Los 144000

THE 144,000
NUMEROUS QUERIES have been received of late concerning the 144,000 brought to view in Revelation 7. Who are they? At what age of the world are they developed? Is the number to be taken in a strictly literal sense? or is it a representative number, meaning a larger and indefinite company, of some particular class? {S144 3.1}
This number is first mentioned in Revelation 7, and thecircumstances under which they are brought to view furnish a very clear indication, in a general way, to the correct application. They are a certain class who are sealed out of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel; and they are sealed at a certain time, when “the four winds” are about to blow upon the earth, to the hurt, or desolation, of the earth and the sea (verses 2, 3); and the blowingof the winds is restrained till this number, which the angel calls “the servants of our God,” are sealed. {S144 3.2}
It will hardly be called in question that the “four winds” of which this prophecy speaks, are the same as “the great whirlwind” prophesied of in Jeremiah 25:32, 33, and that the same scene is brought to view in both these passages of scripture. Jeremiah says: “Thus saith the Lordof Hosts, Behold evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the the coasts of the earth. And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth, even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried: they shall be dung upon the ground.” {S144 3.3}
This scene is certainly future; for nothinglike it has ever yet occurred since the prophecy of Jeremiah was written; and no such scene will be witnessed till this earth’s final time of trouble shall come. Daniel 12:1. Now if the blowing of the four winds of Revelation 7:1 is the same scene (and what would four winds blowing from “the four corners of the earth” produce but “a great whirlwind”?), then the scene of Revelation 7:1-8 applies inthe last days, and is a work preparatory to the closing up of all earthly scenes. The 144,000 must therefore be found in the last generation of “the servants of our God” on the earth; and the sealing of them must be the last special religious movement among men. It is the closing Christian movement of the Christian age. {S144 3.4}
But the thought with some will at once arise, that this cannot be,because the sealed ones are from “all the tribes of the children of Israel” and as those tribes do not now exist, this prophecy must apply to some time in the past when the genealogy of the tribes was kept, and the distinction was preserved. So far as this may appear as an objection to the view above stated, it is easily removed by another thought, - that though men have no distinctive record ofthe tribes, God may have such a record, and that is sufficient. Hebrews 12:23. And the objection is still further barred out by the fact that the people of “Israel” are not confined to the descendants of Abraham after the flesh, but that true Israelites are Jews inwardly (Romans 2:29); not “children of the flesh,” but “children of the promise” (Romans 9:6-8); wild scions grafted into the goodolive-tree and partaking of its nature (Romans 11:17, 24); members from the Gentiles, of the “commonwealth of Israel.” Ephesians 2:12, 19. And all this pertains to Christians, who are in consequence of their relation to Christ, “Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Galatians 3:29. Hence James, addressing Christians at the time - when “the coming of the Lord draweth nigh” (the very timeto which Revelation 7:1-8 applies), greets them as “the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.” And the New Testament city, the New Jerusalem, whose builder and maker is God, which bears on its foundation jewels the names of the twelve apostles, shows on its twelve gates, through which the whole host of the redeemed are to pass in and out through all eternity, the names of the twelve tribes...