THE SEVEN SEALS Part 3

Intermission: The Saints 7:1-17

The Sealing of the Servants of God 7:1- 8

John sees four angels at the four corners of the earth.

vs 1  After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land or on the sea or on any tree. 

John sees four angels standing on the four corners of the earth signifying that they overshadow the whole earth. It points to the totality of God’s creation and the four directions: north, east, south, and west.

The function of the angels is to hold back the four winds of the earth which are God’s agents to execute judgment.

God’s creation is summarized in the interesting combination of earth, sea, and tree. It divides the land masses from the oceans, with the tree symbolizing the plant kingdom. Tall trees are exceptionally vulnerable to fierce winds.

John sees another angel ascending from the east.

vss 2-3 Then I saw another angel coming up from the east, having the seal of the living God. He called out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the land and the sea: 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.

John sees another angel ascending from the east which means that he is approaching John from the rising of the sun, the source of light.

This angel had “the seal of the living God.” The seal was basically a mark of ownership and communicates God’s protective care that no one is able to subvert or undo. Here it marks the men sealed as God’s and thus preserves them from a destruction that will fall on others.

This angel shouts to the other four who are characterized by their ability to hurt earth and sea. He commands them not to hurt earth, sea, or trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.

The loud cry is necessary to reach to the limits of the earth, so that all four angels can hear the angel’s message. The angels addressed are holding the destructive power to harm both land and sea.

God sends forth his angels to seal his people (all believers), for his servants belong to him and are known by a seal.

The Christian is sealed in this threefold sense. The Father has sealed him, for the believer enjoys the Father’s protection throughout life. The Son has sealed him, for he has bought and redeemed the believer with His own precious blood. He owns us. The Spirit had sealed him (Eph. 1:13), for He testifies that we are sons of God (Rom. 8:16).

Nevertheless, Christians are not exempt from physical harm. Throughout the centuries, innumerable believers have been and presently are persecuted, beaten, and killed because of their testimony of Christ. What, then, is the meaning of being sealed? The answer lies in the word until—“until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.”

God postpones judgment, pictured here by the destructive power of the winds, until the last of the saints has been gathered and sealed.

Not the unbelievers who seek cover from mountains and rocks, but believers who are covered with God’s seal are protected by God. They are able to stand before him and the Lamb, for they have no fear of the judgment to come.

All the saints, sealed with the seal of the living God, are acquitted; they rejoice in the presence of the Lamb. Conversely, the enemies of God face the wrath of God and the Lamb and are unable to escape.

This restraint of the forces of destruction for the sake of God’s servants shows that every moment on the earth is made to serve the redemptive purpose of God. The four winds from the four corners of the earth cannot blow and vent their rage as they like, but only as they are made to serve the redemptive purposes of God.

John now hears the number of the sealed.

4-8 Then I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel. From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed, from the tribe of Reuben 12,000, from the tribe of Gad 12,000,  from the tribe of Asher 12,000, from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000, from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000, from the tribe of Simeon 12,000, from the tribe of Levi 12,000, from the tribe of Issachar 12,000, from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000, from the tribe of Joseph 12,000, from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000.

Even though the information relates to the future, the verb had been sealed is in the past tense. God knows the number of those who receive the seals, and John communicates this symbolically to the readers.

The number 144,000 is the multiple of the square of twelve (the number of Israel) and the square of ten (the number of perfection). It thus indicates completeness, the perfect total of the Israel of God, the church.

The Christian is a true Jew (Romans 2:29) and the church is the Israel of God (Galatians 6:16). It is the church which is God’s peculiar people (Titus 2:14), and Christ’s own who are Abraham’s true offspring (Galatians 3:29).

Here we see the church sealed in view of the coming trials. They are sealed permanently: “I shall not lose one.” (John 6:39). There are 12,000 from each tribe except Dan, which is replaced with Manasseh the son of Joseph.

The reason for deleting the name of Dan from the list goes back to a narrative in which the descendants of Dan committed idolatry (Judges 18:30–31). They were also the first to perpetrate the sin of apostasy, for they accepted a golden calf that Jeroboam placed in the northern part of Israel as a center of worship.

John also excludes Ephraim from his list. This tribe likewise agreed with Jeroboam to place another golden calf at Bethel as a substitute for the true worship of God in Jerusalem (1 Kings 12:29). Ephraim, therefore, should not be subsumed under the name of Joseph, for Joseph has taken the place of Ephraim (see Ps. 78:67b; Hos. 5:3–5).

The tribe of Judah is mentioned first for it is the royal tribe, the tribe from which came the Messiah, “the Lion from the tribe of Judah.”