What are the seal judgements in Revelation?

Question 10032.

The seal judgements in Revelation are the first of three great series of judgements that fall upon the earth during the Tribulation, and they open the whole terrible sequence. When the Lamb breaks the seven seals of the scroll, wave after wave of judgement is released, and I want to walk through the seal judgements one by one so that their meaning becomes clear.

It matters who opens them. The seal judgements are not the random chaos of a world spinning out of control, nor the work of the Antichrist or of Satan. They are broken open by the Lamb, the Lord Jesus Himself, which tells me from the very first seal that these are the deliberate judgements of God upon a rebellious world.

The Lamb Opens the Seal Judgements

The setting for the seal judgements is the throne room of heaven, where a scroll sealed with seven seals lies in the hand of God, and no one is found worthy to open it except the Lamb who was slain (Revelation 5:1-7). This is where the whole drama begins, and it is worth dwelling on, because it fixes the character of everything that follows.

Since the Lamb opens each seal, the seal judgements are His judgements. The Greek word for seal, sphragis, refers to the wax seal that secured a scroll and could only be broken by one with authority to do so. Only Jesus has that authority over the scroll of history, and He exercises it in righteousness.

This is why I insist that divine wrath begins with the first seal, not halfway through the Tribulation. The seal judgements proceed from the throne of God through the hand of the Lamb, and that has direct bearing on when the Church is removed, a point I take up in my article on pretribulationism.

The First Four Seals: The Horsemen

The first four seal judgements release the famous four horsemen. The first is a rider on a white horse, going out conquering and to conquer, whom I take to be the Antichrist rising through false peace and bloodless conquest (Revelation 6:1-2). He is a counterfeit of the true Christ who rides a white horse at His return, and he opens the Tribulation with the promise of order.

The second seal brings a red horse, and its rider is permitted to take peace from the earth so that people slay one another; the false peace collapses into war. The third seal brings a black horse and a voice announcing famine, with food weighed out at crippling prices, the natural fruit of war. The fourth seal brings a pale horse whose rider is Death, with authority to kill a fourth of the earth by sword, famine, plague and beasts.

Read together, the first four seal judgements trace a grimly logical chain: false peace gives way to war, war to famine, famine to death. This is how the judgement of God often works, not always by a bolt from the blue but by handing a rebellious world over to the consequences it has chosen.

The Fifth and Sixth Seals

The fifth of the seal judgements shifts the scene to heaven, where the souls of those slain for the word of God cry out from under the altar, asking how long until their blood is avenged (Revelation 6:9-11). They are given white robes and told to rest a little longer. This tells me that even in the Tribulation people are being saved, and some are dying as martyrs for their faith.

The sixth seal brings cosmic upheaval: a great earthquake, the sun turned black, the moon like blood, the stars falling, the sky rolled up like a scroll. The response of the earth’s people is the clincher for my whole reading. They hide in caves and cry for the mountains to fall on them to hide them from the wrath of the Lamb (Revelation 6:15-17).

There it is, in the plainest words: the great day of their wrath has come. The people of earth themselves name the seal judgements as the wrath of God and of the Lamb. No one has to argue them into it; they feel it and confess it. That is why I cannot treat the seals as anything less than divine wrath from the throne.

The Seventh Seal and What Follows

The seventh of the seal judgements is different. When the Lamb opens it, there is silence in heaven for about half an hour, a hush of dreadful anticipation (Revelation 8:1). Out of that silence come the seven trumpets, so that the seventh seal contains and launches the next series of judgements.

This telescoping structure matters. The seal judgements give way to the trumpet judgements, which in turn give way to the bowl judgements, each series more intense than the last. The judgements do not run side by side but flow out of one another, building toward the climax when the Lord returns. I trace the next stage in my article on the trumpet judgements.

So the seventh seal is a doorway. It marks the end of the first series and the beginning of the second, and it reminds us that the Tribulation intensifies as it goes. What begins with the horsemen ends with the bowls, and the whole is under the control of the Lamb who opened the first seal.

Judgement and Mercy Together

I do not want to leave the impression that the seal judgements are only about wrath, because even here mercy runs alongside. The martyrs under the altar show that people are still being saved in the Tribulation, and the whole purpose of the judgements is to break the pride of a rebellious world and drive men to repentance before it is too late.

That is how God’s judgements have always worked. They are real and terrible, but they are also warnings, summonses to turn back while the door of mercy still stands open. Even as the the opening seals fall, the gospel is being preached and sinners are being saved, some of them at the cost of their lives.

So I read the these seals with a sober heart but not a hopeless one. They display the righteous anger of God against sin, and they display, at the same time, His patience in giving the world one last, thunderous call to repent.

Why the Church Need Not Fear the Seals

Because I hold that the Church is caught up before the Tribulation begins, I do not read the seal judgments as a threat hanging over believers today. They describe a period from which the Church has been removed, a season of God resuming His dealings with Israel and judging a Christ-rejecting world.

This is not because believers are too good to suffer; Christians have always suffered and will suffer to the end of the age. It is because the the opening seals are specifically the outpouring of God’s wrath, and the Church is promised deliverance from wrath, not from ordinary trouble. The distinction is the difference between discipline and condemnation.

So when I read Revelation 6, I read it as a rescued man reads the account of a fire he was carried out of. The these seals are dreadful, but they are not my portion, and that mercy makes me long to see others brought to safety in Christ before that day dawns.

Reading Revelation Without Fear

Some believers avoid Revelation because the seal judgments and all that follows frighten them. I want to gently turn that around. The book was given as a revelation of Jesus Christ, and even its judgements are meant to comfort His people by showing that history is firmly in His hands.

The the opening seals are not chaos; they are ordered, measured, and opened by the Lamb who loves His people. Nothing happens in the Tribulation that Jesus does not permit and control, and the whole sequence ends in His visible triumph and reign. That is not a reason to hide from the book but a reason to read it on your knees.

So take up Revelation with confidence. Let the these seals show you the seriousness of sin and the certainty of judgement, and let the Lamb at the centre of the throne show you where safety is found. The One who opens the seals is the same One who opened His arms on the cross for you.

So, now what?

Read Revelation 6 and mark who opens the seals and how the people of earth respond when the sixth is broken. When they cry out against the wrath of the Lamb, the character of the seal judgments is settled beyond dispute: this is the wrath of God, beginning at the first seal. Let that sober you about sin and move you to bring others to safety in Christ. The Lamb who breaks these seals once opened His arms for sinners; have you run to Him while the door still stands open?

“For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” (Revelation 6:17, ESV)