The question still lingers, who are the 144,000 – all those people from every tribe, tongue, and nation? They are those who are even now choosing to be coming out of the great tribulation. This is not an image pointing us to something in the future, but to those who are now overcoming and now believing.
Even now, people are continually choosing to NOT be marked by the Beast with the number of his name (666), choosing that Jesus is their only source of righteousness and purity, believing that without Him they can do nothing. Thus, they are guaranteed to NOT participate in the great tribulation. They will participate in the first resurrection, the rapture of the church.
Accordingly, the bondservants of Jesus Christ are now before the throne of God and they now serve, or literally “minister” to Him day and night in the Holy Place or the inner sanctuary of His temple, the “naos”—the place that only priests can enter. And in the future, He will dwell with them, and they will neither hunger nor thirst, but He will throughout their lives comfort them from the heat of affliction and shepherd them to waters of life. And in the future, He will wipe away ever tear.
