Now we get to take a look at the millennial reign of Christ—the 1,000 year rule of Christ on earth. Now let’s review just a moment two great events that have just been revealed in the previous chapter.
First, Jesus Christ is going to return to earth as conqueror, and He is going to destroy the antichrist and all the war machines and armies of the world at Armageddon. There will not be a shot fired at Armageddon. When Jesus appears in the heavens, He will give one blast of His glory and the most powerful laser beam the world has ever known will destroy the armies and nations of the world.
Second, Christ will take Satan and bind and remove him from the earth for 1,000 years. For 1,000 years Satan will not be able to tempt or deceive people on earth.
Now we get into the next passage, which is the millennial reign of Christ on earth and the first resurrection. READ verse 4. This is the resurrection and rule of the believers. John sees thrones and people sitting on them with the authority to judge and rule. He also sees millions of believers who were martyred during the tribulation, those who were killed for their witness for Christ and their stand for the Word of God. These are those who refused to worship and receive the mark of the antichrist.
Who are the people sitting on the thrones? They are those who live again or come to life again and who reign with Christ. They are those who take part in the first resurrection.
Notice that John sets the martyrs off as a special group of believers. Why? Probably because they paid the ultimate price for Christ—they died for Him. If there is anyone who should be rewarded and given the right to rule with Christ, it should be them.
The Millennium reign of Jesus Christ is:
• When the believers’ rule and reign with Christ begins.
• When Jesus sets up the organization and arrangement of rule and reign throughout the whole universe.
• When Christ gives believers their duties and responsibilities, their assignments and service for eternity.
• When Christ removes the fallen spiritual beings from power. Where Satan and his host are bound and removed from power.
• This is where Christ reclaims the positions of the powers.
READ verse 5. This is the resurrection of believers only. The millennial reign of Christ will see only the resurrection of believers. Verse 6 says it is for those who are blessed and holy and upon whom the second death has no power. In other words, the first resurrection will be only of those who are going to live forever. The rest of the dead, the unbelievers, will not come to life until after the 1,000 years are finished.
READ verse 6. We see here the privilege of the resurrected believers in the Millennium. The resurrected believers will have six privileges in the Millennium.
? They will be blessed. That is what everyone is seeking—to be blessed. The problem occurs when we look at blessing from the wrong viewpoint. For instance, we tend to think that a blessing is when we get a better position in our job, when we come into money, or more possessions, or fame, power, and worldly pleasures. The only blessedness is found in Jesus Christ. He is the only one who can raise a person in the first resurrection. He is the only one who can give a person the right to rule and reign with Him in His millennial reign.
? The second privilege for the resurrected believers is that they will be holy. That is, they will be perfected into the holiness of Christ Himself. They will be perfectly separated from the world and set apart unto God.
? The third privilege is that the resurrected believers will never be touched by the second death. What is the second death? It means a second kind of death. The first death is when we leave this world and pass into the next world. The second death refers to eternal death, being separated from God forever. It means to be put in a different place other than where God is. When we get to verse 14 we will see more about the second death.
? The resurrected believers will serve as a priest of God and of Christ. This means that we will have the same right that we now have on earth, the right to enter the presence of God and Christ as needed. It will be as it is now except that then we will be face-to-face with God and Christ whereas now we approach Him through prayer and thought.
? The resurrected believer will rule and reign with Christ. These will be the different positions of service that are mentioned in chapter 19. (Rev. 19:8)
? The resurrected believer will serve under the rule of Christ.
Let’s try to answer the question, “Why is the Millennium necessary?” Jesus is going to return to earth and rule for 1,000 years. Why? Why doesn’t He just end everything when He comes back to earth? There are several reasons.
? The earth must be ruled over by Christ in its present form. Why? Because the earth belongs to Christ. He created the world and man. Man gave the world to Satan and when he did it brought evil into the world. So, Jesus has to reclaim the earth and bring righteousness to the earth, and He has to do it while the earth is in its present form. To just destroy the earth would mean that God failed with the present earth. God can’t fail. So, Jesus has to reclaim the earth and rule over it before He moves the world and believers into the perfect world.
? Why is the Millennium necessary? Because God has to fulfill all the promises to man that are in His Word. In order to bless the few believers on earth, in order to fulfill His promises, Jesus has to come back to earth while it’s in its present form. God made some wonderful promises throughout Scripture that haven’t yet been fulfilled, and they can’t be fulfilled without Christ ruling and reigning and bringing them about.
? Why is the Millennium necessary? Because God is love, and He wants to see more people saved despite the terrible evil of past history and the horrible evil of the end under the antichrist. In the millennium, God is going to give man the very presence of His Son. He will give man utopia on earth, peace and prosperity, giving every opportunity in the world to receive Christ as Lord.
Now let’s go just a little deeper. The believers are resurrected. This is a bodily resurrection. The believers will be in their resurrected bodies and people on earth in their earthly bodies. There will be mingling among the two.
We will have bodies in heaven and eternity. We will not be just some floating spirit on a cloud. In fact, we will have our present bodies, with one difference, they will be perfected. This is the purpose for the resurrection: to raise up the very elements of our bodies and perfect them to live eternally in the perfect environment of heaven and earth.
So, during the millennium, it will be just like it was when Christ fellowshipped with the disciples after His resurrection. He was in His resurrected body and the disciples were in their earthly bodies. During the Millennium, it will be a common thing for the resurrected Lord and resurrected believers to fellowship with people in their earthly bodies. All will have bodies, some earthly, some heavenly. The Millennium will be a new age for the earth. Life on earth will be entirely different from what it is now.
The next 4 verses are shocking. Verses 7-10 tell us that at the end of the Millennium Satan is going to be set loose from hell and allowed to deceive people again.
READ verse 7. Satan is loosed and immediately deceives the nations. Weren’t the nations destroyed at Armageddon? The Scripture tells us that there will still be people on earth after Armageddon, people who will go through the Millennium.
So, there will be survivors of Armageddon who will become witness to the glory of Christ when they return home to their nations. There will even be some survivors of the bowl judgments which fall on the earth, and some survivors of the catastrophic earthquake. We have to remember that this earthquake takes place at the same time as Armageddon, when Christ returns to earth, but there will be some survivors.
There will be people who turn to the Lord during the Millennium. So, there will be nations that exist when Christ returns to earth. The number of people will be greatly decreased after the trumpet and bowl judgments, but there will still be survivors. It will be the people of these nations and the future generations born during the Millennium that Christ will rule with an iron scepter. It will be these over whom He will execute justice.
READ verse 8. When Satan is set loose at the end of the Millennium, he will immediately deceive the nations. The Scriptures tell us that everything during the Millennium will not be saved. There will be many whose hearts that will not belong to Christ.
Even though Christ will actually be living in Jerusalem where His palace and rule will be centered, there will still be hearts of many that will be hard toward Him. How could this possibly happen when Christ will rule for 1,000 years, when He will personally guide the rebuilding of the world’s cities and bring peace and prosperity to earth?
The answer is the same as what is experience today and has been experienced since the beginning of time. When Christ came to earth over 2,000 years ago, people not only rejected Him, but many denied that He was even God’s Son.
Today, despite all the clear and unmistakable evidence, most reject and deny Him. Remember, too, that the Millennium is 1,000 years. That’s a long time. People around the earth, as we all tend to do, will begin to fall into a routine. Years will pass and some people won’t even meet Christ face-to-face.
What will happen will be just what has happened since Christ came the first time, people will begin to think of Christ in terms of a mere man. To many He will be just another ruler. Many will follow the deception of Satan. They will be numbered as the sand of the sea. They are called by the name Gog and Magog.
These are the names that symbolize the nations that come from the north to fight against God’s people. Gog was the king of Magog.
READ verses 9-10. The final armies of the world will be destroyed and Satan will be condemned forever. The nations will march against Jerusalem and the throne of Christ to take over the world for themselves but there will be no battle.
The nations will misinterpret who Christ is. They will let the fact that He has come to earth throw them into thinking He is only a mere man as they are. God will intervene and cause fire to fall out of heaven and consume the armies. The devil will then be taken and cast into the lake of burning sulfur with the antichrist and the false prophet. They will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
