Lesson Eleven • Witnesses

Devotion 3: God’s People Will Be Preserved

Debbie Gabbara

“And I heard the number of the sealed, 144,000, sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel.” Revelation 7:4

Many religions have many different answers to the question, who are the 144,000 that are referred to in Revelation chapter 7? Many questions surround this passage of Scripture:

  • Who are the people that make up these 144,000?
  • Is the number literal?
  • What is their purpose?
  • What is the seal?
  • Are they Jews who have believed in Jesus?

Different religions have different answers. After reading many commentaries, we are going to look at it just as the Bible says. In Revelation 7:4-6, the 12 tribes of Israel are chosen and sealed by God. Revelation chapter 14 calls them, “Redeemed and blameless, and these who follow the Lamb wherever He goes.”

Beginning in the Old Testament and through the Bible, we see that God preserves His people. In Genesis, God first chose Abraham and promised that He would make Abraham a great nation. God later repeats His promise to Isaac when he is told that his descendants will be more numerous than the stars. The nation of Israel gets its name from Isaac’s son Jacob, whose name God changed to Israel. Genesis 35:10-11 records, “And God said to him, ‘Your name is Jacob; no longer shall your name be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.’ So he called his name Israel. And God said to him, ‘I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall come from your own body.’”

 

God’s people are chosen and treasured. Deuteronomy 14:2 says, “For you are a people holy to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.”

 

Just like Adam and Eve, we all think that we can find more than God has given us and sin causes us to wander away. God has always been faithful to His people even though time and time again they chose the sin of the world and turned away from the ways of God. Time and time again we see that God rescues them.

The Lord sent prophets to warn and preserve His people. Jeremiah 1:4 says, “Now the word of the LORD came to me, saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.’”

Romans gives us a picture of the Israelites, God’s chosen people, that would one day include the birth of Jesus. Romans 9:5 (NLT) says, “Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are their ancestors, and Christ himself was an Israelite as far as human nature is concerned.”

 

Romans 9:24-26 tells us that we are all chosen by God, Jews and Gentiles. God loves us all and chose us all to be children of the living God. One day, Jesus will return and call His children home. They will come from the four corners of the Earth and wander no more.

Ephesians 1:13 states, “In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.” It is beautiful that God has a plan for all His children.