THE HUNDRED AND FORTY-FOUR THOUSAND by A. Smith

The Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · December 4, 1879

FromThe Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 54, No. 23

THE HUNDRED AND FORTY-FOUR THOUSAND.

By A. Smith

A company is brought to view in Rev. 7 and 14, who are said to be sealed with the seal of God. It is a question of some interest to determine where, in point of time, we may look for such an event as this sealing to transpire. To deny the possibility of locating the time when the prophecy should become due, would be equivalent to impeaching the wisdom of God in making it a subject of revelation.

The most remote period, I think, that has been claimed as the time when this transaction should have taken place, was that of Christ’s resurrection, when “many bodies of the saints which slept arose,” and constituted the sealed company. The arguments adduced in support of this proposition are (1.) The 144,000 were to be of the tribes of Israel, and hence not Christians, but Jews; and (2.) They were to be the “firstfruits,” answering to the wave sheaf in the former dispensation, which was offered at the beginning of harvest.

Of the first argument we would say, that the limitation of this company to the tribes of Israel does not necessarily exclude Christians from a participation in its membership, for they also are declared to be the seed of Abraham. “And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Gal. 3:29. “Now we [Christians], brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.” Chap. 4:28. “They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.” Rom. 9:8. There is nothing, therefore, in that argument, to invalidate the claim that even the last generation of Christians may constitute the 144,000.

To the second argument we reply, that Christ is plainly declared to be “the firstfruits of them that slept” (1 Cor. 15:20); but this expression is nowhere applied to those who came out of their graves soon after his resurrection. The only direct reference to this company found in the Bible is in Matt. 27:52, 53; but in Rev. 5:8, 9, four living creatures and four and twenty elders are mentioned as ministering conjointly with Christ as priests, and who ascribe their redemption out of every nation, and tongue, and people (some besides Jews among them, certainly,) to the Lamb. This company was doubtless composed of the resurrected saints who ascended with Jesus to Heaven (see marginal reading in Eph. 4:8), and probably consisted of a few holy men out of each generation from the beginning of the world; but that they were not the sealed ones mentioned in Revelation 7 and 14, appears from the fact that the 144,000 sing their song of deliverance before them. See Rev. 14:3.

It has been claimed by some that the first converts to Christianity from among the Jews constituted the 144,000. But, as we have seen, Christians, of whatever extraction, are counted as the “house of Israel.” Furthermore, it is not likely that so many of the Jews believed and were made perfect, else the apostles would not have found it necessary to turn to the Gentiles. See Acts 13:46.

But what is most fatal to both the foregoing positions is the fact that what was revealed to John A. D. 96, about thirty-five years after the resurrection of Christ, was concerning events yet to transpire. See Rev. 1:1; 4:1. It is worthy of remark that there does not appear to be a hint or reference to this sealed company in either the gospels or epistles, except, perhaps, in Jas. 1:1, 18. This is certainly very singular, if a work of such marked peculiarity had transpired at the time when, and in the place where, the inspired writers of that portion of the New Testament lived. The epistle of James was evidently written especially for the benefit of Christians living in the end of time, just before Christ’s second advent. Jas. 5:3, 7, 8.

The earthly records of some of the tribes of Israel are said to have been irredeemably lost long before our Saviour’s time. But we may be assured that a perfect record is kept in Heaven, and every true convert to Christianity is assigned his place in one of the tribes of Israel. See Dan. 7:10; Luke 10:20; Heb. 12:23; Rev. 13:8; 20:12. Up to the time of Christ, the records of Israel served the purpose of establishing the genealogy of the lineage of David and Abraham, and of preserving the integrity of the Aaronic priesthood; but when the ministration in the heavenly sanctuary began, God would no longer shield the now worthless memorial from corruption.

When, in the providence of God, this prophecy should become due, four mighty angels appear on the stage of action, to whom is assigned the duty of holding the four winds of the earth until the process of sealing shall have been accomplished. In prophetic language, “wind” is a symbol of war (compare Rev. 7:1 with Dan. 7:2; Jer. 25:32; 49:36, 37); and “the great sea,” which it agitates, is an emblem of the people who constitute the nations of the earth. (Compare with Isa. 8:7, 8; Jer. 46:7, 8; Dan. 7:2; Rev. 17:15.)

Why should it be necessary to employ mighty angels to restrain the nations and keep peace on earth, unless the armaments and temper of those nations were such that, in all human probability, a general war of such magnitude as to seriously impede the Divine work in question were inevitable? Can the reader discern in the signs of the times a condition of military and diplomatic preparation answerable to this hypothesis? These four angels have, no doubt, received a commission from Heaven to influence the decisions of councils and legislative bodies at the capitals of nations, in order to hold in abeyance the strife of war until the specific work of sealing the servants of God shall have been accomplished.

Coincident with the appearance of the four angels, and with a commission running parallel with theirs, another mighty angel, having the seal of God, is seen, ascending from the east, his ascending, no doubt, indicating his growing power and influence in the earth, like the increasing effulgence and fervor of the sun, as he ascends from the horizon to the meridian. This angel exerts a powerful influence upon the religious world, employing agencies comparatively weak at first, but increasing mightily in power, and becoming world-wide in renown. Could such events in the political and religious world have transpired at the resurrection of Christ or in the days of the apostles, and not become the subject of profane and ecclesiastical history, so emphatic as to leave no doubt as to the application of the prophecy at that time? Let stern facts respond to the question.

THE SEAL OF GOD.

The seal in the hand of the angel is an object that demands the most careful attention, as every servant of God is to bear its impress, and all must receive this seal gladly, knowing its character, or they cannot be sealed and finally inherit eternal life.

The term is thus defined by Webster: “Seal, n. 4. Any act of confirmation. 5. That which confirms, ratifies, or makes stable; assurance.” “Seal, v. t. 2. To set or affix a seal as a mark of authenticity. 3. To confirm; to ratify; to establish. 10. To imprint on the mind.” Dr. Clarke, in his notes on Rom. 4:11, says: “There is nothing more common in the Jewish writers than the word אות, sign, and חותם Chotham, seal; as signifying the mark in the flesh, by the rite of circumcision.”

It will be seen from these extracts, that the terms seal, sign, and mark are synonymous; and by reference to Heb. 8:10; Rev. 3:12; Ex. 31:13, 16, 17; and Rev. 14:11, that these symbols may indicate such impressions made upon the mind as will convince the judgment and reform the life; and that the Bible Sabbath and the so-called Christian Sabbath, are, respectively, the “SEAL OF GOD” and the “MARK OF THE BEAST.”

In view of the foregoing, the use of the seal under consideration is obvious; but the conditions upon which it is to be affixed, can, I think, be made very clear to every candid reader by the following illustration: Before me lie two deeds of conveyance, one of which was executed in the State of Massachusetts, and sealed with a bit of circular, serrated red paper, attached to the document with sealing-wax, and stamped with the initials of the sealing officer; the other deed is sealed with a mere scrawl of the pen. Each seal answers a specific purpose,—it ratifies, or establishes unalterably, the contents of the document to which it is affixed. Let the first represent the seal of God, and the last the “mark of the beast.”

Any individual might obtain a piece of red paper like that described, and attach it to a document of his own framing, and, though that instrument might be correct in detail, and the seal properly affixed, yet, to constitute it a legal tenure, it must be stamped by the officer of law. So one might keep the Bible Sabbath, and the life record in other respects might be quite perfect, yet such a person could not be considered as sealed in the full sense contemplated in the text, until that life record had been scrutinized by the Judge of all, and stamped with the name of God, of Christ, and of the New Jerusalem; thus showing a purity of character that will qualify the receiver to behold the face of God in glory, to enjoy the companionship of Christ, and to inherit eternal life in paradise. Until this point is reached, a Sabbath-keeper may fall from grace, lose the seal entirely, and irredeemably mar his life record in Heaven.

The special work of the sealing angel, as now transpiring in the earth, consists in filling out, or writing, the moral document, so to speak, of each individual’s life, with pure and holy principles that will constitute it a legal tenure in the kingdom of God; and the scrawl of an earthly tenure is exchanged for the seal (Sabbath) of another state, and all who will are being made ready for the final stamp of immortality.

Do those who keep Sunday have the mark of the beast? No; unless they do so knowing it to be a papal institution, and that the seventh day is the Bible Sabbath, which God requires men to sanctify, certainly not in a sense that it cannot be exchanged before the close of the third angel’s message for the “seal of the living God,” the Sabbath of Divine appointment.

The moral aspect in the earth reveals the work of the sealing angel as rapidly approaching its final consummation, when every servant of God will receive the seal of immortality, and every sinner the impress of eternal death. It will be too late then for the self-righteous professor to plead admittance on the ground of having been associated in church capacity with some who are saved; too late for the backslider to return to his first love; too late for the sinner to plead for the mercy which he has once rejected and despised.

“ ‘Too late! too late!’ will be the cry; Jesus of Nazareth has passed by.”

Reader, you have not yet reached that awful period of anguish. The third angel’s message still sounds its solemn warning in your ears: “If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God.” Rev. 14:9, 10. And the cheering promise still pleads: “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne.” Chap. 3:21. A. SMITH.