The 144,000: Understanding Revelation’s Most Debated Passage

October 18, 2026 — Sermon from Church Service

Thank you. Let us open with the words we’ve been studying, Revelation chapter 7, verse 3: “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.” And I heard the number of the sealed—144,000 sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel. Twelve thousand from the tribe of Judah were sealed, twelve thousand from the tribe of Reuben, twelve thousand from the tribe of Gad, twelve thousand from the tribe of Asher, twelve thousand from the tribe of Naphtali, twelve thousand from the tribe of Manasseh, twelve thousand from the tribe of Simeon, twelve thousand from the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand from the tribe of Issachar, twelve thousand from the tribe of Zebulun, twelve thousand from the tribe of Joseph, and twelve thousand from the tribe of Benjamin were sealed.

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” And all the angels were standing around the throne, and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

Now we will come back to that chapter near the end, if you’d like to keep your place. For now, let us pray.

Father God, thank you so very much for allowing us to be in Your house together today. Grant now that Your servant will have both the courage and the clarity to unpack this passage. May our hearts be open, Lord, to receive instruction. And what a tricky word that is, Father. Please help us today, and help Your servant today, as we try to navigate this chapter of this book. We want You to remind us again that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable. May we profit today from something we draw from this text. In Christ’s name, Amen.

A Call to Listen

Now, let me lay out two things before you this morning. First, I have to say again—because we’re going to be touching on some subjects here, and I’ve said this many times—the fact that you’ve never heard something doesn’t make it wrong. Now, it is true that Christians are to be on guard against error, and oftentimes when we hear something new, it might be error. But when we come to a way of trying to dissect this book—and by the way, we’re not just trying to say, “Okay, here’s what we believe, and all those other people are wrong”—we’re trying to see what the book actually says and what it actually teaches. And to do that, we have to talk about some subjects and some concepts that you might never have heard before, and therefore conclude off the bat that it’s wrong. You need to hear it out.

The greatest challenge I feel like any pastor has today is for people to actually listen. And that’s what I said in my prayer. I just paused there for a moment. I was going to say, “I don’t know this, and therefore I can never be instructed in that.” And we also have to be reminded—we always have to come back to what we’ve been told again and again—because as human beings, we have a tendency, even if we’re not old, to forget things.

I am a pilot, as you know, and every two years I have to do a flight review. I have to go up with an instructor. I unfortunately have an instructor in my family, but I have to go up with an instructor, and you have to go through all the motions—you have to stall the plane, you have to do steep turns—and you forget things from one year to the next. And this is the way it is with life. So we have to be willing to be instructed, and sometimes that means hearing things we haven’t heard and may be confused about. And this is especially true today because of the subject matter of chapter 7 of Revelation.

I want to remind us of our basic premise: Revelation is written to encourage suffering Christians in their tribulations. And this is the premise that gives the book application for every generation. If we say it’s only forward-looking and it’s out there somewhere, how did it benefit the people who first heard it? And if we say it’s all back there, how does it benefit us today? The only premise that goes across the centuries is this view that God is trying to encourage His people when they’re suffering for their faith confession. That concept continues in chapter 7 here.

The Central Question: Who Are the 144,000?

The central question of this most debated passage in the book of Revelation is this 144,000. Who are these people? Who do they represent?

Now, today I’m going to attempt to keep my thoughts focused on the three main viewpoints. There are many under those—many sub-viewpoints—but I want to try to stay focused on the three main viewpoints of this passage. And the first one we want to look at, which is clearly wrong, is the viewpoint of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Viewpoint One: Jehovah’s Witnesses

The Jehovah’s Witnesses have their own take on the 144,000, and it is wrong. I want to stress that, because the other two viewpoints have an idea about the 144,000, and someone might say, “Well, they could be wrong about the 144,000, so who are we to say the Jehovah’s Witnesses are wrong?” And I want to remind you: Jehovah’s Witnesses are wrong about a whole lot of stuff, not just the 144,000. The fact that they could be—and they aren’t. But even if they were, even if they had a legitimate view on the 144,000, their other viewpoints are wrong. And we must affirm that.

Some years ago, we had a couple attending our church, and the wife had a sister. That sister was coming to our Wednesday night Bible studies, and her sister’s husband attended a Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Kingdom Hall. They come in all the time and say, “Well, he believes. He believes.” And they would justify him going to a Jehovah’s Witnesses’ meeting because he believes. But the failure there is not to realize that Jehovah’s Witnesses are wrong across the board. You cannot say they’re okay. They do not believe in the fundamental central belief of the Christian church, and that is Christ and Him crucified. They do not believe Jesus is the Son of God, and they do not believe He was resurrected. That throws them out of biblical Christianity altogether. And this is very important.

Walter Martin, in the book The Kingdom of the Cults, spends one hundred pages describing the errors, the false predictions, and the changes that have occurred in the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ organization. They have their own Bible, and in that Bible they’ve made hundreds of changes that go against the original Greek language in which the Bible came to us. So they’re wrong across the board.

Now, specifically as it relates to the 144,000: we do not love people by letting them continue in their error. “Oh, I’m going to love those people.” Not if you don’t challenge their error. If you will let them go on in their error, that’s not love. That’s indifference. And it’s grieving in the heart of God. Yes, there’s a right way to express your love, but it’s not an act of love to just let someone go on in their false beliefs.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that the 144,000 are literal, faithful Christians who go to heaven to rule as kings and priests alongside Jesus Christ in an invisible heavenly government. They are also called the “anointed class,” the “little flock,” or those with a heavenly calling. The Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that most Jehovah’s Witnesses will not go to heaven; they will stay here on earth in a paradise of God. Only this 144,000 actually get to go to heaven.

And again, they do not believe that Jesus is God, and a host of other things. They believe Jesus is Michael the archangel. After his death, he went back to heaven and resumed his role as Michael the archangel. That is not Christian doctrine and Christian belief. And so it’s very important to see that.

Viewpoint Two: Dispensationalism

Now, there are two other views that represent the bulk of the Christian church after that: the dispensational camp and the non-dispensational camp, perhaps the more Reformed groups. Both groups agree the number is symbolic, but it should go beyond exactly 144,000.

Michael Wilcock, in his commentary on Revelation, says the number looks too stylized to be anything else—the suspiciously tidy sort of number that is much more likely to be a symbol than a statistic. It’s not meant to be taken absolutely literally as exactly 144,000 people. It is symbolic. Joel Beeke argues, because given the genre of Revelation, the numbers are not to be understood mathematically but spiritually.

When you get into the book of Revelation, there are all kinds of symbolic numbers: the number 10, the number 12, the number 7. For example, in chapter 1, it talks about the seven spirits of God. It’s not saying there are seven spirits of God. It’s a metaphorical reference to the fullness of the Holy Spirit, which the number 7 represents. And this is true when we go through this.

Now, another reason some do not believe this is a literal number—exactly 12,000 from the 12 tribes of Israel—is because that listing is not the 12 tribes of Israel. If you don’t know your Bible, you’ll skip right over that fact. But if you read down through the list again, it says “the tribe of Joseph.” Joseph wasn’t a tribe. Joseph was a son. Jacob had twelve sons, and ten of those sons became tribes. The other two tribes came from Joseph. Joseph and Levi were not tribes; they were sons. Manasseh was a tribe, but not a son. So the list is not the 12 tribes, nor is it the 12 sons. In fact, the tribe of Dan isn’t even mentioned. And if you go to the Old Testament, you would not find this list in this order, and you would not find those names, because Joseph and Levi were not tribes—they were sons.

So from the get-go, it seems like a hint that this is a symbolic number and not meant to be seen as a literal 144,000 people, regardless of their ethnic origin, which we will come to.

Now, if it is a symbolic number, what or who does it represent? I will come back at the end to try to bring some kind of application to this, because you can see—again, what I’ve tried to tell you so many times along our journey—this book is a labyrinth of detail and symbolism.

So let me talk to you a minute about dispensationalism, or the dispensational viewpoint. This is really an umbrella term. There are a lot of groups underneath dispensationalism. It is a variety of premillennialism, and it is committed to a literal interpretation of Scripture—that is, that there are passages in the Bible that you take literally in every instance, in every situation. One of those would be, for example, that Israel has a right to the land. God promised the land to them, and that promise must come true literally with Jewish people inhabiting the Middle East. And this is the argument for many Christians to support the nation of Israel as it is today because of that literal interpretation of the prophecy.

Leaders or representatives of the dispensational movement would include the late John MacArthur, David Jeremiah, Jonathan Cahn, Pat Robertson, John Hagee, and people of that background. Now, dispensationalism is declining in popularity because it is based so much on predictions that continually do not come to pass. Hal Lindsey wrote a book back in the 1960s called The Late, Great Planet Earth. It was a record-breaking bestseller, and I have a copy of it, and it’s full of failed predictions when you look at it today. There are all kinds of things he said were going to happen that haven’t happened.

We’ve also heard me talk about, for example in Revelation—and we’ll get there later on—it says the river Euphrates will dry up, and people post on Facebook all the time that the river Euphrates is drying up. And on my phone, I have a screen-saved shot of a statement from the Iraqi Interior Ministry—which is like our National Park Service—that says the river’s not going to dry up until 2040, which is fourteen years from now. So it can’t have any reference to an immediate presence or an immediate coming of God. And this is the frailty of the dispensational movement. They keep making predictions, and as you can see from the list I gave you, two of those men are dead already. John MacArthur and Pat Robertson are gone, and they represented this viewpoint.

And I want to make sure you understand: I’m not demonizing these people, and I’m not saying they’re unsaved. I’m saying they hold to a viewpoint that is different from other people in the Christian community. I know that David Jeremiah is a very popular, well-known, and liked minister. I’m not saying he’s wrong, or he’s a bad guy, or he’s lost. I’m saying he holds to a dispensational viewpoint about the end times that everyone does not share. John MacArthur was very good friends with R.C. Sproul, and they differed on the end-time thing. And R.C. Sproul was not a dispensationalist. You may not know that name either. I’m sorry if you don’t.

Now, our purpose here is to recognize, as we try to unpack this, that in dispensationalism generally, this number, 144,000, represents actual ethnic Jews who are protected from harm during the seven-year tribulation period. Now, you have to believe in a lot of other things to believe that, and that’s why it’s not a stand-alone thing.

Marvin Pate, representing progressive dispensationalism, says that it is possible to view the 144,000 as a select group of Jews who are converted to Christ during the great tribulation, which in turn evangelizes the Gentile nations, which are the innumerable multitude that John sees after seeing this 144,000. The dispensationalists then see the 144,000 as one group—Jews—and the great multitude as another group, Gentiles who have been saved by God.

This is an assumption among dispensationalists. Some, and I said it was an umbrella term, some believe at this point in Revelation the church has been raptured. The only people of God on the planet now are the Jews, and God saves people from that group of people during the tribulation period. Well, there are many things that could be said that complicate that viewpoint.

Here’s one that to me remains the biggest, and it comes from the promise to Abraham. Now, statistically, there are twelve million Jews on planet earth. Twelve million. There are eight billion human beings on this planet. So that number doesn’t come close to anything resembling the sands of the seashore or the stars of the heaven. And this is after thousands and thousands of years, by the way. And so if you say 144,000—God’s going to save only 144,000 Jews out of twelve million, out of eight billion? This is the way God keeps His promise to Abraham? And you can see the complexities and the difficulty with that.

And even if you argue, which many people do, that there’s going to be a great ingathering of the Jews in the last days—if God saved all twelve million of them today, it would still be a pittance compared to the vastness of humanity. And this is why, as you will see, some take the position—and I think it’s scriptural, and I’ll show you these passages in a moment—that God’s people are both Jew and Gentile, and that when we come to Christ, we become the offspring of Abraham. And therefore, we are included in this group. And there’s no longer a separation of Jew and Gentile, as we have thought through the years.

The Scripture: Jew and Gentile Made One

Listen to this. As Jason said, let me show you the Scripture, not just tell you. Ephesians chapter 2, verses 11 through 16:

“Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands, remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope in the world, and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one. He has broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility, that He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.”

Who was far off? The Gentiles. The Gentiles have now been brought close. Now notice what it says: “He has made us both one.” Who is the “both” there? Jew and Gentile. They’re both made one in Christ Jesus. He has made both one, and has broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility, that He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two. Instead of two groups of people serving God, one group of people identified with Christ. And this is the concept that Paul uses repeatedly. He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both, Jew and Gentile, to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Here, Paul clearly contrasts Jew and Gentile. He clearly affirms the distinctions are now erased, and that there is one people identified by their connection to Jesus Christ.

Now, it’s important because this could be a consideration. Those who believe it’s two groups—the dispensationalists believe it’s two different groups. I’m getting ahead of myself. Those who aren’t in the dispensational group believe it’s two perspectives on the same group: that the 144,000 are from God’s perspective, and the great multitude is from John’s perspective.

Now, let me say to you, that sounds like a contradiction. I appreciate Jason’s comments about a paradox. Let’s assume that they had an event up on the National Mall, and the National Park Service estimated two million people were there. And unbeknownst to the National Park Service, there was somebody in the crowd actually counting heads—and I realize that’s an impossibility, but for the sake of argument—he counted three million people were there. They’re both talking about the same group of people, but they’re seeing it from two different perspectives. And this is the idea that is floated about who this group of people are. The 144,000 are a typological, symbolic representation of all God’s people, and the innumerable multitude is what it looks like from John’s perspective.

Now, notice it says this: John heard—verse 4, “I heard the number of the sealed.” And verse 9, “I looked.” He heard one thing. He saw something else. Now, we saw that back in chapter 5, because John is weeping, and the elder says—and I heard the elder say—”Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah has prevailed.” And when John looks, he sees a Lamb. He heard one thing. He saw something else. And this is the same consideration.

From this standpoint, from God’s standpoint, they’re all Israel. They’re all His people. But from John’s standpoint, they come from every nation under heaven. Now, I have to point out to you that that last phrase—”they come from every nation under heaven”—would be true of the Jews, because the Jews were scattered to all the nations. And if you listen to different programs, you’ll hear people talk about historical programs specifically connected to the Holocaust. You will hear them say, “I was a Ukrainian Jew. I was a Russian Jew. I was a Jew from England or France or Spain. An American Jew.” They’re still identifying their ethnic identity from the land where they grew up and lived. And it could be the same consideration here.

So the 144,000—and I’m just explaining the differences to you—the applications at the end have no bearing upon which position you take about the 144,000. The 144,000 are said to be the church militant, active on the earth, doing the work of God now. And the church triumphant is that group of innumerable people who are seen to be in heaven.

The Seal and Its Purpose

Now, this is important because of how chapter 6 ends. “The great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” Who can stand in the day of God’s wrath? Only those sealed by God’s power can stand in the day of wrath. And this is where it comes into our discussion about this book being a word of encouragement. The people of God will stand. They are servants of God, and they are sealed against spiritual harm, which allows them to stand in heaven at the end. This image is meant to convey assurance to God’s people. They will all be saved in the end, whether it be ethnic Jews or all people who have been called and saved in Christ.

Now, is it a sealing then? We’re back to that question. Which of these two groups is it speaking of? Well, it’s interesting when you speak of Israel and ethnic Jews specifically.

Now, I must pause here, because this is a false allegation: that if you believe the non-dispensational perspective on the Jews, you don’t care about Jews, and you don’t love those people, and you don’t care about what’s happening in the Middle East. And that’s simply a false allegation. I affirm that the Jews, as any other group of human beings, have a right to live in a homeland and defend themselves against harm. That’s a human right. Me and Scott did a podcast episode about this, and sometimes we get into discussions with non-believers, and it comes to the nation of Israel, and we say, “Well, God promised that land to them.” You just lost the argument if you’re talking to an unbeliever. They don’t believe in God. They couldn’t care less what God promised to the Jews. We try to talk to unbelievers in Bible language. So what you have to do is talk in human language: I support the human right of every person to live in a homeland that is historically theirs, and they have the right to defend themselves in that land. And that’s where we are in the question of that aspect. So it isn’t a denial of the Jews or their value.

Now, I’m a very practical person, and I don’t want to be an alarmist, but our country has been on the forefront of supporting Israel for five decades, and our country is not being blessed by God. It is being judged by God. Now, why is that? Because there’s more to it than just supporting a democratic government in the Middle East. There’s much more to it than that.

Let me take you to a passage in Ezekiel, because this passage of Revelation—and we’ve said this throughout our journey—is drawing on Old Testament images. When you go back to the book of Ezekiel, here’s where we get this thing about marking these people and protecting them. And I realize this has got a context all around it, and we will come back to it when we get down to the mark of the beast, but notice this, please. Very important here:

“The Lord said to him, ‘Go through the city, through Jerusalem, and put a mark on the foreheads of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations that are committed in it.'”

The mark and the seal in Ezekiel was put on people who were grieving over the sins of the nation. There was no mark or seal put on those who were engaging in the sins of that nation. Now, this is important. As we try to say: Is this ethnic Jews? The 144,000 ethnic Jews? And again, I’m simply trying to explain the differences to you.

Now, if I could go off in a different direction and wax political for just a moment: we’re going to have a vote in a couple of weeks on one of the things about the abortion amendment. I’ve got to stay away from that. And I’m not staying away from it because of cowardice. I’m staying away from it because of complexity. It’ll take me longer than this message to unpack that faithfully.

Notice this: “Go through the city. Mark everyone who groans and sighs over the abominations that are committed in it.” Despite their religious devotion, Orthodox Jews in Israel today cannot be considered servants of God. They deny the Messiah. They don’t believe Jesus is the Messiah. They don’t believe He came. When you look at the New Testament, the people who were sealed were people who confessed Christ as Savior and God.

Listen to this passage. There are many sections here, and you can make a case that it’s two kinds of sealing. I don’t think so as you look at these passages. Ephesians 1, verses 13 and 14: “In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of His glory.”

The seal is a guarantee. A guarantee of what? That we will inherit the eternal life that God has called us to and given us. And what do you find in Revelation chapter 7? The people are being sealed against harm. Now, you’ll notice as we go on here, it isn’t physical harm. It’s not material harm. It’s spiritual harm. It’s protection against apostasy, against abandoning God. That’s what they’re being protected against.

And so we have a question: How can you be protected against something you’ve never come to? The Jews do not believe in who Christ is. And this is not anti-Semitic. This is a proclamation of the gospel. All people must come to Christ for salvation. “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” and there is no way but Jesus.

Ephesians 4:30: “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” 2 Corinthians chapter 1: “It is God who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us and who has also put His seal on us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” The seal is a guarantee, a protection against irrevocable spiritual harm. This is what’s going on.

In addition to that, so the Jewish—now, we have to be careful here. There are Messianic Jews. We have, Sarah, if I’m not mistaken, has or knows in one of the homeschool groups some Messianic Jews. They’re Jews who believe in the Messiah. But the average Jew does not believe in the Messiah. They reject the Messiah and they resist any connotation. That’s just the way it is in the real world. And so the Jewish people cannot be the focus of this sealing. They’re not servants of God. They’re actually in disobedience to Jesus.

And what does Jesus say? He goes into the city. Do you remember? He comes riding in. He looks over at the city and He begins to weep. And He says, “How many times I wanted to rescue you, but you would not let me do it. And now your house is left to you desolate.” And He meant the temple and the temple hierarchy and all of the things that had to do with it. They rejected their Messiah. They are under the judgment of God, as all human beings are. It’s not a Jew-Gentile thing. All those in rebellion against God are under the frown of God. And we must pray that they be delivered from the eternal frown of God.

In our hurry to protect the Jews sometime, we miss what the Scripture says. It is those who come to Christ who are His servants and God’s children. And I again will call your attention to the Scripture: “James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes in the dispersion.” Is that written to Christians or Jews? If you say it’s written to the Jews, then we don’t have to obey it. It wasn’t written to us. It is written metaphorically to Christians who are now being described as part of the people of Israel in the twelve tribes. It’s a metaphorical term.

Or how about this one? Romans chapter 2: “A Jew is one inwardly. Circumcision is a matter of the heart by the Spirit, not by the letter.” Galatians chapter 6: “Neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision.” Now, what did we say earlier from Ephesians? Circumcision represents the Jews. Uncircumcision represents the Gentiles. Paul says neither of those categories matter anymore. Are you a new creation in Christ? Do you know Christ is your Lord and Savior?

And this is the danger of misunderstanding these things, and they are made so much more complex by this book and trying to unpack it. John Hagee, as an example, actually said Jews don’t have to believe in Jesus because they’re Jews. They’re in already. And that is not what Jesus said when He said, “If I am lifted up, I will draw all people, all kinds of people, to Me.” Not just Gentile people. “Neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.” Not just Israel—the Israel of God.

1 Peter 2:9: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” If you have a reference Bible, that’s going to reference you back to the book of Exodus where God is speaking to the Jews. And Peter takes that label and applies it to the New Testament Christian. We are the people of God. And the Jews can be the people of God if their faith is in Christ.

Galatians 3:28 and 29: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.”

Now, why does he say such a thing like that when there were clearly Jews and Greeks in the world still? There’s neither slave nor free, nor male and female. Well, despite our gender-confused culture, there still is male and female in the world in which we live. What is Paul talking about? He’s saying those kinds of things no longer have meaning for those who are in Christ. This is the point. There’s neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, there’s no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Now, who’s He talking to in that letter? He’s talking to Christians. He’s talking to Gentiles. There may be Jews in that Gentile congregation, but it’s to the Galatians, and Galatia was not one of the 12 tribes. He says to you Gentiles, you are—and he goes on, doesn’t he?—if you are in Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. It’s not Jew or Gentile anymore.

And even this term, “Christian,” is so misused in our culture today. You know, people carrying that around. So I had a festival yesterday, offering my books, and there was a lady next to me in her tent. She had all these crafts. And on this side, she had a little plaque that said, “Witches are welcome.” And on the other side, she had a plaque that said, “Bless us this day, oh Lord,” with something or other. And I’m thinking, this is Christianity in America today. We don’t know that there’s a distinction anymore between right and wrong, good and evil. And this is something we have to be careful about. We are in Christ. If you’re in Christ, you’re one of Abraham’s offspring. You are the chosen people of God.

It does not negate the Jew. Many people argue this is replacement theology. We’re not replacing the Jews with Gentiles. Both Jews and Gentiles are being brought together into Christ and made one.

Application: What We Can Draw From This

Now, that I have thoroughly angered you, confused you, bored you, frustrated you—what in the world can we draw, application-wise, from that jumble of stuff? Well, I think we can find three things that are very important.

One: God Knows His People

He seals them, regardless of who the 144,000 are. It shows God knows. He knows who they are. He knows who His people are. “Go through,” He says in Ezekiel. “Go through and mark the foreheads of all those who are groaning and sighing about the abomination.” He knows our hearts, and He knows His people.

Listen to this passage of Scripture from 1 Timothy. It’s very important. Do you listen to the language? God’s firm foundation stands, having this seal: “The Lord knows those who are His. And let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity.”

Now, I want you to think of two passages. There’s another passage where Paul says, “Now that you know God—or rather, are known by Him.” Many people want to boast about, “Well, I believe this. I believe that. I believe that.” But God knows who you are. And can I remind you then what Jesus says in Matthew chapter 7? “Depart from Me, you workers of iniquity. I don’t know you.”

Now, here’s a little—put it together. God’s people depart from iniquity. They don’t become complacent in it and say, “Well, I’m a sinner. God understands I’m a sinner. I gotta sin a little bit every day.” You will sin, because we are sinners. But we don’t rejoice in that. We don’t come complacent about it. We run to Christ with our sins and say, “Oh God, forgive and cleanse me.” As Jason says, we go through life and our feet are cluttered by the darkness of the world, and we come to Christ again and again and again, confident that He will never tire of us, though we often tire of ourselves.

God knows His people. People will say, “Well, God knows my heart.” That’s not necessarily a word of comfort, because He knows the things you’re trying to hide from. I haven’t said it for a while, but I love my job.

Two: God Keeps His People

Not only does He know them, He keeps them. I know there’s a lot of concerns in every period of time, and sometimes we’ve just got to know God keeps His people.

Now I want to read this. This is a very lengthy passage. I didn’t make a slide. It goes along with what we’ve been reading because we looked at it last week with the comparison of the seals and what Jesus said. But listen to what He says. Listen to what Jesus says in Luke chapter 21:

“Then He said to them, ‘Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences, and there will be terrors and great signs from heaven. Before all this, they will lay hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for My name’s sake. This will be your opportunity to witness.'”

That’s probably not what most American Christians would say when they were trotted in before kings and governors. “This will be your opportunity to bear witness when they drag you in front of all these people. Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer, for I will give you a mouth and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.”

Now listen, it’s very important. We’re coming up on a big paradox here. Thank you, Jason, for that. “You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you will be put to death. You will be hated by all for My name’s sake.”

Now here comes the paradox. I’ll reread the previous verse. “Some of them they will put to death,” and the last phrase: “but not a hair of your head will perish.” Wait a minute. You said I was going to die. No—you’re going to die physically, which is something that’s coming to all of us—but we’re not going to die spiritually, because we’re in Christ, and He sealed us for His glory and His kingdom. And as we wait on Him and trust in Him and serve Him, He keeps us. And this is the message.

When you go back and look at the persecution of the first century, when you look at persecution around the world today, and we scratch our heads, “How did they do it?” Through the power of God. And Jesus says, “Be confident in My keeping power.” And come on, folks—this is so important—”not a hair of your head will perish.” And everybody knows the jokes about how much hair you lose and how often it falls out, and how the sink gets clogged up in my house anyway when Lisa’s in there in the bathroom. And I don’t—I keep mine trimmed down, you know, I don’t have that problem. But He says not one hair. It’s meant to convey that even the smallest, seemingly insignificant part of your life is kept by God.

Three: God Comforts His People

Not only does He know them, not only does He keep them—He comforts them.

Now listen to the end. We didn’t read the end, but I’ll jump down to verse 15. We’ll come back to verses 13 through 14 next week, but verse 15:

“Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple. And He who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

Now notice how that overlaps with the last parts of Revelation chapter 21: “I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.'”

This is hope. That when all the dust settles, we’re in the presence of God, safe in His hands. And please notice the immediate, intimate, personal notation. You’ve got to get really close to do this. You remember, parents, when you did that for your children—they were crying, and you got down, and you wiped the tears from their eyes. John is using language here that every person can understand: the need for someone to get close and wipe away my pain. And this is what God says He’s going to do.

And no matter what the valleys or the struggles—whether we have outbreaks of persecution, whether there are people that hate us—God says, “I’m going to keep you. And when the dust settles, I’ll be on My throne, I’ll be in the midst of My people, and we will all be rejoicing without memory of the pain anymore.”

And so you see, there is good stuff to draw out of the madness. God knows His people, and God keeps His people, and while the world loses its mind, Christians need to be a people of confidence and hopefulness because of who our faith is in.

Oh God, thank You for giving us this.

Amen.