Revelation 7
About RevelationWritten by AI
Revelation is the Bible's last book and its most vivid. It is a prophecy, a letter to seven churches, and an apocalypse, a word meaning unveiling: a kind of writing full of symbols, numbers, beasts, and heavenly scenes. The author is John, exiled on the island of Patmos. Tradition identifies him as the apostle John, though some think he was another early leader with that name. Most date it around AD 95, under the emperor Domitian, while some place it earlier, in the 60s.
The churches of Asia faced pressure to compromise with Rome's power, trade, and worship. Revelation pulls back the curtain to show who truly rules: God on the throne, and the Lamb who was slain and is alive.
Christians read its visions in several ways: as mainly about John's own time, as a picture of the whole church age, as chiefly about events still to come, or as a symbolic portrait of the spiritual battle in every age. Many combine these. Whatever the view, the ending is the same hope: “Behold, I make all things new.”
Before you read Revelation 7Written by AI
Before the seventh seal, a pause. An angel seals 144,000 servants of God from the tribes of Israel. Then John sees a great multitude no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people, and tongue, worshiping before the throne. Christians differ on whether these are two groups or two ways of seeing the same people. The chapter ends with God wiping away every tear.
144,000 Sealed
After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back its four winds so that no wind would blow on land or sea or on any tree. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, with the seal of the living God. And he called out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the land and the sea: “Do not harm the land or sea or trees until we have placed a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.”
And I heard the number of those who were sealed, 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel:
From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed,
from the tribe of Reuben 12,000,
from the tribe of Gad 12,000,
from the tribe of Asher 12,000,
from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000,
from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000,
from the tribe of Simeon 12,000,
from the tribe of Levi 12,000,
from the tribe of Issachar 12,000,
from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000,
from the tribe of Joseph 12,000,
and from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000.
Praise from the Great Multitude
After this I looked and saw a multitude too large to count, from every nation and tribe and people and tongue, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:
“Salvation to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb!”
And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. And they fell facedown before the throne and worshiped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”
Then one of the elders addressed me: “These in white robes,” he asked, “who are they, and where have they come from?”
“Sir,” I answered, “you know.”
So he replied, “These are the ones who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. For this reason,
they are before the throne of God
and serve Him day and night in His temple;
and the One seated on the throne
will spread His tabernacle over them.
‘Never again will they hunger,
and never will they thirst;
nor will the sun beat down upon them,
nor any scorching heat.’
For the Lamb in the center of the throne
will be their shepherd.
‘He will lead them to springs of living water,’
and ‘God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’”