Revelation 14The Lamb, the Three Angels and the Harvest

“Then I looked, and there before me” (in older translations, “I looked, and behold”) is the language of visual communication from God, and it often marks the beginning of another vision throughout the prophetic books: Ezekiel 1:4, Daniel 7:13, Zechariah 1:18, Revelation 4:1 and dozens more in his notes, including 14:14 later in this chapter.

“And God said” is the language of God’s audio communication; “then I looked and saw” is the language of His visual communication. Both are happening in the prophetic. (He added that “And God said” is a junior Bible quiz question!) So we’re walking into a vision here.

Mount Zion is Jerusalem most often throughout Scripture. It also often represents God’s dwelling place, His central place of worship on earth (Psalm 9:11; 74:2; Joel 3:21). But now in Revelation, both the term Mount Zion and the word Jerusalem (3:12; 11:19; 21:2, 10) represent the heavenly Jerusalem: the heavenly reality of the place where God rules and reigns (Psalm 2:6; Isaiah 52:8; 62:1–12; Hebrews 12:22–24). We’ve shifted from earth to heaven.

The Lamb of God, standing in this place with these people, is an awesome and holy and powerful sight! He’s the One who in chapter 5 is the Lion, and was counted worthy to open the scroll and break its seals. In chapter 7 He receives the adoration of the innumerable multitude in heaven.

The 144,000 “had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads.” More on them later, but the first thing we see is that they’re on the right team: they’re marked for God, directly opposed to the mark Satan’s people were getting in the last verses of chapter 13 (13:16–17). This is the team you and I are on.

“The roar of rushing waters” echoes Ezekiel 1:24 (the sound of the cherubim’s wings) and 43:2 (the voice of God), and it was already used in Revelation 1:15 for the voice of Jesus. “A loud peal of thunder” is like Sinai (Exodus 19), and thunder shows up at important moments in Revelation 4:5; 8:5; 11:19; 16:18; 19:6, and in 6:1 for the voice of one of the living creatures.

There’s a lot of sound going on in this vision now. God likes both sound and visuals. The peals of thunder are always announcing something big.

The exclusive nature of the salvation of the redeemed is described with the analogy of a song that only they can learn and sing. This is a beautiful, artistic analogy.

Someone in the room added that it sounds like the redeemed have this song because of what they’ve gone through: they’ve experienced God and learned things about Him, and now they have a song. “Yes, I think so. Absolutely.”

Our faith before God is also beautiful, acceptable and exclusive. The life of faith is very much like a song that only God’s people can learn and sing. It doesn’t sound or feel right to others, but it’s the song of the redeemed, the song of those whom Jesus purchased with the price of His own blood and death on the cross. (That’s what “redeemed” means in Scripture: He purchased us back.) It’s the audio thumbprint of those who know God and are in right relationship with Him, and it’s the song that resounds in the courts of heaven. Our lives as believers should sound more and more like this beautiful, acceptable and exclusive song from heaven’s courts.

The tables discussed: How can a believer’s life be like a beautiful, acceptable and exclusive song before God? What is your next step in “singing” this song?

These verses echo Zephaniah, who is talking about the remnant of Israel that is faithful to God: “They will do no wrong; they will tell no lies. A deceitful tongue will not be found in their mouths. They will eat and lie down and no one will make them afraid” (Zephaniah 3:13).

Now, back to the 144,000. That’s 12 times 12,000, as we saw in chapter 7. It’s a number of completion, a complete multitude. It’s not meant to limit the number of people, but to show that there will be a multitude of people throughout history who are right with God. The 144,000 are the redeemed of God. They are the saints. They are us. They are pure. They are right with God. And the redeemed are described three ways.

1. “They remained virgins.” This doesn’t mean they are actual virgins sexually. It means they’ve been washed clean and pure before God, ready for war. Jewish warriors were required to abstain from sex while at war, and only in regard to warriors is the term “virgin” used to describe men in Scripture and ancient Jewish writings. It means they’re not sexually impure and they’re not idol worshipers: that analogy is applied to abstaining from both sexual immorality and idol worship throughout the prophetic books. This is the language of purity.

And this is an army. It corresponds to the army in Revelation 19:14 that follows Jesus on the white horse into the final battle, the one with the sword coming out of His mouth, who ends everything and makes it right. There’s an army behind Him there, just like this army is behind the Lamb.

He does not believe these are the same 144,000 as in Revelation 7:4–8. Those 144,000 represented the whole of faithful Israel; these in Revelation 14 represent the whole of all faithful believers throughout history. In both cases the number for a complete multitude is used!

2. “They follow the Lamb wherever he goes.” These are disciples, Christ-followers, those committed to growing in God for their entire life. A slightly better translation, he says, would be “they follow the Lamb in all of His ways.” The Greek has the force of a life-commitment following, not following Him around as He strolls around heaven. Following the ways of Jesus makes them lifelong learners of Jesus, as He commands us in Mark 8:34, Matthew 19:21 and many other Scriptures. This is the language of discipleship.

It’s not a multitude of 144,000 wandering around after Him while He wanders. They’re following His life. They’re committed to Him, maturing in Him, growing in Him.

3. “They were purchased from among mankind and offered as firstfruits.” The redeemed are purchased, bought back from mankind, and offered to God. This is the language of sacrifice. The sacrifice of the Lamb, Jesus, purchased believers back to God, and now they are an offering themselves. Jesus’ sacrifice means that we offer ourselves back to God fully as a sacrifice.

“Firstfruits”: the firstfruits for God will contrast with the grape harvest trampled by God’s wrath at the end of the chapter. You want to be the firstfruits; don’t be a leftover.

“No lie was found in their mouths; they are blameless” echoes Zephaniah 3:13. Telling the truth is a baseline for holiness and blamelessness before God: being truthful in the inmost parts before God, and then being authentic and a truth-teller to others. This contrasts with those who will receive God’s wrath, who are liars (Revelation 21:27; 22:15), and with those who “exchanged the truth about God for a lie” (Romans 1:25). “Blameless” means these people were a holy sacrifice: purified and acceptable to God.

“Midair” is literally midheaven, mesouranēma in the Greek. It’s used in Revelation 8:13 and 19:17 as well. This is the second heaven as described in Scripture.

“The eternal gospel” has three parts: (1) fear God; (2) give Him glory, as opposed to Romans 1:21, where they “neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him”; (3) worship the Creator God rather than the antichrist.

That third part is directly contrasted with chapter 13, where people were commanded by the prophet to worship the beast. The angel says no, no, no: you have to worship the Creator God, or else you’re going to take on God’s wrath, which is way worse than anything the antichrist can do to you.

This is slightly different from the gospel of Jesus’ death, redemption and salvation.

The gospel as we know it: God so loved the world that He sent His only Son. Jesus went to the cross and took the sin of the whole world on Himself, so that we don’t have to die eternally. We receive Him by faith, His blood covers our sin, and when God looks at us He sees the blood of His Son. Jesus rose from the dead so we can have eternal life with God.

He believes it’s called an “eternal gospel” because it also points to a reality that precedes the death and resurrection of Jesus. It’s possibly a partial answer to the question: how were people saved before the cross? It is eternal because it sets forth God’s eternal purpose for humans. Barnabas and Paul make a similar appeal in Lystra, to turn to “the living God, who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them” (Acts 14:15).

This is an echo of Isaiah 21:9, “Babylon has fallen, has fallen! All the images of its gods lie shattered on the ground!”, and of Jeremiah 51:7: “Babylon was a gold cup in the Lord’s hand; she made the whole earth drunk. The nations drank her wine; therefore they have now gone mad.”

Babylon as an empire was long gone by John’s day. But the Jewish leaders of his time, and the prophets who preceded them, saw commonalities among all the empires of the earth who oppressed and subjugated Israel, God’s people. Every oppressor was a type of Babylon.

They were often related to Babylon, he said, because Babylon was the first to oppress and subjugate God’s people.

So here, Babylon represents the political, religious and economic system of the whole world in the end times.

People hearing this for the first time would have thought, “That’s definitely Rome right now. They’re the ones martyring Christians, coming after our property, shutting down our businesses.” Since then we’ve seen different forms of government oppress and martyr Christians and shut down their businesses. And there’s a good reason John never says the word “Rome” in the entire book of Revelation. They all knew who was oppressing them, but he leaves room for any other system to be a form of Babylon. There’s purpose in it.

For every prophecy there is a present application, or else why would it have been told to us, now? The application is this: Don’t compromise the gospel, for any government or system! Stay true to the pure, unadulterated gospel of Jesus Christ.

The tables discussed: What are ways that people compromise the gospel for government or other earthly systems? How do we resist that?

From the room: other earthly systems besides government, like the business world; and the internet, which could have created a new Babylon. There are ways of connecting now that weren’t possible in the first century (he watched two people at a phone store talk across a language barrier with their phones). Whatever new ways come out, stay true to the gospel. That’s the point.

The third angelic proclamation is a counter to the commands of the false prophet in Revelation 13:14–17.

The cup of wrath is an echo of Isaiah 51:17: “Awake, awake! Rise up, Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the Lord the cup of his wrath, you who have drained to its dregs the goblet that makes people stagger.” See also Job 21:20; Psalm 75:8; Isaiah 51:21–22; 63:6; Jeremiah 25:15–38; 49:12; Ezekiel 23:31; Habakkuk 2:16; Zechariah 12:2.

Isaiah 51 was said in regard to Israel’s exile: you’ve already taken on some wrath.

“Burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb.” Here’s the torment: to be eternally aware of the holy angels and the Lamb, but to be burning, instead of being with them. Wow!

The smoke and sulfur echo the smoke of destroyed Edom in Isaiah 34:10: “It will not be quenched night or day; its smoke will rise forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever pass through it again.” It also mirrors Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:28; Luke 17:29); John the Baptist’s understanding of eternal torment (Matthew 3:12); and Gehenna as spelled out by Jesus (Matthew 5:22, 29) and in Revelation 19:20; 20:10; 21:8. Jesus spells out unquenchable fire as punishment for non-believers in Mark 9 and Luke 16.

Edom was the nation that came out of Esau, Jacob’s brother: sometimes friends with Israel, sometimes enemies. And Edom was destroyed entirely.

The warning is for non-believers to come to Christ, and for believers to stay true to Christ. The fury of God’s wrath is an eternal punishment, hence the eternal smoke, while all the tribulation and persecution done by Satan, the beast and Babylon are temporary punishments. Jesus said, “But whoever disowns me before others will be disowned before the angels of God” (Luke 12:9).

“There will be no rest.” Remember this for verse 13 …

“Patient endurance … who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus.” Here is a threefold practical application of what we are to do with all this imagery: 1. Endurance, 2. Obedience, 3. Faith. These commands reflect three different ways to work your muscles.

Eccentric exercise, lowering a curl as slowly as you can, is a key to hypertrophy, muscle growth. If you want your muscles to get bigger, control the muscle on the way down. Obedience is the “saying no” muscle.

The tables discussed: What part of faith do you need to grow in the most right now: holding, controlling or building? How can you grow in that area?

“Blessed … who die in the Lord.” Makarios: blessed, or happy. This Scripture is used at many funerals, for good reason. Understanding that when a saint dies right with God, it’s better to be them than the rest of us left on earth gives us a heavenly perspective, and it gives us comfort!

“There will be no rest” (14:11) … “they will rest from their labor” (14:13). The people under God’s wrath cannot experience rest, but the people who die in the Lord will rest. These contrasting rests between the enemies of God and the people of God are a purposeful juxtaposition by the Spirit of God. It’s the same kind of rest we’re to enter with God that’s talked about in Hebrews 3 and 4. You can enter that rest now, but its culmination is after death.

Over 50% of the Jewish epitaphs (grave inscriptions) recovered in Rome included the words “in peace,” so the idea of rest in peace is certainly not modern. Rest is your inheritance as a believer.

A question to take into your time with the Lord: how can you rest in God more?

This “one like a son of man” clearly represents Jesus, who claimed the title “Son of Man” from Daniel 7:13 over and over again in all four Gospels. The Son of Man from Daniel is the Messiah. Jesus’ claim to be “Son of God” was less offensive to the Jewish leadership than His claim to be “Son of Man,” because that claim was Messianic and divine: the Son of Man in Daniel 7 comes from heaven, splits the sky and makes everything right. To the Jewish leaders we’re all sons of God. So “the Son of Man” was a higher claim to them!

The guy with the sickle is Jesus. It’s not the grim reaper! It’s a bright picture. (On whether it’s Jesus: “There are a couple of scholars who disagree, but all the good ones agree with me … I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist.”)

Another reason to see Jesus here: only Jesus is powerful enough to harvest the entire earth in one swing of His sickle. That’s power!

He believes this is a positive image. There’s much debate about this (some good scholars see it as a parallel to the grape harvest that follows, which is definitely negative), he can see both sides, and ultimately it doesn’t matter a lot. Jesus is reaping the harvest from all nations of those who are His. He’s exercising His dominion over all the earth: a dominion foreshadowed here, as we look through the spiral helix, and then coronated in chapter 19, where the same positive and negative contrast appears.

The sickle of reaping, and the grape harvest, echo Joel 3:13: “Swing the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, trample the grapes, for the winepress is full and the vats overflow— so great is their wickedness!” The harvest echoes Jeremiah 51:33: “Daughter Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time it is trampled; the time to harvest her will soon come.”

It also brings to mind Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the weeds: “First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn” (Matthew 13:30). Other positive uses of the grain harvest: Matthew 9:37–38; Mark 4:29; Luke 10:2; John 4:35–38.

Someone in the room added: there’s going to be a harvest of everything, and what makes the difference is whether you’ve borne good fruit and been obedient. “Absolutely. We’re all getting harvested; it’s just where are you going after that.”

“Another angel … Still another angel”: this is the grape-reaping angel and the fire angel. The fire angel, who comes from the altar, probably corresponds to the one who took fire from the censer at the altar in Revelation 8:3–5. Fire was used for judgment there, and it is commonly associated with judgment in Scripture (Matthew 18:8; Luke 9:54; 2 Thessalonians 1:7).

Someone read verse 19 from a translation that adds “as judgment of the rebellious world.” “Yeah, the grapes of wrath. That’s where it comes from.”

“The great winepress”: grapes were put through a series of tramplings underfoot to remove the juice. The deep stain of the juice coming out of the grapes, staining the winepress floor and overflowing, looked to many like blood being spilled and poured out. Genesis 49:11 shows this correlation: “his robes in the blood of grapes.” Throughout the Bible the treading of grapes is imagery for the judgment of God on wickedness (Isaiah 63:1–6; Joel 3:13; Jeremiah 25:30; Revelation 19:15).

The contrast to this in Scripture is being alive and connected to the vine of Christ in John 15.

We want to be the live grapes connected to the vine; we want to be the branches connected into the trunk that is Christ.

1,600 stadia is about 200 miles. It’s a square number, 40 × 40, and some ancients estimated the length of Israel to be 1,600 stadia. So the slaughter of judgment would be complete, and cover Israel.

The wine of God’s wrath is human blood. Yikes. This is gruesome. However, remember: God’s salvific deliverance only and always includes the judgment of the wicked, throughout the Bible. There is no heaven without the destruction of what cannot belong there. People throughout history who have become too comfortable and unacquainted with suffering have taken issue with God’s wrath. But heaven, holiness and God’s goodness necessarily require the removal of what is not like Him.