The 200 Million

Summary

In Revelation chapter 9 we read about an army of 200 million horsemen. We will discover that it identifies with the believers. At this point in time, it appears that the 200 million horesemen represent all of those saved throughout time. However, as God reveals additional truth we may learn otherwise. The 200 million appears to be a literal number, but perhaps we will later discover that we are to understand this number spiritually such as is the case with the 144,000.

We will examine Revelation 9:14-18 verse by verse...

Verse 14: Loosed from Euphrates
"Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates."

In the Bible, the Euphrates river is used in connection with the Promised Land:
"In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates" (Genesis 15:18)
"Every place whereon the soles of your feet shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even unto the uttermost sea shall your coast be." (Deuteronomy 11:24)
"From the wilderness and this Lebanon even unto the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and unto the great sea toward the going down of the sun, shall be your coast." (Joshua 1:24)
The Promised Land was a representation of the Kingdom of God so the Euphrates river spiritually identifies with God's Kingdom.

The four angels being bound and then loosed is language to indicate that this event is not to take place until a predetermined point in time according to God's plan. Recall that Revelation 20:7 indicates that Satan would be loosed when the "thousand-year" reign came to an end:
"And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison"
We learned in our Study on The 1000-Year Reign that the thousand years is a figurative length of time referring to the Early Rain which began in 33 AD and ended at the beginning of the Great Tribulation. Satan was bound during the Early Rain and it was God's plan that he would be loosed again to forward His judgment process when that predetermined time had arrived. Likewise, the four angels mentioned in Revelation 9:14 will not be loosed until the predetermined point in time arrives in God's judgment process.

Verse 15: Third Part of Men Killed
"And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men."

We learned in our Study on The Number 666 that the human race is spiritually broken into the following three parts:
1/3 = the true believers
1/3 = those who look like they are believers but aren't saved (the unsaved in the churches)
1/3 = the unsaved out in the secular world

These are spiritual numbers and therefore do not imply that literally one-third of the human race is saved. However, according to page 711 of the 2008 World Almanac, 2.2 billion people in the world call themselves Christians, which is almost exactly one-third of the 6.7 billion world population.

We know from other studies that the end-times judgment is largely focused on the churches and based on the context of Revelation chapter 9 we can be certain that the third part being referenced are the churches.

Verse 16: 200 Million Horsemen
"And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them."

"Two hundred thousand thousand" is another way of saying 200 million. We already know the number 2 identifies with the believers (see Number Study on 2) so here we have a clue that the 200 million horsemen represent the believers.

Verses 17-18: Horsemen of Judgment
"And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths."

We read that these horsemen are wearing breastplates of jacinth. We only find the word "jacinth" in one other verse in the Bible and it's in a passage which is describing the beauty of the eternal Jerusalem:
"And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony; the fourth, an emerald; The fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolyte; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst." (Revelation 21:19-20)
We know that precious stones identify with the Kingdom of God:
"But in his estate shall he honour the God of forces: and a god whom his fathers knew not shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things." (Daniel 11:38)
Specifically, we find that they identify with the true believers:
"Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble" (1 Corinthians 3:12)
(The gold, silver, and precious stones represent the true believers in the churches and the wood, hay, and stubble represent the unsaved in the churches - see Study on The Wheat And Tares)
The breastplates of jacinth are another clue that these horsemen represent the true believers.

We also read here that the horsemen are wearing breastplates of fire and brimstone, which is language to indicate that judgment is in view. In addition to the breastplates, we read that fire and brimstone went out of their mouths to kill the third part of men. This is similar to what we read about the two witnesses of Revelation chapter 11, which also represent the true believers (see Study on The Two Witnesses):
"And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed." (Revelation 11:5)

The believers proclaim the Word of God and it is God's Word that judges mankind:
“For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law” (Romans 2:12)
“So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.” (James 2:12)
“He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.” (John 12:48)

We read in Revelation chapter 19 that Christ comes with a sword going out of His mouth to smite the nations:
"And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God." (Revelation 19:15)
The sword is the Word of God:
"And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" (Ephesians 6:17)
Once again, it is a reference to the Word of God judging mankind.

The fire and brimstone coming out of the mouths of the horsemen is language indicating that the believers are judging the world. We don't fully understand what God means when He says that the believers will assist in the judging process but God does indeed tell us that this is so:
"Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters?" (1 Corinthians 6:2)

Numbering the Believers

The idea of God giving us the number of believers is not foreign to the Bible. For example, we know there were exactly eight believers in the world at the time of the flood:
"Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water." (1 Peter 3:20)

We know that 120,000 people were spared from God's wrath in Ninevah:
"And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?" (Jonah 4:11)

We know that there 7,000 believers at one point in Israel:
"Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him." (1 Kings 19:18)
"But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal." (Romans 11:4)

Percentage of the Population Saved

As mentioned above, we know that there were only 8 true believers in the world when the flood came in Noah's day. We also know that the world population at the time of the flood in 4990 BC was likely between 900,000 and 2 million (see Study on Population Estimates). This means that 6,000 years into the world's existence nearly its entire population was not saved.

As also mentioned above, we know that there were only 7,000 true believers in all of Israel at a certain point in time. We know that about 1.5 million Israelites left Egypt in the exodus (see Study on Population Estimates) so the population of Israel was probably around 2 million at the time when only 7,000 were true believers. This means that only about one-third of 1% of those who were identified as God's people were actually saved. Secular records indicate that the world population at that time was about 40 million and there is no Biblical evidence of there being any significant number of believers outside of Israel in those days. Therefore, we can safely estimate that in the days of national Israel (1407 BC - 587 BC), only about 1/50th of 1% of the world's population was actually saved.

If we want to be very conservative in our estimates, we can simply say that throughout the first 11,000 years of this world's existence far less than 1% of the world's population was truly saved.

According to the 2008 edition of the World Almanac, about one-third of the world's population today identifies itself with Christianity. In other words, since there are about 6.8 billion people alive today, a little over 2 billion people today are externally God's people. This does not mean they are all actually saved, but like the Israelites in the days of national Israel they are the earthly representation of God's people. If Revelation chapter 9 is teaching us that 200 million people will be saved throughout time, then the Biblical evidence suggests that a very small percentage of that 200 million were saved during the first 11,000 years of this world's existence before the cross. The Bible speaks of those that were saved during the Early Rain from 33 AD to the beginning of the Great Tribulation as being figuratively 144,000 and those saved during the Great Tribulation as being "a great multitude which no man can number" (see Study on The 144,000). This language suggests that a greater number of individuals will become saved during the Great Tribulation than during the entire Early Rain period. In other words, a relatively large percentage of the 200 million believers will actually be alive and present on Earth when the Rapture occurs.

The bottom line is that, if the above conclusions are accurate, then 2% to 3% of the world's population will be true believers at the time of the Rapture. That is a drastically higher percentage than at any other time in the world's history. However, the sad fact is that this still means 91% to 93% of those who call themselves Christians will be left behind. Even though the percentage of the world's population that is truly saved will be higher than ever before in history, 97% to 98% of the population will be left behind after the Rapture.

Genesis 24:60 Indicates Thousands of Millions of Believers?

In Genesis 24:60 of our King James translation we find language that seems to indicate that the number of believers will be much higher than 200 million:
"And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them." (Genesis 24:60)
Even one thousand million believers is a number five times higher than 200 million, and this verse indicates that the number of believers will be multiple thousands of millions. Doesn't that contradict the idea that the number of believers will be 200 million?

The Hebrew word translated as "millions" is rebabah and should have been translated as "ten thousand." The Hebrew word rebabah is found 15 times in the Old Testament and Genesis 24:60 is the only place in which it is translated as "millions." Once it is translated as "many" and the other 13 times it is translated as "ten thousand."

Below is a portion of Genesis 24:60 taken from a Hebrew interlinear Bible and it also indicates that rebabah should have been translated as "ten thousand."

One thousand ten thousand is 10 million. Genesis 24:60 indicates that the number of believers will be thousands of ten thousand. In other words, it will be a multiple of 10 million. The number 200 million is twenty thousand ten thousands; it is 20 x 10 million. The point is, Genesis 24:60 doesn't contradict Revelation chapter 9. It, of course, doesn't specify 200 million as the number of believers but the language of the verse does harmonize with the number 200 million.