Revelation 14:1-20
The Book of Revelation
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In our last three studies in the Book of Revelation, we looked at various scenes of great difficulty to God's people brought about by Satan and his two agents, the Antichrist, and his false prophet. In chapter fourteen of the Book of Revelation, we get a “sneak preview” of the company of God's devoted servants who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. This chapter gives us pictures of hope alongside God's judgment. It reminds us of the purpose of the Book of Revelation, to tell us about the coming Day of the Lord, both the glorious justice to be carried out, God's vengeance against evil, and also the wonder of His redemption. The Apostle John is also given a warning to share with those considering joining the Antichrist’s ranks by taking his mark of allegiance and ownership, the Mark of the Beast. Again, we must remember that the events described are sometimes imagery and are not all in sequential order.

 

Chapter fourteen gives us a view of the return of the glory of God to Mount Zion, the place where King David “captured the fortress of Zion—which is the City of David” (2 Samuel 5:7). Mount Zion is the place in Jerusalem where Solomon built a temple to the Lord, i.e., the place where God has put His Name. The Lord spoke to David’s heir, King Solomon, that Mount Zion would be a place of consecration to the Lord:

 

I have chosen and consecrated this temple so that my Name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there (2 Chronicles 7:16).

 

Since the middle of the seven-year period, the image of the Beast (The Antichrist) has been speaking forth blasphemies against God in the rebuilt temple on Mount Zion in Jerusalem (Revelation 13:6). The Antichrist will proclaim himself as a god (2 Thessalonians 2:4) until Jesus suddenly arrives on the scene: “Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple” (Malachi 3:1).

 

The Lamb and the 144,000

 

¹Then I looked, and there before me was the Lamb, standing on Mount Zion, and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads. ²And I heard a sound from heaven like the roar of rushing waters and like a loud peal of thunder. The sound I heard was like that of harpists playing their harps. ³And they sang a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders. No one could learn the song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. ⁴These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for they remained virgins. They follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They were purchased from among mankind and offered as first fruits to God and the Lamb. ⁵No lie was found in their mouths; they are blameless (Revelation 14:1-5).

 

What characteristics do you see in these 144,000? How have they shown their faithfulness?

 

In verses 1-5, we see a glorious sight of the Lord’s return. Just as the Shekinah glory of God departed from the temple and went eastwards (Ezekiel 9:3; 10:4), from the same direction, the Lord shall return from the East after descending to the Mount of Olives (Zechariah 14:4; Acts 1:11-12) and stand on the Holy Mount of Zion. The big question we all have is this: Who are these 144,000 redeemed from the earth?

 

This writer believes that the 144,000 are the Messianic Jewish believers redeemed from Israel, i.e., those mentioned in Revelation 7 as being from the twelve tribes of Israel. They have the name of Yeshua along with the Name of the Father on their foreheads. It could be that the name on their foreheads is symbolic of those set apart to be the new priesthood of Israel: “you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession”  (1 Peter 2:9), for the high priest had a gold plate over his forehead with the words, HOLY TO YAHWEH written on it (Exodus 28:36). We also read about the Messianic believers in chapter 12, symbolized as the woman that the dragon will try to devour (Revelation 12:13-16). They are kept under God's protection in the wilderness for a time, times, and half a time (Revelation 12:14). This group of Hebrew believers, twelve thousand from each tribe of Israel, were sealed for protection during the Great Tribulation (Revelation 7:1-8). In verse four of chapter fourteen, we note that these 144,000 are called the first fruits of God and the Lamb. So, that gives us a big question to answer: What is meant by the first fruits?

 

The first fruits remind a Jewish person of God's instructions to Moses about what the Israelites were to do when they came into their inheritance in the promised land. They were to go before the Lord with an offering of the first fruits of their harvest. The people of Israel brought what was first harvested of the land in a basket to the holy place of God's choice, and there they worshiped and rejoiced (Deuteronomy 26:2-11). The Old Testament has many types and shadows of things that God would fulfill under the New Covenant. The apostle Paul wrote: "These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come" (1 Corinthians 10:11). The Gospel has always been to the Jew first and then to the Greek (Gentiles) (Romans 1:16). The Jewish people have carried a solemn responsibility to protect the Holy Scriptures' integrity and have endured heavy discipline for their idolatry and abandoning their covenant with God. To whom much is given, much is also required. These Jewish Messianic believers are just the first fruits of the harvest of the Earth. In this writer’s opinion, what we are reading here is God's way of showing us that He will always keep His promises to His children, both Jews and Gentiles. As Gentile believers, we should not feel disappointed or think that we are being left out because we are not Jewish and are not part of the benefits these 144,000 receive in this passage. God has not left us out of that great Harvest! We also are redeemed and purchased by the sacrificial Lamb of God.

 

To help us understand why God gave these words to John, we should remember the Book of Revelation's context, written around 95 A.D. All seemed lost to the Jewish–born John the Revelator, for there could be no greater disaster than the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D., and every stone dug up for the gold that melted during the fires of destruction. Jesus' prophetic words of Jerusalem's destruction were fulfilled to the letter (Mark 13:1-2). The historian of the time, Josephus, writes that the Romans killed more than 1.1 million Jews in the siege of Jerusalem. These verses of a Jewish remnant standing on Mount Zion could very well be a fulfillment of prophecy (Isaiah 10:22; Romans 9:27; 11:5) that God will bring forth a remnant from the house of Israel through the darkness of that time to stand with Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) when He comes in the clouds of glory. I can only imagine the celebration!

 

They sing a new song (v. 3). These words take Jewish minds back to the song of Moses after God delivered them from the soldiers of Pharaoh pursuing the children of Israel as they made their escape from Egypt. The escaping Israelites were led through the Red Sea on dry land with walls of water on their left and right (Exodus 14:22). After they got to the higher ground on the other side, the Red Sea fell in on their enemies, destroying them. Moses led God's people in a new song (Exodus 15:1-21). This new song is an experiential song of deliverance. They saw God's power right before their eyes to deliver them and destroy their enemies.

 

The number 144,000 could also symbolize the completeness of God's Church, Jew and Gentile. He will leave none of His own behind. This number mirrors the one given to describe the building of the Heavenly Jerusalem, which is 12,000 furlongs by 12,000 furlongs (12 x 12 = 144,000). We will discuss this in more depth when we come to the chapter about the New Jerusalem coming to Earth. This does not mean that the 144,000 are not an actual company of specific believers, but just as there is often a natural fulfillment in God's Word, there is also a spiritual meaning as well.

 

This new song of the 144,000 reminds us that there are some truths about which one can read and other truths that one can only experience. Experiential truth takes faith in God to a new level. Have you ever heard the saying, "Don't trust anyone who doesn't walk with a limp?" Seasoned Christians who "walk with a limp" are those who have had their faith tested through trials, and because of various experiences in their journey with Christ through life, their faith in God is deepened. Seasons of trial and testing bring us to a new level of faith and trust in God. For example, when Jacob came to a new level of faith after he wrestled with God, he had his hip put out of joint and walked with a limp from that time on (Genesis 32:22-32), his name was changed to Israel, i.e., "One who has prevailed with God" (Rashi). No more would he rely on what he could manipulate, but he would rest in God's power alone and have an experiential song of the Lord’s deliverance.

 

Can you think of a time in your life when an experience of hardship brought your faith to a new level? Briefly describe what that experience was, if you are able.

 

As believers, each of us has our experiential songs of deliverance born out of struggle and arising from battling the enemy's attempts to destroy God's children. After I came to Christ and began to study the Scriptures, I saw how I had grieved the Lord and others by my ruined moral life. I remembered my failures, sins, and lies that were my way of life without Christ. Again and again, I also realized the depth of God's mercy and loving-kindness in His forgiveness of sin. As I have now walked with the Lord for more than forty-seven years, I still appreciate His forgiveness and power to restore and redeem. I do not believe that these 144,000 are born without sin and have never lied (v.5). These Messianic believers are only blameless because the Lord has purged their sins away, just as the Lord applied the coal of holiness to Isaiah, His servant (Isaiah 6:5-7). The Scriptures reveal that all of humanity has fallen short of the standards of righteousness (Romans 3:23), Jews as well as Gentiles. These redeemed Saints are sealed and sanctified and demonstrate that God will fulfill His promises and that Israel will be a blessing to all nations, with Christ reigning over the Earth (Genesis 26:4).

 

What are we to understand from John the Apostle's words about these men “who did not defile themselves with women, for they remained virgins?" (v. 4). The word translated into English as defiled cannot be applied to the marriage relationship for the Greek word means to "soil, to stain, to defile." It is a word that is expressive of illicit sexual intercourse – of impurity and unchastity of life. “For they are virgins” is in the Greek masculine form and cannot mean that they lived an unmarried life, for the Book of Hebrews tells us the marriage bed is undefiled (Hebrews 13:4). It helps to remember that at the temple in Jerusalem is the image of the Antichrist, and those in the world system of the Beast must bow down and worship him. These spiritual virgins are those who have not entered into spiritual adultery by bowing to the Antichrist’s image and departing from the Lord. There is another reason that this group may be described as virgins. Ancient Israel had a clear policy about going to war. If war was justified, war was also holy, and those who fought in it had to obey special rules of purity, including abstention (for the time) from sexual relations (Deuteronomy 23:9-10; 1 Samuel 21:5). This group stands true to the Lord in the midst of great conflict. What is clear is that these believers demonstrate a life of purity. They are wholehearted followers of the Lamb.

 

These words of Scripture should make us all reflect on our lives. Are we biblically chaste as spiritual virgins and have not bowed down to the idols of this age? Even after we have given our lives to Christ, are we still dabbling with the world system in a chronic sense? As the Jewish people found deliverance from Egypt, a picture of the world system, through the sacrifice of a Passover Lamb, we also are to break with that which has enslaved us. We also are purchased by the blood of a Lamb (v. 4), and God should find no act of deceitfulness in our mouths. Will we come to the end of our lives and, on our deathbed, reflect on a wasted life? When we stand before God at the judgment, will we be disappointed with ourselves for not repenting and not breaking away from things in our past life? Are we morally blameless, having made every effort to take the beam out of our eye so that we may help others with their sliver? (Matthew 7:5). We all need the grace and forgiveness of sin (Romans 3:23), but having received God’s mercy, we are to walk it out in our lives through the power that God gives us through His Holy Spirit. Thank God that the Messiah has made believers in Christ blameless with His atoning blood!

 

The Three Angels

 

⁶Then I saw another angel flying in midair, and he had the eternal Gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth—to every nation, tribe, language, and people. ⁷He said in a loud voice, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heavens, the earth, the sea and the springs of water.”

 

⁸A second angel followed and said, “‘Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great,’ which made all the nations drink the maddening wine of her adulteries.”

 

⁹A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice: “If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives its mark on their forehead or on their hand, ¹⁰they, too, will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. ¹¹And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There will be no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name.” ¹²This calls for patient endurance on the part of the people of God who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus.

 

¹³Then I heard a voice from heaven say, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Yes,” says the Spirit, “they will rest from their labor, for their deeds will follow them” (Revelation 14:6-13).

 

We now jump to another scene closer to the end. We cannot tell if this vision is chronological from the first passage in verses 1-5. The angelic announcements John hears seem to be closer to the end of the second half of the seven-year period, i.e., the time known as the Great Tribulation. An angel flies through the air, speaking in a loud voice so that the whole world can hear one last warning to humanity. He proclaims the eternal Gospel that God wants none to perish and that all are to repent (2 Peter 3:9). If there are any who have not yet heard the Gospel, they will get an opportunity to listen to and respond.

 

A second angel also declares judgment on Babylon the Great. We should not think that this passage of Scripture refers to a literal Babylon in the Middle East country of Iraq as the focus of this judgment. The prophet Jeremiah spoke that, after the Persians destroyed Babylon, it would never be rebuilt (Jeremiah 51:26; 29; 37; 43; 62). God is speaking of the system of false worship and economic slavery first brought into being in Babylon. This idolatrous false-god system was exported to Egypt, Tyre, Carthage, Rome, and other ancient cities under different names, but the same evil spirits inhabited their idols. Paul the Apostle wrote, "The sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons" (1 Corinthians 10:20). This world system is resident throughout the world and permeates the religious, political, and economic systems at the end of the age. Like cancer, Babylon the Great has worked its way into every facet of life in the time we live. God will judge it, and it will fall.

 

A third angel follows the other two angels and warns and proclaims judgment for all who take sides with the enemies of God. To take the beast's mark is to declare allegiance and ownership to Satan and the Antichrist in opposition to God. They will be tormented forever and ever (v. 11). It is likely that, even after this warning, there will be those who willfully take the mark in opposition to God and the Messiah. It may seem strange that the angels of doom immediately follow the angel with the Gospel, but the Gospel has, of necessity, a double-edged quality. It is good news to those who receive it, but there is judgment to those who reject it, for there is no other sacrifice for sin than what Jesus accomplished at the cross: Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me (John 14:6).

 

In verse twelve, the Lord’s call for faithful endurance on the part of the saints refers to the martyrdom and suffering of God’s people in the last days. There will be great persecution, and many who stand for Christ and overcome the evil one will receive their victor’s crowns.

 

Harvesting the Earth and Trampling the Winepress

 

¹⁴I looked, and there before me was a white cloud, and seated on the cloud was one like a son of man with a crown of gold on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand. ¹⁵Then another angel came out of the temple and called in a loud voice to him who was sitting on the cloud, “Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.” ¹⁶So he who was seated on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested (Revelation 14:14-16).

 

What do you think the Word of God means when it refers to the earth being harvested? (v.16).

 

In the passage above, Revelation 14:14-16, the Lord uses the analogy of a ripe wheat harvest that is gathered when the timing is right. This Harvest analogy is similar to something Jesus spoke of in Luke's Gospel: “He told them, "The Harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the Harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field" (Luke 10:2). In parabolic language, life on Earth is viewed as God likened to a farmer who has prepared his ground well. He has removed all the stones from the ground, planted a choice seed, and is looking to find fruit at the proper time (Isaiah 5:2). Early on in Christ's ministry, He also spoke about the end times using the analogy of the Harvest, saying, “His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:12). Jesus also shared The Parable of the Wicked Tenants in terms of a harvest brought in (Luke 20:9-19).

 

A similar theme is the Parable of the Wheat and Weeds, in which the Lord made it very clear what would happen at the end of the age:

 

³⁷He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. ³⁸The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the evil one, ³⁹and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The Harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. ⁴⁰“As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. ⁴¹The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. ⁴²They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ⁴³Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears, let them hear (Matthew 13:37-43).

 

Similar to the separation passage above, Revelation 14:17-20 continues by also talking of the grape harvest:

 

¹⁷Another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. ¹⁸Still another angel, who had charge of the fire, came from the altar and called in a loud voice to him who had the sharp sickle, “Take your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of grapes from the earth’s vine, because its grapes are ripe.” ¹⁹The angel swung his sickle on the earth, gathered its grapes and threw them into the great winepress of God’s wrath. ²⁰They were trampled in the winepress outside the city, and blood flowed out of the press, rising as high as the horses’ bridles for a distance of 1,600 stadia (Revelation 14:17-20).

 

Most interpreters see this scene of blood rising as high as the horse’s hooves as primarily symbolic. Some suggest that what's described is a 1600-stadia zone of carnage during the battle over Jerusalem. Whether it’s entirely or partly poetic, one thing is certain: this judgment creates a gory scene.

 

Verse twenty speaks of the process of making wine, which requires separation and pressure. It is an unpopular thing in our culture today to talk about God's judgment and the reality of good and evil. In our Western society, the idea of virtue has been relegated to one’s personal choice as if every man can decide his version of good and evil, as in the time of the Judges when every man did what was right in his own eyes (Judges 17:6). The reality that God will judge every person is very different from how most people think of their end. God will separate the sheep from the goats and will judge and bring both rewards and punishment, but He is not willing that anyone should perish! The Lord desires that all men and women everywhere would turn to Him and put their trust in His substitutionary sacrifice for sin, the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus for you and as you. The Lord will reward all who, by faith in God, endure the difficulties of this time. The Scripture says, “They will rest from their labor, and their deeds will follow them" (v.13). It is comforting to know that God sees the good we have done and that our good works will follow us into life eternal. God will use even the fruit of sorrows. He will not waste anything!

 

We sometimes think of the judgment of God only as a fearful thing. The judgment of God will also herald a new beginning. At the beginning of this chapter, we read of the 144,000 singing a new song unto the Lord. One commentator observes:

 

The song of Moses was sung at the Red Sea; the song of the Lamb is sung at the Crystal Sea; the song of Moses was a song of triumph over Egypt; the song of the Lamb is a song of triumph over Babylon; the song of Moses told how God brought His people out. The song of the Lamb tells how God brings His people in; the song of Moses was the first song in Scripture, and the song of the Lamb is the last.

 

Prayer: Lord, we see a great harvest that is ripe and that Your laborers are few. Send more laborers into Your Harvest and help us be willing to see what part we have in this great Harvest. Along with our  brothers and sisters worldwide, we say, “Come, Lord Jesus!”

 

Keith Thomas

 

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