The Four Angels and Four Winds
saw that awful wrath of the sixth seal, he was shown what he is about to describe. Four angels.—The earth number, but still angels from heaven in control of events under God. Holding the four winds.—"Winds" is a symbol of strife, war, revolutions, commotions. Dan. 7:2; Zech. 6:5. When the four winds blow at once, there will be universal strife and confusion, causing the worldwide whirlwind of Armageddon, covering the earth with its slain. Jer. 25:32, 33. The disturbances of the past—the conquering of some one or more powers—have been overruled of God for peace among the nations. So the earth was quieted by the conquering power of Persia, that God's people might build His temple in peace. Zech. 6:5, 8. So the earth was quieted when our Lord first came to earth. Even so God's mighty messengers, who are given special charge among the nations, control the strife of earth till God's work is done, and "the end is come upon the four corners of the land." Eze. 7:2. How marvelously has strife been stayed in these wonderful years, so pregnant of war and of rumors of war! War, dire, general, and universal, has been predicted for the last fifty years. Preparations for war unprecedented have been carried on during that time, increasing in geometrical progression with the years. Strenuous efforts have been put forth by mighty men for peace, vast sums have been given, government aid secured, international parliaments assembled; but government representatives have returned from peace congresses where they have made eloquent pleas and drawn glowing, roseate pictures of the world's future peace, to face far more extravagant measures by their home government for war. Nations are almost bankrupt under the mighty burden. The back of the people is bent near to breaking with the awful incubus, grim mutterings of sedition are common everywhere, and observing men are looking with apprehension to that time when, to paraphrase Tennyson's line, when "World-wide Demos will rise a demon and shriek, and slake the light with blood." It is true that Andrew Carnegie gave of his uncounted hoard just recently the great sum of ten million dollars for peace; but what is that compared to seven hundred million dollars for Dreadnoughts? Every nation is preparing for war. God said they would, despite the false and universal cry of peace. Nations would beat plowshares into swords, and pruning-hooks into spears; the weak nations would say, I am strong; and finally all, moved by the demons of war, would gather in the last great Armageddon strife for the conquest of the world. Joel 3:9-14; Rev. 16:14, 16. We see it all but the last; and the only reason why we have not long ago seen it, is that God is staying the winds of strife till His work is done. One soul is worth more than all the sinful kingdoms of earth, and God's closing work is to warn men and save souls, and in the light of His Word there will be no universal war or strife till His work is done. 2. From the sunrising.—Relating to direction as well as to power and glory. Ezekiel says, "And, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east." Eze. 43:2. Another speaks: "But unto you that fear My name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in its wings." Ever7the Gospel has gone westward, until in its closing aspect it will encircle the earth, even as the sun, and return to the place of its starting, but not in a declining day; God's closing work to every tribe and tongue and nation will be like the rising sun in glory and in power till the work closes. See Rev. 14:6, 7; 18:1. It is in power and character an ascending work. Above all the mists and fogs and miasmas of the false pagan philosophies which have originated in a mystical and darkened East will that Gospel shine. The false church will be "filled with customs from the East," and so will bear the false soothsaying message of peace (Isa. 2:6); but God's loyal children will accept the message of light which shines above all these, and preach to every individual heart the only message of peace, God's righteousness in His Gospel. Isa. 57:19-21; Rom. 1:16, 17. Upon the remainder of this lesson there are four great questions: Who is "the living God"? What is His "seal,"—that which distinguishes Him from other gods which men worship? Who are the sealed? Who is the sealer? a. The living God is the Creator of the heaven and the earth. "Jehovah is the true God; He is the living God, and an everlasting King. . . . The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, these shall perish from the earth, and from under the heavens. He [the living God, Jehovah] hath made the earth by His power, He hath established the world by His wisdom, and by His understanding hath He stretched out the heavens." Jer. 10:10-12. And so the true and living God in contra-distinction to all false gods is ever characterized as the Creator of the heavens and the earth. See Ps. 96:5; Acts 4:24; 14:15; 17:24-26; 1 Thess. 1:9, et al. Therefore it is not surprising that in the last days of unfaith and infidelity a mighty burden of God's great "everlasting Gospel" to all the world is, "Worship Him that made the heaven and the earth and sea and fountains of waters." Rev. 14:6, 7. God's power to create and re-create by His word is sinful, dying man's only hope. Regeneration is re-creation. As hopeless as the eons of soul transmigration is the evolution of the modern Higher Critics. There is hope for you and me, fellow sinner, in the one fact that God can and will create a new heart, a new disposition, which will delight in righteousness. b. What is the seal of the living God? It must be that which points out that characteristic so often declared—His creative power. A seal is that which is used to authenticate, stamp, make legal or authoritative. The original word is sphragis, and is defined to mean a seal, a signet-ring, a distinctive mark, a token, a proof, a guarantee. It is used in Rom. 4:11 as a synonym of "sign." Among rulers it is connected with law, and so points out the lawgiver and his authority. So Jezebel stamped the unholy decree of hers with Ahab's name and seal, and made it authoritative. 1 Kings 21:8. So Haman's wicked decree was in the name of the King and sealed with the King's seal. See Esther 3:12; also 8:8. The company that bear God's seal in Revelation 7 bear His name in Rev. 14:1. God's seal must have His name and show Him to be "the living God." It must be made so clear in connection with His law and government that all men may recognize the seal in that law. Let us examine the eternal law of God, the Decalogue, for His seal. We find His name in the first, second, third, and fifth commandments; He is "Jehovah thy God." It is not found in the sixth to the tenth. But the name alone does not tell us who He is. He might be a god of some of the nations. We must have more than this to meet Jeremiah's definition of "the living God." We do not need to go outside of His great constitution. Both name and authority are given in the fourth commandment. We quote: Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord [Jehovah] thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord [Jehovah] made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord [Jehovah] blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it. This meets every condition. What is the name?—Jehovah. What is pre-eminently characteristic of Him?—The Maker of all things. What is the extent of His authority?—The heaven and the earth. For this reason God gave in His law His Sabbath, that which forever should make "His wonderful works to be remembered" (Ps. 111:4), and which would forever be a sign between Him and His people, not alone that He is Jehovah their God (Eze. 20:20), but He declares, "Moreover also I gave them My Sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am Jehovah that sanctifieth them." Verse 12. There would never have been an idolater in the earth if men had remembered God in His Sabbath, if that distinctive sign of the true God had been written in heart and mind. Against that Sabbath the devil has gathered his strongest forces throughout the ages. He has so entrenched a rival in the professed Christian church that he has found himself able through the centuries to swing many of God's own people against God's mark of authority and power. He knows the importance of the mighty truth for which that Sabbath day stands—God's creative, regenerating, sanctifying power. Would God that His own people might appreciate it also. c. Who are the sealed?—Israel. But who are Israel? Not the nominal ones, the nation of the Jews. Baylee well says: "At the time this book [the Revelation] was written, Israel [according to the flesh] was no longer God's people, nor could there have been an elect remnant out of them to be thus sealed. . . . An Israel containing a Christian elect in distinction from the Christian church would be a simple impossibility. . . . We are therefore limited to one conclusion, that Israel here is a symbolical name for the Christian church."—"The Apocalypse," page 192. Dean Alford, in his comment on this, says of the sealed ones, "They are, primarily, those elect of God who shall be living upon the earth at the time here indicated, viz., that of the coming of the Lord." The origin and meaning of "Israel" is individual and spiritual, not national. God gave it to Jacob "the supplanter" when by faith he won the victory over his grasping character and left all with God. "Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for thou hast striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed." Gen. 32:28. Of the earthly tribes, Paul declares, "They are not all Israel, that are of Israel." Rom. 9:6. And he elsewhere tells us that all become Israel by being grafted in by faith. Rom. 11:17-20. "And so," that is, "by faith," "all Israel shall be saved," brought in through Christ Jesus into the covenants and the promises and the hope. Rom. 11:26; Eph. 2:12-20. Through Jesus Christ by faith every saved soul becomes one of a true Israel of God. But what of the tribes named? It is not of earthly tribes and records that God speaks. The records of all His people are on high. Every true Israelite is there recorded in the tribe to which he belongs. The gates to the glorious city, the twelve only entrances, are named after the twelve tribes of Israel. Rev. 21:12. Every overcomer in Christ will enter through some one of those gates, a member of the tribe of that gate. God knows them all. Men may lose count, as they have centuries ago; God never. These twelve names are taken as the names of the twelve divisions among His people, that shall enter the gates of Israel. And the 144,000 represents the last number which Christ will gather at His coming to complete the Israel of God for that earth made new. Whether, like other numberings in the Bible, it pertains only to men, the women and children being included tho not numbered, we may not know; it is not of major importance. Far more important questions are, Am I one of the Israel of God? Is His seal, designating me a true worshiper of "the living God," stamping me as His "servant," written upon my forehead? Am I one of those sighing and crying because of the sins of God's people, upon whom the heavenly messenger is placing God's mark, while the angels with the slaughter weapons wait? See Eze. 9:1-6. Is Christ mine? Has He washed away my sins? Is He giving me victory by faith? d. The Sealer.—Do not confound the seal of God with the Sealer. The seal is God's Sabbath, not as a mere day, but a living, mighty experience of relationship between us and the Creator; but that seal is placed upon us by the Holy Spirit. We can not seal ourselves. No church or creed or council or man can absolve us from sin or put upon us God's seal. That is the work of the mighty Spirit of God. Eph. 1:13; 4:30. In placing that seal upon us, there is written in our hearts and minds—our character—for which the forehead stands, the Father's name. We bear His character. Rev. 14:1. There is written upon us the name of Christ, for He cleansed us from sin, and His glorious name as sin's Conqueror is ours. Rev. 3:12. There is also written upon us the name of Israel's city, and the tribe to which we belong, and our own new name, stamped indelibly in character forever. We are "the servants of our God," and the glad keeping of His commandments is the expression of our love. 1 John 5:3. God is holding the winds till that work is done. For this generation it began, and it is going forward, reaching all the dark corners of the earth like the rising sun. Soon it will close. Are you a part of it? Are you one of Israel? "Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever: for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day He rested, and was refreshed." Ex. 31:16, 17. To him who receives God's rest there is resting and refreshment.