40. The Thousand Year period - Part 2 of 2

a.k.a. The Millennium
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This is a continuation of post #39 below, and addresses some issues raised near the end of #39, especially why there would be more than one view of the Millennium, and what the various views might mean and include.

There are three main views of the Millennium, the thousand year period described in Revelation 20: 1-8.

The three views (a.k.a. positions, systems) are called premillennial, postmillennial, and amillennial, and are often shortened to pre-mill, post-mill, and a-mill in conversation. Within the premillennial and postmillennial views, there are important divisions that will be discussed sometime in a future post (perhaps in a Part 3 of 2. :^)

The three terms refer not so much to the Millennium itself, but rather its relationship in time and history compared to the second coming of Christ.

Here is a short description of what each of the views believe:

> The premillennial view believes that Jesus' second coming happens before (pre-) the Millennium, and that both the second coming and Millennium are yet future.

> The postmillennial view believes that Jesus' second coming happens after (post-) the Millennium, and that the second coming is future, but the Millennium has either ended, or is still going on (and is longer than a literal 1000 years). [An important variant says that the second coming has already happened, at least in part.]

> The amillennial view does not believe that the Millennium is a literal, actual, 1000-year period, and therefore it is meaningless to place Jesus' second coming in a time and history relationship within such a period. The second coming is generally considered still in the future, although some amillennialists do not believe in a literal, visible, actual second coming.

The postmillennial and amillennial view share a few things in common, in that both of them believe that (1) the Millennium is the period between the two comings of Jesus, (2) that Jesus began reigning in his fullness after he rose from the dead and ascended to heaven, (3) that Satan was bound at that same time, and (4) that the Kingdom of God arrived when Jesus was raised and ascended. The amillennial position has historically been the dominant view of the Christian church.

The postmillennial view grew in popularity from the 1600's to the early 1900's, and traditionally has believed that while we await Jesus' coming, the world has been getting better and better, eventually ushering in a new golden age. This view fell upon hard times after the two world wars, and the historical postmillennial view is now in decline, with one important exception: a robust and important recent view usually dated from the 1980's known variously as dominion theology, christian reconstruction, and theonomy. More about this view in a later post.

For the sake of honest disclosure, the writer of this website believes that the premillennial view explains the whole of Biblical prophecy most satisfactorily for many reasons. To mention the two most important, premillennialists feel that both the other two views suffer from two fatal flaws, which are:

First, the interpretation of the binding of Satan. The amillennial and the postmillennial views believe that this happened when Christ was raised from the dead and subsequently ascended to heaven to begin his Kingdom reign. In other words, Satan has been bound since approximately 35 A.D. If you have lived long in this world, you may be surprised to hear that.

Since to the normal Christian it has not seemed (nor does it now seem) that Satan is bound sufficiently, adherants of the two views generally explain that he will be further bound at the end of the age, when Jesus returns.

Now if there were no detailed description in scripture of the actual binding, perhaps we could agree with this position. But the only binding of Satan that the bible describes is not a partial and tentative binding whereby he is weakened, but a full and complete binding in which he is totally disabled. Here is the scripture passage that describes the binding of Satan:

20:1 Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. 2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, 3 and threw him into the bottomless pit, and shut it up and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. But after that he must be released for a little while.

Note that not only is Satan bound with a great chain during the Millennium, but he was thrown into the bottomless pit. And not only that, but the pit was shut up and locked with a key. And not only that, but it was sealed over him. And further, during this period, the nations cannot be deceived by Satan and his forces. That does not seem to square with the reality of the times since Christ's first coming.

That is why premillennialists say the period starting at Christ's ascension (35 A.D. - present) cannot possibly be the Millennium as the two other views say, because Satan has been active during the entire period and is surely currently active. Therefore the Millennium must be yet future, and the post-mil and a-mill views must be mistaken.

But there is a second reason of equal strength: In Revelation chapter 20, the Millennium begins, not after Jesus Christ's first coming, resurrection and ascension (which in Revelation's prophetic chapters can be seen only in Rev 12:5), but instead after his glorious and victorious second coming which can be seen happening in the 19th chapter, leading the way logically into the 20th chapter. First, His glorious, victorious coming in 19, and only then the Millennium in 20.

I'm sure I will be addressing this issue more in later posts, but as for now, hopefully this will help you understand that while there are three main views, they are not equally valid. And, there is only one view that has no fatal flaw, and which generally adheres to the most reasonable and the most literal meaning of the passages involved.
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