"Sealed" On The Forehead

Biblegems #170

Question: The “seal” put on foreheads in Revelation 7:3: What is it, who puts it on, who gets it, and when does it happen?

Revelation 7:3 (NIV) reads: “Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.”

The one giving this instruction is an angel who has with him “the seal of the living God” (Rev. 7:2). He addresses a group of four other angels who have been given control over earth’s winds. God's command to these 5 angels is clear and specific: They are not to begin pouring out His Wrath (i.e., the Trumpets and Bowls [cf. Rev. 8:7-11; 15:7-17:24]) until they put a seal on the forehead of God's servants.

What is the seal? It is the name of the Lamb of God, and of God the Father, written upon the forehead. It signifies that those who are sealed are protected from the wrath of God that is about to be poured out upon the Antichrist and upon the whole earth (Rev. 9:4; 14:1; 16:2). To describe it as being upon their foreheads may be symbolic. However, it may also mean that those who stand for Jesus and against the Antichrist in that day intentionally write the name of Jesus upon their foreheads in direct opposition to those who wear the mark of the Beast (Rev. 13:16). Either way, they are eternally identified as belonging to Jesus, the Lamb of God (Rev. 20:4; 22:4).

So who are these who are given this seal in the End Times? They are Jews, the 12 tribes of Israel represented by the 144,000 (Rev. 7:4-8), who are also followers of Jesus, the Lamb of God:

         Rev. 14:1 Then 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.

        

They are Redeemed Jews:

Rev. 14:3 And 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.

These Jews are sexually pure followers of Jesus. The reign of the Antichrist is identified with an XXX rated culture (Rev. 17:1-2, 5), a culture in which maintaining sexual purity will be extremely difficult.

          Rev. 14:4 These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for they kept themselves pure. They follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They were purchased from among men and offered as firstfruits to God and the Lamb.

These Jewish believers are the “firstfruits” of the Lamb (14:4), the advance wave of a vast number of other Jews who will become believers in Jesus when the Messiah is revealed from heaven at His coming in glory (Rev. 1:7). They are “sealed” after the sixth seal of the scroll is opened (i.e., after the Great Tribulation) and just before the Day of the Lord, the outpouring of God’s Wrath (Rev. 8:5-18:24) and the appearing of Jesus Christ in the sky (Rev. 19:12-21).

Even so, come Lord Jesus!

Revelation's 1,260 Days

Biblegems #70

Question: Revelation 11:3 speaks of the two prophets and the 1,260 days that they will be prophesying, and Rev. 12:6, 14 speaks of the woman having the child and after giving birth God sends her to the desert for 1,260 days. Does the 1,260 days refer to both events taking place at the same time?

It is likely that both passages refer to events happening during the last 31/2 years of the Antichrist’s reign. 1,260 days equals 31/2 years, according to the Jewish calendar of NT times, which contained twelve months of thirty days each. Let’s begin with Revelation 11:3.

The context tells us that the two witnesses of verse 3 carry out their ministry after the temple has been rebuilt in Jerusalem (v. 1), and specifically after the Gentiles have taken over the temple (v. 2). According to Daniel 9:27, this refers to the Antichrist outlawing the Jewish sacrifices and setting up a statue of himself in the temple to be worshiped. Jesus refers to Daniel’s prophecy:

When you see ‘the abomination that causes desolation’ standing where it does not belong—let the reader understand—then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains (Mark 13:14; see also Dan. 11:31; 12:11; Matt. 24:15).

The two witnesses of Revelation 11:3 are most likely Moses and Elijah. The miracles they perform (Rev. 11:6) are identical to those performed through Moses and Elijah in the OT. Elijah is mentioned in this regard by the prophet Malachi:

See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers… (Mal. 4:5-6).

Malachi’s prophecy places Elijah in Jerusalem, just before the Day of the Lord (Mal. 4:5), which means at the end of the last 31/2 years of the Antichrist’s reign.

In a preview of His Second Coming, when Jesus was transfigured before Peter, James and John, appearing with Him were Moses and Elijah (Mk. 9:1-4).

Turning to Revelation12: 6, 14, and 13:4-18, we see Israel under the control of the Antichrist, yet protected from annihilation (12:6), during the last 31/2 years of his reign. Indeed, the influence of the Antichrist will be world-wide:

         All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the book of life belonging to the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world (Rev. 13:8).

This is the period Jesus calls the Great Tribulation (“Great Distress,” NIV, Matt. 24:15-29). As we saw earlier from Daniel 9:27, The Antichrist will have established an agreement with the nations, an agreement he will break halfway into his 7 year reign:

         He will confirm a covenant with many for one ‘seven.’ In the middle of the ‘seven’ he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing [of the temple] he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him (Dan. 9:27).

Though the reign of the Antichrist will last seven years, the Great Tribulation will be cut short as far as the persecuted church of Jesus Christ is concerned when Jesus returns to for His Church and pours out the wrath of God upon the Antichrist and an unbelieving world:

         For then there will be great distress [Tribulation], unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again. If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened (Matt. 24:21-22). And—

         Immediately after the distress [Tribulation] of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other (Matt. 24:29-31).

Revelation 3:10 & The Rapture

Biblegems # 66

Question: Does Revelation 3:10 refer to the rapture of the Church before the Great Tribulation?

Rev. 3:10 reads, Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole world to test those who live on the earth.

This verse has been called “the watershed in the debate over the timing of the rapture.”¹ I have underlined the portions that are key to its interpretation.

Rev. 3:10 is addressed to the Church of Philadelphia. The promise given is specifically to the church of Philadelphia. However, the promise makes no sense unless the Philadelphian church is seen as a type of the future Church at the time of this predicted “hour of trial” because those of John’s day would not live long enough to see that period.

The promise is conditional: “Since” you have patiently endured, then (implied) I will keep you from the hour of global trial. Those who have endured are the Philadelphian Christians. No such promise is given to the other churches in Revelation 5. In other words, not all Christians will be ‘kept from the hour of trial,’ but only that remnant that has “patiently endured.”

The word “endurance” (Gk. hupomonais) means standing firm through trouble and adversity. So the idea is that standing firm through trouble and adversity now will result in God’s keeping you from “the hour of trial” in the future.

The “hour of trial” clearly refers to a specific period of time in the future. It will be world-wide, therefore the principal of divine protection promised to the Philadelphian church would apply to the church universal at the time of this world-wide “trial.” The “hour” actually describes the beginning of the Great Tribulation, which according to Daniel 12, begins 31/2 years into the reign of the antichrist.

The word “trial” (Gk. Peirasmoun) means “testing,” which aptly describes the Tribulation, but not the Day of the Lord’s Wrath, where testing is replaced by judgment. The two events should not be confused as one.

So the expectation of the Church as it approaches the time of the Great Tribulation, based on the cause and effect promise given to the church of Philadelphia, is that some believers, those who “patiently endure” the period just prior to the Tribulation (i.e., the first 31/2 years of the antichrist’s 7 year reign), will be kept from that “hour of trial.” They will be “kept” by God from experiencing that last 31/2 years known as the Great Tribulation.

This is not the Rapture, because it does not include the whole Church, but represents God’s protection of a remnant within His Church. Remember Jesus’ warning to those believers who are alive during the Tribulation to hide in the mountains when the antichrist sets up his image in the temple at Jerusalem (Matt. 24:15-21). Those who have been anticipating this terrible climax of human history and flee into hiding when they see the antichrist set himself up as a god may be among those whom God keeps “from the hour of trial.” They have been watching, enduring and preparing for that very day.

1 Rosenthal, Marvin. The Pre-Wrath Rapture Of The Church, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tenn. 1990, pg. 238

Who Are The Holy Ones? 1 Thess.3:13

Biblegems # 63

Question: Who are the “holy ones” Paul is referring to in 1 Thessalonians 3:13 who will be with Jesus when He returns?

There are three possibilities as to whom “all His holy ones” refers to. Either the phrase refers to all God’s angels, or all of those who are saved (the dead in Christ and those who are raptured at His appearing), or to a combination of God’s angels and the resurrected redeemed.

Some commentators say the phrase cannot refer to both angels and the redeemed of the Lord because “Paul would hardly include two such diverse groups in the same category.”¹

I disagree.

The apostle Paul has much to say about the Lord’s Return throughout his letters. In 2 Thessalonians he talks about the Lord being glorified in His people at His Return:

         2 Th. 1:10 …on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed.

Paul stated previously, in his first letter to the Thessalonians, that the dead in Christ will join with those who meet the Lord in the air at His Return:

         1 Th. 4:15 According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. (16) For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. (17) After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

This “joining” of those who are raptured and those who are already with the Lord in heaven would constitute “all His holy ones,” if “holy ones” refers only to people and not angels. However, this joining of the living and dead in Christ at His return happens, we are told by Paul, “with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God” (1 Thess. 4:16). The timing is important in identifying the “holy ones.”

Jesus spoke of this same event in Matthew 24:

         Matt. 24:31 And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

Notice that according to both Jesus and Paul, the Rapture takes place at the trumpet call of God, which Jesus says is blown by angels (Matt. 24:31), and Paul says is accompanied by the voice of the archangel. All this, Jesus says, is at the visible return of Jesus Christ to planet earth (Matt. 24:30) immediately after the Great Tribulation (Matt. 24:29).

“All his holy ones” refers to all those who are in Christ at His appearing, together with all the angelic army of heaven.

1 The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Frank E. Gaebelein, Ed., Zondervan,1415 Lake Drive, S. E. Grand Rapids, MI 49506. ISBN: 0-310-36440-X Copyright © 1990 Electronic text hypertexted and prepared by OakTree Software, Inc., Version 1.5, in loc.