Chapter 53
The Millennium and the Third
Deadly Wound
The Old
Testament prophets graphically described the condition of this old earth
during the millennium following Christ’s Coming. Jeremiah described the
ruin of the earth at this time,
I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form,
and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the
mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly. I
beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens
were fled. I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness, and
all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of the Lord,
and by his fierce anger. (Jeremiah 4:23—26)
We note that the earth in this period contained no
living human and all the birds were destroyed. This will be the ultimate
environmental disaster.
The prophet Zephaniah also proclaimed the destruction
of the earth when the Lord returned.
And flocks shall lie down in the midst of her, all
the beasts of the nations: both the cormorant and the bittern shall
lodge in the upper lintels of it; their voice shall sing in the
windows; desolation shall be in the thresholds: for he shall uncover
the cedar work. This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly, that
said in her heart, I am, and there is none beside me: how is she
become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in! every one that
passeth by her shall hiss, and wag his hand. (Zephaniah 2:14, 15)
Zephaniah also declares the destruction of all life
at Christ’s Coming.
I will consume man and beast; I will consume the
fowls of the heaven, and the fishes of the sea, and the
stumblingblocks with the wicked; and I will cut off man from off the
land, saith the Lord. . . . Neither their silver nor their gold shall
be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath; but the whole
land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make
even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land. (Zephaniah
1:3, 18)
Nahum vividly described the event:
He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and drieth
up all the rivers: Bashan languisheth, and Carmel, and the flower of
Lebanon languisheth. The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt,
and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that
dwell therein. Who can stand before his indignation? and who can abide
in the fierceness of his anger? his fury is poured out like fire, and
the rocks are thrown down by him. (Nahum 1:4—6)
And the prophet Micah was further inspired to
describe the same scene.
For, behold, the Lord cometh forth out of his
place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the
earth. And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys
shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are
poured down a steep place. (Micah 1:3, 4)
Ezekiel, a priest captive in Babylon, beheld in
vision the devastation caused by the seven last plagues.
For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have
I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the
land of Israel; so that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the
heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that
creep upon the earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the
earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown
down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to
the ground. And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my
mountains, saith the Lord God: every man’s sword shall be against his
brother. And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood;
and I will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people
that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire,
and brimstone. (Ezekiel 38:19—22)
Jeremiah saw dead, rotting, and no doubt stinking
bodies lying on the ground throughout the world.
And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from
one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall
not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried; they shall be dung upon
the ground. (Jeremiah 25:33)
There would be no reward for the righteous dwelling
on such an earth. It is time for Christians to study diligently
Scripture and eschew the fabrications of men.
Isaiah proclaimed:
Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for
fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty. The lofty looks of
man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down,
and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. For the day of the
Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and
upon every one that is lifted up; and he shall be brought low. (Isaiah
2:10—12)
And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and
the haughtiness of men shall be made low: and the Lord alone shall be
exalted in that day. And the idols he shall utterly abolish. And they
shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth,
for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he
ariseth to shake terribly the earth. In that day a man shall cast his
idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for
himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats; to go into the
clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear
of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to
shake terribly the earth. (Isaiah 2:17—21)
Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh
it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the
inhabitants thereof. (Isaiah 24:1)
For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to
punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also
shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain. (Isaiah
26:21)
What a day when the lost cry out,
The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we
are not saved. (Jeremiah 8:20)
Our prayer is that every reader of this volume will
accept God’s grace and ask for power to serve Him faithfully, for Christ
said,
If ye love me, keep my commandments. (John 14:15)
However, the earth will not be uninhabited during the
millennium. Describing it as "the bottomless pit" to emphasize that no
being can escape from it, the Bible describes the total living
inhabitants during that period.
And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having
the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he
laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and
Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the
bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he
should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be
fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.
(Revelation 20:1—3)
Jude, also known as Judas, one of Christ’s
step-brothers (Matthew 13:55), wrote stating that the fallen angels are
in this pit bound with "everlasting chains"
And the angels which kept not their first estate,
but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains
under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. (Jude 1:6)
Here it is appropriate to note the idiomatic use in
Scripture of the word "everlasting," for we have seen that Satan, and no
doubt his angelic followers, will be loosed a short season; thus the
chains are not everlasting as we would use the word today. The Jews
frequently used the word "everlasting" to mean "until completed," or
"until death." Thus the prophet Samuel’s mother, Hannah declared,
But Hannah went not up [to the temple]; for she
said unto her husband, I will not go up until the child be weaned, and
then I will bring him, that he may appear before the Lord, and there
abide for ever. (1 Samuel 1:22)
That she meant "forever" to mean until Samuel died is
evident in Hannah’s later statement,
Therefore also I have lent him to the Lord; as long
as he liveth he shall be lent to the Lord. (1 Samuel 1:28)
That Jude also used "everlasting" as an idiom to
mean, until finally and utterly completed, is evident in the very verse
following the one quoted above:
Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about
them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going
after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the
vengeance of eternal fire. (Jude 7)
Jude well knew that the fires which destroyed Sodom
and Gomorrha were not burning still in his day. But those fires
destroyed the cities and were not extinguished until the cities were
utterly destroyed.
Satan and His angels who, unrestrained by the Holy
Spirit, would have brought such utter destruction to this earth,
destroying all life and razing all cities, towns and villages to rubble,
are compelled to remain on this utterly desolated earth for 1,000 years
to contemplate and endure the evil they have wrought in their 6,000
years of activity on this earth. Further, they will be left to
contemplate their terrible fate in the judgment.
At the conclusion of the thousand years, John "saw
the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven"
(Revelation 21:2). At that time the saints return to the earth after
spending the millennium in heaven.
And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and
judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were
beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which
had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received
his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and
reigned with Christ a thousand years. (Revelation 20:4)
At the same time the second resurrection occurs, not
the resurrection of the righteous who had already spent a thousand years
in heaven, but of the unrepentant of all ages.
But the rest of the dead lived not again until the
thousand years were finished. (Revelation 20:5)
Of the saints on the other hand, we read,
This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is
he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death
hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and
shall reign with him a thousand years. (Revelation 20:5, last part,
and 6)
The wicked arise once more to be deceived by Satan:
And when the thousand years are expired, Satan
shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the
nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to
gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of
the sea. (Revelation 20:7, 8)
They are still full of rebellion against God.
And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and
compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire
came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them. And the devil
that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where
the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and
night for ever and ever. (Revelation 20:9, 10)
The reader will once more notice the use of "ever and
ever," used in the idiom of the day in which John wrote.
The Bible is quite plain in declaring that the wicked
are annihilated.
Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction
from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. (2
Thessalonians 1:9)
Here is the use of the word everlasting in its
literal meaning, just as it is used in the promise of eternal life for
the redeemed. We know that this is literal for we are told in plain
words that for the redeemed "There shall be no more death." (Revelation
21:4) Notice the prophecy of Ezekiel concerning Satan’s annihilation.
Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I
have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast
walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast
perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity
was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have
filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned:
therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and
I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones
of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast
corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to
the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.
Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine
iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffic; therefore will I bring
forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will
bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that
behold thee. All they that know thee among the people shall be
astonished at thee: thou shalt be a terror, and never shalt thou be
any more. (Ezekiel 28:14—19)
Paul, writing to the Jewish believers, also affirms
the ultimate destruction of Satan:
Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of
flesh and blood, he [Christ] also himself likewise took part of the
same; that through death he might destroy them that had the power of
death, that is, the devil. (Hebrews 2:14)
Satan is certainly to be destroyed. His followers
likewise will be consumed with him. This is the second death as
Scripture testifies.
And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and
death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were
judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were
cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever
was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of
fire. (Revelation 20:13—15)
We recall the most loved verse in Scripture,
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only
begotton Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but
have everlasting life. (John 3:16)
Here we see the alternative to everlasting life—the
wicked will not suffer eternally, but will perish. For the wicked to
continue eternally in excruciating suffering would characterize our God,
not as the embodiment of love (1 John 4:8, 16), but as a fiend. Even
more tragic, it would ensure that God’s plan of salvation was a failure,
for sin would pollute the universe for eternity; never again would the
universe be clean.
But the prophet Nahum promised us that affliction
(sin) will not ever curse the universe again.
What do ye imagine against the Lord? he will make
an utter end: affliction shall not rise up the second time. (Nahum
1:9)
The question raised in this verse, a rhetorical one,
pierces the minds of those who believe in an ever-burning punishment in
which affliction will ever blight the universe.
This is the third and ultimate deadly wound, not only
of the Papacy, the first beast of Revelation 13, but of all the seven
beasts (heads) that have stood as leaders in defiance of the King of
kings and Lord of lords, and all who followed them. This deadly wound
will be inflicted and never again in the entire history of eternity will
that wound be healed.
We appreciate Ellen Harmon White’s final paragraph in
her 1888 edition of The Great Controversy, page 678:
The great controversy is ended. Sin and sinners are
no more. The entire universe is clean. One pulse of harmony and
gladness beats through the vast creation. From Him who created all,
flow life and light and gladness, throughout the realms of illimitable
space. From the minutest atom to the greatest world, all things,
animated and inanimate, in their unshadowed beauty and perfect joy,
declare that God is love.
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