the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him as they had feared Moses all the days of his life.

And so Joshua was to be God's tool for a long time. We don't know what his age was. Caleb may have been a little older. There's a place later in Joshua where Caleb goes when the land is being divided out, and the tribe of Judah was given their territory, and Caleb went. And he said, you know, I was 40 when we were spies, and now another 45 years. So 40 years in the wilderness, and apparently then another five years of actually taking militarily over the land as far as they went.

And he said, I'd like my inheritance. And he was given the area around Hebron, down the plains of Mamre, where Abraham himself once set up his tent. And so Joshua has been set aside. And as we mentioned, the two spies were sent across. The king of Jericho, we can say, serves as a type of Satan the devil, the God of this age, the one who wants to destroy the work of God at any time, or at every time.

After the Garden of Eden, Cain and Abel were born. They obviously had a lot of other children. Jewish tradition says something like Adam and Eve had 33 sons and 23 daughters, or something like that, because the time came when Cain took his wife. Of course, he's driven away, land of Nod, and he builds this city named Enoch.

And, you know, Satan always builds his house. From the very beginning, Satan has a presence here. God had a presence, the Garden of Eden. And then it's moved around as well, different places. It seems at a certain given point, especially under David's time, God specifically decided, I want this place here called Jerusalem. We call it that today. Jebus, as it was before. I want this place in the mountains of that central Judean mountain chain, here on this little land bridge where peoples will come and go, and I can establish the descendants of Abraham and set up an example people to be a blessing to all peoples of the earth.

Back to Satan. He always builds his house. From the very outset of Cain, his first crony. And he built the city. And it seems that there's always been. You go a little later in Genesis, and you have around Babel. After the flood, God told them, Go, repopulate, spread across the earth. So they stayed in one place, and they built a tower.

Satan has built a house, and it too moves around different places in different times. And all the way to the very end, there will be this house called Babylon. But one last time, Satan will build his house, and it will rear its ugly head as Satan tries to thwart, to completely overthrow the plan of God. So, King of Jericho represents Satan.

Jericho represents, essentially, the whole world. The whole society that will be there for the people of God and the angelic host under Jesus Christ to begin to assault. Christ steps onto the Mount of Olives. Let's go to the latter few verses of Joshua 5. And let's be reminded that here is a little story where type meets end type. A plan, a program of conquest, surely was revealed to Joshua, perhaps at this time. But in verse 13, chapter 5, verse 13, And it came to pass when Joshua was by Jericho.

He was, after all. We kind of first come across him, and he was a general of the armies of Israel. And a general is going to want to be out there on the front, looking with his own eyes. To see what it is we're going to go up against. So Joshua was out there looking over at the city of Jericho.

But he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, a man stood opposite him with a sword drawn in his hand. And Joshua went to him and said to him, Are you for us, or for our adversaries? Again, he too was quite a man of war. And he was a man of courage. Because he sees someone over there, he doesn't know who it is initially.

A man has a weapon, and he walks right over to him. Are you for us, or are you against us? And lo and behold, he finds he's in the presence of the God of the Old Testament. As you will see already, that some of these words, man is capitalized, and him is capitalized, and he, because the translators recognize this is God. Verse 14, So he said, No, but as commander of the army of the LORD, I have now come.

And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and worshipped, and said to him, What does my LORD say to his servant? And then the commander of the LORD's army said to Joshua, Take your sandals off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.

And Joshua did so. And heaven, we heard that somewhere else before. Somewhere about forty years earlier, only it was Moses, and he sees a bush, burning with fire, but not being consumed. And as he walked over, the voice told him to take his sandals off his feet.

Anytime a human being comes like John with an angel, and falls down to try to worship an angel, the angel says, Get up! We are all fellow servants here! But whenever they are in the presence of the God of the Old Testament, in this case, the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ. And is it interesting that Joshua and the Hebrew is the equivalent of Jesus in the Greek?

He is even named by the same name. Let's continue where we dropped off in chapter 6. And just make a survey here of what happened, because again, we are looking at a pattern. God always gives us patterns. We look at what has happened. The further backward we see, the greater clarity we have to look forward. And so in chapter 6, verse 6, Joshua, the son of Nun, called the priests, and said to them, Take up the Ark of the Covenant, and let seven priests bear seven trumpets of ram's horns before the Ark of the Lord.

And he said to the people, Proceed and march around the city, and let him who is armed advance before the Ark of the Lord. And so it was when Joshua had spoken to the people of the seven priests, bearing the seven trumpets of ram's horns before the Lord advanced, and blew the trumpets. The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord followed them. The armed men went before the priests who blew the trumpets.

The rear guard came after, while the priests continued blowing the trumpets. I hope those priests had good wind, because when they're going to start blowing and march around Jericho, let alone seven times on day seven, they need some pretty good wind to do that. He goes on and explains the plan.

We're going to march around the city. Your job, you people, your job is to be quiet. Let the priests blow the trumpets. The rest of us, be quiet. Now, how quiet a few hundred thousand men with weapons can be, I don't really know. But there would be a time for them to shout. And this was not the time. God would let them know. So they marched through 14 the second day, and then they did for six days. And verse 15, the seventh day.

And they marched around it seven times in the same manner. Verse 16, the seventh time it happened, the priests blew the trumpets, and Joshua said to the people, Shout, for the Lord has given you the city, and the city shall be doomed by the Lord to destruction. It and all who are in it only Rahab the harlot shall live.

She and all who are with her in her house, because she hid the messengers that we sent. And you, by all means, abstained from the accursed things. Well, that got them into trouble in chapter 7. We're going to skip over that, but there was a man whose name was Achan. And Achan took something. You see, any of the wealth, the gold, the silver, the bronze, etc. Anything they found was a go into God's treasury.

But Achan took some and hid it under his tent. And that's when Israel thought, you know, that's right. We's bad. We don't need everybody. We'll just send a few thousand over here against AI. And they came home scared to death. And that's when, by the casting of the lots, they realized somebody took something that wasn't ours to take. So, the warning, don't take these things that aren't yours and make the camp of Israel a curse and trouble it. Verse 19, the silver and gold, the vessels of bronze and iron are consecrated to the Lord, and they shall come unto the treasury of the Lord.

Interesting to think forward to a time, the final beast, a system beyond anything, you know, an economic system beyond anything the world has ever seen. And in Revelation 19, it talks about the buying and selling of all these goods around the world, and even the souls of men, which is scary to me. If you've ever been to a Holocaust memorial, there's one in Washington, D.C. Of course, there's the Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. If you ever go there and look at things like lampshades made from human skin, you'll never be the same again.

Buying and selling the bodies of humans. And yet, when Christ returns, all of that amassed wealth is just taken into the treasury of God for the financing of the work of God as it goes through the millennium. Verse 20, so the people shouted when the priests blew the trumpets, and it happened when the people heard the sound of the trumpet. And the people shouted with a great voice, and a great shout, that the wall fell down flat. And the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city. And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, oxen, sheep, and donkey, with the edge of the sword.

Joshua said that the two men who had spied out the country go into the Harlot's house, and from there bring out the woman and all that she has as you swore to her. So the men go find Rahab, her father, mother, brothers, all that they had, all the relatives.

And at the end of verse 23, they left them outside the camp of Israel. 24, they burned the city and all that was in it was fire. Alright, file that one away, too, because that's what happens in time Babylon.

Fire has a way of purging, kind of has a way of cleansing the fingerprints, not only of human beings, but also of Satan the devil. Jericho was burned with fire. Isn't it interesting that as they dug down, archaeologists found a thick layer of ash down way down there at a certain level. Babylon, as well, will be burned with fire. The vessels of gold, silver and gold, bronze and iron, put them in the treasury of the house of the Lord. 25, Joshua spared Rahab the Harlot, her father's household, all that she had, so she dwells in Israel to this day, because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent this fire out.

27, the Lord is with Joshua, his fame spread throughout all the country. Well, chapter 7, just a quick survey here and there, we have the debacle at Ai, and then the finding of the man-aiken who had taken the accursed thing, whatever that was. And in verse chapter 8, we have the fact that God says, you know, don't be afraid, don't be dismayed, if you follow Me, all will go well with you.

If you learn from what happened, every last one of you, because, you see, all it takes is one. You look at what happened there with aiken. One man took that which God says you may not have, and his whole family was destroyed. And Israel was plagued with the horror of what had happened, and people's lives were lost. But if you follow Me, do what I say, every last one of you, that I will drive the enemies of Israel from before you.

Verse 2, you shall do to Ai and its king as you did to Jericho and its king, only a spoil and its cattle. You shall take his booty for yourself, play an ambush. So, again, you remember the story? This time, he sends 30,000 to, by night, go around the far other end of Ai. And then the next day, the main bulk of the army came marching up. You remember the story. Those of Ai came out, and the Israelites ran back, as if in fright, and got them far enough away from the city that those around the backside came and burned the city, and then they were caught in the middle.

And that began a conquest. There they went on down south. They ended up down Hebron, some area over at Eclon, over in the Philistine areas. Later, there was a conquest where they went up north, and they conquered as much as they conquered. They were told to drive out every inhabitant from the land and never finish that. They didn't drive the Philistines out, and if you get to the days of Saul, and you get to the days of David, 350-400 years later, and the Philistines were continually a thorn in the sign, if they had only been driven out before.

But the complete establishment of Israel is yet to be done. It's never been fulfilled. In Chapter 10, we have the story of some of the Amorite kings who came to do battle, five of them together. I believe this is a story. I want to keep moving, but you had the sun stand still later because the spoil was so great.

God gave them more time. In verse 16, these five kings had fled and hidden themselves in the cave at Makadah. And so Joshua said, go cover it with stones, and we'll come back and deal with them later. Well, later he killed them and put their remains back in there and covered them permanently with stones. So you have five kings with their armies fall. No one is able to stand before the armies of Israel as they obey God. As they follow Joshua, who is a type of Jesus Christ, they have total success.

But we realize the story doesn't always continue that way. Chapter 11, verse 23. So Joshua took the whole land according to all that the Lord had said to Moses, and Joshua gave it as an inheritance to Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. Then the land rested from war. The Promised Land. God held out this dream.

I'll give you this land. You'll have your own vine and fig tree. You will have no war. God speed the day when the stories of this forerunner are a reality. Chapter 12 gives a listing of 31 kings. 31 kings who had been overthrown. It even mentions Balaam in there being overthrown, which had happened earlier. Balaam, some have suggested he was somewhat a type of a false prophet who troubled ancient Israel, just as at the end, the false prophet will trouble Israel.

Chapter 13. We begin to have the story of the portioning out of the inheritance. Let us remember that back on the other side of the Jordan, we already had Gad and Reuben with their inheritance and half of Manasseh. So we're talking about the other nine and a half tribes. And he's going to divide by lot. We also realize the Levites do not get a land inheritance. They get certain cities and they were to be dispersed throughout Israel to be there for the service of God.

But we also find that Joseph was divided into two. As, remember how Father Jacob crossed his hands wittingly and placed the right hand on the head of the younger Ephraim. But there were two. And so we still have 12 tribes as far as inheritance given out. So Gad and Reuben already have theirs. Half of Manasseh has theirs. Verse 14, the latter part of verse 2 mentions the nine and a half tribes.

Verse 3 mentions the two tribes and the half tribe on the other side. They cast lots. Verse 15 tells us the lot fell for Judah. And then it gives all of these little geographical pointers that probably are rather hard to follow today. But Judah was given a larger territory. They were one of the more dominant tribes, as Ephraim was. And they received a larger inheritance.

And that's in chapter 15. In chapter 16, the lot fell on Joseph. And then it in a little bit shifts to the land Ephraim received. In chapter 17, the inheritance of Manasseh. In chapter 18, verse 2 tells us there remains seven tribes. And so the first lot fell for Benjamin. Verse 11. And we have Benjamin. Sometimes it's called Little Benjamin. Apparently smaller in population. But it was situated right there between the land of Judah and Ephraim. That little long narrow place. And that's where Jerusalem was. But Benjamin received their inheritance. And in chapter 19, the second lot came out for Simeon. And Simeon is given an inheritance. Although, his is down, actually kind of completely encircled down in the south by the tribe of Judah.

Verse 10, the third lot, children of Zebulun. They received land way up north. 17, fourth lot, Issachar, again, way up to the north. 24, Asher, 32, Naphthalai. 40, the seventh lot came out for the tribe of Dan, the children of Dan. And so the land is portioned out. Israel is settled to the degree that they drove out the inhabitants. We realize it was unfinished.

They didn't follow through with what God told them to do. That's kind of the end of our story back there. That's enough. All of this points forward. And yes, the fall Holy Days do tend to kind of... They're kind of woven in between. Kind of all weaving together. Because it looks forward to a time when Jesus Christ, with the fulfillment of this day, will return to this earth. And like with the days of Joshua, God has chosen the most remarkable leader. Jesus Christ was set aside a long time.

Now, I just can't resist myself. I didn't give you one point last time I spoke. I'll give you four points. I'll feel better. Number one, Christ will return as King of Kings. He was ordained to this role long ago. Now, that role of becoming King over all Kings of the earth will take time.

Some will fall immediately. Others will hold out longer. And really, as you look at the prophetic areas, we realize that as Israel is restored in the land of unwalled villages and here, not Isaiah, Ezekiel. And here comes these peoples called Gog and Magog and come and rebel against them. They see Israel in peace and it will be easy pickings and let's go and how they're overthrown. But then, later on, we can go all the way to Revelation. We see that Christ releases Satan after the thousand years.

And here are peoples, maybe not the same descendants, Gog and Magog, but incorrigibles, like them. Who, all of a sudden, tells us a little bit, gives us a little insight into the power of Satan's influence. Gets these people stirred up and they go onward and upward to rebel against God. But Jesus Christ returns as King of Kings. Let's look at Psalm 2. A couple of Psalms, prophetic Psalms. Psalm 2. Psalm 2, verse 1. Why do the nations rage?

And the people plot a vain thing. The kings of the earth accept themselves and the rulers take counsel together. Against the Lord and against his anointed. So, here in this Psalm, we have the concept of two divine beings. The Lord and then his anointed.

Saying, let us break their bonds into pieces and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens shall laugh. Yes, as it has been said, man plans and God laughs. He in the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall hold them in derision. He shall speak to them in his wrath and distress them in his deep displeasure. Yet I have set my keen on my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree. The Lord has said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possession.

You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them to pieces like a potter's vessel. Now, therefore, be wise, O kings. We instructed you, judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss a son lest he be angry and you perish in the way. When his wrath is kindled but a little, blessed are all those who put their trust in him. In one sense, kind of a summary of the message of two symbolic trees in the Garden of Eden.

There are two ways to live. There is a way of loving God with all your heart and soul. There is a way of absolute rebellion, a way of death that is the embodiment of being anti-God and everything he stands for. Satan the devil has always had his house, and he has his people prepared. And when Christ returns, he is going to step right down.

Someone earlier mentioned Zechariah. He is going to step right down into the midst of the battle between human beings. And it goes on in that chapter and talks about their very flesh being consumed from off of their bones. Let's go to Psalm 110. Here is another psalm that touches this concept of two divine beings.

Psalm 110, Psalm 2 was as well, but it wasn't named there. It is quoted in Acts, and it says that David wrote it. Psalm 110, verse 1, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand. All right, who is pictured as having gone to his Father's right hand? Stephen, when he was being stoned, Heaven opened, and he looked, so to speak, and he saw. Jesus standing there at his Father's throne. Till I make your enemies your footstool.

Sometimes we have those here at church who have a little footstool. The footstool is under their feet. Till I make your enemies. And it seems that Satan always has those who are the enemies of God. He stirs up from time to time. Your people shall be volunteers in the day of your power, the beauty of holiness from the womb of the morning. Verse 5, The Lord is at your right hand. He shall execute kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge among the nations.

He shall fill the places with dead bodies. He shall execute the heads of many countries. It's unpleasant to focus on, but when Christ returns, there has already been death beyond anything we even want to really imagine. When you talk about blood running to the level of horses' bridles, that's sickening to really think about for very long. But when Christ returns, so many of those armies of human beings will just be vaporized, just be destroyed. And there will be kings who no longer exist.

The second point is that Satan's house is destroyed. Israel crossed over. They followed Joshua. The first order of the day is, we're going to go after Jericho. And when Christ returns, Satan will have built his house another time. Let's go to Revelation now, Revelation 8. Revelation 8. And here we are introduced to seven trumpets. There have been seven seals. Revelation is filled with sevens. Seven trumpets, seven plagues, seven final plagues, seven churches, seven...

I mean, it goes on and on. But here we focus on the seventh seal is opened, and it introduces us to seven trumpet plagues. Verse 2, I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. Now, the trumpets in the Old Testament was from the Hebrew shofar, the ramsborn. This one in the Greek, I didn't look up, but there's not a connection. We can't make a connection at the same one.

It may be some type of a silver or brass one that has a different sound. Seven trumpets, and we begin to follow the sounding of those. Verse 6, the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound. And when we get to this point, we're looking at the last year. We're looking at the Day of the Lord. The seventh seal is the Day of the Lord. It is the year of the Lord's vengeance. The final year, because in certain places here, it'll talk about, to them, we're given the power to kill for five months.

And we add all that up, and it's that last year. And then we have seven more plagues, and they're poured out in the presence of the Lamb. But in verse 7, the first angel sounded. We wade through all of these, but there's a trumpet plague. Thereupon the trees and the grass. Verse 8, the second angel sounded. Verse 10, the third angel sounded.

The star fell from heaven, affected the fresh waters of the earth. Verse 12, the fourth angel sounded. Dimming of the heavenly lights continues in chapter 9, the fifth angel. Actually, chapter 8 ended with the concept of three woes. And as we get to Trumpets 5, 6, and 7, we're looking at the three woes. Fifth trumpet equals the first woe. And as we understand it and have understood it, we're going to have these power systems, one in Europe, probably quite a bit after what we looked at a couple weeks ago as far as the King of the South, whoever that is, however that is, pushing at the King of the North, King of the North coming and taking over the Middle East.

But here we have a situation where King of the North, the European Middle Eastern power base, turns toward the East. It has happened before. It's interesting how many patterns we find in history. History repeats itself. Napoleon, everything was going fine for Napoleon until he couldn't stand that he had the turn against Russia.

And the Russian winter devastated his army.

Hitler had everything going his way. He had this pact with Russia. They previously agreed, we'll just carve Poland in half. And they did. They moved in from each way and took over Poland. Everything was going his way. Russia was out of the conflict. He couldn't stand it. He turned it toward the East. Sent all of those armies that way. The Russian winter devastated him. And thank God they weren't over there on the coasts of Normandy and on up to Calais and across the ports of Belgium.

Once again, we're going to have Satan's house primarily being there in Europe and the Middle East. And it's going to turn to the East. Well, they're going to live to regret it because then we get to the sixth angel, verse 13. The sixth angel sounded. And here we have the sixth angel with the trumpet, verse 14, released the four angels who were bound at the great river Euphrates.

There's an act that takes place somehow, some way. There is this harnessed group of people, this army of 200 million men who are unleashed from the East. And they come rolling in. There are precedents that go all the way back into the Dark Ages, all the way back in the 1200s. They had some of the Mongol Khans going all the way to the gates of Damascus. It's happened before. It'll happen again. Second woe, the East counterattacks. Then we have to go to chapter 11, and we have the sounding of the last trumpet, the seventh trumpet, the great trumpet, as it's called, the one we yearn to hear.

And all kinds of things happen. Revelation 11, verse 15. And the seventh angel sounded, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of our Lord have become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever. And Jesus said to pray every day, Thy kingdom come. Pray that God's will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. The seventh trumpet. But we're not quite through. Joshua's day, on the seventh day, they encircled the city seven times.

And it would seem to be a parallel to the fact that this seventh trumpet not only sounds, but it introduces seven more of something else. And we have seven final plagues, or some translations called the bowls of judgment. And we could go over, you can go over to chapter, we've got some inset chapters there, but chapter 15 verse 1, I saw another sign in heaven, Great and marvelous, seven angels having the seven last plagues.

For in them is the wrath of God complete. You see, the tribulation, as we've always understood, is primarily Satan's wrath upon the human family. Their tribulation is Satan's attempt to destroy humanity, and especially descendants of Israel, and most especially, spiritual Israel, the church. The end of chapter 12 tells about that. War in heaven, woe to the inhabitants of the earth, he's come down with great wrath, and he turns after the woman who brought forth the man-child, the church of God.

The earth swallows her up, she's protected, and he turns to find anyone left of that church to destroy. Chapter 16 tells of the pouring out of these bowls of judgment. Verse 2, the first. Verse 3, the second. Verse 4, the third, and you can follow it on through. All seven are poured out in this chapter 16. Chapter 17 returns to the beast. This one, a little different angle of looking at the beast than chapter 13. This one looks at the beast from the time when the woman rode the beast.

The woman, in this case, representing a church, but this is not the true church, with the names that are used about her. We're looking at the days of the Holy Roman Empire. From Justinian to Charlemagne to Otto, one after another, has risen. No one at the time was able to stand against them until God put them down. And we live in that time. Isn't it interesting that decades ago, a man who was preaching on a radio was pouring over these scriptures, and it dawned on him.

I think God gave the revelation to Herbert Armstrong. Five are fallen. One is, and one's yet to come. I think he specifically saw that at a time when that Germany-Ipoli axis was rising once again. Maybe about the time Mussolini proclaimed the resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire. Chapter 18. Just a little bit here. Another loud voice. The world. The six thousand years of human beings are waiting to hear.

Verse 2. He cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, Babylon the Great is fallen, is fallen. Yes, Satan builds his house. He's always had his house. But this day reminds us, it's painful to think of, where the descendants of Israel will be. Somewhere earlier than the time when Christ returns, U.S. and Britain, other related peoples, drop off the end of the radar screen.

Something will happen we don't want to focus on. But, you know, for years we've been coming down from within. It's the way all the great powers have done. Within our system, it's sown the seeds of our own destruction. We're seeing it happen ever increasingly, but it's been happening since World War II, probably in many regards. Babylon is fallen, is fallen. There will be peoples all over the world.

There will be people of God scattered. However, I think we need to leave it to God how he's going to protect his people. We used to have all the answers, but it's okay to say we don't know. Places of safety, places of safety...let God figure that out. But there will be a time when they'll be aware that that system, that house of Satan, has gone down. And like Babylon, verse 8, excuse me, like back in Jericho, verse 8, her plagues will come in one day, death and mourning and famine, and she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her.

Late in chapter 19, we have the two main cronies that leader of the beast power and his partner in crime, the false prophet, taken and cast, verse 20, cast into the lake, burning with brimstone, like a fire burning with brimstone. So Satan's house is destroyed.

Number three, God's people are saved. Specifically there, I mean the church. Satan the dragon will have been trying his death level best to destroy the church. For that matter, he's been doing that for 6,000 years. God created the first man and the first woman, and there came the serpent, bright and early, that day, and led them down the path that I suppose the rest is history. The people of God, kind of like Rahab and her family, the time comes their spared.

The time comes when not just one of the trumpets, but the final trumpet, the great trumpet, sounds.

Matthew 24. Matthew 24. It speaks of heavenly signs, and after that it speaks of the sign of the Son of Man. And how the tribes of the earth will mourn because they see the Son of Man coming in clouds.

Matthew 24, verse 31. And he will send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other, wherever they are scattered, God knows those who are his. God recognizes the Spirit of God in the lives of his people, and the angels go forth to gather. This coincides with what we call, what the Bible calls, the first resurrection. Let's look also at 1 Corinthians 15.

1 Corinthians 15. It tells us that flesh and blood can't enter the kingdom. In verse 51, behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep. That beautiful biblical emblem of death. We shall not all sleep. We won't all die. But we shall all be changed. You see, Paul, this is one of his earlier epistles. Paul believed he would live till Christ's return. It's not till some of his later works, like 2 Timothy, his last one, where he said, I've run a good race. There's a crown of life waiting for me. He had been condemned to be executed. I'd like to see the end of the movie.

You would too. But we may not. That's okay. It might be easier. It surely would be easier to sleep the sleep of death, to just wake up with the sounding of a trumpet. A long piercing blast, such as the world has never... A blast the world has been waiting for for 6,000 years.

Verse 52, in a moment in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.

Let's add to that 1 Thessalonians 4. Verse 16, Verse 16, For the Lord himself would ascend from heaven with a shout, For the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, And the dead in Christ will rise first.

We who are alive remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, To meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. And we have to go to other places in the Scripture to find an answer to that question. Well, where's the Lord going? Well, He's on His way to stand on the Mount of Olives. He's on His way to reign from Jerusalem, because He's going to send out the law.

Interesting. I think I skipped over the part back in Joshua where, at one point during their campaign, They got to that area. Today, if you look at the map, it's called Nablus, the Arab term. Anciently it was Shechem, or Sychar, I think the New Testament calls it. You have that city. Right there, down at the bottom, Mount Gerizim, Mount Ebal goes up on either side. A fascinating place.

They say, on a still day, a man standing on top of the one mountain, people over on the top of the other, everyone through there can hear what is said. And that's where Israel gathered. And Joshua read to them the words of the law. He read to them the blessings and the cursings. The law went out to Israel.

Then the law goes out from Israel today, or in the future. The harvest of the firstfruits. We celebrated God's calling of firstfruits with the last Holy Day, the Feast of Pentecost, also known as the Feast of Weeks or the Feast of the Firstfruits. And this one looks to, Trumpets looks to, the harvest.

The welcoming of those who spiritually are Israel to the wedding supper. And at fourthly and finally, physical Israel is spared. Physical Israel is spared and begins to be restored. Let's go to Isaiah for this one, Isaiah 11. There will be those of Israel who have been overrun, taken captive, sold to the far-flung places of the earth, perhaps. And what a joyous time it will be to hear the seventh trumpet, because it announces that they are free.

Chapter 11, verse 10. And in that day there should be a root of Jesse, the father of David. A root, a branch that sprouts out the basic stock of a tree. And of course, Jesus was of the lineage of David. Who shall stand as a banner to the people, for the Gentile shall seek him, and his resting place shall be glorious.

It shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people who are left, from Assyria and Egypt, from Patheras and Cush, from Elam and Shinar, from Hamath and the islands of the sea. People set up a banner for the nations, will assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah, from the four corners of the earth. And you know, for thousands of years, Judah especially has been scattered all over the world. So many times, and we have to realize Satan the devil, sometimes we want to look at human beings.

We want to put a face on some of our problems and forget that there's a power behind that. Our battle is not against flesh and blood. But at times in history, the Jews have paid a horrific price. You know, read of what happened at the Warsaw Jewish ghetto. But the Jews have been dispersed far and wide. Judah and Israel will be brought in together. 13. The envy of Ephraim shall depart, and the adversaries of Judah shall be cut off. Ephraim shall not envy Judah. You see, Ephraim was the larger dominant tribe of the northern house, and Judah, of course, was the dominant tribe of the southern house. 14. Judah shall not harass Ephraim, but they shall fly down upon the shoulder of the Philistines toward the west.

Together they shall plunder the people of the east. Kind of like Joshua and the Israelites did once upon a time. The world system in the form of Jericho was pushed down before them, and they went and just gathered the wealth for God to use for His purpose. 15. They shall lay their hand on Edom and Moab, and the people of Ammon shall obey them. The Lord will utterly destroy the tongue of the Sea of Egypt.

16. Verse 16 will be a highway for the remnant of His people. Who will be left from Assyria as it was for Israel on that day that He came down from the land of Egypt? Isaiah 27, verse 13. I'll wrap it up here in just a minute. Never heard that before, have you? Isaiah 27, verse 13. So it shall be in that day. The great trumpet will be blown.

They will come who are about to perish in the land of Assyria, and they who are outcasts in the land of Egypt shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem. The return of Christ, the fall of Babylon, the gathering of the elect, the salvation of the remnants of Israel.

God still has a plan for Israel. It's never been realized. He chose that little land bridge for a reason between those continents, and placed His people there so that those who traveled by could see and marvel and learn and go home and do likewise. And that's yet left to be done. And it will be done in the world tomorrow. Let's go back to Joshua 1.

It strikes me that there's so much left yet ahead of us. Prophecies of Joshua, which after all, Joshua is the first book of prophecy. The way that the Old Testament was divided, you had the law, which was the first five books, then you had the prophets. You look at a listing of the way they were originally arranged, and the first book, actually it's combined, Joshua Judges says we have them. The first book of prophecy was Joshua Judges.

And in the first chapter of the first book of prophecy, God says to us, verse 2, Moses, my servant, is dead. Now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people, to the land which I am giving to them the children of Israel. Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given you, as I said to Moses, from the wilderness in this Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites and to the great sea, toward the going down of the sun, shall be your territory.

No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life. For as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you. Be strong and of good courage, for to this people you shall divide as an inheritance, the land which I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous, as that you may observe, to do according to all the law which Moses, my servant, commanded.

You do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may prosper wherever you go. This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it, for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. I like to look at those words on a regular basis. We look to the time of the fulfillment of the next Holy Day.

Passover, Unleavened Bread, they're behind us in one sense, at least as far as God beginning to work in our life, but it's continuing. The pouring out of God's Spirit is an ongoing process. But when we get to this one, Trumpets, we look forward. And we're left here asking, well, in the meantime, Father, what would you have me do? I think we find some pretty good pointers there. He tells us to be ready to move. He tells us to be prepared at any time because you don't know when it's going to happen. He tells us that as long as you follow me, God, all will go well with you. You start leaning, relying on your own strength. You'll fall down flat every time. He says no human being really can stand before you. And for that matter, neither can Satan the devil. He also tells us to engage the enemy. And you know, most of that battle for us today takes place between our own ears. We all have human nature. We all have a society that wants to pull us in the wrong direction. And we still have the God of this age who hates the people of God, the work of God, the plan of God with all of his heart. He is the one who said once upon a time that he made the I statements back in Isaiah 14. And the final one was, I will be like the Most High. He wants to be the Most High. He wants to destroy everything God is doing. But we'll get to him with the next Holy Day, won't we? God has a plan for him. So engage the enemy. Let God fight your battles. Keep your eye on the plan of salvation. Here is where we are, and it always points us forward. And there's more yet to come. Have a wonderful Trumpets.