Morning, all. This morning, we will be in Revelation 20, picking up where we left off last week. But before we start, let's go to a prayer. Father, we're grateful to be here this morning. We're grateful for the beautiful creation that you've given to us. We see the snow on the ground, and we see the purity and the brightness and even representations of your character in the snow. But Father, we see much greater glimpses of your glory in your word, especially as it reveals Christ to us. And Father, that's why we gather this morning is we want to see those glimpses of your glory. We want to be in awe of your glory. We want to run after your glory. And so Father, we're gonna turn to your word this morning and meditate on it, and we pray that you would do those things for us. Give us eyes to see your glory clearly as we read your word. Give us hearts that understand correctly and feel correctly about your glory. Give us a will that desires to run after the things of Christ as we study this morning. So Father, we pray that your spirit would be among us this morning. Father, that you would be giving us hearts and eyes and wills that are desiring to follow after you. Father, I pray for myself that you would fill me with your spirit as well as I speak out your word this morning. Father, I pray that you would guard my words, that they would be glorious and true of Christ, and that they would be beneficial to those who hear us. In Christ's name we pray, amen. So this morning, we will be in Revelation chapter 20. But as I do every week, I want to go back and bring us back to where we are. And so I started several months ago in Revelation with a summary statement of what I thought the message of the entire book was. And this was what we came up with, is that the Revelation of John is a Christocentric book that shows us the pattern of the world from Christ's first coming to his second coming. And the purpose that John's writing for, he wants us to see the spiritual realities around us. He wants us to recognize the dangers that face us, that face the church. But in light of all those, we know that God is going to win. And so the exhortation, the call of the book is this, that Revelation calls us to wisdom, to understand the world around us rightly. It calls us to perseverance, to keep following Christ, even when things get hard. And it calls us ultimately to worship, which is why we see those breaking ends of worship all the way across Revelation. Christ is worshiped in heaven, and the gospel is bringing worship down to earth, and we look forward to a day when we will join in perfectly with the worship of heaven. So we're pretty far in the book, actually we're only a couple chapters from ending the book, so we'll do a quick review of where we've been so far. We started with the prologue, we saw Christ come and appear to John in a vision, as one who was walking among the lampstands in power and in glory, claiming that the church belonged to him, that he was the caretaker and the provider for the church. And Christ in glory has a message to give to the seven churches. And so we said that there's seven sevens or six sevens and a seventh in Revelation. And so we had the message to the seven churches, which talked about seven dangers that would face the church during the age from Christ to Christ. But in light of those dangers, the letters called the churches to keep their eyes on Christ, to focus on his command and love his promise. And so if we're to keep our eyes on Christ in the midst of the dangers of this world, then the next scene, the interlude, is going to be in the throne room of heaven, where we see a glimpse of the glory of God. First, God the father, the creator, the one who is worthy of worship. And then second, Christ the son, the lamb who was slain, the line of the tribe of Judah who now looks like a lamb who was slain. And that lamb was worthy to open the scroll, to break its seven seals, to declare what the purpose of God for the rest of history would be. And so that leads us to our second seven, the seven seals. The lamb breaks the seven seals, and we see what the pattern of the world from Christ to Christ would be. It would be marked by war and famine and plague and death. And yet, we would not need to be alarmed by these things. These things were planned for by God. They were the pattern that he had wrought into history. And so in the midst of that, the saints cried out, how long, oh Lord, until you Save us until you rescue us and you judge our enemies. And the answer is, wait a little while. But we see in the interlude that it will happen. We see that 144,000 are sealed, 12 times 12 times 1,000, a full number, yes, a full number, a great number were sealed from the earth. And that's emphasized when we get to the next paragraph. And a great multitude from every tribe and tongue and language and nation are gathered before the throne to enter into the worship of heaven. Then we came to our third seven, the seven trumpets. And the seven trumpets were very closely paralleled to the seven seals. They dealt with the same sorts of things. But the thing we saw there was, in the seven seals, we had a quarter of the earth destroyed. In the seven trumpets, we had a third of the earth destroyed. We thought about the fact that, yes, God's judgment lies on all of history. But it will intensify. It will get stronger as history goes on. It will be like the pangs of childbirth. They start out small, but get more intense and more intense until the time of delivery. But in the midst of God's increasing judgments on this world, what is the church to do? We thought about the two witnesses, the interlude, where the two witnesses continue to testify even in the midst of the enmity of this world. And they are promised that they will continue to fulfill their mission until the mission is complete. But also, we had kind of a dour prediction that the church would end up being conquered by the world, that that conquering would not last forever, that Christ would raise them up on the last day. Then we got to the fourth seven, the central seven in Revelation, which was a very different seven. It was a story. There were seven scenes in this seven-fold saga of the woman and the dragon. We thought about Christ, the promised son being born to the people of God, the dragon, Satan, trying to destroy him and failing. He lost the battle, was kicked out of heaven, was cast down to earth in great wrath. and great fury as the enemy of the children of the woman. And then we saw two beasts, the first beast and the second beast raised up by the dragon to be his mode of operation in this world, the way that he would fight against the saints of God. And we see that they were given great power to even kill the saints because they would not worship the beast in his image. But even though the beast appears strong, the dragon is chasing them with great wrath. In Great Fury, we see at the end, the lamb wins. And again, he gathers 144,000, 12 times 12 times 1,000, a full number times a full number. Yes, a large number of saints gathered beside the sea, singing praise to the lamb once again. Then we came to the fifth seven, the seven bowls. At the seven seals, talked about the general pattern of this world. The seven trumpets talked about the intensifying pattern. of God's judgment in this world. The seven bowls were the finality of God's judgment in this world. With these, the wrath of God is finished. They thought about there will be a day when God's judgment will fall, and his wrath will consume all of his enemies. And so the interlude looks at that, and it talks about fallen. Fallen is Babylon the Great. The city of man that stood up against God, that pursued its own pleasure and its own lust, was cast down by God. And the whole world looked on in terror. And then we've entered into the sixth seven of Revelation, which is seven scenes of victory. If Babylon the greatest fallen, then what is going to happen? And that's what we're in right now. And so we gave a theme to this seven. We said that as God's judgment reaches its end, John sees, wow, I'm having trouble talking. John sees seven scenes. That's a lot of S's in a row. John sees seven scenes that display God's great victory. God's people are vindicated. They're joined to Christ. Christ returns as the glorious king of beasts, and the dragon are both defanged and destroyed. And God is declared to be the judge of all. So we saw that these seven scenes are marked by, after this, or then, I heard, or then I saw. And so we see them marked out in the text. We thought about the seven. We saw the first of the saints are vindicated. We saw the marriage feast of the lamb. We saw a rider appear on a white horse. We saw the defeat of the first and the second beast. And that's where we left off last week. So we're going to finish off these seven scenes with the last three scenes. So we're going to see the dragon bound. We'll see the 1,000 years. And we'll see the great white throne as we go forward this morning. So we are going to be in Revelation 20 this morning. If you have your Bible, feel free to open it and follow along with me. or I'll have the text on the screen if you want to follow along. Revelation chapter 20. Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be released for a little while. Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also, I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or on their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for 1,000 years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the 1,000 years were ended. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection. Over such, the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years. And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle. Their number is like the sands of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. But fire came down from heaven and consumed them. And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were. And they will be tormented day and night, forever and ever. Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence, earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the Lake of Fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the Book of Life, he was thrown into the Lake of Fire. So as we look at Revelation 20, this is going to be a proposition, my main point. It's that Satan, our great enemy, may be powerful, but he is not all-powerful. Satan, our great enemy, may be powerful, but he is not all-powerful. Both his power and his time are limited and then he will be utterly destroyed. Our God will be victorious and will be the final judge. So endure with patience waiting for that day. That's what we're going to see as we go through Revelation 20. There's a lot of things that people want to argue about in Revelation 20. We'll hit on those just a little bit. But that's, I think, the main point of the chapter. And so we'll break it down into four points. First, we'll see Satan bound. The emphasis on this is that the deceiver deceives no longer. The deceiver deceives no longer. Then we'll see the saints reign. The kingdom now belongs to Christ. And the saints will reign with Christ. And then we'll see the final scene. God sits in judgment, and evil is destroyed forever. Then we'll have application at the end. What does this mean for us? Revelation 20 and us. And what are we doing? We're waiting for these things. We're waiting for this. So we'll start with our first point, sinking down. The deceiver deceives no longer. We'll look at Revelation 20, verses 1 through 3. It says, then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it, and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be released for a little while." So as we look at this, the first thing we see is that the dragon comes back. So he seized the dragon. And then we give several names to the dragon. We just finished looking at the rider on the white horse, Four names to the rider on the white horse. Actually, when the dragon appears, we're going to give him four names as well. First, he's called the dragon. That's kind of his general term across Revelation. But then he says, the dragon is that ancient serpent. I'm going to follow that in a few minutes. But that's what he wants us to be looking at, is that the dragon is the ancient serpent, the serpent from long ago, who is both the devil and Satan. And so the devil and Satan, those are two different Greek words derived in different ways, but they actually mean almost exactly the same thing. Both of them mean the accuser, the accuser of the brother and the one who stands in heaven and tries to convince God that there are none worthy of salvation. And so he says, this is the ancient serpent, the one who wants to separate from God, the accuser, the one who brings a case against us. And so when we look at this, the four names given to the enemy, I think, actually, we'll look at one more thing. The purpose for what this first scene is, is that he might not deceive the nations any longer. All of this is actually calling us to look back to Genesis 3. When John writes this down, he's thinking very strongly about the first scenes of the Bible. We'll see that we see a lot of these words. When he says that ancient serpent, he's going back to Genesis 3.1. Now the serpent, was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made." Then we know the story. He convinces Eve to eat of the fruit. Eve gets Adam to eat of the fruit. They both realize they're naked. They go and hide. And so then the Lord God appears again. And we come to verse 9. But the Lord God called to the man and said to them, where are you? And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked and I hid myself. He said, who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? The man said, The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me the fruit of the tree, and I ate. Then the Lord God said to the woman, What is this that you have done? The woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate. Next, right at the heart of Genesis 3 is that the serpent deceived. and plunged humanity into destruction. The serpent deceived. And so now when we come to Revelation chapter 20, we're coming to the serpent is no longer able to deceive. That ancient enemy, the ancient serpent, the devil and Satan is no longer able to deceive. But then also we are hearing echoes of Revelation chapter 12. Actually, we've seen these four terms paired together before. So we come to Revelation chapter 12. This is the opening scenes of the saga of the woman and the dragon. It says this, no war arose in heaven. Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And so here's the form of the row, the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. So we've had this march before in Revelation of the dragon, the serpent, the devil, and Satan, who deceives, specifically, the whole world. When we saw this before, what happened? The great dragon, he was thrown down to the earth. and his angels were thrown down with him. It was one of the opening scenes of the saga of the woman and the dragon. Christ had been victorious. The dragon had been cast down, had been cast out of heaven, was no longer able to be the accuser of the brethren, had been defamed, and lost his power before God. He was thrown down to the earth. And so when we come to Revelation 20, Revelation 20 is very closely related to Revelation chapter 12. How it's related might not be quite clear yet. We'll come back to that. But I want that to be in the back of our minds that Revelation 12 and Revelation 20 have some sort of connection between them. So we come back to Revelation 20. We have the dragon, the ancient serpent, the devil, the Satan, the deceiver of the whole world, and what happens to him. The angel comes down from heaven and binds him. throws him into a pit, shuts it, and seals it over him. And because of that, he's no longer able to deceive the nations. And so we have this really interesting phrase. We've seen it a couple of times in Revelation. We have this bottomless pit, the pit that the dragon is thrown into. In Revelation, the way that our English Bible is translated, this sounds very exotic, very like, oh, there's a bottomless pit. We have a key to the bottomless pit. We're going to take a lid off. We're going to look down and see all the way down. I don't think that's really a great translation of that Greek word, because that Greek word is actually used a lot of different places, and it never means bottomless pit. Actually, the word bottomless definitely isn't in the Greek. That's an English translation that kind of held on for a long time. But the word that's translated pit as abyss And it's actually used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament quite a bit, the satuagint. And whenever it's used, it actually refers to the ocean, the depths, the depths of the sea. In fact, this goes back to the first stories of Genesis as well as the first time we see this. In the beginning, God created the heaven and earth. And the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. The opening words of Genesis talk about the earth. It was formless and void. Chaos still reigned. and there was the deep and darkness was over the surface of the deep. But then God speaks in and brings order to creation and sets all things in the right place so at the end he can say it is very good. And so when we come to Revelation 20, it's the same word that's being used. He's going to cast the dragon into the deep so that he's no longer able to deceive. The dragon came out of the deep and deceived the woman. Now he's going to be set back into the deep so that he can no longer deceive the nations anymore. And so we could go all places in the Old Testament where this word is used. But one that I think is particularly important is Proverbs 8. This is a wisdom passage. where we see wisdom being personified. Actually, I think a representation of Christ. We could talk about that more, but wisdom personified. And this is what it says in Proverbs 8, 22 through 29. The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of old. Ages ago, I was set up at the first before the beginning of the earth. When there were no deaths, that's the same word in Greek, in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, I was brought forth. when there were no springs abounding with water, before the mountains had been shaped, before the hills I was brought forth, before he made the earth with its fields or the first dust of the world, when he established the heavens, I was there, when he drew a circle on the face of the deep, when he made firm the skies above, when he established the fountains of the deep. And then this is actually what I think is a really important phrase, when he assigned to the sea its limit so that the water might not transgress its command. when he marked out the foundations of the earth. And so Proverbs, looking back at the creation story, says, this was a big part of creation, is that the deep and God were somehow not completely aligned. God created everything, but the earth was formless and void. It was not quite where God wanted it to be yet. And God said, no, the deep will be here, and the land will be here. I will assign to the sea its limit. The water will not transgress my command. And so when the dragon gets thrown into the abyss, into the great deep, The same thing is happening. No, you are no longer free. You are bound by my command. You are bound that you may no longer have free reign to do whatever you please, but you are under my control. You no longer have authority to deceive the nations anymore, but you are being bound up so that you no longer have authority. And so the great dragon, the seaver, the devil, and Satan was bound up and cast into the abyss. where that has set its limit so that he was no longer able to have free reign on this earth. But then we get to the interesting part, which a lot of people talk about quite a bit. Well, actually, just a second. So when we say that he was bound, we could say something like this, that Satan's power is severely restricted for a time. Or to look at it another way, we could say this, creation's curse is being undone. Revelation 20 comes and says, this is what happened to creation. This is what caused the fall of creation. Now we're going to take all those parts and start undoing them. The deceiver won't be able to deceive any longer. In fact, he's going to be cast back out into the deep. The deep is going to be shut off so that it can't come back and overwhelm the earth. But then, specifically, he's going to be bound for 1,000 years. People talk a lot about what is this 1,000 years? We use the word millennium in the English, or actually, Latin word for 1,000 years, and talk a lot about the millennium. It says that he's going to be bound for 1,000 years, and he's going to be bound until the 1,000 years are ended, and then he's going to be released for a little while. I'm going to kind of work through this as we go through the passage. We're going to kind of add different things to what is 1,000 years about. But the first thing I want to look at is why 1,000 years? What about 1,000 years ends up having it placed into this passage? Actually, as we look at the Old Testament, I don't want to say every use of the word 1,000 is figurative. But actually, in the Old Testament, 1,000 was a very figurative number. Over and over again, 1,000 has just used to mean a lot or something intense. And so we can go through and just pick out a few. But when God tells the Israelites who he is, he says that he is the one who shows love to thousands of those who keep my commands. He doesn't mean that I'm going to get to 999,999 and then I'm done. So it's not a literal, like, I show love to thousands. It just means, I show love to a lot. I show love to many whom keep my commandments. Or Exodus 34, 7, in the great name of God, again he says, he's the one who keeps steadfast love for thousands. and not limiting himself to 999,999, but the one who shows love to many, forgiving iniquity and transgression. In Senator Deuteronomy 7.9, he keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments for a thousand generations. I don't get the picture that God's counting up. Be like, first June, second June, third June. 500th generation, we're halfway done, 600th. No, he's just meaning, I show love throughout the ages. And so 1,000 was used very figuratively, representative. It wasn't supposed to be taken as a literal number very often in the Old Testament. I think our pinnacle of this is in Psalm 90, where we actually get 1,000 years. Psalm 90, one through seven. Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, forever you had formed the earth and the world. From everlasting to everlasting you are God. You return man to dust and say, return, O children of man, for a thousand years in your sider, but as yesterday, when it is past, or as a watch in the night. You sweep them away as with a flood. They are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning. In the morning it flourishes and is renewed, and in the evening it fades and withers. For we are brought to an end by your anger, and by your wrath we are dismayed. So in Psalm 90, it says, you know what? 1,000 years are like yesterday when it is past. These great lengths of time to God are as but nothing. And so the contrast is between what man can see. We see day to day, and we're worried about yesterday, and we're worried about tomorrow. But for God, he says, 1,000 years are as but yesterday. You are small, and God is great. But then specifically, Psalm 90 is pulled into the New Testament. And it's pulled into the New Testament specifically to talk about the end times, which is why we came to 2 Peter. So we read 2 Peter this morning. I'll just read a couple verses out of that again. 2 Peter 3, verses 8 through 10. So the question is, where is the coming of the Lord? Why is he delaying in this coming? And this is Peter's answer. Do you not overlook this fact, beloved, that with the Lord, and then he starts quoting out of Psalm 90, one day is as 1,000 years. And 1,000 years is one day. He takes Psalm 90, and he flips it both ways. 1,000 years, there was yesterday on your side. If that's true, then yesterday could be the same as 1,000 years. You're not bound by time in the same way we are. It's not a literal number. It's just saying that to God, all times are great, and all times are small. He's outside of time. He's not bound by it in the same way we are. And so Peter encourages them, saying, the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise. It might seem long to you. But think from God's perspective, it's not long. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promises. Some count slowness, but he is patient towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But then he encourages them, but the day of the Lord will come, and it will come like a thief. Looking back and saying, no one will know when it will come. It will come like a thief, and on that day then, the heavens will pass away with the war, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved. and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Actually, this is very parallel to this passage in Revelation 20 that we're talking to. They're looking at the same event. Peter from a more straightforward, literal writing things down and saying, this is what we should expect. Revelation giving us these vivid images of this, but talking in many ways about the same thing. And so as we come back to this, it says that he's bound for 1,000 years. I'm going to come to this. Like I said, we're going to keep developing this because we're going to hear more about this 1,000 years in the next section. But the first thing we want to say is we don't need to necessarily take that as a literal 1,000 years, but rather that this is looking back at a wealth of Old Testament references to 1,000 and to specifically 1,000 years and saying that the dragon is going to be bound for a long period. His reign is going to be captured in so that he's no longer given free reign to deceive the nations like he did in Genesis 3. In Genesis 3, he took down all of humanity. And he reigned over all of humanity for a long period. But now his reign is over. He's been reigned back in. And he is losing his power over the nations. And so that's the main point. We'll talk about the 1,000 years a little bit more in a few minutes. But the point is that Satan's power is severely restricted for a time. And creation's curse is being undone. So that's going to bring us to the sixth scene. So that was the fifth scene. and the seven scenes of victory. Now we're gonna enter into the 16th, which is the saints reign and the kingdom belongs to Christ. We'll be in Revelation 20 verses four through 10. It says, then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God. and those who had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or on their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for 1,000 years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the 1,000 years were ended. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection. Over such, the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for 1,000 years. And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations. They're at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle. Their numbers are like the sands of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints in the beloved city. But fire came down from heaven and consumed them. And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet were. and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever." So as we look at this scene, come back to verse 4, it starts out, "...then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those who were given the authority to judge." So we go back, this is actually referencing Daniel, Daniel chapter 7, where thrones are set out and the Ancient of Days takes a seat. And then the beasts are judged and thrown into the fire nest for the rest of the beast. The dominion was prolonged for a day and a time. But this is what we're looking at. And so these thrones are heavenly thrones. And actually, as we look across Revelation, every time we get this reference to thrones, it's talking about the 24 elders who sits on thrones before the council of God. And so he's being brought back into that sort of situation, looking at the heavenly council. And sitting on them was those to whom were given authority to judge. And then he sees something new. He says, that wasn't surprising. But this is the surprising thing. Also, I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God. So he's looking back. He said, all across Revelation that this will happen over and over and over again, is that the beast will pursue the church. The dragon is furious with the offspring of the woman. Nonetheless, even though they will perish when they refuse to follow the beast, here they're being raised up at the end. I saw the souls of those who were beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God. Even if they died, they were still gathered to Christ. And in case we lose some, okay, if you died in service of Christ, you're being gathered up here. But also we get a second group. All those, the word in Greek is anyone, anyone who had not worshipped the beast or its image, and had not received its mark on their forehead or on their hands. And so we see these two categories, those who died because of their faith in Christ, and anyone who had not served the beast. If we think about that for a little while, we can define both those groups to mean all the saints. You have died in the service of Christ, or you didn't die in service of Christ. But you were not following the beast. You were following the lamb. We talked about those being the only two options. You could either have the mark of the beast, or you could have the mark of the lamb. And so all the saints. He sees all the saints gathered together. What does he say about them? They came to life and reigned with Christ for 1,000 years. The rest of the dead, however, did not come to life until after 1,000 years was ended. Then he says, this is the first resurrection, with emphasis on the first. There's going to be two resurrections. He says, this is the first resurrection. confusing at the least, the smallest level. But actually what I think is happening is we're going to see, I'm going to hit on this a little bit, but actually there's a great parallel being done to Ezekiel. And I've pulled this out as we've gone through Revelation so far, but especially here at the end of Ezekiel chapter 20 and going into Ezekiel 21 and 22, he's going to start very, very closely paralleling what happens in Ezekiel. And so, actually, I think to understand what this first resurrection is, we go back to Ezekiel and say, what is the first resurrection? Ezekiel actually tells us Ezekiel 37, verses 1 through 6. We see a resurrection in Ezekiel chapter 37. In Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39, we see the great battle between Gog and Magog, and the people of God, and Gog and Magog completely destroyed. And then in Ezekiel 40 through 48, we see a new temple being built, which is actually the same pattern we're going to see in Revelation. So this is the kickoff for that. It's in Geko chapter 37. And it says this, the hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley. It was full of bones. And he led me around among them. And behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley. And behold, they were very dry. So Ezekiel gets pulled up. We went through Ezekiel a little while ago. And he says, these were bones. And these weren't just like kind of dead bones. These were the deadest bones you could possibly find. They were very dry. And he said to me, son of man, can these bones live? And Ezekiel's like, oh, Lord God, you know. Like, why are you asking me? I can make those bones live. But you brought me into this vision for some reason. So maybe you've got something to show me. So I answered, oh, Lord God, you know. Then he said to me, prophesy. Prophesy over these bones and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. That says the Lord God to these bones. Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I will lay sinews upon you, and I will cause flesh to come upon you, and I will cover you with skin and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord. Actually, as we went through Ezekiel chapter 37, we worked through that. And we saw that this was a great picture of what was to come with Christ, that there would be a first resurrection, that those who were dead were brought to life again. We think about Ephesians 2, you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the rule of the kingdom of the air. But now in Christ, you who were once dead have been made alive in Christ. And so I think that's what the first resurrection is referring to is a resurrection, a spiritual resurrection in which the dead are brought to life again. We'll come back to that, that fits really well in the passage and it fits the parallel passage in Ezekiel chapter 37. But we'll keep going on Ezekiel, I'm trying to come back to Revelation. Revelation chapter 20, we left off in verse 6, so coming up in verse 7. And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth. Gog and Magog to gather them for battle. Their number is like the sands of the sea. So actually, we're seeing a parallel here. We've got the 1,000 years referred to again. We'll come back, deal with that in a few minutes. But at the end, Satan's going to be released. He had been bound so that his power was limited. He'll be released, and now he's going to be able to deceive again. Deceive like he did in Genesis chapter 3. Deceive all the nations, to bring all the nations together. And we come back, and we see this prophecy from Ezekiel. Gog and Magog, a great final battle at the end of time, when God will be victorious over all the nations. that come up and rise up against him. But actually, as we come to this, we see Gog and Magog, the first thing that goes off in my mind is, we already did this. We already did this. So this is a reference back to Ezekiel 38, verses 1 through 6. So we went to Ezekiel 37, now we're in Ezekiel 38, the word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, set your face towards Gog of the land of Magog, chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him and say, blessed is the Lord God. Behold, I am against you, O God, chief prince of Meshech and Tubal. And I will turn you about and put hooks into your jaws, and I will bring you out in all your army and horses and horsemen, all of them clothed in full armor, a great host, all of them with buckler shield and wielding swords. Persia, Cush, and Put are with them, all of them with shield and helmet. Gomer and all his hordes, Togarmah from the uttermost parts of the north, with all his hordes, many peoples are with you." Actually, that passage in Ezekiel 36 is actually going back to the table of nations and picking up random nations off that table, and just going around and saying the entire earth is deceived and comes together with Gog and Magog to come up against the Lord. So this is prophesying out of Ezekiel chapter 38. But like I said, we've already been here. If you recall last week, We talked about Gog and Magog as well, because this is the end of the prophecy of Gog and Magog is this. And you, son of man, thus says the word of God. Speak to the birds of every sort and to all the beasts of the field. Assemble and come. Gather from all around to the sacrificial feast that I am preparing for you. a great sacrificial feast on the mountains of Israel, and you shall eat flesh and drink blood. You shall eat the flesh of the mighty and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of he goats, of bulls, all of them fat beasts of Bashan. And you shall eat fat until you are full, and drink blood until you are drunk at the sacrificial feast that I am preparing for you. And you shall be filled at my table with horses and charioteers, with mighty men and all kind of warriors, declares the Lord God. So we have Gog and Magog come against God with all the nations of the earth. And then God rains fire down on Gog and Magog and completely destroys them. He says, come on, birds, gather around. You're going to have a big feast. We've seen this before. This was actually the end of Revelation chapter 19. We saw the angel standing in the sun with a loud voice. He called to all the birds that fly directly overhead, come, gather for the great supper of God. And so the end of Revelation 19 was already going back to Ezekiel 38 and 39, and saying when the beast and the second beast are destroyed, when all their armies are destroyed, this will be the fulfillment of Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39, the great battle at the end of the world. But then we go off into this, the dragon is sealed up for a time, and then he's released, and then somehow we're back at the battle of Gog and Magog. Which in Ezekiel, even though prophecies aren't always super clear, Ezekiel doesn't at all see two battles. He sees one extremely definitive battle where all the nations gather together and they are utterly destroyed. And in Revelation, we have that prophecy referred to twice. So if we go through this, Revelation 19, 17 through 21 seems to have a lot to do with Revelation 20, 7 through 10. Let's go back through these seven scenes of victory and start thinking, what's going on here? Because we've got some overlap. And I think this overlap is going to be important. We start out with the saints are vindicated. That's looking back at fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. The saints are vindicated. They were trampled over by this world, but no longer. They are now victorious. And that leads into the marriage feast of the Lamb. The world is no longer a synod, and they are free to go join themselves to the Lamb for eternity. We see the rider come on a white horse. And then we see the defeat of the beasts, which is the reference to Gog and Magog, the final battle predicted in Ezekiel 38 and 39. But then what happens is we have four. That's important. We have four scenes. Then I'm going to pull us out and say, OK, we're going to take a sidestep, look at something from a different angle, and say the dragon is bound. We're going to have the thousand years in which the dragon is bound and in which the saints reign. And then we're going to come back to the great battle, Gog and Magog. And we notice that the fourth scene and the sixth scene are overlapping. And then finally, we're going to have the final judgment. Sometimes I don't like it when people start diagramming things, but I think this is important because we see this overlap here. I'm going to make a note. I'm not saying that these are temporal interactions. This is not necessarily temporal. This is just logically how they're laid out in the passage. The saints are vindicated. The marriage takes place. The writer on the white horse. The defeat of the beast. This all happened as a single story in there. And then we take a step back. The dragon is bound. We have 1,000 years. And we come back to that same great battle. It's the same battle, Gog and Magog, coming up against the people of God. And then after that, we'll have the final judgment. And as we noticed, I said it's important, we have four stories. And then I have three things written here. So forgive me, I wanted to be clear on what we're doing. But those are actually two scenes in Revelation. Those are two scenes. The first scene is the dragon bound, and then the first part of the 1,000 years. And then the 1,000 years also belongs to the second scene, which is the saints reigning and the great battle. So we have four, and then two, and then one scene, which is the pattern of all the sevens. All the sevens are broken down into four that went together, and then two that went together, and then one that went together. And so we have this thousand years, the millennium that people argue a lot about, and it's completely contained in these two stories, these two scenes of victory. And then we have to ask, what is the thousand years? Because people ask that all the time. What is a thousand years? What does this have to do with us? I'll give you a preview. I'm not going to answer that emphatically because I have mixed views on this myself and I'm not sure it's 100% important. But I will go through some of what are common understandings of what this is and then tell you kind of where I lean towards and why I lean towards that. But the millennium, there's kind of four basic understandings, common understandings in the world of what the millennium is referred to among believers. I'll go through these kind of in order. The first one is classical premillennialism. which is called classic because it is the one most commonly espoused by the early church fathers. So if you go back to the 100s, 200s, 300s, 400s AD, and you look at what they were writing about the millennium, it would be something like this. Christ returns, and then the millennium occurs. I've got the word simple there because literally, that's all there is to that view, is, OK, Baha'u'llah says that Christ returns, and then there's 1,000-year reign where the saints, freedom of Christ, were good with that. But there's not really anything else to that. Second view is what we could call dispensational premillennialism. some similarities to classic pre-millennialism. But it's a relatively more recent or developed view, which has a more in-depth treatment of the millennium, where Christ returns, and then the millennium occurs. That's where their points of contact equal out. But then the dispensational pre-millennialism tries to go to the Old Testament and say, OK, Israel was the Old Testament people of God. We feel like there's a lot of promises that still need to come. If we're walking through Ezekiel, we still need to see that temple built. We need to see the sacrifices restarted, all this stuff. And so we're going to see, during that millennium, the Old Testament promises to Israel are going to be fulfilled for ethnic Israel. Third position is amillennialism. Amillennialism looks at, well, we don't think that this 1,000 years is in the future. Rather, we think that probably the 1,000 years are now. The dragon being bound is not looking at some future event, but is actually looking at a past event. Christ triumphed at the cross, his ascension into heaven, his reigning there in heaven, was the dragon being bound, being cast down to earth, being bound so that he can no longer transgress. And the nations no longer being deceived is the gospel going forward so that the deceiving of the nations is being undone. The nations were scattered around, and one nation was chosen out in the Old Testament. But now in the New Testament, that gospel is going out to all nations of the earth, so that the nations are not being deceived by the dragon anymore. And then the fourth view is post-millennialism. Post-Millennium says the saints must reign on earth for 1,000 years before Christ returns. And so those are kind of the four different viewpoints that are often pulled out. I will say I lean towards one side of this chart and not towards the other side of this chart. So I would lean towards these. And the reason I would lean towards these without wanting to get into too many arguments with too many people, is actually, these two are very historical positions. You can go to 100s, 200s, 300s, 400s, and find good church fathers that would talk about things that would look like classical premillennialism or amillennialism. Actually, Augustine is a really good church father to go to, because Augustine couldn't decide. So he wrote down, actually, in The City of God, The City of Man, his book that I've referenced before, he talks about the millennium, and he writes two different positions. And then Athena goes, I don't know which one's true. And the two he goes to are classic premillennialism, perhaps Christ is going to return and then there's going to be 1,000 years, or amillennialism, maybe we're living in the 1,000 years now. Actually, the one thing Augustine was 100% sure of was that he was living in the 1,000 years. He just didn't know whether it was classic premillennialism or amillennialism, which confuses me personally. But one thing we can say about the millennium is it's at best confusing. The reason I wouldn't lean towards the other side is they're both relatively new. They're not historical positions. Dispositional premillennialism is only, at best, a couple hundred years old and was focused a lot on current events and trying to fit current events into certain ideas of what prophecy is. And postmillennialism may be a little older but still relatively a new one. And I have problems fitting dispensational premillennialism and postmillennialism into other statements of the Bible. But classical premillennialism and amillennialism, I can fit both perfectly fine in this passage. Classic premillennialism, that's straightforward. You read the passage, what it says is what it says, and we're done. Super simple. I like that position for that reason. We don't have to think much about it. Amillennialism is a little more challenging. But actually, if we go through here, we can see it fits really well as well. We come to the dragon being bound. the dragon, the ancient serpent, the devil, and Satan. And this is actually referencing, again, Genesis 3. And we said it's referencing Revelation 12. And in both of those, in Genesis 3, the dragon had been the serpent that had deceived. In Revelation 12, it said the dragon had been the ancient serpent, the one who had deceived, passed into the whole world, but he's cast out of heaven by the victory of Christ. And so we come to the ancient serpent being bound, saying his power has been severely restricted so that he can no longer deceive the nations and say that belongs to Christ's victory at the cross. His ascension into heaven is casting down the serpent. So now his dominion is restricted, and he no longer has the power that he used to have. He cannot deceive the nations in the same way that he used to deceive the nations, but the gospel will go forward so that every tribe and tongue and language and nation will come and bow before the throne. It fits very well into the themes of Revelation And then we come to the saints, the saints who are resurrected and reign with Christ. But we notice a couple things. First, it's the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and the word of God. It was the souls that came to life. Actually, it's not looking necessarily at his physical resurrection, but at a spiritual resurrection and saying, in a spiritual resurrection, the saints are reigning with Christ right now. And so the question is, is Christ reigning right now? And we'd all say, yes, Christ is reigning. He is sitting at the right hand of the throne of God, reigning over his people. And it says, right now, during the millennium, The souls, either if you're dead, your soul is reigning with Christ, or if you're living and not worshiping the beast, you are reigning with Christ now for 1,000 years. Again, not a definitive period of time, just a long period of time, which is the first resurrection. So we come back to those and say, I could fit classical or Amelianism. I'm not going to come down strongly on either one, necessarily. But the first reason I like those two is because they fit really well with the whole of the Bible. But the second reason is there's different applications. If we look at these, I think classical premillennialism and amillennialism really have the same applications. We read through the text. What does it cost to do? Well, dispensational premillennialism and postmillennialism cost to do different things. And so thinking through what are the implications of these positions, if we go with either classical premillennialism or amillennialism, the application would be really simple, straightforward. Pursue holiness and wait for the return of Christ. There's not really anything more there. We just go with what the Bible told us to do. What are we to be doing? Endure until that day. Wait for that day. Have patience for that day. Pursue holiness, waiting for the return of Christ. If we get into dispensational premillennialism, the application could include pursue holiness, waiting for the return of Christ. But it would also start to include things like this. Support the ethno-political nation of Israel in our attempt to retake the Holy Land in preparation for the return of Christ. Because we have to see certain things happen for Christ to return. We need to see a temple rebuilt. We need to see the Holy Land come back. And so we're going to be drawn towards running after this. That's great. I don't have necessarily any problem with that. Well, I have various thoughts on that, but not going to go into that right now. My biggest thought is, as we go across the pages of the New Testament, We don't see anywhere in the New Testament anyone calling us to do anything like that. And so this seems to be something that happened pretty recently, and the application doesn't seem to be in the New Testament anywhere. And then post-millennialism, the very on-your-face, which they actually are trying to do, application is take control of the governments of this world and install theopracies so that we can have people being bowed to the knee to Christ, we can reign for a thousand years, and then Christ will return. Again, more power to them. I don't see them winning that battle. They seem to be losing that battle pretty hard right now. But also, it seems to run into a lot of New Testament commands or statements saying that things will go from bad to worse, deceiving, being deceived. That people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, insolent, deceived. And Christ himself saying, if my kingdom was of this world, then My disciples, servants, would be fighting for me. But then he says, but my kingdom isn't of this world. With the implication being, they're not going to. They're not going to fight for me. So those two run into problems with the applications as well. The classical primalism, I don't know. Things will pan out. And it really doesn't matter what I think, because who am I? I'm just Matt Basile. I can't control what Christ is going to do. Those both seem to make sense to me, and their applications seem to be straightforward with the rest of the Bible. And so that's where I would end with the millennium, is that whether it's going to happen in the future or it's happening right now, at some point, right now, Satan's reign is severely constrained. He has been cast out of heaven at the least, if not also being bound so that he can no longer deceive the nation so that the gospel can go forward. At some point in the future, he will be released. There will be some sort of great battle. What that battle looks like, I don't know. I've studied a lot of Revelation over the past several months. Parallel, I've studied a lot of Daniel. And I really like how Daniel ends. But look, for anyone to guess what the last words Daniel ever says are. So Daniel, Daniel chapter 12, he's seeing the end of his vision, the things are happening, and then an angel asks a question, gets to the point, Daniel speaks up. And Daniel says this, this is the last words Daniel ever says. He said, I heard, but I did not understand. Daniel can say that if that's Daniel's last words. I heard, but I did not understand. We can probably come to revelation and be like, ah, these things are true. We get the main point. We get the application point. Then say, I heard, but I did not understand. Things will pan out however they pan out. I don't know. So that's the millennium and what I think about the millennium. But the main point is that the saints reign, and the kingdom belongs to Christ. And then finally, we get to the seventh scene. God sits in judgment, and evil is destroyed forever. So Revelation chapter 20, verses 11 through 15. Then I saw a great white throne, and him who was seated on it. From his presence, earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each of them, according to what they had done. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. So as we enter in here, we see a couple things. First, we see a great white throne and him who is seated on it. This is, again, a clear reference back to Daniel. We get into Revelation. He's thinking a lot about Daniel and a lot about Ezekiel. And then we're going to see the books are opened. And then we're going to see another book opened. Specifically, it's called the Book of Life. So we come to Daniel chapter 7. This is a clear reference back there. And it says, starting in verse 9, this is after the announcement of the four beasts that happens in Daniel chapter 7, and the terrifying fourth beast. And Daniel's worried about the terrifying fourth beast. But then we get to Daniel 7, verse 9. It says, as I looked, thrones were placed. Actually, that's what just happened. We saw thrones being placed with the reign of the saints. He said, I looked and there were thrones. And seated on the thrones, those to whom judgment had been committed. Same thing in Daniel 7. I saw thrones replaced. But now, after the thrones were placed, so we've gotten past that scene, then the Ancient of Days took his seat. He's ready to judge. The heavenly council took their seats and pronounced judgment. But now the ancient of days is ready to seat and take his judgment. And his clothing was white as snow. And then the hair of his head was like pure wool. His throne was fiery flames, and its wheels were burning fire. A stream of fire issued and came out from before him. A thousand thousands served him. And 10,000 times 10,000 stood before him. And again, the court said in judgment, the heavenly council But then the books were opened. And in Daniel chapter 7, the books being opened are a record of deeds. And they look at the beast and judge the beast and declare that the beast is against God and destroy the beast. So that's the first set of books. The ancient of days took his seats. The books were opened. And the beast and all that followed the beast were going to be judged. Now, we see the second book. The second book is actually referred to in Daniel chapter 12. And so we're continuing on in Daniel. So Daniel chapter 12, verses 1 through 4. At that time shall arise Michael. This is the end of his long vision sequence showing the history of the Israelites going forward. That time shall arise Michael, the great prince who is in charge of your people. And there shall be a time of trouble since never has been since there was a nation until that time. But at that time, your people shall be delivered. Everyone whose name shall be found written in the book. So we have a first book. The books were opened before the Ancient of Days to judge the beast. But then another book was opened, the book that was the list of those who were to be delivered. And many who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above, and those who turn many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever. But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase." And so we have both these books referenced in Daniel, And so we have this book of judgment and the book of life. The book of life, we don't actually see all that often. We only see a few references to it in the Old Testament. It became a very, very interesting topic during the intertestamental period, if you go read some of the intertestamental writings, a book of death and a book of life. But we do see this book of life referenced several times. It can come to Psalm 69, verses 24 through 29. This is looking at evildoers who had been treacherous towards the psalmist. It says, pour out your indignation upon them. Let your burning anger overtake them. May there can't be a desolation. Let no one dwell in their tents. For they persecute him whom you have struck down. And they recount the pain of those whom you have wounded. Add to them punishment upon punishment. May they have no acquittal from you. Let them be blotted out of the book of the living. Let them not be enrolled among the righteous. But I am afflicted and in pain. Let your salvation, O God, set me on high. Or we could go back even farther. We come to Exodus 32. This is Moses had gone up the mountain, received the judgments of God. He had come back down the mountain, found that the people got bored, made a golden calf. Moses rightly got pretty angry about that and broke the tablets. And now we're at that point, and Moses is going back up to talk to God and said, I need to go talk to God and see if we can figure this thing out. And so we come to Exodus 32, starting in verse 30. The next day, Moses said to the people, you have sinned a great sin. And now we'll go up to the Lord. Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin. So Moses returned to the Lord and said, Alas, this people have sinned a great sin. They have made for themselves gods of gold. But now, if you will forgive their sin, then he trails off. He'll come back to them. If you will forgive their sin, but if not, please blot me out of the book that you have written. But the Lord said to Moses, whoever sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. But now go lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you. Behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them." So Moses, even back then, knew there was a book in which are enrolled those who will be delivered by God. Moses says, if you're going to block out the Israelites, block me out as well. They're my people. I want to bring my people with me into the promised land. God says, no, that's not how it's going to be. Although Moses was anticipating. Moses was anticipating a greater one who would stand up and say the same thing and say, no, I want to rescue my people. Don't leave them to perish in the wilderness looking forward to Christ. And so we come back to Revelation 20, 11 through 15, the great white throne judgment, the final day when all the dead are raised back to life and they are brought before the throne. And it says this, the dead were judged by what was written in the books. It tells us what was written in the books according to what they had done. Every deed that had ever been done was recorded in the books. And they were judged according to what had happened in the books. And it says, the sea gave up the dead. Death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them. The dead came from forever. All the dead were raised up to stand before this judgment. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And so those who failed that judgment were cast out forever, cast into eternal punishment to be destroyed under the wrath of God forever. The problem is we can read into this and actually see none passed that judgment. The books were open and every single person failed. Every single person failed. If we went to the books and read the list of deeds, no person had made the righteousness of God. No person had matched what God would require. And so there's a final statement. If anyone's name was not written in the second book, the books were opened, and then a second book was opened. The first book was all the deeds that had ever been done, and all had failed. But a second book was opened, which was the book of life. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. And so even here at the end of the judgment, we hear the gospel being held up. None can make the judgment. None will survive when the books are open. None will make the cut. All are unrighteous. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. So the only hope is that your name would be enrolled in the book of life. That as Moses had so many millennia before, Christ would stand before the throne and say no. blot my name out of the book, or save my people. And so we find that there are those whose names are written in the book of life, who are rescued from this judgment, and then are going to enter into the events of Revelation 21, which we'll get to in a few minutes. But Revelation 20 ends with this great judgment, where all will fail, and all will be brought before the throne of God, and all will be declared guilty, unless they were found to be written in Christ's book, the book of life. So we come to Revelation chapter 20. We can argue back and forth and go through all sorts of different things trying to figure out what does the end look like. So what does this mean for us? What is the application? If we're going to study something it should have application or we really shouldn't be arguing about it at all because it doesn't matter that much. So what does Revelation 20 mean for us? It meant mostly to argue about the millennium or What does it mean? Actually, I'm going to come back to 2 Peter 3, because I think 2 Peter 3 is extremely parallel to what's going on in Revelation chapter 12. And so we get to this, is Christ coming back? When is the promise of his return? He's waiting a long time. Peter says, no. A thousand years with the Lord is one day, and one day is a thousand years. The Lord does not slow us, come some kind of slowness, but is patient towards you. Then he says, the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will be burned up and dissolved. and the earth and all that is done on it. But then he comes to the end. He says, if all that's true, this is the application. Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these. So he says, you're looking for it. You don't know when this is going to happen. You don't even know how all of this is going to happen. You just know that right now you're here and at some point in the future Christ will return and then cataclysmic events will happen and the end result will be the earth will be dissolved and all the deeds that will be done on it will be burned up with fire. He says, and then he's going to give five applications. These are the five things you should do if you are waiting for these. One, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish and at peace. Two, Count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destructions as they do the other scriptures. You, therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, three, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But four, grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Then this isn't technically a command, but we'll put this as five. To him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. So five applications. If we are waiting for these things, even if we're not sure what these things always mean or what they're going to look like, if we're waiting for these things, hoping for the return of Christ and the final consummation of all of his promise as we are winning, five things. Same application as last week, we should pursue holiness. If we can look forward and say there is a day when judgment is coming, there is a day when Christ will return, there is a day in which the evil will be destroyed forever and the saints will reign with Christ, then we should be preparing for ourselves for that day, we should pursue holiness. Or as Paul says, we should be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish and at peace. And so we take the gospel and apply it to ourselves and say, this is the message of God for me. I'm going to put on this gospel, and I'm going to walk in this gospel. And this gospel teaches me to deny ungodliness and worldly pleasures, and instead to pursue the discipline of God, to pursue righteousness and godliness. And so we say, if all these things are true, we believe Revelation 20, even if we don't always know exactly what it means. If we believe it, then we're going to be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish and at peace. Second, we should pursue the spread of the gospel. If we see that there is a day in which the judgment of God is going to fall, when all the evil will be judged and cast out forever, then as long as it's not that day right now, we should count the patience of our Lord as salvation. and say, right now, the gospel can still go forward. People can still bow their knee to Christ. Their names can still be written into the book of life so that they can be found blameless on that day. So we get that. He says, first, be found by him without spot or blemish and in peace. And second, count the patience of our Lord as salvation. He says, the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promises. Some count slowness, but is patient towards you. And this is what he says next, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach So count the patience of our Lord as salvation. As long as that day delays, as long as we haven't reached the day when we're like, oh, that's what it meant, we should be waiting and saying the gospel can still go forward. Satan is in some way bound, whether it's the binding of Revelation 21 or it's The binding of Revelation 12, if those are the same or different, I don't know. But Satan is somehow bound so the gospel can go forward in this earth. People can come and bow the knee to Christ. They can come and embrace the gospel. So participate in that. Be part of the gospel going forward to the nations. The undeceiving of the nations so that Satan does not have the victory. So we should pursue holiness for ourselves. We should pursue the spread of the gospel in the world. And then third, we should be wary of getting carried away by novel theology. We should be worried of being carried away by something new. Come back here, he says, you know what? Paul talks about this as well. Then he goes, you know what? I kind of like Paul. Paul's kind of confusing sometimes. Sometimes I don't understand Paul. He goes, here's the thing. Sometimes you don't understand things, but you can always figure out the application, what Christ wants you to do. But there's going to be some people that take, he's specifically referring to Paul, but we can spread this out to all the scriptures. There's going to be people that take confusing scriptures, they're going to start twisting them all up, and then running after new things. He says, you therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with them, not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. So we ought to be on guard and say our theology has to come from scripture. We should not be listening to new things or running after the guy who has this new prediction or this new understanding. He says, I understand what the end is going to look like or whatever it is. No, our path is clear. Wait for Christ. Endure with patience. Pursue holiness in the spread of the gospel. Don't get carried away after novel things, the new prediction that happens today. So pursue holiness in the spread of the gospel, not getting carried away by novel theology. And he says, the opposite of getting carried away by novel theology is focusing on one thing, Christ and his gospel. Don't get carried away by the error of law's people unless you're in stability, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. If anything is taking your eyes off of that, and running down all these predictions, or running down all these different things, and pulling you towards something else, that thing probably isn't worth following after. Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That's the foundational bedrock. If it's not going to say, I want to know Christ more, and I'm waiting for him to return. I want to know Christ more, and I'm waiting for him to return. Then you've probably gotten off on some sort of tangential sidestep. So pursue Christ and his gospel. And then devote yourself to worship, because we're going to be worshiping Christ now and forever. So that's how he ends the book of 2 Peter. To him, to Christ, to God in Christ, be glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. So those are the five applications I'd make. The five things, if these things are true, even if we don't know what true means, these things are true, then our call is clear. Run after Christ, pursue his gospel, put on the holiness that he has brought for us, and see that gospel go forward to others. And then there's a promise associated with that application. We come to Revelation 24 through 10. It said, they came to life and reigned with Christ, the souls of those who had been beheaded for the word of God, and all who had not worshiped Jesus. They came to life, their souls were raised up with Christ, and they reigned for 1,000 years. This is the first resurrection. Then it says this. We have these blessings just a few times in Revelation. They're always really important. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection. Over such, the second death has no power, that they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years. And so we ought to be working to find ourselves in that group, working to make sure that we have not been associated with the beast, and we're not running after what he desires, and we're not running after the pleasures and temptations and power of this world, but instead running after Christ. Because if we are found to have been running after Christ, instead of running after all the things that this world offers, then it says the second death has no power over us. The second death will not capture us, but instead we will reign with Christ and be priest of God and of Christ. And so there's a great promise, a promise I think that echoes an earlier promise from Revelation. Blessed are the dead who die in Christ from now on because their deeds will follow them. So come back to the main point. Satan, our great enemy, may be powerful, but he is not all-powerful. Both his power and his time are limited. We could argue about what that means, but we know that that's true. Both his power and his time are limited, and then he will be utterly destroyed. Their god will be victorious and be the final judge. So endure with patience, waiting for that day. So kids, here's your question for this message. What is the purpose of the millennium in Revelation? Purpose isn't to go argue with each other constantly and try to figure out exactly what's going to happen at the end. The millennium encourages believers that we will not always be in Satan's dominion. The millennium encourages believers that we will not always be under Satan's dominion, but the kingdom will be given to us. So we wait for Christ with patient deliverance. That's the meaning of the millennium. That's what we're supposed to gain from this text. Run after Christ, because now it looks hard, but now you're in an enemy land that won't be that way forever. Sin will be bound, and then it will be destroyed, and the kingdom will belong to you. Let's close in prayer. Father, we're grateful for these prophecies, these visions that you gave to John. Father, I pray that you would give us hearts that run after your purpose in them, not running after our own desire for knowledge or our own ways of construing things, but we would take them and run after Christ. Father, that we would take the encouragement that you have given us and the warnings that you have given us, that we would desire to find ourselves in Christ, wearing his holiness and living it out in our lives now and waiting for that day. Father, for that to happen, we need your Spirit to be in us, to be renewing us, to be guiding us after the things of Christ, even be giving us the desire to run after Christ. And so I pray that you would be filling us now with your Spirit, that we would be ready for that day. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. So I'll open it up for any questions or comments or other discussion. If not, I'll be grateful. Well, good morning, everybody.