Revelation 7Sealed and Standing

Here’s the picture: four angels “holding back the four winds.” In other words, the winds are coming. They’re about to be released with the trumpets and bowls, and it’s only divine providence and divine intervention holding back that judgment. The harming of the land, the sea, the trees and people, the wrath of God, is coming. But first, protection for God’s people! The earth is about to take a beating, but first …

The four corners of the earth were always metaphorical. Even the ancient world knew the earth was not a square.

Five angels: four holding back the winds, and a fifth who comes and tells them, hold it a little longer, we’ve got one more thing to do. He will seal and protect “the servants of our God.” These angels are serving in the role of protectors or guardians in this moment.

The seal is the stamp of God’s ownership and authenticity. It’s like a tattoo, but it’s spiritual, not physical. It is for protection from wrath. Remember, throughout Revelation tribulation (humans causing harm) is different than wrath (God’s just judgment on the earth). Tribulation affects believers; wrath does not. This seal is in contrast to the mark of the beast in chapter 13, which very well may be physical.

The first time this kind of seal is used in prophecy is Ezekiel 9:1–6: the man clothed in linen with a writing kit goes through Jerusalem and puts a mark on the foreheads of those who grieve over its detestable things, and the executioners are told not to touch anyone who has the mark. John’s readers would have thought of this when they saw the angel sealing God’s servants.

2 Timothy 2:19: God’s solid foundation stands firm, sealed with this inscription, “The Lord knows those who are his.” And Ephesians 1:13: when you believed, you were marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit. In the New Testament the seal is the Holy Spirit. Is that exactly what John is talking about here? He said he’s not sure, but we see the echoes.

Cain, the murderer, was sealed for protection (Genesis 4:15); see also Isaiah 66:19. The sealing here is echoed again in Revelation 9:4, where the locusts are told not to harm anyone who has the seal of God.

Answers from the room: it skews your view of Him, and then how do you worship or serve Him? (Think of the servant with one talent who thought his master was harsh.) It makes Him look like the devil, and He’s not; He’s a good Father, who rewards those who earnestly seek Him. There’s no shadow of turning with Him, no darkness in Him at all. He does discipline, like a good parent, but that’s not harm.

So you see it consistently throughout Scripture and again here: the Lord is protecting those who are His. That doesn’t mean we won’t be harmed by humans, or affected by tribulation. It just means He will not harm us. That’s the difference.

Twelve times 12,000: 144,000. This is a deliberate symbolic use of numbers by John. Many prophetic books use numbers this way!

There are 18 different listings of the twelve tribes of Israel in the Old Testament, and this one is different from all of them. It’s unique in the entire Bible. Reuben was the firstborn and should be first, but he isn’t always, because some of the time the tribe of Reuben wasn’t doing so good.

A number like this has an immense amount of speculation around it. Groups like the Mormons say a lot about the 144,000: you’ve got to be in this group, or you’ll get all this stuff, you’ll have your own planet. Oh, it’s real weird, and none of that’s true. Here are my best thoughts, based on some data we do know.

God’s people are being numbered for war. I believe this for two reasons:

This numbering heavily points to war. The sealing of God’s people only shields them from wrath, not from war or even tribulation, as we’ll see with the next group.

Whether it’s tied to this number or not, God preparing an army for war is something we see throughout the rest of the book, and in chapter 19 for sure.

Here’s the picture. You have a counted number of Israelites in the first half of this chapter, and a number “no one could count” of saints from “every nation, tribe, people and language.” A finite (symbolic) Israelite army, then a multitude of worshipers.

“Standing before the throne”: these people are worthy to stand in God’s presence. Oh, to be counted worthy! They are the answer to the question of 6:17, “who can withstand it?” No one, unless you’re one of these. They are the ones who can withstand the day of God’s wrath, and the ones who can stand before the living God!

They are “wearing white robes,” like those in Revelation 3:4. They are holding “palm branches,” like Psalm 118:27 and the crowd at Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem (John 12:13).

“Cried out in a loud voice”: the saints will be a noisy group. If you think heaven is going to be a place of quiet serenity, you’re in for a shocker. All the self-described “frozen chosen” church people are in for a wake-up call in heaven. All of us nutty Pentecostals will feel right at home: lifting hands, getting on knees, falling down on faces, shouting, dancing, singing loudly. That’s all described clearly in the worship of heaven!

Every time you see worship in Revelation, there’s some kind of action going with it. In a few minutes we’ll see silence for half an hour. It’s mayhem. It’s fun!

These worshipers from every nation, tribe, people and language are joining in and adding to the song from chapter 5. “Salvation belongs to our God” is an echo of Psalm 3:8, “Salvation belongs to the LORD” (NKJV).

In other words, rather than saying “Lord, save us,” “Hosanna,” from Psalm 118 and the triumphal entry, at this moment in heaven these believers are recognizing the fully realized salvation of God. We’re in His presence. We’re not asking Him to save us; we know He saves us, and we’re declaring it. Salvation belongs … to our God … and to the Lamb.

The One who sits on the throne is now called our God, and Jesus, the Lamb, is worshiped as equal with God.

See the picture. Now the familiar chorus of angels, elders and creatures from chapters 4 and 5 chimes back in with a song that is extremely similar, but not identical, to 4:11, 5:11 and 5:14. Compare them: the lists overlap, but none of them are identical.

From the room: praise is singing about God, worship is singing directly to Him, and both are aspects of our worship. It’s all about God and His attributes. Being led by the Spirit in worship is part of worshiping in spirit.

One woman shared that God told her she could not worship Him in spirit and in truth until she knew who her father was, and she had a DNA test to find out. God wants to take out every lie in our life: truth in the inmost being. What lies do we believe about ourselves? Agree with the truth about how God thinks about you.

There was a breakthrough in the spiritual realm in worship tonight, and there’s more available to us every time. Studying the worship of heaven should unlock aspects of heaven for us in our worship. I’m here for it!

This question is interesting because, unlike the others, John doesn’t ask it. The elder asks him, so that John can turn it around (“Sir, you know”) and the elder can answer it. It’s almost as if the elder was waiting for John to ask, got tired of waiting, and just moved the plot along: “This is what you should be asking, buddy!” I love this.

John pulls from Daniel and from Jesus’ teaching: Daniel 12:1 and Matthew 24:21.

“The great tribulation” as used here does not refer to a specific time period, as similar terminology may in Daniel and Matthew. John doesn’t have a time frame in mind, but rather believers throughout history who have gone through any kind of tribulation. That’s how you have this giant, uncountable multitude. If it were just the people at the end of time, we’d be able to count that group; those who will experience this at the end of time are a much smaller group. He’s referring to the great trial God’s people had been experiencing, that many he was writing to were presently experiencing, and that believers throughout history will experience: trouble that will get worse before it gets better.

Their robes are washed “in the blood of the Lamb.” Blood should stain, but not the blood of Jesus. It makes clean and pure. Here’s how: Hebrews 9:14, the blood of Christ cleanses our consciences so that we may serve the living God; and 1 John 1:7, the blood of Jesus purifies us from all sin.

This blood is also a metaphor for death. These people have died physically: they’re martyrs, killed for their faith. But before that they also died spiritually to their sinful desires, to their old person. That’s the metaphor of baptism too: buried with Him, dying to ourselves. Paul says, I’m crucified daily. Now they’re made alive by the blood of the Lamb and seen as spotless. It’s almost like a blood infusion: new clothes, new people, everything’s new.

This section ends with a description of the martyrs’ final rest at the end of time. Look at the spiral: you can see through the whole thing at once. It points toward the culmination of all things, though we’re still on some of the outer edges of the spiral right now.

It is written to comfort those who had lost people to martyrdom, and to give strength to those who were about to be killed for their faith, as many of them would be. But it also strengthens all the martyrs, and their families, coming throughout history.

Here is a similar description directed toward Israel: Isaiah 4:5–6, a canopy of glory over Mount Zion, a shelter and shade from the heat of the day. Now in Revelation, these are from all nations, not just Israel.

God is both the ultimate Ruler and the ultimate Protector.

And finally, for the martyrs, God is the ultimate Provider. “Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst … nor any scorching heat” echoes Isaiah 49:10 (“They will neither hunger nor thirst, nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them”). John draws on the first half of it here, borrows the rest in the next verse, and reinterprets it in a New Covenant context with a phrase he puts in the middle …

“For the Lamb at the center of the throne”: New Covenant! He takes an Old Testament Scripture and puts New Testament reality in it. Then “he will lead them to springs of living water” finishes his Isaiah 49 quote.

The shepherd imagery borrows from Psalm 23:1 and Ezekiel 34 (a great study, with lots of shepherd language), and from John’s own writing, Jesus’ teaching in John 10:11: “I am the good shepherd.”

God’s kingdom turns everything completely on its head!

“Springs of living water” is from Isaiah 49:10 again, but also from John 7:38–39: rivers of living water will flow from within whoever believes, and by this Jesus meant the Holy Spirit! John’s own little commentary on Jesus’ words: the living water is the Spirit.

“God will wipe away every tear” is drawn from Isaiah 25:8 (“The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears from all faces”), and it points to Revelation 21:4 as well. This imagery of comfort happens in heaven and at the end of time.

Next comes chapter 8: the seventh seal, and diving headlong into the trumpets. It’s just going to get weirder from here. I promise.