093. Chapter VIII (Revelation 14)
CHAPTER VIII The exposition of the 14th chapter, wherein the state of the true church under Antichrist is described. As in the 13th chapter you have the false antichristian church, whereof the Pope is the head, so in this 14th chapter begins the description of the true church during the time of Antichrist, whereof the Lamb is the head: which church is made up of that ‘seed of the woman’ mentioned Revelation 12:17; whom, during her lying hid in the wilderness, Satan through Antichrist’s power did persecute. Now the several conditions of the church, during those times of Antichrist unto this day, may be reduced to three heads:—
1. The state of true believers in those darker times of Popery, when they were mingled with Papists, as making no open separation from them, and yet preserving themselves pure from much of their idolatrous worship and opinions; and this during the space of seven hundred years from the Pope’s rising.
2. The state of the church when first a separation began to be made from the church of Rome, and the gospel to be preached, from the year 1100.
3. The state of the church under the Reformation since the times of Luther and Calvin, for these last hundred years.
Into these three several states the church of God doth eminently fall divided, to the view of any that are skilled in ecclesiastic stories. And these three states are lively deciphered in this chapter.
1. The state of that confused company under Antichrist’s first times, Revelation 14:1-6.
2. The church’s first separation from the company of Antichrist, in three several degrees of it, Revelation 14:6-14.
3. The state of the Reformation since Calvin’s time, Revelation 14:14 to the end.
First, The state of believers mingled among Antichrist’s company, and not setting up churches distinct from those under him, though opposing the grossness of his idolatry, and keeping themselves pure from it. And these are set forth in characters suitable to that condition. They are a scattered company of a hundred and forty-four thousand, joining themselves to the Lamb Christ, having his Father’s name written in their foreheads,—that is, professing the true God, in the sincere obedience and worship of him,—whilst the opposite company of Antichrist went ‘wondering after the beast,’ even a world of them, as Revelation 13:3, and received his mark, Revelation 13:17. These are set forth by the same number of a hundred and forty-four thousand that the Christians in the east, under the Mohammedan bondage and darkness, are, who were the fifth and sixth trumpets, their state and condition being much alike in this, as they are a company of persons singly to be numbered and scattered up and down, here and there, as they were, in the midst of the corruptions of those eastern churches, under the darkness and oppression of Mohammedanism. So in like manner, these are a company of true believers scattered up and down under the growing superstitions and increasing darkness of Popish antichristianism; which, until the year of Christ 1100, did increase more and more upon the world. They stand upon Mount Sion, which was called the city of David; as not yet having a temple, or instituted churches distinct from Antichrist, erected and built, as in David’s time Mount Sion had not. And though they sung a ‘new song,’—the truth of the gospel which themselves believed,—yet so confusedly and indistinctly, as none could learn it, or understand that they differed from them. It was a new song, differing from what the Papists taught about Christ; yet they did not propagate it to many; there were few or none, it is said, that could learn it. And they are said to sing it secretly, before this representative chorus of the four beasts and the four-and-twenty elders,—as they are considered as a standing company, that do view all the visions of this book,—but themselves were not cast into such an order of worship, they not having churches or officers to begin the song, as in other times you may observe that it is said, the four beasts began, and the four-and twenty elders sung that song. So that they had no distinct churches and assemblies, nor officers of their own who sung this song; their voices being sometimes as the voice of many waters confusedly murmuring against the superstitions daily arising in those times, and thundering aloud. First, against setting up of images, anno 707, both in France and Germany; and then, against transubstantiation: sometimes sweetly harping melodious strains of true devotion, which believers, and some writers of those times, as we in their writings find, were full of. Those kept themselves virgins from the gross idolatries of the whore, not defiling themselves with the rest of those women; by which are meant the daughters of the whore,—that is, those cities and kingdoms in which they lived,—which (as the daughters receiving themselves the fornications of Rome, the mother city) allured these also unto spiritual fornication with them. Thus during those times of gross idolatry, we read of those who professed their detestation of images, and that idol of transubstantiation. The second state of the church is, that of the separation which believers made from antichristian churches, having a new and a further light broke forth among them; which we have described unto us by three degrees, rising higher and higher, presented under three several angels, from the 6th verse, and so on, according to the usual course of this book: the first of which flies in the midst of heaven, being to publish his message unto many nations, having the gospel to preach; that is, Jesus Christ, and justification by him, and the true worship of him: which in those times was counted a new gospel; therefore in opposition to that made calumny, the Holy Ghost here calls it the everlasting gospel. And this began to be done about the year 1100. But because I mean to begin the Second Part of this my Exposition of this book with the story of the church’s first separation from Popery, which here begins at the 6th verse of this chapter; therefore I reserve the particular exposition thereof unto that Second Part in its due place, and break off this First Part here, although in the middle of a chapter, yet at a right joint or period.