Bible Questions and Answers

Revelation 14:1 And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father’s name written in their foreheads.

The first point I will make is that Revelation doesn’t say that the Mount Sion is in Heaven.

The Heaven that John sees in Revelation 12:1 is not the literal heaven but a symbolic one.

Revelation 12:1 And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: 2  And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.

The woman, clothed with the sun, giving birth in heaven is not to be understood literally. Nor can the dragon, the stars cast to the earth, the war in heaven etc. be understood as literal happenings. The heaven represents the political heavens of the Roman Empire, the ‘war’ represents the struggle of the idolatrous government with Christianity, It ended when the Empire adopted Christianity as its official religion and Idolatry was suppressed. The clue to the reality represented in symbol appears in Revelation 12:11.

Revelation 12:11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.

The ‘dragon’ was removed from the political heaven by the preaching and martyrdom of believers upon earth. It took some 300 years.

When we come to Revelation 13:1 John is on a sea shore.

Revelation 13:1 And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.

Again the sea, the beast, the horns etc are not to be understood literally. The sea represents the nations. The beast is another manifestation of the beast in Daniel 7:7.

Daniel 7:7 After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns.

The beast in its sixth head phase represents the Roman Empire in John’s day.

Revelation 17:10 And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.

When we come to the Lamb standing ‘on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father’s name written in their foreheads’ we are not to suppose that there was literally a lamb or 144,000 people standing upon a literal mount Sion.
We are not told that the mount Sion is in heaven and if we were it wouldn’t be the literal heaven.
What John is seeing in symbol is the triumph of Jesus and his saints on the earth. The lamb represents Christ, the 144,000 represents the whole of the saints that are raised and glorified at Christ’s return. Mount Sion represents the ‘mountain of the LORD’S house’. It is from Jerusalem in the land of Israel that the earth is to be ruled. Christ will sit upon the throne of his father David.

Isaiah 2:1 The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. 2 And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. 3 And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. 4 And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

Luke 1:31 And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. 32 He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: 33 And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.

The Jehovah’s witnesses have no understanding of revelation, nor do they accept the restoration of the nation of Israel. They take the 144,000 as a literal number and apply it to an invisible reign of an elite body of JWs with Christ in heaven in an attempt to rescue their failed prophecy of the date of Christ’s return. Christ tells us plainly that even he didn’t know the date of his return. If it was possible to work it out from scripture as the JW’s claim then Christ himself would have been able to work it out. JW understanding of scripture is seriously flawed and should not be given credence.

Revelation 11:15 And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.

If we suppose that here the voices in heaven are to be understood to be literal voices in heaven it does not follow that Christ is reigning from heaven. The rejoicing in heaven is just as valid if he is reigning upon the earth.

It is clear from numerous scriptures that the reign of Christ is upon the earth.

May God bless you,

Glenn