Objection 35

From Sovereign Grace and the Scope of Election: A Comparative Examination of Attainment Theology and Grace Theology, with Particular Attention to the Question of Whether God's Elect Are Found Among All Nations and Religions

Revelation 14:4-5, the 144,000 are "not defiled with women; for they are virgins," "the firstfruits," "without fault." This is our consecrated ministry.

If read with the literalism the attainment system needs, the passage excludes all women from Zion (they are male virgins undefiled "with women") and excludes every consecrated worker who has ever sinned ("in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault"), a standard 1 John 1:8 says no living person meets. The symbols interpret consistently: virginity is untainted covenant fidelity, the Bride's chastity (2 Corinthians 11:2; contrast the harlot of Revelation 17, spiritual adultery, i.e. idolatry); "firstfruits" is the standing designation of the whole company of the redeemed ("that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures," James 1:18; "the church of the firstborn," Hebrews 12:23); faultlessness is the presented church, "that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle... holy and without blemish" (Ephesians 5:27), and "faultless before the presence of his glory" is promised to all whom Christ keeps (Jude 24). Every descriptor the system reserves for its workers, Scripture spends on the whole election of grace.