Foreward #

by Evan Kahlich

Trumpets in the Bible.

I cannot shake the use and references of trumpets in Scriptures. The trumpet is often used in the Scriptures and with much meaning. One expositor said,

"Now the voice was like a trumpet. It is the one instrument that makes us think of the future. It is piercing, it is commanding, it is penetrating, it makes you listen and pay attention. There is going to be a day - the noisiest day in the world's history - when the trumpet shall sound, the archangel will cry out with a shouted command: and the word trumpet occurs more in the last book in the Bible than anywhere else in the New Testament. It is quite frequent in the Old, but this is the book of trumpets, and though most people associate harps with heaven, I associate trumpets. It was a voice like a trumpet: piercing, loud, penetrating."

The most impressive use of the trumpet in the Bible is it is the sound used when the dead are raised! The Apostle Paul makes this reference twice in his epistles.

First, in 1 Corinthians 15:52:

"In a moment, in a twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed!"

And then, when writing to those in Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 4:16:

"For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first."

“Incredibly, the astronomical reconstruction of the circumstances of Revelation 12:1–7 that produces a birth date for the Messiah of September 11, 3 B.C., was also the beginning of the Jewish New Year in 3 B.C. (Rosh ha-Shanah)—Tishri 1, the Day of Trumpets. The Feast of Trumpets/Tishri 1 was also the day that many of the ancient kings and rulers of Judah reckoned as their inauguration day of rule. This procedure was followed consistently in the time of Solomon, Jeremiah, and Ezra… Jewish tradition also held that the Day of Trumpets commemorated the beginning of the world—the very first “first day” of the human calendar. As Jewish historian Theodor H. Gaster writes, “Judaism regards New Year’s Day not merely as an anniversary of creation―but more importantly―as a renewal of it. This is when the world is reborn.” [Heiser, Michael S.. Reversing Hermon: Enoch, the Watchers, and the Forgotten Mission of Jesus Christ (pp. 81-82). Kindle Edition.]

The trumpet is an odd instrument because, to me, it is an instrument we don't hear too often in our modern context. I'm not advocating that the trumpet is the best instrument in an ensemble or that it is my favorite instrument! But when we hear a trumpet, we almost always stop to linger, look, and listen because its penetrating noise has caught our attention.