Revelation 20
Let’s hear God’s word together.
This is Revelation chapter 20, beginning at verse one. This
is still John and he continues with his, I saw visions. This is the seventh and final
vision. of Revelation. He says, 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 who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had
not received its marks on their foreheads or their hands. They
came to life. They reigned with Christ for
a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life
until the thousand 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 sand
of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the
earth. They 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. They
will be tormented day and night forever and ever. Then I saw a great white throne
and him who is seated on it. And from his presence, the earth
and sky fled away. 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. 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. Amen. This is God’s word. May we take encouragement from
it this evening. There are certain scriptures
in the Bible that are very upsetting. There are places in the Bible,
there are passages in the Bible that are very confusing. And
then there are passages of the scriptures that cause people
to have so many questions. One of those places is chapter
20, the millennium. It’s chapter 20, the judgment.
It’s chapter 20. Where is Satan and what is he
up to? Where is Satan and what is he
capable of doing? A couple Wednesday nights ago,
maybe two months back now in July, we talked a little bit
about the millennium, the thousand years. We talked about there
are basically two millennial views. One is pre-millennial
and one is post-millennial. And for lots of years, these
were the dominant views. And now it’s spread a little.
There are maybe four significant views. The premillennial view
has stretched into the dispensational premillennial view, which if
you’ve bumped into the Left Behind series or bumped into the prophecy
preaching you might find on the television, you see a literal
interpretation of this thousand years. Then there’s the historic
premillennial view held for centuries by many faithful servants. But
then there’s the postmillennial view. which for thousands of
years has been held and now maybe more faithfully called the Amillennial
view. But basically, we understand
as the Reformed Church, we understand that this thousand years is figurative. It’s figurative for of the time
between the two advents of Jesus. Jesus was born a few years BC. How Jesus was born a few years
BC, before Christ, figure that one out. But we think he was
born maybe in 6 BC, maybe somewhere around 4 BC, somewhere in between. But the advent of Jesus a few
years before Christ, to 2019. He’s still not yet come. We are in at least a 2,000 year
millennium. Got to figure that out. But we
take it as a figurative stretch of time between Advents. It’s
simply that and nothing more, nothing less. Most Christian
interpreters have believed this. for the couple thousand years
of history. It’s just really been the last 150 years or so
that this dispensational premillennial craze has hit. They didn’t discover
anything new, they just at least in my estimation, made up something
new, and it’s very confusing, and it causes great difficulty
in interpreting the rest of the parts of the Bible in some places. So we believe that this millennium
is this period of time between Jesus’ first coming and his second
coming. We’re in the millennium now,
as it were. So here’s the question. What
occurs? What takes place? What are some
of the features of life in this millennium, in this figurative
1,000 years that so far is, well, it’s 2,000 years. Well, first
thing that we find, the first feature is Satan. Satan appears in verses one to
three. John says, 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, the
ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for
a thousand years, threw him into the pit, he shut it, he 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 how about Satan in the millennium. Well, sometimes you hear us speak
of Satan as God’s devil. He’s God’s devil and he’s on
a chain. He can only go so far as God allows him. We see this
very clearly in the prologue to the book of Job. Job is wandering
the earth to and fro. God calls him into heaven. He
comes and appears in the court of the throne of God. And God
says, Hey, Satan, where have you been? He says, Oh, I’m just
wandering about looking for trouble. Basically what he says. And he
says, looking for some trouble to make. And he says, if you
consider my servant Job, you can do whatever you will, but
do not take his life. And so we know of the troubles
of Job, his family taken, his stuff taken. He goes through
30 some chapters of struggle with God. And in the end, he
says, God, you’re sovereign. I’m not. Whatever you ordain
is right. And God restores to him way more than he ever had
before. And it gives us a theology of
suffering, but it also gives us a theology of Satan. Satan
is God’s devil. He can only go so far as God
allows him. I think I’ve told y’all this
a number of times about the Doberman pincher on a chain in my childhood. And that dog would come running
at the fence, but that chain was attached to that post. And
he would lunge, but the chain would stop him. That’s how we
picture the devil. He is on a chain. He is God’s
devil. But the strong man has been bound
up. He is tied up. Or as our passage
says, he is in the bottomless pit. The top has been put on,
the lid has been shut and sealed. But notice the end of verse three.
For a little while, he will be released. We don’t know when
that is, but we understand it to mean that at some point in
The time between the advents of Jesus, Satan will be more
active than before on the earth. But we have a good hymn for this,
don’t we? A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing. And we speak in that hymn, we
sing in that hymn of the rage of Satan. We speak about how
we can endure it. We can hide in the shelter of
God most high. that he will protect us from
the evil one. And there’s that wonderful phrase
in there, lo, his doom is sure, one little word shall fail him. He is a ruthless, evil enemy
of God and his people, but he is limited. He is God’s devil
and he is on a change. And we remember also this great
truth, the church is built up in the world. The world is not
the final place for the church. We’re an outpost of heaven and
God is establishing and building us up while we live in this world. But he will ultimately take us
to be with him in heaven. So how do we how do we work with
this truth? Well, we have the word. We have
the same scripture that Jesus quoted and used to fight off
the devil and his temptations, his influences, his temptings,
his rage and his fury at the church. This morning’s passage
of scripture in Luke’s gospel chapter 10, remember it said
that when the 72 went out, they had authority over demons, they
could cast them out of people. And God said to them, as you
were doing that, I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven. And we need to remember that
yes, Satan is a real enemy, but God has given us the power to
overcome him. And he continues and continues
and continues to lose when the church is faithful and does what
God commands us. But we remember the words of
Martin Luther, lo, his doom is sure. One little word shall fail
him. One of the features of this millennium
is Satan’s activity. Well, there’s another feature
of the millennium that we find in verses four through six, and
it’s a picture of the saints in heaven. Verse four says, I
saw thrones and seated on them were those to whom 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, who had not worshiped the beast or its image. They
had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned
with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not
come to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the
first resurrection. So we have a picture of saints
and I want you to think about. Think about something for a minute.
Back up from this picture. How did God first make man and
woman to live on the earth? He made Adam and Eve. He made
a male and female. He put them in the garden. He
told them to dress the earth, to keep it, to be fruitful, to
multiply, to fill the earth, to subdue it and to make it prosper. That was the original command
of God to Adam and Eve. In a sense, he was saying, you
be kings of the earth. Now this was before sin. They
were to be kings of earth and basically take life in Eden and
let Eden spread over the whole earth. And so that the whole
earth would be filled with the glory of God and the wonders
of creation. Well, why do you think Satan
appeared by chapter three? because he did not want Eden
and the wonders of God to spread over all the earth. That would
detract from Satan’s glory and bring God more glory and Satan
would have nothing of it. And so we know the story of the
fall. We know Satan came into the garden. He tempted Eve. She and Adam both ate of the
fruit. Mankind fell and Adam and Eve were kicked out of the
garden. They were put out into the jungle. They were clothed.
with the skins of animals and Eden and the tree of life were
blocked off from Adam and Eve until Christ could come and redeem
and take us to heaven. But there’s this age old battle
of Satan does not want this world to be a glorious place filled
with the glory and goodness of God. But there’s still this command. There’s still this creation command
for us to be the kings of the earth and to rule it. And we
see it. We live in a wonderful technological
world. Most of you are holding these little wonderful devices
in your hands that can do way more than the first computers
50 years ago. Most of you drove here in automobiles.
Cars that can get us places A to Z safely. Most of us live in
a place with a roof over our head. We have air conditioners
in this heat. We have food that is delivered to us by way of
the grocery store. We have all these wonders. Some
of you have had parts of your human body fixed or replaced
or repaired by men and women who God has made in his image
and made in a special way to know how to do pretty amazing
things. So we’re living in a wonderful
time where we have seen human beings made in God’s image serve
as kings of the earth. Imagine if the fall hadn’t taken
place. Imagine how much smarter and
amazing we’d be. Also imagine how much less trouble there would
be. Actually, there’d be no trouble
at all. But I want you to think about
this as we look at verses four through six, the fall stopped
the mandate to rule the earth. You see very quickly in the early
chapters of Genesis, what did evil men do? Well, they built
Sodom and Gomorrah. They built the Tower of Babel.
You had Lamech who said if revenge on the life of Cain is seven
fold. Anybody who touches me, revenge
is 70 fold. You had men and women and boys
and girls living wickedly until the time of Noah, when God put
one family in the ark and destroyed the rest of mankind by a flood. But God in Christ, as we see
the progressive revelation, we see God in Christ coming into
this world, dying for our sins. And as each of us comes to faith
in Jesus, he makes us new creations. And so we talk week by week as
we think of being evangelists, that as we live a God fearing
life, And as we live as Christian people to a standard of holiness
out in the world, people are going to say, who are you? Where’d
you come from? And we speak of our citizenship being in heaven
and how God in Christ has saved us and redeemed us and made us
new creations. And so in a sense, we are ruling
the earth by our faithfulness to God and by influencing it
little by little. But there’s a picture here of
the saints who’ve gone to heaven and what are they doing? they’re
ruling, they’re reigning, and they’re judging. Sometimes we
walk through the little card aisle at Hallmark or wherever
it is we purchase our cards and we get our theology from that
place a little too often, but we think Oh, you know, dear old
dad, dear old mom, dear old Aunt Maude or whoever who’s gone before
us. You know, they entered the pearly gates and St. Peter put
them in the pickup truck and drove them on up to the big house.
And, you know, they were issued their harp. They were issued
their angel wings. We got in our theology from It’s
a Wonderful Life. Every time a person dies, they
get their wings or something like that. Our theology is just
all out of whack, isn’t it? What does this passage tell us?
The saints in heaven are sitting on thrones. It’s speaking here
specifically of the martyred saints. You think of the Jim
Elliots, you think of the polycarps, you think of all of those who’s
given their lives for the cause of Christ. They are sitting on
thrones. They are ruling, they are reigning,
and they are judging with almighty God, with Jesus Christ. And they
are waiting for the great day of judgment. as they sit on these
thrones. They rule and they reign when
they get to heaven. They rule with Christ. And so
one of the great comforts we have is that judgment is coming. Judgment is coming on those who
are martyred. Judgment is coming on those who
have done evil and wicked things. But we rule and we reign with
Jesus Christ. God has made us a kingdom of
priests and he’s made us to rule and to reign with him. So scrap
the angel’s wings, scrap the harps and all that business.
Look at seats of judgment and thrones. Doesn’t make too much
good for Hallmark cards, but it does bring us great comfort
that we will sit with Christ. There’s a third feature in this
millennial chapter here, this view of the chapter, and it’s
a beatitude. Look at verse six. I think I’ve
mentioned to y’all there are, I believe, seven Beatitudes in
the book of Revelation. And I forget which number this
is. I think it’s the fifth one, if I’m not mistaken. But verse
six says, blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first
resurrection. Over such, the second death has
no power, but they will be priest of God and of Christ. they will
reign with him for 1,000 years. I want you to think about something
strange for a minute. This has nothing to do with the
book of Revelation, so don’t confuse what I’m about to say
with some mystical thought about Revelation that you might have
read about or heard about. Think about a world leader, a president.
You see why I’m already getting into trouble. Think, oh, is he
talking about Putin or the Chinese guy or whatever? No, this is
completely unrelated to all the fanciful business of Revelation.
But think about a world leader for a moment who, they sat on
a great throne of the earth. They rode in the armored car.
They had access to the button. You know what I mean by the button?
They could push it and the world would end, that kind of thing.
But this ruler was a Christian, a Christian who had great power
while on earth. What about when they died and
got to heaven? What do you think they would think about their
little earthly throne once they got to heaven? It’s a big difference,
isn’t it? It’s a vast difference. And God
in Christ here says through John, blessed and holy is the one who
shares in the first resurrection. Now, this is where a whiteboard
or something like that would come in very handy. I want you
to think about the first resurrection and the second resurrection on
one hand, the first death and the second death on the other
hand. You gotta fill in the blanks or the gaps here, as it were.
Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection. Over such, the second death has
no power. What do you think the first resurrection
is? Well, it’s when a person dies, their souls, as our catechism
teach us, do immediately pass into glory and their bodies,
being still united to Christ, do rest in their grave until
what? The second resurrection. So the first resurrection is
our spirits being made perfect and going to heaven. What about
the second resurrection? It’s at the last day, our bodies,
which have rested in the graves, united to Christ are raised up
into glory and we’re given new bodies. What about the first
death? He says here, blessed and holy
is the one who shares in the first resurrection over such
the second death has no power. And then if you skip over to
the end, It speaks of the same terms again over in 11 through
15, which we’ll come to in just a moment. But the first death
would be the physical death of a unbeliever. What happens when
they die? Their bodies go in the grave
and their spirits go into everlasting judgment and torment. What about
at the second death for an unbeliever? Their bodies are resurrected
and where are they sent? their sin into hell forever.
And so for Christians, there’s the first resurrection, the spirit
going into heaven, the second resurrection, the body being
united to the spirit and enjoying heaven and God’s presence forever.
But for the non-believer, the first death would be their spiritual
death, the second, their physical body being handed over to Satan
and to judgment forever. And he says, blessed and holy
is the one who shares in the first resurrection, a good passage
of comfort to us. It’s a strange one, but it ought
to bring us great comfort. There’s a fourth feature, a fourth
feature of this millennium, and that’s the defeat of Satan. You
find it in verse seven through 10. He says, when the thousand
years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison. He
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 sand
of the sea. And they marched up over the
broad plain of the earth. They surrounded the camp of the saints
and that beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed
them. 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. If you remember back at the end
of verse three, it said, after that, Satan must be released
for a little while. And one of the things we believe
about the end times, if you’re an amillennial, you believe things
are gonna get worse and worse, right? Are things getting worse
and worse? Probably so. But if you’re postmillennial,
you believe things are gonna get better and better and that will have
an effect on culture. Well, most reformed folks take the amillennial
position that Satan is going to wreak havoc on the earth And
then, as Jesus says in Matthew 24, which we read in just a little
bit ago, that’ll be the sign of the end of things to come,
when things get worse and worse. The question is, how bad will
it get? And is it bad now or is it going to be bad later?
We don’t know. We just hold on to our seats,
buckle up, trust the Lord, and know that at the end of the day,
when the forces of Satan surround the church, guess what? Fire
from heaven will come down and take care of our enemies. We
just said in our catechism earlier this night that Christ as our
King, he does a lot of things. He calls us to himself by his
word and spirit. He subdues us to himself by his almighty power,
but he controls and he destroys all his and all our enemies.
And so, yes, while the enemies may surround us, we must think
like the Old Testament saints when they looked up on the hills
and what did they see beyond the vast numbers of the Assyrian
army? They saw the host of heaven coming to make war. And in that
day, thousands upon thousands upon thousands of Assyrians fell
by the sword of the hand of the Lord. And so, just the same,
we see the defeat of Satan. He’ll be released for a little
while. He’ll make war on the saints. The Antichrist will deceive.
It will be of Old Testament proportions. He mentions a passage from Ezekiel.
Gog and Magog had surrounded Jerusalem. Jerusalem was terrified,
but God took care of his people. God’s people are hated. They’re
attacked by Satan. It’s true of the church today.
but fire will descend and the enemies will be thrown into the
lake of fire forever. And so the defeat of Satan, lo,
his doom is sure, is of great comfort to us. And then last,
there’s judgment, verses 11 through 14. 15, I saw a great white throne
and him who was seated on it from his presence, earth and
sky fled away. No place was found for them.
And I saw the dead great and small standing before the throne.
Books were opened. And 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. 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.” There’s a little statement that a minister makes
at a graveside service. It’s called the committal. We
commit the body back to the earth. And over the years, I’ve used
different statements of committal, but the one I’ve landed on that
I really like using is, I think, of the most comfort because when
you’re at the burial service, you’re committing the body of
a loved one into the grave, you sort of want to know All right,
what’s next? What’s gonna happen to this person?
So I always quote the catechism, the souls of believers are at
their death made perfect in holiness and do immediately pass into
glory, but their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest
in their grave until the resurrection. But there’s a statement in the
committal that is made, and I believe this is the one from the Orthodox
Presbyterian Church. It speaks of, at the last day,
At the last day when Christ shall come with trumpet sound, the
earth and the sea shall give up their dead. The graves will
be opened and the sea will be opened and everyone who died.
Sometimes we wonder, can God resurrect a body? you know, that’s
been in a war-torn land, or been through 9-11, or, you know, many
people have died at sea over the centuries. We’re really only
living in a modern era the last hundred years or so. But lots
can happen to the human body as it’s laid to rest in whatever
fashion. And the earth and the sea give up their dead, and Jesus
is able perfectly to raise us up and give us new bodies. And
this picture of judgment, I think, gives us hope. Saints and sinners
are both raised. Saints and sinners are both raised.
The books are opened. Now, which book do you want to
be in? You want to be in the Lamb’s Book of Life. That was
in our passage of scripture this morning. Isn’t it interesting
that as we make our way through Luke and we make our way through
Revelation, how on the same day, there’s two things from Luke.
Satan falling from heaven under the power of the ministry of
the disciples and now the book of life. Jesus said you should
rejoice not that Satan obeys you but that your book is in
the book of life. Isn’t it interesting how preaching through Luke and
preaching through Revelation on the same day those two things
just re-emphasize to us God is speaking to us and he knows what
we need to hear. But interestingly or as interesting
as that is, saints and sinners are raised, the books are opened,
Saints to everlasting glory and sinners to everlasting punishment. And so here’s a question, and
I don’t mean to ask this casually. I mean with all my heart for
you to think about this. Are you sure you’re a Christian?
Are you sure your name is in the book of life? You come to
a passage like this tonight, it’s a you is or you ain’t passage,
isn’t it? It’s a everlasting joy or everlasting
suffering passage. Which book is your name in? That’s a mighty big question,
isn’t it? God is not playing around. You
see, as the culmination of human history is coming to pass, you
see that this cosmic war between God and his Christ and Satan
and his minions, it is coming to a culmination. And who wins? It’s God, and He wins big. He plays for keeps as He draws
us to Himself, but He punishes forever, not only Satan, but
also those who don’t call on His name. So are you sure that
you’re a Christian? Do you trust in Jesus Christ
alone for your salvation, for the forgiveness of your sins?
And do you believe that your name is written in his book. That’s a big question, an ultimate
question. And that’s something we ought
to not go to sleep tonight before we have answered for sure in
our minds. Do I know Christ? And when he
appears, am I going to be happy to see him? Or am I going to
be utterly terrified and wish that the rocks and the mountains
might fall on me and hide me from his wrath that he has promised
to come? Let’s go to the Lord in prayer.
Our great God, we thank you that during this end of times, as
we live between the first and second coming of Jesus, we have
great hope. We have great hope that you love
us. You keep your church and yes, evil will befall us. There
will be tough times for Christians in this world, but we thank you
that we know the end, that Satan will fall to his great doom and
you will gather your saints into your heaven forever. We pray,
Lord, that we would know the way of salvation most clearly,
that we would embrace Jesus Christ as he is so freely offered to
us in the gospel, so that when we embrace him, our names are
etched forever. Our names are indelibly placed
into your book of life that Jesus one day will bring and open.
And we pray that our names would be in it by faith. And it’s in
his name we pray.