Revelation 14

Notes

Ver. 1. Zion may either denote heaven or the true church on earth. The saints being marked with God's name in their foreheads imports their being sealed and set apart as his property and for his service, and their making an open and honourable profession of him and his gospel, attended with an answerable holiness of life. 4, 5. They were virgins; i.e. they had not defiled themselves with the whorish idolatries and other abominations of the tempting antichristians; but, as wholly redeemed from sins and errors, sanctified by and consecrated to God, and as a pledge of far greater multitudes afterward, had faithfully and uprightly followed and adhered to Jesus Christ and his cause. 6-13. The witnesses of Christ, especially at the Reformation, plainly and powerfully preached the gospel, and warned men of the approaching ruin of the Papacy, and of the damnable nature of cleaving to it in opposition to the light of the gospel, which then shone forth; and taught that union to Christ by faith, and fellowship with him, only and effectually secured a happiness, an immediate happiness, after death; and that believers' good works did not merit heaven, but in it received a gracious reward. 14-20. These verses relate to future events, and import, that whenever the antichristians shall have filled up the measure of their iniquities, Christ and his instruments shall, in answer to the prayers of his ministers and people, cut them off in the most terrible manner, perhaps deluging the papal territories in Italy, of 200 miles length, with torrents of their blood.

Ver. 3. No man could learn that song. That is, so as to sing it; for singing depends not so much upon voice as upon expression; and expression depends upon feeling; and the feeling of filial love cannot be learned by any rote of words; therefore, as none but children can feel the sentiment, none but children can learn the song. C.

Ver. 6. Of this emblematic angel, the Reformation, the Bible, and Protestant missionary societies are, no doubt, shadows and precursors, but cannot be the end of the vision; for this angel introduces the judgment, ver. 7, not the day of the final judgment of quick and dead, but, as appears from ver. 8, 9, the judgment of Babylon and the beast. C.

Ver. 12. This notice is parallel to that of ch. 13. 10, from which comparison it is obvious that, in the former case, the 'patience of the saints' was tried while witnessing the prosperity, enduring the persecution, and waiting for the downfall of Rome imperial, ch. 13. 1-8; so here their 'patience and faith' (faithfulness unto death) are tested in the labour of propagating 'the everlasting gospel,' ver. 6, resisting the allurements and terrors, and waiting for the fall of Rome papal, ver. 8-11. C.

Ver. 13. Blessed . . . from henceforth. Rather, 'Blessed even now' (even before the glory of 'the new heavens') 'are the dead who die in the Lord.' Robinson.

Ver. 14. A golden crown—as evidence that he is about to assert his kingly power and authority over the nations by which it has hitherto been, at least, practically denied. C.

Ver. 16. Though there is no mention of judgment by Christ as an harvestman, yet, as both harvest and vintage are prophetical emblems of judgment, Joel 3. 13, the reaping cannot be otherwise interpreted here.—Note, Does not this silence intimate that this first judgment, most probably, by mere prophetic announcement, as by 'the sword of his mouth,' will pass with little observation, like his tears shed over Jerusalem, and be treated with neglect and contempt till physical judgments succeed? The allusion of this emblem seems to be to the messenger of the Sanhedrim coming out of the temple to proclaim the cutting down of the 'first-fruits' of the harvest—before which proclamation it was unlawful for any one to begin reaping. C.

Reflections.—The cause of Jesus Christ and his faithful followers will triumph at last. And glorious is the appearance of his saints when they answer their character in qualities and works, and have Christ among them owning and honouring them. Happy they when marked with the Father's Spirit and image—purified from idolatry and superstition, weaned from the world, and made sincere and upright in their profession of the pure doctrines of the gospel, and steady in their imitation of and obedience to Christ. Their consciences are now freed from guilt and condemnation, through faith in his righteousness; and when patience hath had her perfect work, and their prescribed course of holiness is finished, death shall only usher them into the heavenly mansions, to receive their everlasting but gracious rewards. What an inestimable mercy was the pure preaching of the gospel at the beginning, after so long and heavy a night of pagan darkness! and what a humbling stroke to the wicked interest, and sure prelude of its downfall! For certain, dreadful, but righteous and gradual, punishment shall overtake the obstinate abettors of it in this world, much more in hell.