Revelation 14:5

And in their mouth was found no guile; for they are without fault before the throne of God.

After the picture of abomination in the preceding chapter we have here visions full of comfort and strength and consolation for all believers. The Lamb now again becomes the center of interest: And I saw, and, behold, the Lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with Him one hundred forty-four thousand having His name, the name of the Father, written upon their foreheads. In the midst of the last great woe the Lord has ways and means of keeping and saving His Church. Mount Zion is often used figuratively for the Church of Christ and for the place where it is established. The Lamb is our Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world. The number given here, one hundred and forty-four thousand, is the symbolical figure representing the total number of the elect. See chap. 7:4-8. These elect of God did not bear the mark of the beast upon their forehead, but the name of their Savior, Jesus Christ, and of the Father in heaven, by whose power and through whose will salvation was given them.

John now tells what he heard in that vision: And I heard a voice out of heaven as the voice of many waters and as the rumbling of great thunder; and the voice which I heard resembled that of harpists playing on their harps; and they sang a new song before the throne and before the four living beings and the elders; and no one can learn the song except the hundred and forty-four thousand that have been redeemed from the earth. See chap. 5:8. It was a wonderfully strange and beautiful music which John heard, now as the rushing of mighty waters, then again as the rumbling of loud thunder, then resembling the delicate playing of many harpists attuned in perfect harmony. The glory and power and beauty of the Lord were praised in this incomparable hymn, in this hymn which is sung only in the heavenly presence, before the throne of God, before the four cherubim, before the elders that represent the Church of God on earth; Only those that are among the elect of God are able to learn this wonderful hymn; for hypocrites and Christians in name only it is too difficult It is like the confession of Peter; flesh and blood cannot comprehend it, but only they to whom the Spirit of God has revealed it.

The faithful believers, the elect of God, are now described more fully: These are they that have not been defiled with women, for virgins they are; these have been redeemed from men as the first-fruits to God and to the Lamb, and in their mouth there is found no lie; for they are blameless. That is a characteristic of the elect of God in the midst of the abominations of this last period of the world: they take no part in the idolatry of the Pope wherewith so many people are now defiling themselves; they are pure in this respect. They have been redeemed from among men by the blood of Christ, which was indeed shed for them all, but which the great majority reject and therefore do not become partakers of its wonderful benefits. They are therefore the first-fruits of the spiritual harvest of the world, offered to God as a living sacrifice on the great Passover festival of heaven. They now belong to God, their heavenly Father, and to the Lamb, their Savior, whose cross they cheerfully bear after Him. They do not join in the hypocrisy which sings the praises of the Lamb and does the works of the dragon, but they are free from the lying and the falsehood of Anti-Christ. Altogether, they are pure, blameless, without stain, not on their own account, hut by virtue of the blood of Christ, which cleanses them from all sins.