Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
They are a strange group of people who keep popping up before our consciousness. Some of us would like to forget them and stash them away in a theological attic, out of sight and mind. But then they get back on the stage again--these mysterious 144,000.
What makes us uncomfortable to even think about them is that "in their mouth was found no guile, for they are without fault before the throne of God" (Rev. 14:1-5). No church can hang up a banner, "The 144,000 "R" Us" like "Toys "R" Us." Instead, we realize how faulty we are by nature. And even when we get old, the Holy Spirit helps us remember, "There is none righteous, no, not one" (Rom. 3:10). Even to read aloud what the Bible says about these mysterious 144,000 is suspected as teaching the heresy of "perfectionism."
To go on letting ourselves be faulty, indulging in selfishness, being worldly, is as comfortable as wearing an old shoe. Rowing upstream is just too difficult, well, it's downright impossible, is the idea. "Allah" knows we can't be "without fault," so let's just trust His "compassion" and settle down to stay sinful in character. It's comforting to notice that's how everybody else is.
But here those people are back on stage--the fruition of God's goal for humanity. In spite of countless evil angels, they will "follow the Lamb wherever He goes" (Rev. 14:4). It means Christ as the crucified One has captured their hearts; they "glory in the cross of Christ" (Gal. 6:14). They discover a blessed "hunger and thirst for righteousness" that transcends their natural love for selfish worldly pleasure. These people see something in Jesus.
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: June 17, 2002.
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