Chapter Forty/Crushing the Serpent's Head - Judged for a Thousand Years - Continue

 Were all these 144,000 royal judges physically "executed with an ax"? Likely, relatively few of them were in a literal sense. This expression, though, doubtless is intended to embrace all those around Christians who endure martyrdom in one way or another. (Matthew 10:22, 28) Certainly, Satan would liked to have executed all of them with the ax, but, in fact, not all of Jesus' anointed brothers die as martyrs. Many of them die of disease or old age. Such ones, however, also belong to the group that John now sees. The death of all of them is, in a sense, sacrificial. (Romans 6:3-5) Additionally, none of them were part of the world. Hence, all of them have been hated by the world and, in effect become dead in its eyes. (John 15:19; 1 Corinthians 4:13) None of them worshiped the wild beast or it image, and when they died, none of them carried the mark of the beast. All of them died as conquerors. - 1 JOHN 5:4; REVELATION 2:7; 3:12; 12:11. 

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