One of the elders asked about those clothed in the white robes: who are they and where do they come from? The answer given is that they are people who have become clean, brilliantly white, through or by (that is a better translation of the Greek word than in) the blood of the Lamb. They have allowed themselves to be washed white; they are sanctified, and are justified through the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ and through the Spirit of our God.1 Their clothes are not soiled;2 nothing contaminates their body and spirit.3 They themselves have actively made sure of that. They have washed their clothes. They have escaped the corruption of the world,4 and they are not polluted through sexual uncleanness5 or through words spoken by a tongue set on fire by hell.6 They have remained pure by daily cleansing and, washing away their sins.7 They have sought the cleansing power of the blood of the Lamb continually, and the strength to offer resistance8 while the powers of darkness appear to be all-powerful, while temptations fan the flames of their own evil desires.9 These are the people who have come out of the tribulation, the great, as it says literally in the Greek text, the great tribulation spoken of in Daniel 12:1, Matthew 24:21–22 and Mark 13:19. This is the time during which the beast, the antichrist, the lawless one, reigns, when the Church, rather Christianity, will have become a prostitute.
The beast’s hot breath, the ‘spirit of lawlessness’, has been at work throughout all the centuries. During this time, many so-called believers have made the Church into a pseudo-church which has become drunk with the blood of the saints, but things will finally come to a climax in the end, at the final great struggle and battle. John will be allowed to talk about this in detail in Revelation 12–18.
Many believe that the meeting of all the believers with Christ will take place before or during the great tribulation; for others, the words ‘out of’ means that the great tribulation is past and that they have therefore gone through it. Others, again, believe that it is not the Church of Christ that comes out of the great tribulation, but believers converted after the ‘rapture’ of the church before the ‘great tribulation’. They have come to faith during the judgments of the great tribulation, they say. Jesus says in John 17:15 “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.” So you may be in it, but protected by Jesus from the evils of the devil and the powers of darkness. However you look at it, what is decisive for salvation and redemption and victory is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work of atonement as the Lamb of God, slain for the sins of the world. We can accept that sacrifice personally and we can persevere in faith through sanctification and trust until victory comes. Let’s put our hope in Jesus, rather than in ‘a rapture’.
• The centre of the ‘great tribulation’ lies apparently in Israel.
• The ‘abomination that causes desolation’ is in the rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem, some say,10 although the passage in Matthew 24:15 does not necessarily mean that there will be a rebuilt Temple at that time. ‘The holy place’ with ‘an abomination that causes desolation’ in Matthew 24:15 can also mean that such an abomination will stand on the place, on the mountain upon which the Temple in the heart of Jerusalem was built. So upon Mount Zion, Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount.
• What could that mean: an abomination upon the Temple Mount, Mount Zion which is also Mount Moriah? Could this ‘abomination’ refer to the two mosques that are standing there already for centuries? Instead of blessings for Israel and the whole world coming from that place, because the Lord God decided to let His Holy Name dwell again on that place, almost daily a stream of hatred is coming forth from it. Hatred against in particular Jews and Christians.
• The Lord Jesus hopes that the Jews’ flight will not be on a Sabbath.11 This will be not just the ‘time of trouble for Jacob (Israel)’12 but also for the Christian believers from the nations who do not worship the beast’s image. Even though the prophetic ‘slide pictures’ of the details of the great tribulation have still to be given in the following chapters, the result is already certain: the great multitude is already seen triumphant with God.
• The Second World War and the Holocaust demonstrated how countless people can be ‘slaughtered’ in a short time. Were they a gruesome foretaste of what is to come?
Bible References:
1.1 Corinthians 6:11 2.Revelation 3:4 3.2 Corinthians 7:1 4.2 Peter 2:20 5.Jude 8 6.James 3:6 7.1 John 3:3 8.Ephesians 6:13; Hebrews 12:4; James 4:7 9.James 1:13–15 10.Matthew 24:15; Daniel 9:27, 11:31, 12:11 11.Matthew 24:20 12.Jeremiah 30:7
