Revelation 7:2-17
Grace peace and mercy from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
The feast of all Saints as everyone is aware is a time when we celebrate all those who have gone on to be with Jesus and a time to remember we are one with them.
I've heard a few different interpretations of the reading from Revelation in particular the first few verses. Most of them put a literal meaning on the verses. The problem with those interpretations is that the Book of Revelation is apocalyptic literature not intended to be read literally. The unfortunate result is it scares people. John's intent was not to scare people but to reassure them.
Revelation depicts the monstrous enemies of the people of God as terrible beasts. The political cartoonists of the cold war era similarly depicted Russia as a fierce bear whose fangs and claws grew in length as tensions between the US and the USSR rose. John's people, those of the late first century, were enduring a terrible persecution so the visions depict their persecutors as fearsome beasts. As the story unfolds, the fearsome enemies are overcome. God intervenes and the people are saved. These visions were not a horror story, but a comforting story of victory.
It's commonly accepted that the Book of Revelation is the retelling of world history seven times between each retelling there is an interlude. Our reading is the interlude between the sixth and seventh accounts.
These interludes are presented as a means for the reader to remember the world as God sees it and to take note of important truths which are the focus of the particular retelling of the story. In this case, we have a definition of the people of God as God sees them. First we have the people described as Israel enumerated. Each tribe has 12,000 and when taken in aggregate that comes to 144,000.
The numbers in John are intended as symbolic numbers. 10 seems to be a number of completeness, thus a complete complement of fingers is ten. The number 12 seems to be a number which stands for the people of God. Now, the ancient people were actually quite adept at what you would call basic math, subtraction, addition, multiplication, etc. multiplying a number would intensify it. Thus 10 are all of something, but 100 are really all, and 1000 is even more intensely all. 12 are the people of God, and 12 x 12 or 144 is really truly the people of God. The number 144,000 is not a literal number of people but could perhaps be rendered as 10 x 10 x 10 x 12 x 12. Or in verbal terms, all, really all, absolutely all the really truly people of God.
Now the numbering of the people in the first part of the text also serves another function it seems. In the Old Testament numbering was also a military function. The census which Moses takes is to get people arranged for battle. Even Jesus at the feeding of the multitudes in Mark tells them to be seated in groups of fifty and hundreds, which was the military formation of ancient Israel (just see the scene where the captains of the fifties confront Elijah in the first chapters of II Kings). This seems to be a picture of the Church militant.
Contrast that imagery with the next picture where the people are not numbered, but they are simply called innumerable. This is not a picture of the church militant but the church at rest, the church in heaven. These people have palm fronds, not swords. They have no worry or problem. They do not hunger or thirst, God takes perfect care of them and has wiped away every tear. They are now part of that great heavenly multitude who sings in praise of the Father and the Son on the throne, in the presence and power of the Spirit.
Of special importance is the angel telling John of the great multitude, "These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes in the blood of the lamb." You may have already made the connection to the parable of the wedding feast. The multitudes are wearing the wedding garments given by the bridegroom through His death and resurrection. They have come out of the great tribulation of this life where they wept many tears, endured hardships of every kind. In this later time which John sees, they are at perfect peace and rest. For a persecuted people this one level simply says that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. This persecution will end and you will enjoy perfect rest.
For the Christian of every time and place, it says that those who have died, whose bodies we have laid to rest in the grave are not lost, nor forgotten by God. He wipes away their tears and they are precious to him, they have joined those heavenly ranks of angels and archangels and all the company of heaven.
We too are numbered with the Saints, the great multitude, John saw in his vision. We are not seen by God in the same way we see ourselves or by others. God has a much different perspective. He doesn't see us as the gossip, or the person that lashes out in anger, or abuser, or the thief, or the murderer, or any number of other sinful things we can be or do. Jesus has washed us clean of those sins and handed us the white robes of the feast.
We have ample reasons to be discouraged by what we see going on around us. Christianity in North America seems to be on the ropes, following a dismal European path of irrelevance and empty buildings. However God does not count success the same way we do. A business person who goes looking for that one lost sheep and leaves the 99 behind doesn't make sense to this world but all the heavens rejoice when that one is found. God has knit us into a mighty host of Christians, a body which stretches around the world and across two millennia of history, and even beyond to the heroes of the Old Testament.
Take courage from the fact that the God who went with David against Goliath goes with you out those doors. Take courage that the God who turned Saul to Paul still works in this world.
As we approach the table today and partake in communion we are connected with Jesus, the heavenly host and all of the saints of every time and place. We are no longer an army of one, but part of the mighty host arrayed for a battle whose outcome is already known. We have the victory.
In the name of our Risen Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
