_CONSOLATORY VISIONS._
REV. vii.
Six of the seven Seals have been opened by the "Lamb," who is likewise
the "Lion of the tribe of Judah." They have dealt, in brief but
pregnant sentences, with the whole history of the Church and of the
world throughout the Christian age. No details of history have indeed
been spoken of, no particular wars, or famines, or pestilences, or
slaughters, or preservations of the saints. Everything has been
described in the most general terms. We have been invited to think
only of the principles of the Divine government, but of these as the
most sublime and, according to our own state of mind, the most
alarming or the most consolatory principles that can engage the
attention of men. God, has been the burden of the six Seals, is King
over all the earth. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a
vain thing? Why do they exalt themselves against the sovereign Ruler
of the universe, who said to the Son of His love, when He made Him
Head over all things for His Church, "Thou art My Son; this day have I
begotten Thee;" "Rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies"?[168]
Listening to the voice of these Seals, we know that the world, with
all its might, shall prevail neither against the Head nor against the
members of the Body. Even when apparently successful it shall fight a
losing battle. Even when apparently defeated Christ and they who are
one with Him shall march to victory.
We are not to imagine that the Seals of chap. vi. follow one another in
chronological succession, or that each of them belongs to a definite
date. The Seer does not look forward to age succeeding age or century
century. To him the whole period between the first and the second coming
of Christ is but "a little time," and whatever is to happen in it "must
shortly come to pass." In truth he can hardly be said to deal with the
lapse of time at all. He deals with the essential characteristics of the
Divine government in time, whether it be long or short. Shall the
revolving years be in our sense short, these characteristics will
nevertheless come forth with a clearness that shall leave man without
excuse. Shall they be in our sense long, the unfolding of God's eternal
plan will only be again and again made manifest. He with whom we have to
do is without beginning of days or end of years, the _I am_,
unchangeable both in the attributes of His own nature, and in the
execution of His purposes for the world's redemption. Let us cast our
eyes along the centuries that have passed away since Jesus died and rose
again. They are full of one great lesson. At every point at which we
pause we see the Son of God going forth conquering and to conquer. We
see the world struggling against His righteousness, refusing to submit
to it, and dooming itself in consequence to every form of woe. We see
the children of God following a crucified Redeemer, but preserved,
sustained, animated, their cross, like His, their crown. Finally, as we
realize more and more deeply what is going on around us, we feel that
we are in the midst of a great earthquake, that the sun and the moon
have become black, and that the stars of heaven are falling to the
earth; yet by the eye of faith we pierce the darkness, and where are all
our adversaries? Where are the kings and the potentates, the rich and
the powerful _of the earth_, of an ungodly and persecuting world? They
have hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains; and
we hear them say to the mountains and to the rocks, "Fall on us, and
hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the
wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of their wrath is come; and who is
able to stand?"
With the beginning of chap. vii. we might expect the seventh Seal to
be opened; but it is the manner of the apocalyptic writer, before any
final or particularly critical manifestation of the wrath of God, to
present us with visions of consolation, so that we may enter into the
thickest darkness, even into the valley of the shadow of death,
without alarm. We have already met with this in chaps. iv. and v. We
shall meet with it again. Meanwhile it is here illustrated:--
After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the
earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that no wind should blow
on the earth, or on the sea, or upon any tree. And I saw another
angel ascend from the sun-rising, having the seal of the living God:
and he cried with a great voice to the four angels, to whom it was
given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth,
neither the sea, nor the trees, till we shall have sealed the
servants of our God on their foreheads. And I heard the number of
them which were sealed, a hundred and forty and four thousand,
sealed out of every tribe of the children of Israel. Of the tribe of
Judah were sealed twelve thousand; of the tribe of Reuben, twelve
thousand; of the tribe of Gad, twelve thousand; of the tribe of
Asher, twelve thousand; of the tribe of Naphtali, twelve thousand;
of the tribe of Manasseh, twelve thousand; of the tribe of Simeon,
twelve thousand; of the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand; of the
tribe of Issachar, twelve thousand; of the tribe of Zebulun, twelve
thousand; of the tribe of Joseph, twelve thousand; of the tribe of
Benjamin were sealed twelve thousand (vii. 1-8).
Although various important questions, which we shall have to notice,
arise in connexion with this vision, there never has been, as there
scarcely can be, any doubt as to its general meaning. In its main
features it is taken from the language of Ezekiel, when that prophet
foretold the approaching destruction of Jerusalem: "He cried also with a
loud voice in mine ears, saying, Cause them that have charge over the
city to draw near, even every man with his destroying weapon in his
hand. And, behold, six men came from the way of the higher gate, which
lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand;
and one man among them was clothed with fine linen, with a writer's
inkhorn by his side.... And the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst
of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the
foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations
that be done in the midst thereof.... And, behold, the man clothed with
linen, which had the inkhorn by his side, reported the matter, saying, I
have done as Thou hast commanded me."[169] Preservation of the faithful
in the midst of judgment on the wicked is the theme of the Old Testament
vision, and in like manner it is the theme of this vision of St. John.
The _winds_ are the symbols of judgment; and, being in number _four_ and
held by _four angels standing at the four corners of the earth_, they
indicate that the judgment when inflicted will be universal. There is no
place to which the ungodly can escape, none where they shall not be
overtaken by the wrath of God. "He that fleeth of them," says the
Almighty by His prophet, "shall not flee away, and he that escapeth of
them shall not be delivered. Though they dig into hell, thence shall
Mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring
them down: and though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will
search and take them out thence; and though they be hid from My sight in
the bottom of the sea, thence will I command the serpent, and he shall
bite them."[170]
In the midst of all this the safety of the righteous is secured, and
that in a way, as compared with the way of the Old Testament,
proportionate to the superior greatness of their privileges. They are
marked as God's, not by a man out of the city, but by an _angel
ascending from the sun-rising_, the quarter whence proceeds that light
of day which gilds the loftiest mountain-tops and penetrates into the
darkest recesses of the valleys. This angel, with his _great voice_,
is probably the Lord Himself appearing by His angel. The mark
impressed upon the righteous is more than a mere mark: it is a
_seal_--a seal similar to that with which Christ was "sealed;"[171]
the seal which in the Song of Songs the bride desires as the token of
the Bridegroom's love to her alone: "Set me as a seal upon Thine
heart, as a seal upon Thine arm;"[172] the seal which expresses the
thought, "The Lord knoweth them that are His."[173] Finally, this seal
is impressed _on the forehead_, on that part of the body on which the
high-priest of Israel wore the golden plate, with its inscription,
"Holiness to the Lord." Such a seal, manifest to the eyes of all, was
a witness to all that they who bore it were acknowledged by the
Redeemer before all, even before His Father and the holy angels.[174]
When we turn to the numbers sealed, every reader who reflects for a
moment will allow that they must be symbolically, and not literally,
understood. Twelve thousand out of each of twelve tribes, in all _a
hundred and forty and four thousand_, bears upon its face the stamp of
symbolism. It is more difficult to answer the question, Who are they?
Are they Jewish Christians, or are they the whole multitude of God's
faithful people belonging to the Church universal, but indicated by a
figure taken from Judaism?
The question now asked is of greater than ordinary importance, for
upon the answer given to it largely depends the solution of the
problem whether the author of the fourth Gospel and the author of the
Apocalypse are the same. If the first vision of the chapter relating
to those sealed out of the tribes of Israel speak only of Jewish
Christians, and the second vision, beginning at ver. 9, of "the great
multitude which no man could number," speak of Gentile Christians, it
will follow that the writer exhibits a particularistic tendency
altogether at variance with the universalism of the author of the
fourth Gospel. Gentile Christians will be, as they have been called,
an "appendix" to the Jewish-Christian Church; and the followers of
Jesus will fail to constitute one flock all the members of which are
equal in the sight of God, occupy the same position, and enjoy the
same privileges. The first impression produced by the vision of the
sealed is undoubtedly that it refers to Jewish Christians, and to them
alone. Many considerations, however, lead to the wider conclusion
that, under a Jewish figure, they include all the followers of Christ,
or the universal Church. Some of these at least ought to be noticed.
1. We have not yet found, and we shall not find in any later part of
the Apocalypse, a distinction drawn between Jewish and Gentile
Christians. To the eye of the Seer, the Church of the Lord Jesus
Christ is one. There is in it neither Jew nor Greek, barbarian,
Scythian, bond, nor free. He recognises in it in its collective
capacity the Body of Christ, all the members of which occupy the same
relation to their Lord, and stand equally in grace. He knows indeed of
a distinction between the Jewish Church, which waited for the coming
of the Lord, and the Christian Church, which rejoiced in Him as come;
but he knows also that when Jesus did come the privileges of the
latter were bestowed upon those in the former who had looked onward to
Christ's day, and that they were arrayed in the same "white robe."
Under all the six Seals, accordingly, embracing the whole period of
the Gospel dispensation, there is not a single word to suggest the
thought that the Christian Church is divided into two parts. The
struggle, the preservation, and the victory belong equally to all. A
similar remark may be made on the epistles to the seven churches,
which unquestionably contain a representation of that Church the
fortunes of which are to be afterwards described. In these epistles
Christ walks equally in the midst of every part of it; and promises
are made, not in one form to one member and in another to another, but
always in precisely the same terms to "him that overcometh." It would
be out of keeping with this were we now, when a similar topic of
preservation is on hand, to be introduced to a Jewish-Christian as
distinguished from a Gentile-Christian Church.
2. It is the custom of the Seer to heighten and spiritualize all
Jewish names. The Temple, the Tabernacle, the Altar, Mount Zion, and
Jerusalem are to him the embodiments of ideas deeper than those
literally conveyed by them. Analogy therefore might suggest that this
also would be the case with the word "Israel." Nay, it would even be
the more natural so to use that word, because it is so often used in
the same spiritual sense in other parts of the New Testament: "But
they are not all Israel which are of Israel;" "And as many as shall
walk by this rule, peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel
of God."[175] Nor need we be startled by that employment of the word
_tribes_, which may seem to give more precision to the idea that
Jewish Christians are designated by the term, for St. John, in his
peculiar way of looking at men, beheld "tribes" not only among the
Jews, but among all nations: "And all the tribes of the earth shall
mourn over Him."[176] In chap. xxi. 12, too, the "twelve tribes"
plainly include all believers.
3. The enumeration of the tribes of Israel given in these verses is
different from any other enumeration of the kind contained in
Scripture. Thus the tribe of Dan is omitted; and, contrary to the
practice of at least the later books of the Old Testament, that of
Levi is inserted; while Joseph also is substituted for Ephraim: and
the order in which the twelve are given has elsewhere no parallel.
Points such as these may appear trifling, but they are not without
importance. No student of the Apocalypse will imagine that they are
accidental or undesigned. He may not be able to satisfy either himself
or others as to the grounds upon which St. John proceeded, but that
there were grounds sufficient to the Apostle himself for what he did
he will not for a moment doubt. One thing may, however, be said. If
the changes can be explained at all, it must be by considerations
springing out of the heart of the Christian community, and not out of
any suggested by the relations of the tribes of Judaism to one
another. Levi may thus be inserted, instead of standing apart as
formerly, because in Christ Jesus there was no priestly tribe: all
Christians were priests; Dan may be omitted because that tribe had
chosen the serpent as its emblem, and St. John not only felt with
peculiar power the direct antagonism to Christ of "the old serpent the
devil,"[177] but had been accustomed to see in the traitor Judas, who
had been expelled from the apostolic band, and for whom another
apostle had been substituted, the very impersonation or incarnation of
Satan[178]; Ephraim also may have been replaced by Joseph because of
its enmity to Judah, the tribe out of which Jesus sprang; while Judah,
the fourth son of Jacob, may head the list because it was the tribe in
which Christ was born.
4. Some of the expressions of the passage are inconsistent with the
limitation of the sealed to any special class of Christians. Why, for
example, should the holding back of the winds be universal? Would it
not have been enough to restrain the winds that blew on Jewish
Christians, and not the winds of the whole earth? And again, why do we
meet with language of so general a character as that of ver. 3:
"_till we shall have sealed the servants of our God_"? This
designation "servants" seems to include the whole number, and not some
only, of God's children.
5. If God's servants from among the Gentiles are not now sealed, the
Apocalypse mentions no other occasion when they were so. It is true
that, according to the ordinary interpretation of the next vision, they
are admitted to the happiness of heaven; but we may well ask whether, if
the sealing be the emblem of preservation amidst worldly troubles, they
ought not also, at one time or another, to have been sealed on earth.
6. The sealed are marked upon their _foreheads_, and in chap. xxii. 4
all believers are marked in a similar way.
7. We shall meet again this number of a hundred and forty-four
thousand in chap. xiv.; and, while it can hardly be doubted that the
same persons are on both occasions included in it, it will be seen
that there at least the whole number of the redeemed is meant.
8. It is worthy of notice that the contrasts of the Apocalypse lead
directly to a similar conclusion. St. John always sees light and
darkness standing over against each other, and exhibiting themselves
in a correspondence which, extending even to minute details, aids the
task of the interpreter. Now in many passages of this book we find
Satan not only marking his followers, but, precisely as here, marking
them upon the "forehead;"[179] and it is impossible to resist the
conclusion that the one marking is the antithesis of the other. But
this mark is imprinted by Satan upon _all_ his followers, and the
inference is legitimate that the seal of the living God is in like
manner imprinted upon _all_ the followers of Jesus.
9. One more reason may be assigned for this conclusion. If ver. 4,
with its "hundred and forty and four thousand out of every tribe of
the children of Israel," is to be understood of Jewish Christians
alone, the contrast between it and ver. 9, with its "great multitude,
which no man can number, out of every nation, and of all tribes, and
peoples, and tongues," makes it necessary to understand the latter of
Gentile Christians alone. It will not do to say that the comprehensive
enumeration of this verse may include Jewish as well as Gentile
Christians. Placed over against the very definite statement of ver. 4,
it can only, according to the style of the Apocalypse, be referred to
persons who have come out of the heathen world in the fourfold
conception of its parts. Now, whatever may be the precise
interpretation of the second vision of the chapter, it is undeniable
that it unfolds a higher stage of privilege and glory than the first.
It will thus follow on the supposition now combated that at the very
instant when the Apostle is said to be placing Gentile Christians in a
position of inferiority to Jewish Christians, and when he is treating
the one as simply an "appendix" to the other, he speaks of them as the
inheritors of a far greater "weight of glory." St. John could not be
thus inconsistent with himself.
The conclusion from all that has been said, is plain. The vision of
the sealing does not apply to Jewish Christians only, but to the
universal Church. When the judgments of God are abroad in the world,
all the disciples of Christ are sealed for preservation against them.
Notwithstanding what has been said, the reader may still find it
difficult to conceive that two pictures of the same multitude should
be presented to us drawn on such entirely different lines. What is the
meaning of it? he may exclaim. What is the Seer's motive in doing so?
The explanation is not difficult. An attentive examination of the
structural principles marking the writings of St. John will show that
they are distinguished by a tendency to set forth the same object in
two different lights, the latter of which is climactic to the former,
as well as, for the most part at least, taken from a different sphere.
The writer is not satisfied with a single utterance of what he desires
to impress upon his readers. After he has uttered it for the first
time, he brings it again before him, works upon it, enlarges it,
deepens it, sets it forth with stronger and more vivid colouring. The
fundamental idea is the same on both occasions; but on the second it
is the centre of a circle of wider circumference, and it is uttered in
a more impressive manner. Want of space will not permit the
illustration of this by an appeal either to the nature of Hebrew
thought in general, or to the other writings of the New Testament
which owe their authorship to St. John. It must be enough to say that
the fourth Gospel bears deep and important traces of this
characteristic, and that difficult passages in it not otherwise
explicable seem to be solved by its application.[180] The main point
to be kept in view is that the principle in question may be traced on
many different occasions both in the fourth Gospel and in the
Apocalypse. One of these has indeed already come under our notice in
the case of the "golden candlesticks" and of the "stars" in Chapter I.
of this book. The two figures relate to the same object, but the
second is climactic to the first, and it is taken from a larger field.
The same principle meets us here. The second vision of chap. vii. is
climactic to the first, and the field from which it is drawn is
larger. The analogy, however, not of the golden candlesticks and of
the stars only, but of many other passages of a similar kind, warrants
the inference that both the visions relate to the same thing, although
the aspect in which it is looked at is in each case different. Any
difficulty therefore at first presented by the double picture
disappears; while the peculiarity of structure exhibited not only
helps to lead us to a Johannine authorship, but tends powerfully to
establish the correctness of the interpretation now adopted.
We are thus entitled to conclude that the hundred and forty-four
thousand of this first consolatory vision represent not Jewish
Christians only, but the whole Church of God, and that the number used
is intended to represent completeness: not one member of the true
Church is lost.[181] Twelve, a sacred number, the number of the
patriarchs, of the tribes of Israel, and of the Apostles of Jesus, is
first multiplied by itself, and then by a thousand, the sign of the
heavenly in contrast with the earthly. A hundred and forty and four
thousand is the result.
It need only further be observed--and the observation will help to
confirm what has been said--that St. John did not himself count the
number of the sealed. He _heard the number of them_ (ver. 4). Already
they were "a multitude which no _man_ could number" (ver. 9). But He
who telleth the innumerable stars that sparkle in the midnight sky,
and who "bringeth out their host by number,"[182] could number them.
He it was who communicated the number to the Seer.
The second vision of the chapter follows:--
After these things I saw, and, behold, a great multitude, which no
man could number, out of every nation, and of all tribes, and
peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne, and before the
Lamb, arrayed in white robes, and palms in their hands; and they
cry with a great voice, saying, Salvation unto our God which
sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb. And all the angels were
standing round about the throne, and about the elders and the four
living creatures; and they fell before the throne on their faces,
and worshipped God, saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom,
and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our
God for ever and ever. Amen. And one of the elders answered,
saying unto me, These which are arrayed in the white robes, who
are they, and whence came they? And I said unto him, My lord, thou
knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of the
great tribulation, and they washed their robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the
throne of God, and they serve Him day and night in His temple: and
He that sitteth on the throne shall spread His tabernacle over
them. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither
shall the sun strike upon them, nor any heat: for the Lamb which
is in the midst of the throne shall be their Shepherd, and shall
guide them unto fountains of waters of life: and God shall wipe
away every tear from their eyes (vii. 9-17).
Upon the magnificence and beauty of this description it is not only
unnecessary, it would be a mistake, to dwell. Words of man would only
mar the sublimity and pathos of the spectacle. Neither is it desirable
to look at each expression of the passage in itself. These expressions
are better considered as a whole. One point indeed ought to be
carefully kept in view: that the _palms_ spoken of in ver. 9 as in the
_hands_ of the happy multitude are not the palms of victory in any
earthly contest, but the palms of the Feast of Tabernacles, and that
upon the thought of that feast the scene is moulded.
The Feast of Tabernacles, it will be remembered, was at once the last,
the highest, and the most joyful of the festivals of the Jewish year. It
fell in the month of October, when the harvest not only of grain, but of
wine and oil, had been gathered in, and when, therefore, all the labours
of the year were past. It was preceded, too, by the great Day of
Atonement, the ceremonial of which gathered together all the sacrificial
acts of the previous months, beheld the sins of the people, from their
highest to their lowest, carried away into the wilderness, and brought
with it the blessing of God from that innermost recess of the sanctuary
which was lightened by the special glory of His presence, and into which
the high-priest even was permitted to enter upon that day alone. The
feelings awakened in Israel at the time were of the most triumphant
kind. They returned in thought to the independent life which their
fathers, delivered from the bondage of Egypt, led in the wilderness;
and, the better to realize this, they left their ordinary dwellings and
took up their abode for the days of the feast in booths, which they
erected in the streets or on the flat roofs of their houses. These
booths were made of branches of their most prized, most fruit-bearing,
and most umbrageous trees; and beneath them they raised their psalms of
thanksgiving to Him who had delivered them as a bird out of the snare of
the fowler. Even this was not all, for we know that in the later period
of their history the Jews connected the Feast of Tabernacles with the
brightest anticipations of the future as well as with the most joyful
memories of the past. They beheld in it the promise of the Spirit, the
great gift of the approaching Messianic age; and, that they might give
full expression to this, they sent on the eighth, or great, day of the
feast, a priest to the pool of Siloam with a golden urn, that he might
fill it from the pool, and, bringing it up to the Temple, might pour it
on the altar. This is the part of the ceremonial alluded to in John vii.
37-39, and during it the joy of the people reached its highest point.
They surrounded the priest in crowds as he brought up the water from the
pool, waved their _lulabs_--small branches of palm trees, the "palms" of
ver. 9--and made the courts of the Temple re-echo with their song, "With
joy shall ye draw water out of wells of salvation."[183] At night the
great illumination of the Temple followed, that to which our Lord most
probably alludes when, immediately after the Feast of Tabernacles spoken
of in chap. viii. of the fourth Gospel, He exclaims, "I am the Light of
the world: he that followeth Me shall not walk in the darkness, but
shall have the light of life."[184]
Such was the scene the main particulars of which are here made use of
by the apocalyptic Seer to set before us the triumphant and glorious
condition of the Church when, after all her members have been sealed,
they are admitted to the full enjoyment of the blessings of God's
covenant, and when, washed in the blood of the Lamb and clothed with
His righteousness, they keep their Feast of Tabernacles.
A most important and interesting question connected with this vision
has still to be answered. It may be first asked in the words of Isaac
Williams. "It is whether all this description is of the Church in
heaven or on earth." The same writer has answered his question by
saying, "The fact is that, like the expression 'the kingdom of
heaven,' and many others of the same kind, it applies to both, and it
is doubtless intended to do so--in fulness hereafter, but even here in
part."[185] The answer thus given is no doubt correct when the
question is asked in the particular form to which it is a reply. Yet
we have still to ask whether, granting it to be so, the _primary_
reference of the vision is to the Church of Christ during her present
pilgrimage or after that pilgrimage has been completed, and she has
entered on her eternal rest. To the question so put, the reply usually
given is that the Seer has the latter aspect of the Church in view.
The redeemed are sealed on _earth_; they bear their "palms," and
rejoice with the joy afterwards spoken of, in _heaven_. Much in the
passage may seem to justify this conclusion. But a recent writer on
the subject has adduced such powerful considerations in favour of the
former view, that it will be proper to examine them.[186]
Appeal is first made to Matt. xxiv. 13, a passage throwing no light upon
the point. It is otherwise with many prophecies of the Old Testament
next referred to, which describe the coming dispensation of the Gospel:
"They shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun smite
them: for He that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the
springs of water shall He guide them;" "He will swallow up death in
victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces;" "And
it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations
which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to
worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of
Tabernacles."[187] To passages such as these have to be added the
promises of our Lord as to fountains of living waters even now opened to
the believer, that he may drink and never thirst again: "Jesus answered
and said unto her, Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst
again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall
never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a
springing fountain of water, unto eternal life;" "Now on the last day,
the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man
thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the
Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living
water."[188] St. John, too, it is urged, teaches us to look for a
Tabernacle Feast on earth[189]; while at the same time throughout all
his writings eternal life is set before us as a present possession. Nor
is this the case only in the writings of St. John. In the Epistle to the
Hebrews we meet the same line of thought: "Ye are come" (not Ye shall
come) "unto Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the
heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, to the general
assembly and Church of the first-born, who are enrolled in heaven."[190]
Influenced by these considerations, the writer to whom we have referred
is led, "though not without some hesitation," to conclude that the
vision of the palm-bearing multitude is to be understood of the Church
on earth, and not of the Church in heaven.
The conclusion may be accepted without the "hesitation." The colours
on the canvas may indeed at first appear too bright for any condition
of things on this side the grave. But they are not more bright than
those employed in the description of the new Jerusalem in chap. xxi.;
and, when we come to the exposition of that chapter, we shall find
positive proof in the language of the Seer that he looks upon that
city as one already come down from heaven and established among men.
Not a few of its most glowing traits are even precisely the same as
those that we meet in the corresponding vision of this chapter: "And I
heard a great voice out of the throne saying, Behold, the tabernacle
of God is with men, and He shall tabernacle with them, and they shall
be His peoples, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God;
and He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death shall be
no more; neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any
more: the first things are passed away."[191] If words like these may
be justly applied, as we have yet to see that they may and must be, to
one aspect of the Church on earth, there is certainly nothing to
hinder their application to the same Church now. The truth is that in
both cases the description is ideal, and that not less so than the
description of the terrors of the worldly at the opening of the sixth
Seal. Nor indeed shall we understand any part of the Apocalypse unless
we recognise the fact that everything with which it is concerned is
raised to an ideal standard. Reward and punishment, righteousness and
sin, the martyrdoms of the Church and the fate of her oppressors, are
all set before us in an ideal light. The Seer moves in the midst of
conceptions which are fundamental, ultimate, and eternal. The "broken
lights" which partially illuminate our progress in this world are to
him absorbed in "the true Light." The clouds and darkness which
obscure our path gather themselves together to his eyes in "the
darkness" with which the light has to contend. Descriptions,
accordingly, applicable in their fulness to the Church only after the
glory of her Lord is manifested, apply also to her now, when she is
thought of as living the life that is hid with Christ in God, the life
of her exalted and glorified Redeemer. For this conception the colours
of the picture before us are not too bright.[192]
The relation in which the two visions of this chapter stand to one
another may now be obvious. Although the persons referred to are in both
the same, they do not in both occupy the same position. In the first
they are only sealed, and through that sealing they are safe. Their Lord
has taken them under His protection; and, whatever troubles or perils
may beset them, no one shall pluck them out of His hand. In the second
they are more than safe. They have peace, and joy, and triumph, their
every want supplied, their every sorrow healed. Death itself is
swallowed up in victory, and every tear is wiped from every eye.
Thus also may we determine the period to which both the sealing of
believers and their subsequent enjoyment of heavenly blessing belong.
In neither vision are we introduced to any special era of Christian
history. St. John has in view neither the Christians of his own day
alone, nor those of any later time. As we found that each of the first
six Seals embraced the whole Gospel age, so also is it with these
consolatory visions. We are to dwell upon the _thought_ rather than
the _time_ of preservation and of bliss. The Church of Christ never
ceases to follow in the footsteps of her Lord. Like Him, when faithful
to her high commission, she never ceases to bear the cross. The
unredeemed world must always be her enemy; and in it she must always
have tribulation. But not less continuous is her joy. We judge wrongly
when we think that the Man of sorrows was never joyful. He spoke of
"My peace," "My joy."[193] In one of His moments of deepest feeling we
are told that He "rejoiced in spirit."[194] Outwardly the world
troubled Him; and huge billows, raised by its tempestuous winds, swept
across the surface of His soul. Beneath, the unfathomed depths were
calm. In communion with His Father in heaven, in the thought of the
great work which He was carrying to its completion, and in the
prospect of the glory that awaited Him, He could rejoice in the midst
of sorrow. So also with the members of His Body. They bear about with
them a secret joy which, like their new name, no man knoweth saving he
that receiveth it. As the friend of the bridegroom who standeth and
heareth him rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice, so
their joy is fulfilled.[195] Nor does it ever cease to be theirs while
their Lord is with them; and unless they grieve Him "lo, He is always
with them, even unto the consummation of the age."[196] The two
visions, therefore, of the sealing and of the palm-bearing multitude
embrace the whole Christian dispensation within their scope, and
express ideas which belong to the condition of the believer in all
places and at all times.
FOOTNOTES:
[168] Ps. ii. 7; cx. 7.
[169] Ezek. ix.
[170] Amos ix. 1-3.
[171] John vi. 27.
[172] Cant. viii. 3.
[173] 2 Tim. ii. 19.
[174] Comp. Luke xii. 8.
[175] Rom. ix. 6; Gal. vi. 16.
[176] Chap. i. 7.
[177] Comp. chap. xii. 9.
[178] John xiii. 2.
[179] Chaps. xiii. 16, 17; xiv. 9; xvi. 2; xix. 20; xx. 4.
[180] The writer has treated this subject at considerable length in
_The Expositor_ (2nd series, vol. iv.).
[181] Comp. John xvii. 12.
[182] Isa. xl. 26.
[183] Isa. xii. 3.
[184] John viii. 12.
[185] _The Apocalypse_, p. 126.
[186] Professor Gibson, in _The Monthly Interpreter_, vol. ii., p. 9.
[187] Isa. xlix. 10; xxv. 8; Zech. xiv. 16.
[188] John iv. 13, 14; vii. 37, 38.
[189] John i. 14.
[190] Heb. xii. 22, 23.
[191] Chap. xxi. 3, 4.
[192] Comp. on the general thought Brown, _The Second Advent_, chap. vi.
[193] John xiv. 27; xvii. 13.
[194] Luke x. 21.
[195] John iii. 29.
[196] Matt. xxviii. 20.