July 28: FIERY BLASTS AND SHIFTING SHADOWS
By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed—by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. Revelation 9:18
The sixth trumpet announced the intensification of demonic activities that began with the fifth trumpet and the rise of Islam, the first of three terrible woes. In today’s opening verse is revealed multiple facets of the harm that comes upon those who dwell on the earth. We now see the sixth trumpet plague—the second of the three woes—as three plagues, each of which has the power to kill and to lead people into deadly deceptions.
There is a parallel in history that provides an illustration of the spiritual weaponry that our enemy is allowed to use against those who care nothing about the seal of God or the sealed of God. Remember that the disintegration of the western leg of the Roman Empire ended with the establishment of the papacy in Rome (firmly set up by the year 538). The eastern leg, also known as the Byzantine Empire, was considered a stronghold of power and wealth for over a thousand years, the city of Constantinople having been dedicated in the year 330. While the Turkish Ottomans carried out an extended series of attacks upon the Byzantines, there was a constant search for weaponry. A Chinese invention, called a “fire-spurting lance” was adopted by the Turks, and several variations of it were developed among the Ottomans. The modern-day term for this type of weapon is “firearm”. But it was not only about guns. For the Ottomans, it was about anything that gunpowder would propel. Behind every blast was a sequence of fire, smoke, and brimstone!
A master artilleryman defected from the Roman to the Ottoman Empire. He was assigned by the young sultan, Mehmed II, to create an enormous bronze cannon that would propel a 600-pound cannonball. The task was completed in a matter of months. In the spring of 1453, the Ottomans laid siege to Constantinople, which had been untouched until that time. The surrounding swaths of land had been laid bare, leaving the glorious capital city like a lone island in a sea of destruction. Inside of six weeks the incredibly well-fortified city fell, and the emperor was killed. This had been the seat of the Eastern Orthodox church, now taken down by Islamic forces.
In the millennium during which the eastern leg of the old Roman Empire rose and fell, a dark silhouette was growing in the west, and looming large. The formerly secular Roman Empire that was incited by Jews to hang Jesus on the cross had shifted into the Roman papal power, a terrorizing nightmare.
The prophet who teaches lies, he is the tail. Isaiah 9:15b