Delay No Longer
And swore by Him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and the things that are in it, the earth and the things that are in it, and the sea and the things that are in it, that there should be delay no longer, but in the days of the sounding of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, the mystery of God would be finished, as He declared to His servants the prophets.
After the sixth trumpet plague (Revelation 9:13-21), the apostle John records dramatic pronouncements leading up to the seventh and last trumpet. Here an angel announces that there would be no more delays—that all the mysterious prophecies of the Bible would finally be fulfilled in rapid succession.
Throughout history, human beings have thought that God was delaying too long in bringing blessings and deliverance. Others have felt God was waiting too long in punishing the wicked. The apostle Peter described the difference between God’s timing and human timing this way:
“But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:8-9).
But God won’t wait forever. He promises to intervene to save humanity from self-destruction (Matthew 24:21-22) and to bring the wonderful Kingdom of God. Read more about this culmination of the mystery of God in our section on the “Kingdom of God.”
