All Saints
Rev
7:9-17
11/2/25
The book of Revelation is not like
any other book in the New Testament. It
has features that resemble Daniel, Ezekiel, and Zechariah from the Old
Testament. This is not surprising because Revelation has been written in the
style – in the genre – of an apocalypse. We have several other examples of
Jewish writings from this period which are also written as an apocalypse, and
all of these have shaped by this earlier material in the Old Testament.
An apocalypse is revelatory
literature which discloses a reality that goes beyond our world. They do this
by either revealing God’s future end time salvation, or by revealing the
supernatural world that we can’t see. The Book of Revelation actually does both
of these things.
One of the very distinctive features
of an apocalypse like Revelation is that it uses symbolism to convey its
message. Most of the symbolism in Revelation comes from the Old Testament. But it does also draws upon several other
apocalypses that were already well known in Judaism at the end of the first
century A.D.
This use of symbolism gives
Revelation its very unique character. Reading Revelation is not like reading
one of Paul’s letters. We don’t get
statements – propositions – that are setting forth an argument or explaining
things. Instead, Revelation uses symbolism to convey meaning. This means that
we often can understand the basic point being made, but we are left wondering
how far we can press the specific details.
And this “fuzziness” – this
uncertainty about how much we should make of the symbolism – is related to
another aspect of an apocalypse. An apocalypse like Revelation is not simply
trying to communicate information. It is doing so in a way that will impact
us emotionally. The Book of
Revelation communicates information – revelation from God. It also seeks to
strike us in a deeply personal way as it communicates hope and warning. These
are mutually reinforcing goals of the book.
All of this means that we need to
recognize Revelation for what it is. It is a powerful revelation from God. It
is also something that is not going to give us specific details. It’s not going
to give us a timetable or a play by play of end time events with which we can
interpret the news about what is happening in the world.
The Church has recognized the unique
character of Revelation. She has understood that no doctrine can be based on
Revelation alone. Instead, Revelation can be used to support and give us a
deeper understanding of what we find in Scripture as a whole.
The wisdom of this is revealed when
we consider the teaching of John Nelson Darby. This nineteenth century
Englishman developed the interpretation that divided history into seven
periods, or dispensations. Darby used
the content of Revelation chapter 20 that speaks about the millennium, the
defeat of Satan, the great white throne judgment, and the resurrection as the
framework with which he read everything else that Scripture says about the end
times.
Darby pointed to 1 Thessalonians
4:17 which describes Christ’s return on the Last Day. There Paul says, “Then we
who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in
the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the
Lord.” Darby was the first person in the history of the Church to identify this
as “the rapture.” Because he was using Revelation as the key to reading the
rest of the Bible he said that this was not the Last Day. Instead, it
was an act of Christ to remove the saved before further end time events
occurred.
But all of Scripture teaches that
there is one Last Day – the day of the Lord. It is the day when Jesus Christ will return
in glory and raise the dead. It is the
day when he will pronounce the final judgment and renew creation. It is the day
that begins the endless day of dwelling in God’s presence as we enjoy God’s
final salvation.
When we understand Revelation for
what it is, and don’t ask it to do things it’s not trying to do, then it
becomes a book of great comfort. We see this in the first reading assigned for
All Saints’ Day. Prior to chapter seven, John has seen God on the throne in
heaven surrounded by twenty four elders, and the four living creatures – the
angelic cherubs. He has heard the four
living creatures crying out, ““Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God
Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” He has seen the twenty-four
elders fall down before God on the throne and worship him saying, “Worthy
are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you
created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”
John has been told that he will be
shown what is going to take place. He sees that God holds a scroll that
contains this information. However, it
has been sealed with seven seals that no one can open. John weeps about this, but then one of the
elders says to him, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of
Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll
and its seven seals.”
John sees a Lamb standing as though slain. We recognize that the
Lamb is Christ, for he takes the scroll and the elders fall down before the
Lamb and sing a new song which says, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to
open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed
people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation,
and
you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign
on the earth.”
Christ, the Lamb, begins to open the
seals. The Book of Revelation is structured around three cycles of revelation –
seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven censers. Each of them reveals events
from the ascension of Jesus Christ until the Last Day. They cover the same
period of time as they provide different details. These are the things to come
– the events of the last days.
The first four seals release figure
riding white, red, black, and pale horses – “the four horsemen of the
apocalypse.” These symbolize war and the things associated with it: sword,
famine and death. The fifth seal reveals under the altar the souls of those who
had been slain for the word of God. They cry out, “O Sovereign
Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge
and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” They are told
to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and
their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they
themselves had been. Martyrdom will be
part of the experience of God’s people.
Then just before our text, the Lamb
opens the sixth seal. John sees frightening cosmic distress. He says, “I looked, and behold, there
was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the
full moon became like blood, and the stars of the sky fell to the
earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale.” The
sky vanishes like a scroll rolled up and the kings hide themselves in caves
saying to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is
seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of
their wrath has come, and who can stand?”
It is a terrifying scene. But then
in chapter seven, before the seventh seal there is an interlude – a pause. What
does all of this mean for God’s people, the Church? How can the Church survive?
Chapter seven provides a comforting answer to these questions. First, John sees
the 144,000 – the servants of God who have been sealed on their foreheads.
Numbers are symbolic in Revelation. There were twelve tribes of Israel in the
Old Testament. There were twelve apostles of the Church in the New Testament.
Twelve times twelve times one thousand gives you 144,000 – a number that
expresses the fullness of the Church – the people of God – who will be saved.
And then in our text, John tells us,
“After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could
number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages,
standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes,
with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud
voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the
Lamb!”
John sees a great crowd from all
peoples standing before God on the throne and the Lamb. He sees the same scene
as in chapters four and five when he had seen God and the Lamb. But now before
them stand people who are clothed in white robes, and who hold palm branches
which was a symbol of victory. They acclaim God and the Lamb as the One who has
salvation. And then with them, the angels around the throne, and the elders,
and four living creatures fall down before God as they worship and praise him.
John says that then one of the
elders spoke to him and asked, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and
from where have they come?” Baffled, he replied, “Sir, you know.” Then the
elder said, “These are the ones coming out of the great
tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in
the blood of the Lamb.”
The elder identifies the individuals as saints. They have come out
of the great tribulation that John has been seeing. They have died. But they
have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. They are now able to stand in God’s presence
because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The elders had acclaimed
Christ as the One who by his blood ransomed people for God. At the very
beginning of the book Jesus Christ is described as “the firstborn of the dead”
who “loved us and released us from our sins by his blood.”
Like those depicted in our text, you are a saint because of
Jesus’ death and resurrection. Baptized into his death, your sins have been
washed away. You are holy in God’s eyes because of Christ. You have been born
again of water and the Spirit, and are a new creation in Christ. You are God’s
child.
But on this All Saints’ Day, we don’t focus on ourselves. Instead,
we think about those who have already died in Christ. We think about family and
friends who were baptized in Christ and believed in him. They lived their life
in the faith and died in the Lord. And like the saints portrayed in our text,
they are with God.
The elder tells John, “Therefore they are before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the
throne will shelter them with his presence.
They
shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike
them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will
be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
We have the comfort of knowing that
the saints who have died are at peace with the Lord. No longer do they face the
struggles of this world. No longer do
they experience the temptations of the devil. No longer do they wrestle against
sin and the old Adam. Instead, they are
with Christ and experience the joy of being in his presence.
We give thanks for this. We have the comfort of knowing that if we
die, the same will be true for us. We
learn from Revelation that God will preserve his Church – he will deliver his
saints because death cannot separate them from him. And we look toward the Last
Day when the risen Lord – the firstborn from the dead – will return in glory
and raise up our bodies. We have comfort
now, and hope that carries us forward towards the final goal as we pray with
John at the end of Revelation: “Amen! Come, Lord Jesus!”
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