Revelation 7:5 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Revelation 7:5

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There is presented to us a list of the tribes of Israel, by the apostle John, under inspiration. He was a Jew. Every Jew knew the tribes of Israel. They could all name the tribes of Israel, beginning with Reuben, completely accurately. This list is all wrong. It’s not correct. How do you explain that? But of course it’s under inspiration: it’s deliberately wrong. It doesn’t start with Rueben; it starts with Judah. it leaves some tribes out altogether, as though they didn’t have any saved people. And it makes up the number by bringing in a half tribe and shouldn’t have been named as a tribe, and there are all kinds of deviations from the norm in the numbering and the order of the tribes? According to his human understanding the veteran John knew that perfectly well. So why does he list these names as tribes? Because it is symbolism. The tribes of Israel stand for the whole church: truly saved people in the Old Testament – not all Jews – and saved Jews and Gentiles in the New Testament. Israel has now become a term for all the true people of God. So the describing of the tribes in the symbol is deliberately different from the historic listing of the tribes. This is about the people of God, and all of them are known to God, and all will be brought safely home.

Application

This is the wonderful nature of conversion. Christ gives us eternal life. It was proclaimed by him on earth: ‘I give unto them eternal life.’ When you are saved, you are given eternal life. The security of a believer is all there. How can Christ who is infallible give you something that isn’t true, that will fail, because you will not survive, and you will not make it to the end of the journey, and you will fall away, and you will be lost? He cannot. He can only give you something which is true. ‘I give unto them eternal life.’ That is what you received and you are secure. The debt to God that we have his immense: he has saved us from sin, given us life, and saved us forever. The Hebrews 6 person who fell away: he wasn’t saved in the first place. He only just tasted the truth. He only just felt something of its wonder, and then he chose the world instead. He was never really saved, and so he fell away. If you’ve got the seal of the Spirit and your thinking and your heart has been changed, you are saved for ever.

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Revelation 7:5 Commentary and Bible Study