Jesus is the main character and the central theme of the book of Revelation. The entire book focuses on His second coming, His return to earth in glory, to judge the wicked, and to reward the righteous. This book tells about the events leading up to His return and the events following His return.

Do not try to understand these events of Revelation as a series of chronological events but as degrees of intensity. The judgements of the seven seals of Revelation take place in the seven-year period that the prophet Daniel identifies as the last days. The sounding of the seven trumpets, however, are a return to that same 7-year period and focus on a deeper and different perspective of judgement.

John is sent back over the terrible times of judgement to focus on certain characters and personalities, and to give us more detail about them. John is told to prophesy again about “many peoples and nations and languages and kings”. That is going to be the theme of the next chapters of Revelation.