Every Race, Tribe, Nation, and Language
Revelation 7:9-17; Galatians 3:28[1]
Robert Frost is one of my favorite poets. Many of us may
know if him by his poem “The Road Not Taken.” One of his poems called “Mending
Wall” questions the validity of the boundaries in this world. In the poem,
Frost puts it this way: “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know what I was
walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence. Something
there is that doesn’t love a wall, that wants it down.”[2] Now, what we have to understand is that in Frost’s New England stone “walls”
were the “fences” between properties. The poem is about the annual ritual that
he and his neighbor performed—walking the wall to replace stones that have
fallen off.
In the poem, the “neighbor” insists on holding firmly to
the notion handed down to him that “Good fences make good neighbors.” But Frost
saw the very forces of nature working against the continued existence of stone fences.
Whether it was the ground swelling and contracting, toppling the stones, or it
was the action of ice freezing and breaking up the stones, Frost saw the very
elements themselves as conspiring to bring down the walls and fences that
conventional wisdom insists “make good neighbors.” From Frost’s perspective, God
has built into nature itself the intention to continually uproot and overturn
walls and fences. But, of course, Frost’s poem was about more than just
physical walls. He was talking about all the boundaries and divisions we feel
compelled to uphold.
That’s one the points in the vision of the great multitude
in Revelation. In that vast throng of people worshipping the one on the throne
and the Lamb, all the boundaries and lines and divisions that separate people
from one another are erased. Of course, that vision is contrary to the way of
the world. In fact, it was contrary to the way of the world from the time it
was written down. The way of the world says that only members are allowed. The way
of the world says you must wear shoes and a shirt to receive service. The way
of the world insists that differences in color and culture constitute absolute
boundaries that must be upheld at all cost. This world wants clear boundaries
and fences—and laws that reinforce them!
In the Kingdom of God, however, the standard operating
procedure is “neither Jew nor Greek, neither male nor female, neither slave nor
free” (Gal 3:28). To expand on that statement today, we would have to say that
the way of the Kingdom of God is neither white nor black nor brown nor yellow
nor red; neither rich nor poor, neither employed nor unemployed, neither middle
class nor unhoused; neither native born citizen, nor refugee, nor immigrant,
“legal” or otherwise. All are included in God’s vision of new life for the
human family. Like Frost’s notion of nature itself conspiring to bring down the
walls in our world, God’s Kingdom is designed so that nothing will be left that
can possibly divide us!
The vision of the great multitude in Revelation is a
startling one. I think the majority of us in mainline protestant churches may have
read this passage as if the crowd were composed only of white, anglo-saxon,
protestant Christian, middle- to upper-class voting citizens of the USA! In
other words, people who look just like us. But the seer of Revelation says that
this multitude comes from “every race, tribe, nation,
and language” (Rev. 7:9 CEV). In the First-Century world, that was a
description of just about every distinction that could possibly divide the
human family. It’s an understatement to say that in our day we’ve added to that
list! But the point of the vision is that the “great multitude” cuts across all
the ways in which we like to divide humanity to “protect” ourselves from “others”
who are different from us.
After almost fifty years of studying the Bible, it’s my considered opinion that this vision of the kingdom of God including all people is the focus of the biblical message. Many have tried to frame the “great multitude” in Revelation as a vast throng of Christians from every people group. But I would insist that way of thinking is foreign to the Bible. From start to finish, the Bible tells us about God’s purpose to restore the whole human family, no exceptions. At the start of that great work, Abraham hears the promise that “in you all the families of the earth will be blessed” (Gen. 12:3).[3] And the end of God’s project, depicted by the vision of the vast and diverse crowd around the throne in the book of Revelation, gives us an actual image of what that could look like: the whole human family gathered around the throne as “servants of God” (Rev. 7:3)![4]
This vision lies at the heart of the call in the book of
Revelation to follow the way of the Lamb who was slain. But Revelation also
makes it clear that all who follow that way expose themselves to danger. It’s
dangerous to follow a man who was executed for turning the world upside down.
It’s dangerous to hold faithfully to the testimony of the Lamb who was slain. It's
dangerous to follow the one who wins the victory not by force but by giving
himself over to death. And it’s dangerous to choose to follow the way that
seeks to erase all the “differences” we use to divide the human family. That’s
what the “Lamb who was slain” calls us to do.
We live in a time when it feels like the “powers that be” are obsessed with reinforcing the way of the world and all its divisions. When we embrace people from every race, tribe, nation, and language—as well as all the other “groups” into which we divide the human family, we must expect opposition, hostility, and perhaps even violence. But I would say that it makes a difference every time one of us chooses to follow the radically inclusive way of the Lamb. I would say every time one of us chooses to follow this way, we are continuing the process of “turning the world upside down” that Jesus began. And we can take comfort from the assurance that the Lamb who was slain will one day be revealed as the one who has won the victory! On that day, the biblical vision of God’s Kingdom will be fulfilled, where all the walls and fences and boundaries and divisions are torn down. In the meantime, the assurance is that when we choose to cross a boundary to show God’s love to any who are excluded as “different,” we are making a contribution to that final victory.[5]
[1] © 2025 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 5/11/2025 for
Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
[2] Robert Frost, “Mending Wall,” from North
of
[3] Cf. Richard Bauckham, “The List of the Tribes in Revelation 7, Again,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament
42 (1991):99-115; cf. 103, where he emphasizes the vision of the innumerable
multitude as a fulfillment of the promise to Abraham and his descendants.
[4] Cf. Balmer H. Kelly, “Revelation 7:9-17,” Interpretation 40
(July, 1986): 294, where he says this passage presents “an unalloyed ‘gospel,’
a seeing and hearing of the final justification of Christian hope.”
[5] Cf. Jürgen Moltmann, The Church in the
Power of the Spirit, 293: since the Christian community is “the sign, the
instrument, and the breaking-in” of Christ’s reign and therefore of the new
creation, it “is therefore not an exclusive community of the saved, but the
initial and inclusive materialization of the world freed by the risen Christ.”