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Voddie Baucham - When is the Millennial Reign of Christ? · Voddie Baucham Sermons

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  Speaker 1: There are several issues we need to address. Number one,
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  Speaker 1: the issue of where we are. In chapter 20, one
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  Speaker 1: of the questions that determines the way we read these
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  Speaker 1: first several verses and determines the way we understand the
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  Speaker 1: idea of the millennial reign of Christ is the question
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  Speaker 1: of where we are. Remember these seven visions. I'll recap
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  Speaker 1: them again. Vision number one, the church on earth. That's
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  Speaker 1: chapter one, verse nine through 322. Vision two, God's throne
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  Speaker 1: and the seven seals, 4-1 through 8-1. Vision three, the
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  Speaker 1: seven trumpets, 8-2 to 11-19. Vision four, there's an interlude,
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  Speaker 1: warfare and salvation, 12-1 to 14-20. Vision five, the seven
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  Speaker 1: bowls of judgment, 15-1 to 16-21. Vision six, we just finished,
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  Speaker 1: the victory of Christ. That's 17.1 to 19.21. And then
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  Speaker 1: vision seven, the new heavens and the new earth, 20.1
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  Speaker 1: through 22.5. We're in that seventh vision. We're in that retelling.
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  Speaker 1: So the idea here is that in Revelation 17 to 18,
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  Speaker 1: we see the destruction of Babylon the Great. In Revelation 19,
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  Speaker 1: we see the fate of the beast and the false prophet.
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  Speaker 1: And then in Revelation 20, we see the fate of
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  Speaker 1: the dragon and the consummation of all things before we
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  Speaker 1: see the new heavens and the new earth. So we
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  Speaker 1: need to understand that this is another one of those recapitulations.
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  Speaker 1: That chapter 20 doesn't follow chapter 19 chronologically. That's not
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  Speaker 1: what John is doing. Chapter 20 reintroduces the idea of
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  Speaker 1: the chronology of God's judgment of the world. We're starting again,
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  Speaker 1: kind of like we did chapter 6 into chapter 7,
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  Speaker 1: if you remember that. Who can stand? Remember that the
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  Speaker 1: world has been judged there in chapter 6, and then
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  Speaker 1: in chapter 7, we go answer the question, who can stand?
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  Speaker 1: So we go back in the midst of the judgment. Here,
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  Speaker 1: we go back to the beginning again. In order to
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  Speaker 1: see what God is doing. Which leads us to question
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  Speaker 1: number two. The millennium. This is the issue. First issue
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  Speaker 1: is where we are. Context. The second issue is the millennium.
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  Speaker 1: It's really simple. It's a thousand years. Verses one and two.
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  Speaker 1: Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven. Holding
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  Speaker 1: in his hand. The key to the bottomless pit. And
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  Speaker 1: the great chain. And he seized the dragon. That ancient serpent.
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  Speaker 1: who is the devil and Satan and bound him for
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  Speaker 1: a thousand years. Question number one is what is the millennium?
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  Speaker 1: What is the millennium? It's this picture of Christ's reign.
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  Speaker 1: Question number two, when is the millennium? And that's where
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  Speaker 1: people disagree. You have people who hold a premillennial position.
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  Speaker 1: That position argues that the millennium comes after Christ's second coming.
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  Speaker 1: So Jesus is going to return to the earth. And
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  Speaker 1: when he returns to the earth, there's going to be
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  Speaker 1: a thousand years where he reigns on the earth. And
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  Speaker 1: then the consummation of all things. These people usually interpret
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  Speaker 1: the thousand years literally, though not always. There are some
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  Speaker 1: premillennialists who won't interpret a thousand years literally. They're usually
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  Speaker 1: pessimistic about the future. Things are going to get worse
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  Speaker 1: and worse and worse. And then Jesus is going to return.
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  Speaker 1: Sometimes this can lead to a kind of why bother
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  Speaker 1: mentality as it relates to the culture. Why bother? We
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  Speaker 1: know things are just going to get worse and worse
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  Speaker 1: and worse. And then Jesus is going to return. So
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  Speaker 1: why bother? Why rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic
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  Speaker 1: since we're all going to sink, okay? Then there's the
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  Speaker 1: post-millennial view This is the idea that the millennium comes
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  Speaker 1: before the second coming. That this thousand years of Christ's
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  Speaker 1: reign actually occurs, this thousand year golden age actually occurs,
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  Speaker 1: and then Christ comes at the end of the age.
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  Speaker 1: These individuals usually, almost always, see the millennium as symbolic,
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  Speaker 1: not a literal thousand years. but a symbolic thousand years.
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  Speaker 1: And are very optimistic about the future, obviously. Things are
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  Speaker 1: going to get better and better and better. The gospel
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  Speaker 1: is going to spread and spread and spread. The world
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  Speaker 1: is going to become more and more and more Christianized.
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  Speaker 1: And there's the amillennial view. The amillennial view, again, a
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  Speaker 1: lot of people just go and they say, ah, that
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  Speaker 1: means no or not, millennial. There is no millennium. That's
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  Speaker 1: not actually what the amillennial view is. The amillennial view
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  Speaker 1: sees the millennium as the age between Christ's first and
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  Speaker 1: second coming, which is now. The amillennial view is that
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  Speaker 1: Christ is reigning now. The amillennial view says that what
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  Speaker 1: happens at the end of this period of time is
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  Speaker 1: that Christ returns at the consummation of all things at
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  Speaker 1: the end of the age. Therefore, people who hold this
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  Speaker 1: view always view the thousand years as symbolic and have
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  Speaker 1: an already not yet approach to the future. Christ is
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  Speaker 1: reigning here and now in and through his church. And
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  Speaker 1: yet his reign is not consummated until he returns in
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  Speaker 1: the future. as we've said on a number of occasions,
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  Speaker 1: the approach that we've taken to Revelation is from an
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  Speaker 1: amillennial perspective. And here's where sort of the rubber meets
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  Speaker 1: the road in explaining what we mean about that. One
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  Speaker 1: of the issues is, do we see this millennium as
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  Speaker 1: literal or symbolic? And to be quite honest with you,
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  Speaker 1: this is one of the things that kind of gets
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  Speaker 1: under my skin the most. when I deal with people
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  Speaker 1: from differing perspectives. Because oftentimes, as you heard in my
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  Speaker 1: own experience and Sam Storm's experience and Riddle Barger's experience
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  Speaker 1: and others' experience, there is this charge of liberalism, this
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  Speaker 1: charge of not taking the Bible literally and not taking
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  Speaker 1: the Bible seriously if you view the millennium as not
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  Speaker 1: being a literal thousand years. That is so incredibly disingenuous. Why? Why? Well,
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  Speaker 1: first of all, the nature of the book of Revelation.
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  Speaker 1: It's filled with symbolic numbers. It's filled with symbolic numbers.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, at the beginning of the book, the author
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  Speaker 1: makes it clear that he's using symbols. So how can
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  Speaker 1: it be not taking the Bible seriously when you interpret
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  Speaker 1: Revelation symbolically, just like Revelation says it's supposed to be interpreted? Secondly,
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  Speaker 1: the use of numbers, the use of numbers here and
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  Speaker 1: the use of numbers throughout the book would point us
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  Speaker 1: to the idea that we use this symbolically, not literally. Thirdly,
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  Speaker 1: there's other things in this text that are obviously symbolic.
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  Speaker 1: Let's look again, shall we? Then I saw an angel
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  Speaker 1: coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key
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  Speaker 1: to Are we talking about a literal key? No. To
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  Speaker 1: the bottomless pit. And a great chain. Is the devil
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  Speaker 1: going to have a literal chain around him in the
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  Speaker 1: bottomless pit? Again, those individuals who would interpret the thousand
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  Speaker 1: years literally look at these things and say they're symbolic.
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  Speaker 1: And he sees the dragon. I thought the devil was
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  Speaker 1: an angel who was a fallen angel now he's a
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  Speaker 1: dragon and of course those individuals who say it's liberal
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  Speaker 1: if you interpret the numbers symbolically don't look here and
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  Speaker 1: say the devil is literally a dragon so again they
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  Speaker 1: don't have a problem with symbolism unless and until it
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  Speaker 1: disagrees with them So Revelation, filled with symbols. The numbers
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  Speaker 1: used in the book, overwhelmingly used symbolically. The number 1,000
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  Speaker 1: has been used symbolically. We've already talked about that. And
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  Speaker 1: there are other things right here in this same paragraph
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  Speaker 1: that have to be interpreted symbolically. Listen to Kiss the Mocker.
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  Speaker 1: Revelation on the whole, in chapter 20 in particular, demonstrates symbolism.
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  Speaker 1: For instance, the chain with which the angel binds Satan
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  Speaker 1: is not a customary string of metal links. Neither is
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  Speaker 1: the key to the abyss a metallic object, nor are
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  Speaker 1: the thousand years chronologically 10 centuries. The term key appears
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  Speaker 1: in chapter 1, verse 18, where Jesus notes that he
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  Speaker 1: holds the keys of death and Hades. In 3.7, Jesus
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  Speaker 1: says that he holds the key of David. In 9.1,
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  Speaker 1: an angel described as a star holds the key to
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  Speaker 1: the abyss. In all these passages, the word signifies authority.
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  Speaker 1: It is clear that a spirit cannot be shackled with
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  Speaker 1: a chain but can be restricted by a divine command.
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  Speaker 1: And the expression 1,000 in a book that is filled
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  Speaker 1: with symbolic numbers intimates a multitude, that is, a large number.
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  Speaker 1: That is the most natural sense in which this term
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  Speaker 1: can be read.