Revelation 7:1

Counter picture of celestial reward of Saints, Revelation 7:1-17.

a. Winds are silenced, while OLD TESTAMENT SAINTS are sealed, 144,000, Revelation 7:1-8 .

1. And The six seals of chap. vi give the shady side of human history and destiny; this chapter gives the sunny side. During that darksome history there was a Church, sometimes struggling and sometimes triumphant, in the world. And now, to relieve the scene and to exhilarate the Christian heart, a picture of that Church is contrastively spread before us in its glory. It follows, that the complete history of the world is not profane and inglorious, nor a defeat of Christ’s atonement and headship of the race.

“He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied.”

The angel of the seals bids the angels of the winds to hush every breeze while he stamps the servants of God, Revelation 7:1-3. One hundred and forty-four thousand are sealed from among the twelve tribes of Israel, Revelation 7:4-8. Then the great innumerable body redeemed from among all nations are seen standing before the theophanic throne, (amid a choir of angels circling around them,) and their paradisaic state is explained by one of the elders, Revelation 7:9-17.

It is a great question among commentators, who are the 144,000? and who the great multitude of Revelation 7:9? By our mode of interpretation, the reply seems clear and simple. They are, as may be fully shown in our notes, the Old Testament and the New Testament Church; and their redemption is here pictorially presented in contrast to the condemnation of the profane world, as presented in the six seals of the last chapter.

After these things This contrasted half does not belong to the seal series, but is a contrastive counterpart.

Four angels The creational number, indicating that they are a regular part of the system. In religious allegory they are nature-angels; in science they are the laws of nature; in truth they are the goings forth of the divine power in its established and regular methods.

Four corners Phraseology based upon the four points of the compass.

Not blow A divine quietude of the elements over earth, and sea, and tree, must await the sacred sealing process. All nature yields before the dispensations of heavenly grace.