Revelation 14 1-5, And behold, I saw a Lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with Him one hundred and forty-four thousand, having His name and His Father's name written on their foreheads. And I heard a sound from the sky, like the sound of many waters, and like the sound of loud thunder. And the sound that I heard was like harpists playing on their harps. And they sing a new song before the throne and before the four living beings and the elders. And no one was able to learn the song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. These are the ones not defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever he may go. These were redeemed by Jesus from among men, firstfruits for God and for the Lamb. No lie was found in their mouth, for they are blameless. Amen. Father, we thank you for your word, and I pray that as we dig into it, we would not only understand it, we would learn what it means and cherish it and have our lives adapted and conformed to it. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Now later in the sermon, I hope to at least introduce you to the shock troops that God raised up for the very first missions blitz that would occur after 8070. After all, I did title the sermon shock troops, so I better get to that. To me, it is astonishing that one nation was able to raise up 144,000 missionaries into field and have them so focused on their cause and so dedicated to Christ that Christians began to penetrate every area of life. We know that from the early church fathers. There have been many other major missions movements in the last 2,000 years, but in my estimation, none of them match the dedication, the numbers, and the intensity of this group of people, perhaps until the last two centuries. Today, the total number of missionaries worldwide, and that's if you count even liberal missionaries, all missionaries whatsoever, comes to about 400,000. Evangelicals might be, I don't know, maybe two-thirds of that number. And about 44,000 evangelical missionaries come from the country of India. So third world countries are starting to send out more missionaries than America is. It's really an amazing thing. China, if it can get its borders to be open, they're already sending out missionaries, but if they can get their borders where there's more free travel happening, they're poised to send out 100,000 missionaries right now. And their goal is to send out a million missionaries within two or three decades and they're hoping to have a tithe of all of their numbers going out and their target is the Arab world and back to Jerusalem. Now can you imagine the impact that would happen in the Arab world and in Israel if they were even able to marshal 100,000 missionaries, which they say they can do right now. They could send them out if the borders would open. It would just be astonishing. and that perhaps we can pray that God would raise up missionary shock troops in our own generation. Now just to orient you on where we are in this chapter, this book, the way it's structured can sometimes be a little bit confusing. Chapters 12 through 14 form the very center or heart of this book, the central part of the chiasm. If you remember how the chiasm was structured, in literature when you've got an A, B, C, D, C, B, A structure, the thematic heart or the most important point is at the point of the arrow. Okay? That's the center of the book. And so I think it's very interesting in this book that God showcases these chapters that deal with the behind-the-scenes spiritual warfare that is going on with angels. God wants us to know that the invisible world is just as important as the visible world. He does not want us downplaying the importance of spiritual warfare. So chapter 12 dealt with angel-on-angel warfare. Chapter 13 dealt with angels and demons fighting with and through the physical armies that are in this world. And then chapter 14 deals with angels helping human missionaries as they carry the gospel to the far reaches of the globe. Now you might not normally think of angels as having much to do with missions, but they are very much involved. Verse 6 of this chapter says, I saw another angel flying in midheaven having an everlasting gospel to be proclaimed to those who reside on the earth to every ethnic nation and tribe and language and people. Now it doesn't say the angels proclaimed the gospel. It says that they had the gospel that was to be proclaimed. And I'm not going to focus on that verse this morning, but somehow angels are directly involved in the missions efforts of these Jews and of later Gentile missionaries. In fact, you could label this whole chapter as the chapter on missions and or God's redemptive judgments that advance the cause of missions. Now was there opposition to these missions? Absolutely. We've seen that these chapters are framed before and behind with enormous opposition from Satan. Satan was doing absolutely everything he could to destroy the advancement of the gospel and that's one of the reasons he was going after these 144,000 missionaries. He wanted to kill them. But we saw that God protected them in the wilderness during the last three and a half years. But the beginning of the book promises the total victory of Jesus. The end of the book showcases what planet Earth will look like when the Great Commission is completely fulfilled. And so that's how this section relates to the book as a whole. This is a chapter on missions, and by the end of the book missions will have totally converted the world. Now you may not be as optimistic as I am on this happening, but the Great Commission will indeed be a success. It will not be a failure. Every nation will be converted, discipled, made into disciples, and be obeying everything that Christ has commanded. So it's a glorious future, but these chapters are telling us that doesn't happen overnight. It doesn't happen just automatically. It's going to take sacrifice and dedication and piercing into the enemies. There's spiritual warfare that is involved. There's planning that's involved. There are so many things that are involved to take over this world for Christ. Now this morning we're not going to even get beyond verse 1 because I want to deal with two controversies. that have blinded people to both eschatology and missions. To both God's promises for the future, that's what eschatology means, God's promises for the future, as well as the achievability of the Great Commission, which is what true missions is. And I find it sad that many, many commentators are so opposed to God's eschatology for the Jews that they actually teach that the 144,000 are Gentile believers. They're not Jews. They're Gentile believers. And let me begin by asking, how do I know that they are Jewish believers? Well, he's defined who these 144,000 were in chapter 7, and he made it crystal clear that they are the remnant survivors of the Jewish church. We looked at several undeniable features of their Jewishness in that chapter. and the specific tribes that they came from. They came from the tribe of Judah and Reuben and Gad and Asher. And then he reiterates, he really is talking about Jewish people when he says that the 144,000 are people from all the tribes of the children of Israel. And then he says they're in the land. In other words, in the gates, in the land of Israel. I don't know how you could get any more clear than that. So the 144,000 are missionaries sent out by the remnant church of Israel And I have since noticed, thankfully, to the interactions with people in the congregation that there were actually other women and children that were spared during that period of time as well. So I no longer believe that they were the only survivors. There was a church beyond them. But I think it's so intriguing that John starts this chapter on missions with a Jewish church And he moves to the establishing of a Gentile church. That's the same order that you see in chapter 7. He first of all begins with a description of the Jewish church, then he moves, which can be numbered, then he moves to a Gentile church, which is so innumerous you cannot number the Gentile church. He contrasts the two. there needed to be a reboot of the Gentile church because we saw by this time the Gentile church had almost been extinguished and amongst the the Jews that was apart from God's preservation they would have been extinguished as well. All that were left at this point as Zechariah 13 says that two-thirds of the Jewish church was killed off so all that were left were the 144,000 missionaries plus whoever the other men, women, and children were that were in that church. Now is there a reason that he begins with the Jews and he moves to the Gentiles? I think that there is. This is the New Covenant principle that Paul gave in Romans 1-16 where he says that the gospel is, quote, the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. I want you to notice that phrase, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. Now this makes some Amillennialists so squeamish that they have to spiritualize these Jews as Gentile Christians. But when you study chapter 7, I just don't see how you can get around the Jewishness of these 144,000. And if they are Jews, if 144,000 are Jews, Then Paul's principle of to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Now get this, this is an important principle. The principle to the Jew first and also the Greek was not just true in the last days of the old covenant. which ended in A.D. 70, but it's also true after A.D. 70 in the period that is only New Covenant. Remember, we've been seeing how chapter by chapter, verse by verse, it's been progressing year by year up to A.D. 70 and beyond in chapter 13. And this just continues the historical progress. So this passage is a great answer to full preterism, amillennialism, replacement theology. Actually, it's a great answer to kinism as well. We'll maybe have time to look at that. But it's also a fantastic answer to liberals and Talmudists who claim that the Apostle John was an anti-Semite. Now they claim this because John so clearly portrays the brutal war that Rome brought against Israel as being God's just judgment against Israel. They say, if that's not anti-Semitism, I don't know what is. And my response to them is, well, do you believe that Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel were anti-Semites because they predicted Babylon's judgment of Israel? No, that's ridiculous. And it's just as ridiculous to claim that the Apostle John was an anti-Semite. He was a Jew who was commissioned by the Jewish Jesus to be an apostle to the Jew. His heart's longing was for the salvation of the Jews. His whole ministry was wrapped up in the Jews. He was an apostle to the circumcision, right? And we pointed out when we were in chapter 10 that every book of the Bible, every book without exception of the Bible was written by a Jew, including Hebrews. There is no exception. God said it was to the Jews that he committed the oracles of God. So all of the scriptures came from them. God continues to have a plan for every nation of the world, including a Jewish nation. And though he emphasized judgment upon Israel in this book, He did so because His covenant had been with them and they had broken His covenant and with greater privilege comes greater judgment. Now speaking of judgment, Romans 2 verse 9 says, Tribulation and anguish on every soul of man who does evil of the Jew first and also of the Greek. There's that phrase again. So that's why we saw in the book of Revelation that God brought judgment upon Israel first and then he moved his judgments to the empire of Rome. But the same is true of evangelism in this book. The Gentile church by this time, as I had mentioned, had been virtually wiped out, needed to be reestablished. And we saw that two thirds of the church in Israel were left. And this sizable Jewish church was preserved during the previous three and a half years for one purpose. They were preserved to be missionaries to reestablish the church and to take it to the ends of the world. They had a passion for missions that I think right now the church in India has and maybe the church in China Some of the third world countries are beginning to pick up this kind of a heart's passion. But Paul also says there is blessing that God sends in the same manner. So Romans 2.10 says, but glory, honor, and peace to everyone who works what is good, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. I'm emphasizing this because there are so many preterists and amillennial books that say that God has no place for Jews in the New Covenant. Now these first few verses that take place after AD 70 prove that to be absolutely false. This chapter is totally consistent with Romans 9 through 11 which promises God is going to have a remnant being saved from the ethnic Jews and eventually the entire nation of Jews is going to be saved in the future. When we get to verse 12, I mean verse 4, we'll talk about that a little bit. Well, I'll just mention it very briefly right now. It mentions that this 144,000 was the first fruits of the Jewish nation. Well, first fruits harvest is just a tiny little bundle. If the full harvest of the Jews is going to come later, it implies a far, far greater ingathering of the Jews at some point in the future. I believe it's a reference to national salvation. And anyway, when Israel gets saved in the future, I believe they're going to become the kamikaze shock troops for a massive evangelistic effort in the future. It really is a cool thought when you see the whole paradigm of eschatology. Now in terms of the celibacy of these 144,000, I believe they didn't get married because they all knew they were about to become martyrs. Can I prove that? No. But it appears that their sole goal in life was radical missions. Now before I even get to missions, I do want to give you ammo to oppose the two extremes on this Jewish question. We need to be prepared to oppose a racist approach to Jews. as well as a Zionist approach to Jews. Both of those are unbiblical. And let me just point out that the first word on this chapter, the word behold, clues us into something very, very important that is about to be said. Anywhere in the book of Revelation that the word iddu, the Greek word iddu occurs, we need to pay attention. Various dictionaries define that word as a marker for something of critical and central importance, or at least something extremely unusual that they're about to describe. Well this is both unusual and extremely important. It was unusual to have 144,000, you know, you got these 12,000 from each of those tribes. But it's also extremely important for God's program of eschatology and God's program of the Great Commission. And I believe that post-millennialism alone preserves this distinction. It is post-millennialism alone that sees missions to Jews as a critical part of the eventual conversion of all nations. And it really saddens me that in recent years, this used to be all post-millennialists held to this. In recent years, a lot of the leading post-millennialists are beginning to abandon this feature and they no longer hold to it. But let me deal with the Zionist extreme first. Subpoint A says that this passage stands as a rebuke, first of all, to dispensationalism, which radically divides between Israel and the church as if they were two separate bodies that were saved by God, that belong to God, and these two separate bodies have two totally different destinies, okay? Charles Ryrie is perhaps the most famous representative of dispensationalism today, maybe next to Scofield, but he's still, Scofield's not alive, Ryrie is, and if, by the way, if you have Ryrie's study Bible, toss it. It is, there's just no point in poisoning your mind with all of the junk that's in there. Same with the Schofield Bible. There are so many problems with it. But anyway, he says the dispensationalist, he's defining his own system of dispensationalism, and he quotes from others and says this is pretty much, this describes all dispensationalism. He says the dispensationalist believes that throughout the ages God is pursuing two distinct purposes. One related to earth with earthly people and earthly objectives involved, which is Judaism. while the other is related to heaven with heavenly people and heavenly objectives involved, which is Christianity. Now this is in stark contrast to our own covenant theology which sees only one saved people from Genesis to Revelation. It's a unity of people. And covenant theology holds to the whole Bible. We're not just New Testament Christians. So there's a unity of scripture, and there's unity of salvation, unity of God's laws, unity of purpose, unity of destiny. Dispensationalism sees radical disjunctions between Israel and the church on every one of those subjects. For example, they say it's illegitimate. Now, not all are consistent, praise the Lord. But they say it's illegitimate to take any promise that God made in the Old Testament and apply it to the church. That was made to Israel. And some of the more radical ones will say, you cannot take the gospels and apply it to us, because that was written to the Jews. Sermon on the Mount, that was for the Jews. That's for the kingdom. That has nothing to do with the church. So older dispensationalists were even worse, saying that there were two separate ways to be saved, Jews by law keeping and the church by grace. Some of those older style dispensationalists actually are still spouting heresy. And it is a heresy, because it is another gospel. It is a heresy. For example, any of you guys heard of John Hagee? He's on the TV, he's on the radio all the time. Very, very famous and influential pastor in Austin, Texas. He's involved in politics on a national level. It just makes me melt in my socks. I just think this is awful that people like that are the ones who are the spokespeople for Christianity. But here's what he says. I'm not trying to convert the Jewish people to the Christian faith. In fact, trying to convert Jews is a waste of time. Jews already have a covenant with God, and that has never been replaced by Christianity. In overreaction to replacement theology, he espouses a totally different works-based gospel for Jews. He says, they have a different gospel than we do, and that is heresy. He went on to say, the Jewish people have a relationship to God through the law of God as given through Moses. I believe that every Gentile person can only come to God through the cross of Christ. I believe that every Jewish person who lives in the light of the Torah, which is the word of God, has a relationship with God and will come to redemption. The law of Moses is sufficient enough to bring a person into the knowledge of God until God gives him a greater revelation and God has not. Why? Because the New Testament wasn't written for the Jews. It was written for, according to him, just for the church. Well, this passage is not only a rebuke to John Hagee's consistent dispensationalism, but it really is a rebuke to all forms of dispensationalism altogether. I want you to notice, take a look at the text here, I want you to notice that these 144,000 Jews have the same sacrificial lamb that we do in verse one. It's Jesus Christ. They have the same father that we do in verse one. Where dispensationalists often believe that Israel was married to the father, And the church is married to Jesus, two totally different brides, two totally different people they're married to, is the way they word it. Verse 1 shows that both the names of the father and of the son are on their foreheads. In other words, they belong to both. Just like a woman takes on the name of her husband biblically, they took on the name of the father and they belong to both, okay? All believers from Genesis to Revelation belong to both the Father and the Son. And contrary to dispensationalists who insist that Jews are restricted to the earth and the church is restricted to heaven, these come to the same Mount Zion in heaven that we come to according to Hebrews chapter 12. Consistent dispensationalists deny that. They say that the Jews are going to be on the earth in the millennium and forever after the millennium, and we're going to be forever in heaven. That's just a ridiculous claim. In fact, they claim that the book of Revelation doesn't even talk about the church being on earth after chapter 3. They got raptured. In chapter 4, verse 1. Notice also that these 144,000 in this passage enter into the same worship that the elders of the church enter into in verses 2 through 3. They have the same redemption that the church does in verse 4. They follow the Lamb wherever He goes just like the church follows the Lamb wherever He goes. Do we have the Lamb going off this way for the Jews and the Lamb going off this way for the church? No, no, no. Wherever He goes, both follow. The church follows, the 144,000 follow. So yes, there is a distinction God makes between Jew and Gentile, but not a separate destiny, separate body, separate salvation, separate scriptures, or a separate law. Dispensationalism, taken to its logical conclusion, is heresy. Now thankfully, thankfully, most dispensationalists I know love the Lord, and are true believers, I think they're just deceived. I grew up as a dispensationalist. I think there is just, they've not seen the historic faith really being consistently taught. But even the non-heretical dispensationalists, I should say dispensationalism, is an escapist theology that has done enormous damage to American culture. And the reason it's done enormous damage is it has very self-consciously withdrawn the gospel and withdrawn the law of God from government and any other aspect of culture. Their one goal is saving people from the sinking Titanic, not repairing the Titanic. But if God's mandate is to both save the people and to repair the ship, that's disobedience. Now let me give you some quotes from famous dispensationalists so you can see this problem. Hal Lindsey. How many here have read anything by Hal Lindsey or at least know who he is? He used to be famous in my generation. Hal Lindsey said, God sent us to be fishers of men, not to clean up the fishbowl. Okay, very clever quip there. But from his perspective, opposing abortion is a useless endeavor for the church because it is just cleaning up the fishbowl. We should just be involved in missions. We should just be involved in saving people for heaven. J. Vernon McGee. He's a lovely guy. I like listening to him. Love his accent, you know, on the radio. But he teaches, he spouts a lot of problematic stuff. He says you don't polish brass on a sinking ship, and according to him, getting involved in politics is polishing brass on the Titanic. He tells us don't do that, it's a waste of time, just be involved in saving souls. Wainhouse and Tommy Ice said God's intent for this age is to take out from among the nations a people for His name, not to convert the nations and make them into Christian republics. And I'm scratching my head and thinking, wasn't that exactly the wording of the Great Commission, to disciple every nation and teach the nations to obey all things? He goes on, he says, indeed any attempt to establish long-term change in institutions will only result in the leaven of humanism permeating Christianity. Wow, he has real faith in humanism. has no faith that even though sin abounds out there, that grace abounds much more. So he just says, because of the abounding of sin in the culture, we must withdraw from the world. And so to me, it is no wonder that the world is in the mess that we are in, when for a hundred years Christians had followed this advice. Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount guaranteed we would be in exactly the mess that we are in today if we do what dispensationalism tells us to do. Remember that? He said if the salt loses its favor and you fail to be salt in society, he says, you are good for nothing but to be cast out and trampled underfoot of men. What does it mean to be trampled underfoot of men? It means humanism is going to dominate you. Their feet are going to be over you. That's exactly where we're at today. Humanism dominates because the church has retreated. Now, in contrast, we're going to be seeing that this believing remnant of 144,000 Jewish believers would have the boldness to run toward the enemy and engage culture so much that early church fathers said that there was not any area of government or any area of culture that you could not find Christians in the empire of Rome. They were everywhere, everywhere. So these were the shock troops who helped to turn planet Earth upside down in the years to come. Now I was tempted to skip over a couple of pages this morning, but because dispensationalism you run across it on the radio, the TV, you've probably got Bibles, you've got the influence everywhere. I think I'm going to go ahead and go through some of this material with you. At least a couple more verses. First Scripture is Hebrews chapter 12. And it actually answers an additional question that some people have about verse 1. Verse 1 says, I saw a lamb standing on Mount Zion and with him 144,000. Now Mount Zion's in heaven, right? It's in heaven. So you might be surprised that commentators are hotly divided on whether these 144,000 are exclusively on the earth or others who say, no, they're exclusively in heaven. Now the ones who say they're exclusively on the earth say, well, it's just simple logic. Look at the other passages where these 144,000 are. It's guaranteed that they will not die. during the three and a half years of that war, God's going to preserve them. If they're in heaven now, they were obviously martyrs, and now we're at the end of this period. That doesn't make any sense. The ones who say, no, it's in heaven. Zion is in heaven. So whatever contradictions might appear, we've got to see these as exclusively heavenly being. But the best commentators say that it is both and, and they demonstrate this not only by comparing this to different parts of Revelation, but they show that this passage is tied point by point and verse by verse with Hebrews 12, 18 through 29, which explicitly says that believers on earth that he was writing to had already, quote, come unto Mount Zion. And unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that of Abel." Okay, we on earth have come to Mount Zion and as we move through Revelation 14 we're going to be returning to that passage more than once. Hebrews 12 not only shows that Jew and Gentile are one body in the church, but it shows that as we come to worship the Lord on the Sabbath, we are caught up to the heavenlies, we participate in the heavenlies with their invasion of earth with Christ's mediatorial kingdom. Hebrews says that the Great Commission will shake all things and replace all things with that which is unshakeable. Now if you turn with me to Ephesians chapter two, this is the last one. The passage, and this one I think is so, so clear on showing that there are, there is one body through all time, Jew and Gentile grafted, and Gentiles were grafted into Israel. But let's start reading at Ephesians 2 and verse 11. Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision made in the flesh by hands, that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ." What have we been brought near to? We've been brought near to the commonwealth of Israel. to the covenants of promise that were given in the Old Covenant, in the Old Testament, to a common hope. That's what Jesus' blood achieved. It grafted us into the commonwealth of Israel. Okay, continuing to read in verse 14. For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two. Who are the two? Jew and Gentile, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body, through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and to those who were near. For through him we both have access by one spirit to the Father. Now therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone in whom a whole building being fitted together grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for dwelling place of God in the Spirit." So what he's basically saying is we are fellow citizens of Israel just as much as Caleb and Rahab were. Rahab, Caleb, and thousands of others were Gentiles who, formerly Gentiles, who became a part of Israel. So the bottom line is that God does not have two brides, two vineyards, two temples. No, there's one body, one bride, one vineyard, one olive tree, one temple, one people of God. and to misuse a line from Weddings, what God hath joined together let no man put asunder. Right? It is kind of a misuse of it. But really dispensationalism has been fighting against God's purposes by putting asunder what God has joined together. And they've put it asunder on many different levels, different peoples, different destinies, different laws, different purposes, etc. So can you see the problem? It's one of the reasons why I tell you, get rid of those dispensational study Bibles. I've given you a handout, and I didn't bring it up here with me, but I've given you a handout that shows numerous scriptures that give the same name to the church as it gave to spiritual Israel of the Old Testament. And if you just scan through, I won't give you all the verses, but let me just give you the names. Both are called Israel Heirs of salvation, a peculiar or special treasure, a holy nation, a holy people, a special people, a kingdom of priests, saints, household of God, children of promise, seed of Abraham, chosen, church, assembly, circumcised in heart, general assembly and church of the firstborn, commonwealth of Israel, Zion, God's people, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, the promises and the fathers. We are both called the bride of God, the temple of God, the vineyard of God, the flock of God, the house of God. Jerusalem, children of Abraham, an olive tree, and a field of God. So hopefully you can see it's just overwhelming evidence that while we can distinguish between Jew and Gentile, we cannot separate Jew and Gentile into separate peoples of God. Now, this was a total mystery. to Jewish Christians in the first century. They did not understand how this could be. It created conflict in every church. In Revelation 10, we saw that was the reason why they needed to have prophets in every church throughout the empire was to settle this issue of that mystery. Jews were wondering, how is it possible? They didn't have any problem with Gentiles coming into Israel. They're long history. They made proselytes themselves. Even the Pharisees made proselytes. So when a Gentile became a Jew, he had to get circumcised, he had to go through all these ceremonies, and he was considered a Jew. He was no longer considered a Gentile. They had to leave their Gentileness behind. But now Paul is saying, no, no, no, they can keep their Gentileness within the church, and they're saying, How is that possible? It's never been done that way. They had to become Jews before they could become part of Israel. So that is the mystery that Ephesians 2 says required prophets to settle. And if you keep reading in Ephesians 2 and verse 3, Paul says, For this reason, I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles, if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you, how that by revelation he made known to me the mystery, as I have briefly written already, by which, when you read, you may understand my knowledge of the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs. That's the mystery. That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same body and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel, of which I became a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of His power. So back to Revelation. John begins chapter 14 with a behold or an iddu because he wants us to pay particular attention to this chapter, which is going to point out Church has always been Israel. Israel has always been the church. Okay? There's a visible and there's an invisible church. Not everybody in the visible church is a believer. Not everybody in the visible Israel was a believer, okay? Was a genuine elect person. But I think enough said on that. I could have probably put in your outlines that it also stands as a correction to kinism. Kinism makes such a radical separation between cultures. And the Jewish culture was quite, quite different from the Gentile culture. So they speak against multiculturalism within the church. They say, that's a Marxist doctrine. You should not have that. For sure, they say it's a sin for two different cultures to marry. But they say it is a sin for, and not all of them, there's variations on the Kiddism on this, but a lot of the Kenneths say it's a sin for two cultures to be sitting side by side in the worship service. We need to maintain our racial distinctives. So they say, we're not racist. They can worship over there. We'll worship over here. We just need to maintain those things. So there's any number of questions you could ask. But one question is, OK, which church is Timothy going to pastor? Because he's half Jew and half Gentile. One parent was a Gentile, the other was a Jew. Where's he going to be a pastor? He's clearly a pastor somewhere, right? So he did not have pure genetics of one race. And actually, I doubt that many of the kinesths have pure genetics of one race. I would challenge some of them to get one of these genetic studies tests, and they might be surprised. Now I don't have a problem with people preserving their cultures. I think there's something beautiful about cultural food and cultural traditions, all of that kind of stuff. I'm just saying I do object to people saying it's a sin for cultures to mix within the church. That's a radical separation that the New Testament is against. Now this passage also stands as a rebuke to replacement theology, which says that God no longer has any place for an ethnic distinction of Jew and Gentile within the unity of the church. Now some do this by saying that Jews no longer exist on planet earth, and the people who call themselves Jews today aren't Jews, they're Khazars. And I won't even get into that. Others simply say that once a Jew joins the church, he should shed any identity as a Jew, should no longer identify with his culture, his heritage, food, anything like that. Others have gone so far as to say that the Jewish nation committed the unpardonable sin, and therefore all Jews are outside the scope of salvation. So there are no Jews being saved after 80-70 is what they are saying. Not all of them. There's multiple variations of this theme, but all discount the Jew-Gentile distinction based precisely on the verses that I've just finished reading to you that Jew and Gentile are in one body. So their logic is this. Since the church is the spiritual Israel, which it is, I agree with that. Since it's the spiritual Israel, we cannot recognize any other Israel according to the flesh. Okay, and therefore we should not acknowledge any distinction between Jew and Gentile within the church. They say that if every Gentile that gets converted joins the spiritual Israel, then he is just as much a Jew as any other person in the church. Okay, and the distinctions of Jew and Gentile no longer exist. So you can sort of see the logic that they're going, but I hope you can also see the weakness of the argument. To say you cannot separate Jew and Gentile in the church does not mean you cannot distinguish between them. To return to the marriage analogy, God has made two one and what God has joined together let no man put asunder. But just because you can't put husband and wife asunder does not mean you can't distinguish between a husband and a wife, right? So the same is true here. The fact of the matter is that the New Testament continues to use the distinction of Jews and Gentiles long after people joined the church. Now it's true since the church is completely separate from the world, the Bible does indeed separate what it calls unbelieving Jews like Acts 14.2, from believing Jews, Acts 14 verse 1 and 16.1 and many other scriptures I have here. But there's no separation within the church, only distinctions. And it's a failure to recognize this distinction between Jew and Gentile that messes up so many people's eschatology. They cannot read the word Israel in Romans 9 through 11 without making that word un-Jewish. But the fact of the matter is that Paul explicitly calls himself a Jew, Acts 21.39, and a Jew by nature, Galatians 2.15. To be a Jew by nature is something ethnic. And he explicitly calls Peter a Jew in contrast to Gentile believers. He makes that point. And you look at other passages, I won't give you all the verses, but Apollos, Aquila, Peter, Timothy's mother were all called believing Jews. 1 Corinthians 12.13 says that Jews and Gentiles, slaves and free, are equal in the church, but it doesn't say that the distinctions between them are abolished or he wouldn't continue to call them Jew and Gentile. Okay, and so those churches obviously had Jew and Gentile side by side. They had the so-called multiculturalism that is Marxist according to the Kynes. Again, in Romans 10, 12, Paul says that there is no spiritual difference between a Jew and a Gentile within the church. So why does he continue to call them Jew and Gentile? He does, he does. Distinction but not separation. So the fact that there is only one body, one bride, one people of God does not do away with the racial distinctions that this book is going to start talking about. Every tribe and tongue and nation will be included in the church eventually and one of those tribes and nations will call itself Israel. Isaiah 19 is quite clear about that. It predicts a time when Assyria, Egypt, and Israel will all be 100% saved and they'll have trading relations with each other. And they'll all speak the same Hebrew language. And they're all going to be called by God, my people, singular. Not my people's plural, but my people's singular. Israel will be God's people because it will have abandoned Talmudism and embrace God's gospel. And Egypt will be God's people, so will Assyria. Now outside of the Lamb, outside of Jesus Christ, the book of Revelation says Jews are non-Jews, spiritually speaking, and are no different than Sodom and Egypt, spiritually speaking. That's Revelation 11, remember? But the very fact he uses the word spiritually speaking indicates he still recognizes that there is a fleshly distinction. And the fact that unbelieving Jews are no better than Sodom and Egypt means they need to be evangelized. We need to support Jewish evangelism. That's one of the things our family has been involved in for many decades. And when it comes to eschatology, in other words, God's promises concerning the future, we cannot spiritualize away Israel in passages like Isaiah 19 and Romans 9 through 11. It is quite clear that an Israel according to the flesh will get converted, become part of the true church, get grafted back into their own olive tree. Okay, Jews are declared by Paul to be the natural branches, just like Paul called himself a Jew by nature. Galatians 2.15. The unbelieving Jews were cut off, broken off, so they're no longer in Israel, right? They're broken off, but they're natural branches. They will be eventually grafted back in. Some of this may seem really heavy, but it's important stuff. It really is important stuff. So the bottom line is that we need to avoid dispensationalism, which has a hyper-separation of Israel and church, and we need to avoid replacement theology, which obliterates even distinctions. When we get to verse four on another Sunday, we'll see that John calls 144,000 firstfruits. Oh, I think I already mentioned that. There are firstfruits, there's gonna be a general harvest of Jews in the future. And Romans 11 says that Israel's future salvation as a nation will result in greater fullness for the Gentiles. In fact, it's going to be such a spectacular event in history, such a pivotal turning point in history. He says it's almost going to be like life from the dead. Again, I've spent a long time on this, but it'll help us to understand later chapters. Now the next major thing that this behold makes us pay attention to is the critical importance of having a correct theology of missions. Missions is not an optional add-on for the church. Missions is integral to the church's healthy existence. So he says behold. Pay attention to what I'm going to be saying in this chapter. Every member of the church, every church should think of itself as a bond slave of Jesus Christ whose only purpose for being alive is to serve Christ's interests. So if churches make purpose statements and they make goals that are self-serving rather than Christ-serving, we've completely lost our purpose. And there are three points that show this. First, the missions of this chapter is the activity of Jesus Himself working through His people. Look at verse 1. And behold, I saw a lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with him 144,000. And this lamb is clearly calling the shots for the church, directing her activities, as is clear from verse 4, which says in the middle of that verse, these are the ones who follow the lamb wherever he may go. Notice that phrase, these are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever He may go. Do you follow the Lamb wherever He may go? And if not, why not? I believe it is a failure to follow Christ's call to disciple nations and cause those nations to obey everything in the Bible that has led modern missions to make zero difference in cultures around the world. In Africa, in Asia, wherever they have been, they have made zero difference in culture. That is one of the saddest testaments of the last 100 years. This is the difference between the missions of the 1800s, which had a comprehensive Reformed worldview, where they sought to bring everything in culture, all of the demonic aspects of culture being transformed and brought under the feet of Christ, and the dispensational missions of the 1900s, which has granted one tons of people for heaven, but it's had almost zero impact upon culture. We need the missions of the 1800s which sought to disciple nations to submit every square inch of their territory to Jesus. It elevated the treatment of women. It rid cultures of their idolatries. It abolished seti in India and other demonic cultural practices. It was not satisfied with merely winning more people to sit in pews to listen to sermons every Sunday. No, they were out there making a difference. And we're gonna be seeing that these verses show Jesus working supernaturally through the church and advancing his kingdom. For example, I've already mentioned verse six. He's sending angels with these missionaries. That's a supernatural work through the church. In verses 14 through 17, Jesus thrusts his sickle in and he harvests souls. So he himself is involved supernaturally in the Great Commission. And so Jesus promised to be with us even to the end of the age. And it's on the basis of that promise that you can take on the huge, impossible task of the Great Commission. I'm so glad that he doesn't say here that these 144,000 were commissioned all by themselves. No, they stand with Jesus. They follow Jesus. It's because of Jesus' presence with them that they can take this conquest. And interestingly, Acts 1, verse 1 credits everything that the apostles and the other missionaries did to Jesus when it says that the Gospels are the record of what Jesus began both to do and teach, whereas Acts records what Jesus continued to do through His church. Missions that is worth the name of missions is the supernatural work of Jesus through His body. And if Christ is not living His life through us, our missions will not be successful. And if we're ashamed of Him, if we're ashamed of His words of the Bible, He'll be ashamed of us. We must embrace all that Christ stands for and follow the Lamb wherever He may lead us. Second, missions is the heavenly kingdom invading earth. And commentators point out that when verse 1 speaks of Jesus standing on Mount Zion with His army, He's alluding to Hebrews 12. And Hebrews 12 is where Jesus is on His throne in Zion replacing every aspect of culture on earth with His blueprints from heaven. It really is. It's an invasion of earth by the kingdom of heaven. So Sunday by Sunday people on earth come to the heavenly Zion not only to worship but to receive His marching orders. to receive strength and then to go out. Hebrews 12 ends by saying that Jesus, quote, speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth, but now he has promised, saying, yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven. Now this yet once more indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, that's in the present tense, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom, this is an ongoing thing, receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire. So missions is not simply winning souls. True missions shakes the entire culture of countries and replaces those cultures with Christian culture. And it drives me crazy that modern missions contextualize the gospel so much that it leaves demonic aspects of culture untouched. In fact, one of the, I don't know, maybe I shouldn't get into this, but one of the teachers at Fuller, I'll go ahead and say it, one of the teachers at Fuller, he's contextualizing so much that he says, okay, well in Timothy it says that an elder needs to be the husband of one wife, but that was because Polygamy was not honored in that culture, but if you are a missionary to a culture where polygamy is honored, then you must mandate that it can't be an elder unless they have more than one wife. He completely turns the commands of Scripture upside down because all we're doing when we contextualize the gospel, which is the buzzword everywhere. You see it in every form denomination. It drives me crazy. You're just bringing the basics of how to get saved, how to get justified, and you ignore everything else in culture. Well, that's the most of what Christ is trying to transform in culture. It just drives me crazy. We've got to return to the missions of the 1800s. Thirdly, missions involves both the heavenly Zion and the earthly people who come to Zion. Chilton and other commentaries point out that when you interpret these verses in light of Hebrews 12, it's clear that both heaven and earth are keenly interested in the advancement of Christ's kingdom. Now I spent so much time in the introductory material, I'm just going to give very short shrift, but we'll be diving into verses 2 through 5 later. But let me at least briefly introduce you to a few ideas of why I consider them to be shock troops. Verse 1 shows that they stand with Christ. Now the word standing applies to both Christ and the 144,000 and any time that Christ stands He is ready for action. And so if they're standing with Him, they are ready for any action that Jesus calls them to. Are we at His disposal? That's the question. Are we ready to obey His orders no matter what? That is an attitude that is essential for shock troops. They cannot second guess whether the Bible's orders are legitimate or not. No, they follow. Jesus commands us in the Word, we follow. Secondly, they wear the name of Jesus and the Father on their foreheads. Now, in the previous chapter, The beast owned the people, and so His name was placed upon their foreheads and upon their right hands. But here, the Father says He owns them, and Jesus says He owns them. So nobody's going to pluck us out of the Father's hand. We are His precious possession. So do you see yourself as Christ's property to use you as He wishes? Total consecration to Christ is essential to missions. We must see ourselves as bond slaves of Christ. And they, on their part, were not ashamed to identify with Jesus or with God. They boldly and publicly declared themselves to be Christians. I mean, you could sort of think of it, they don't erase his name off their foreheads. Now, they couldn't do it if they tried because it was an invisible mark, right? But the point is that that mark, it shows what they gladly embrace. You cannot be successful in missions if you are the least bit ashamed of Christ and His Word. It just will not work. Is there anything connected with Christ and His Word that you are ashamed of? If so, I would just say repent and ask the Holy Spirit to give you an unreserved identification with everything Christ stands for. Next, their mission flows from a heart of worship. We see that worship in verses 2 through 3, and we'll look at those verses next time. But the worship of heaven gripped their hearts. It even has them singing their own song. Fifth, they have intimacy with Christ. They learn from Him. Verse 3 says, no one was able to learn the song except for the 144,000. I think that's a wonderful image of intimacy. Nobody else, but it's just between them and Christ. It's a secret. Psalm 25, 14 says, the secret of the Lord is with those who fear him, and he will show them his covenant. So it speaks of a closeness with God. Such closeness gives you an inner strength to be in a kamikaze evangelist. The next thing they had was a personal appreciation of what they were redeemed from. They knew that they had been headed toward hell, even though they were Jews. And they were so grateful for this redemption. To be redeemed means to be purchased out of the slave market. So they no longer identify. Verse four, you know, it says redeemed from among. Verse three, redeemed from the earth. Verse four, redeemed by Jesus from among men. So they're no longer identifying with what they had been redeemed from. They're identifying now with the kingdom of heaven, with Christ. So to know what you deserved, where you're headed, is another characteristic, I think, that enabled them to be such powerful shock troops and missions. Verse 4 says, these are the ones not defiled with women, for they are virgins. Now in the Old Covenant, holy soldiers had to abstain from sexual relations when they engaged in holy war. It was a consecration to the task. So commentators point out this at least symbolizes that they were single-eyed in following their general. Now most commentators don't think that they were literally virgins. I do. I don't understand why they would be troubled by that. I think it's quite clear they were not married, they were virgins. They sacrificed a very legitimate thing for the cause of Christ. Now, this is not a pattern that is mandated in Scripture. It's certainly not a call to celibate priesthood. In fact, we're going to be seeing in the future, maybe next time, I'm not sure, that they were still the remnant who came out of Old Covenant Judaism. They'd likely made this vow long before, and there's certain Old Covenant aspects to it. But the best I can figure is they were following Paul's advice during this present trouble, not getting married, because they knew that in their line of work, it was almost guaranteed that they would soon be martyred. The shock troops of a new offensive very often get mowed down. So in effect, they picked up their cross to follow Jesus. Verse four says, these are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever he may go. Where was Jesus going? We look at verses six through 16. He's going back into occupied Israel. That's one of the most dangerous, darkest places to go. But they follow Him wherever He goes. In chapter 19 we're going to be seeing He's going into the rest of the planet to convert the Gentiles. Given the description of these places, it was almost suicidal to go wherever the Lamb would go, but they were willing. What makes missionaries willing to be martyrs? It's being daily with the Lamb, having intimacy with Him, knowing where we came from, where we're going. It is the certainty that nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. When you have their character, you will have their boldness. Jack Vinson was a missionary to China in the years leading up to World War II, and he was captured by bandits. and eventually shot and beheaded. And a witness at that event later described how he had seen Vincent being threatened by a bandit with a revolver who said, I'm going to kill you. Aren't you afraid? And Vincent replied, no, I'm not afraid. If you kill me, I go right to God. And another missionary by the name of E.H. Hamilton heard the martyrdom. He too was leaving another bandit infested area and he wrote a poem that has been encouragement to many missionaries who have also faced martyrdom. It said, afraid of what? To feel the Spirit's glad release, to pass from pain to perfect peace, the strife and strain of life to cease, afraid of that? Afraid of what? Afraid to see the Savior's face, to hear his welcome, and to trace the glory gleam from wounds of grace, afraid of that? Afraid of what? A flash? A crash? A pierced heart? Brief darkness? Light? Oh, heaven's art? A wound of his? A counterpart? Afraid of that? Afraid of what? To enter into heaven's rest and yet to serve the master blessed from service good to service best. Afraid of that? Afraid of what? To do by death what life could not? Baptized with blood, a stony plot. Till souls shall blossom from the spot. Afraid of that? These are men that really have my admiration. I want to be more and more like them. I want to be single-eyed to pleasing the Master. I really want my life to count. And I want to face death with fearless conviction that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We just don't fear persecution. We do not fear what the enemy might do. Finally, verse 5 says that these shock troops had an inward character that matched their outward life. It says, No lie was found in their mouth, for they are blameless. Their testimony matched their life. With models of missions like this, like these men, it's no wonder that the church of the first three centuries converted country after country. And next week we'll dig little bit more, probably less time into verses two through six, but for today let's at least marvel at the beauty and the symmetry of God's plans for this world. And secondly, let's be challenged to be more zealous for the Great Commission. Now we don't have their precise calling, so We're not going to imitate them exactly, but we can for sure pick up our cross and follow the Lamb wherever He leads. Now later on we're going to have some questions at the tables that you guys can discuss that delve into other aspects that maybe I've not touched on. Feel free to pick whatever questions or topics or even things that aren't on the list to discuss. But try during that discussion period to dig a little bit deeper in terms of application of what we have been through. Father, we thank you for your Word, and I pray that you would help us to follow it, to live it out to your glory. In Jesus' name.