78 - Millennium and Eternal State, Part 2

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Well, welcome to the

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Striving for Eternity Academy. This is a ministry of striving for eternity. You can go to strivingforeternity .org

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to find out more about the ministry, other things we provide, more about this and other classes.

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This class is our last, wow, can you believe it, last in our School of Systematic Theology.

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We've been going through four different books. This is book four, the one we're calling God's Plan for the

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Ages, and this is our last and final lesson in a long list of lessons called lesson number nine,

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The Millennium and the Eternal State. This is actually 78 classes in theology, and this was just our overview class.

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Wait until we start getting into detail, wow. So we've broken it up into four different major sections.

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We've gone through a lot, and I encourage you to make sure you go to the beginning actually. Never start your theology with the study of end times.

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Bad, bad, bad. Don't do that. But I encourage you to get your syllabus if you have a syllabus.

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If you don't have a syllabus, well, for one class it probably wouldn't make much sense. But if you were to go back, you can pick up all of the syllabuses.

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They're $25 each on the website. You can also get them four for $75, so you can get all four books for the

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Systematic Theology for $75, or you could go and get all six that we currently have for $100 or any of the future ones, any six for $100.

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So that's the way we do the bulk. So if you wanted to get four of the same one or six of the same one, you can do that and still get the discount.

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So in case you wanted to get it for friends. So with that, we are welcoming you again to this.

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I want to encourage you again, Systematic Theology should always be rooted in the attributes of God, and therefore you should really start with the first few lessons when studying theology.

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A lot of people like to start in either one of two areas, salvation, what's called soteriology.

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Basically, they like to debate the Calvinism or Arminianism issue. Or what the other thing that people love to discuss is this one, end times.

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Man, there's so much speculation you could do, and there are people that spend way too much time, in my opinion, focused on things that, well, they're not going to be as clear as what's already been fulfilled.

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And because of that, there's lots of speculation, lots of people do lots of study. I'm not saying it's wrong, but I am saying that if you're dividing over these issues and you're willing to, as we've been having people who get very upset because of our position on end times,

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I've been trying to fairly represent each of the positions. And just because my conclusion or my position doesn't agree with yours, it doesn't mean that you should be calling us names.

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Let's try to, I know this is a crazy idea for Christians, show grace. You want grace from God?

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You want mercy from God? How about we try showing it to other Christians? I know,

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I know. Some people are just saying, well, we're not Christian because we disagree with their end times view. Yeah, that's the people

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I'm speaking to. So, you know, this is an area, it's not one that I love to study.

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I actually don't do lots of study on end times because, A, it's something of speculation.

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There's some general things we can know for sure. We'll look at some of those even today. But the reality is the specifics are not as clear as people would like to think.

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And it's for that reason that I really want to focus in on what we do know.

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However, it would be wrong for us to teach a systematic theology class and not address the issue since much of the

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Bible deals with the second coming and covers the issue of prophecy.

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So we have to deal with these issues. So we mentioned last week, last week we talked about the millennium.

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And in that study, we're still going to kind of go through a little bit of that. In the study of the millennium, we talked about three major views.

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That's not all the views. It's the major views, amillennialism, postmillennialism, premillennialism.

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And again, I just want to give the overview real quick that amillennialism was the idea that there is no, a millennium being a thousand year kingdom, there is no literal thousand year kingdom on earth where Christ is going to rule on earth.

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So the idea of amillennialism, a meaning negative in Greek, so it's anti -millennial or no millennium.

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And so it's the idea that the millennial kingdom is more of a figurative time period. And instead of being on earth, it is

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Christ's reign over the world while in heaven.

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So there you see things are more figurative and whatnot. Now, with that, we then move into postmillennialism, which is the idea that there will be a kingdom or some would say that there'll be a thousand year kingdom.

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Some like amillennialism see it as figurative. So that, it's going to depend on who you talk to. There's going to be some, and keep in mind within each of these three camps, there's lots of smaller camps.

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So I'm trying to keep this high level, but it's the idea that Christ will return post or after the literal kingdom.

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So whether it's a literal thousand year kingdom or a figurative thousand year kingdom in postmillennialism, they're going to say that it's after the kingdom that we have the second coming.

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And so those that would say that the difference here, so let's look at these two camps. Postmillennialism that sees it as literal is kind of agreeing with amillennialism.

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It's just that they do think that Christ will return at the end of the kingdom, even though it's a literal time period.

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And those that believe in a literal kingdom are still going to see that he's going to return after that kingdom.

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So with premillennialism, so that's before, it's that the return is going to be before the thousand year kingdom and that Christ would come, he'll reign physically on earth during that thousand years and that will be a literal kingdom that he's going to do.

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So those are the three major views. Like I said, there's lots of ones underneath, but let's go, if you have a syllabus, to letter number

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B, the false concerns with the millennium. Now let's deal with this first one.

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This one is out of Daniel, Daniel, if we could put it up, Daniel 2, 34 and Daniel 2, 44.

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So Daniel 2 verses 34 and 44, now this is dealing with this image that Daniel is giving the interpretation, so one, he's describing the image and the second time he's giving the interpretation of the image, but he says, as you looked, so this is the description of the dream that Nebuchadnezzar had, as you looked, a stone was cut out by no human hands and it struck the image at its feet of iron and clay and broke into pieces.

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So what's the interpretation? Well, Daniel 2, 44 says, and in the days of the kings, the

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God of heaven will set up a kingdom and that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people.

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It shall break in pieces all the kingdoms and bring them to an end and it shall stand forever.

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So what you see here is that this first thing, the first view that people have, or the facts,

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I said false views of the millennium, sorry, it's the facts concerning the millennium.

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I'm tired, but so the facts of the millennium is first that this kingdom is going to be established without hands, you see that in both those passages in Daniel.

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Now, this is the idea that this kingdom is going to be something created by God.

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Now let me deal with an issue that some pre -millennialists use against post -millennialists wrongly.

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That's right, I'm a pre -millennialist correcting pre -millennialists that use a bogus argument against post -millennialists, alright?

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I'm sorry, I don't care, even if you're in my camp, you use bad arguments, stop it.

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If you have to use a bad argument to make your point, your point's probably not valid or at least your argument isn't for sure, okay?

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Find a better way to use it. Now, why am I saying this? Because I know some people that argue that this is proof that post -millennialism is wrong.

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Why? Because they argue that what post -millennialists believe is that man is going to make things better, that man's, we're going to go out, we're going to share the gospel, we're going to share the gospel, people are going to get saved and by getting saved the world's going to get better and then

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Christ is going to come because that better period of time is going to be the millennial kingdom. So the idea is that that's created by man, that's man -made hands.

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And they look at this and say, it wasn't by man -made hands and therefore pre -millennialism's true.

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Wrong! If I was post -millennial, I could still argue that this millennial period where God saves many people, it's

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God saving many people. It's very easy to argue that's still without hands.

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So please don't make that argument, it's a bad argument. God is still saving people, so even in a post -millennial view, okay, it is still

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God doing the work of saving people. So don't make the argument, as some have made, that that's proof that post -millennialism is wrong.

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But what we do know as a fact is that in all three views, this millennial kingdom, this kingdom established by God, this period described is made without hands.

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In other words, God does it. It's just really that simple. God gets all the credit, God does the work of it.

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Number two, the type of government is, ready for this, a theocracy.

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Andrew, are you believing in theonomy? Okay, if you don't know theonomy, it is a view of post -millennialism.

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A specific view, well, there's two views. There's covenantal theonomy, which would kind of be more in line with millennialism and post -millennialism.

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But then you have really the reconstructionist theonomy, which is popularized by Greg Bonson, that would argue really for post -millennialism.

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And the thing that we end up seeing with that is I'm not saying that. I'm saying that in this kingdom, whichever kingdom you hold to, pre -millennialists believe that God will reign in a theonomy.

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It's just not now in the church age, it's in the millennial kingdom age. If you believe we're in the kingdom, whether it be amill or post -mill, if you believe we're in that, then yes, you're going to think that we should enact a theocracy now.

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You might, I should say. But the idea is that Christ will be a benevolent ruler, judging righteously and immediately.

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Let's not turn, but Isaiah 11, verse 4, Isaiah 65, verse 20,

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Daniel 7, verse 14, and Revelation 19, verse 15.

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Those are the passages to support that. Because I do want to see if we finish this whole class up and we still have the eternal state.

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So, number three. The center of Jesus' rule will be Jerusalem.

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Jerusalem. So, let me give you the verses for that.

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Isaiah 2, verse 3, and by the way, if you have a syllabus, they're all here. Isaiah 2, 3,

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Zechariah 14, 8 -11, and Psalm 2, 6 would be the proof texts to use to see that this kingdom will be centered in Jerusalem.

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Which means it wouldn't be this, you know, this would be an argument that people make to say, well, it's not going to be a worldwide type of thing.

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But it's the focus where Jesus would actually physically reign from the seat of David or throne of David is the idea.

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Then we see, number four, that the apostles will reign over the twelve tribes of Israel.

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We see this in Revelation. In Matthew 19, 28 and Matthew 25, 31.

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The idea there is it seems that the apostles will reign over the tribes of Israel during this period of time.

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Can we be exact about that? That's just the way that, you know, I think that I'm seeing this.

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Again, I'm not going to fight people over it. Lastly, in number five, the church, that's your blank there, the church will reign with Christ.

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The church will reign with Christ. 1 Corinthians 6, 2 -3 and 2

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Timothy 2, 12. So 1 Corinthians 6, verses 2 and 3, 2

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Timothy 2, 12. And then lastly, you can look at Revelation 5, 10 and chapter 20, verses 4 and 6.

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Would be the argument that the church is going to reign with Christ. Now, one more, number six, is that there are many different types of people that are going to populate the

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Millennial Kingdom. We see in Jeremiah 30, verses 8 -9, we see that there's going to be

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Old Testament saints. We see in, as I mentioned, 1

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Corinthians 6, 2 and 3, New Testament saints, the church. Revelation 7, 9 and Revelation 7, 14, seems that there's tribulational saints.

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Now, this is going to be clearly just to those that believe in a pre -Millennial Kingdom. Because they are going to argue, as I would, that there was a period of tribulation that occurred.

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And those saints that died during that time would be included in this Millennial Kingdom. And then believers who survived that seven year tribulational period.

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In Matthew 25, verses 31 -34. Now, not all their children would be believers.

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And so, as some believe, is that those children would be deceived by Satan at the end of that thousand year

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Millennial Kingdom. So, that's kind of the overview there with some of the facts that we would look at to say.

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Now, do these facts point specifically to a pre -Millennialism? I hope you're not taking the conclusion that I'm saying yes.

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I'm trying to show that these things are seen, we see these things. But you take, for example, the last one where people say, well you have all these different people.

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That would argue that it's now. So, each of the different positions are going to see these things.

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They're going to interpret them differently. And so, again, don't beat people up over these things. Because this is stuff that we can't be super dogmatic on.

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Because Christ is not... I say this each time when we talk this subject.

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But Christ's first coming was not as clear to those who are in the Old Testament as it is to us.

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Hindsight is a beautiful thing. We don't have foresight. So, let's look at letter

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C. Characteristics of the Millennium. So, what do we see about this Millennial Kingdom? Well, first off, it's going to be a spiritual kingdom.

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That's your blank there. Could we put up the Ezekiel 36?

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Okay. Ezekiel 36, 25 to 28. And if you could, by chance, work your magic to make that a little larger, that would be wonderful because it's a little bit hard for me.

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But this is Ezekiel. Thank you. Ezekiel 36, 25 to 28.

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I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean. For all your uncleanness and for all your idols,

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I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit

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I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

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And I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in the statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

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You shall dwell in the land that I give your fathers and you shall be my people and I will be your

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God. So you see in Ezekiel 36 here, this is speaking of the new covenant specifically.

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But he is speaking to Israel and so the idea is Israel is going to experience this ultimately.

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Now, either way, this is an argument people say, this is spiritual. Okay?

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And this new covenant that God is going to make, whether it be with the church or with Israel, is a spiritual one.

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This is, again, this isn't something that only premillennials would hold to. Actually, the argument would be more from the amillennial camp for this one because they would say the whole period is figurative, it's all spiritual, it's a spiritual kingdom.

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And by the way, just because the argument made that Christ is spiritually reigning in heaven and not on earth is used by Jehovah Witnesses doesn't mean it's wrong.

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Again, that's an argument I've heard people make against amillennialists. That's an invalid argument.

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Don't make dumb arguments, okay? A broken clock is right twice a day, right?

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Just because the Jehovah Witnesses are bad in their doctrine of salvation doesn't mean everything they teach is bad.

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I'm not saying you should go follow their doctrine. I'm not saying that this is right.

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I don't agree with the view that Christ will reign only in the heavens. But the point being is just because Jehovah Witnesses make the same argument doesn't mean that everything that agrees with Jehovah Witnesses are always wrong, okay?

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People are going to be right once in a while. Jehovah Witnesses, they're going to be right in some areas.

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It's the key areas, like how to get right with God, that they're wrong. Alright, so this is going to be a spiritual kingdom.

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I'm getting looks like, will I actually finish this class this week?

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I only have two pages of notes to go. I can do this. One day

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I'm going to turn the camera around, I'm just saying. So, uh, I would cause such trouble.

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So, it's going to be a righteous kingdom. Let's not turn there, but Isaiah 32, verse 1.

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It's going to be a righteous kingdom. So, this kingdom is going to be spiritual. This kingdom is going to be righteous.

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Number three, this kingdom is going to be peaceful. That's your next blank. So, it's spiritual, that's your first blank.

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It's righteous, that's your second blank. Peaceful is the third blank. And this is going to be in Zechariah 14, 11.

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And what you see there. Why so much of this in the Old Testament? Well, it's a very simple reason. This is

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God speaking to the Old Testament saints. That's why. And much of it is there. And it shall be inhabited for there shall never again be a decree of destruction.

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Jerusalem shall dwell in security. And so the idea is that this kingdom will be one of security, of peace.

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There will be, as we see, I think, in Revelation 20. There's going to be at the end an uprising where Satan will, at the end, try to deceive the nations.

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And it will be finally put down. But the thousand year period, the idea there is that it will be peaceful.

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It will also be prosperous. Let's not go there, but we'll just... Psalm 72, verse 12 and 13.

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Isaiah 35, verses 1 through 7. And Amos 9, verses 13 to 14.

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Again, you can get the syllabus to get all those. But this is going to be prosperous. So again, this kingdom, the characteristics are described as being spiritual, being righteous, being peaceful, being prosperous.

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And last blank there is religious out of Ezekiel 40 and 48.

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So we're definitely not going to read those two chapters. So the characteristics of this millennial kingdom, again, spiritual, righteous, peaceful, prosperous, religious.

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I wouldn't say that that describes the current day in which we're living or in any day that we've seen so far.

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So this is one reason why I wouldn't see this being a strong argument for millennialism.

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There have been times of peace. I definitely think that post -millennialism in its heyday before World War I, they thought the world was seeming like it's becoming more spiritual and religious and peaceful and prosperous and religious.

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And World War I hit and boom. I mean, everything went bad. The millennial kingdom will include a temple, by the way, at least in pre -millennialism, sacrifices and keeping holy days.

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All, I would argue, as a memorial for Christ. And some people say, well, wait, if you're having a sacrificial system, then you are sacrificing to the

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Lord and saying Christ's atonement wasn't enough. It doesn't have to be that.

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That's an argument that many make against pre -millennialism. And the fact that we would argue there will be a temple again and there will be sacrifices.

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But more in the way that we do the Lord's Supper. That it is a memorial. This is where we would disagree with the

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Roman Catholic Church. Where the Roman Catholic Church would say in the taking of the communion table that body and blood is literally the body and blood of Jesus.

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And therefore they're saying it's a re -sacrificing of Christ. We would disagree with that for the same reason

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I would disagree that this temple offering is a re -sacrificing of Christ. I think it's a memorial of what

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Christ did do and that the Jewish people would follow. That's my view.

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Hate it if you want. If you're going to argue with me, just use scripture, please. And let's discuss it civilly, maybe.

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Try. Okay? Let's get to the very last topic that we will have in this long class.

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If you've been following with us, by the way, 78 classes means it's been over a year and a half of teaching every week.

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That's long. And like I said, this is just the overview. Let's get to the Eternal State. The Eternal State.

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Some of you thought I would never get here. But we're here.

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So, looking at the Eternal State, let's look at the events after the Millennial Kingdom. I'm saying after the

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Millennial Kingdom and before the Eternal State. Okay? So I think there's going to be this time period between the two.

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It's a time of judgment. I don't think it's this clear -cut thing that one and then the other. But I think that there's going to be basically a dissolving of the heavens and the earth.

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2 Peter, if we put that up, 2 Peter 3. Thank you. 2

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Peter 3, verses 10 and 12. And this says here, in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for the hastening, the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt and they will burn.

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So when you see Peter's arguing, look, there's a lot of people that focus on the things of earth. Why? These things, you're going to build up treasures, you're going to build up riches.

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They're going to burn one day. So I think what you're going to see is that before this

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Eternal State, that final state, there's going to be a burning up, a dissolving of the heavens and the earth.

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And we'll see there will be a new heavens and a new earth. Second is the

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Great White Throne Judgment. That's your blank there. Great White Throne Judgment.

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And this we see in Revelation 20, verses 11 -15.

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Revelation 20, 11 -15. Then I saw the Great Throne and Him who was seated on it.

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From His presence, earth and the sky fled away, and no place was found for them.

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Then I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and the books were opened.

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Then another book was opened, which is the

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Book of Life. And the dead were judged by that which was written in the books, according to what they had done.

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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.

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Then Death and Hades were thrown into the Lake of Fire. And the second death, the

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Lake of Fire. And this is the second death, the Lake of Fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the

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Book of Life, they were thrown into the Lake of Fire. So what you see there is that there is this

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Great White Throne Judgment that will be that final judgment. So I think there's a judgment where people go to heaven or hell, which is a temporary place, and then as we saw there, hell gets thrown in or Hades gets thrown into this

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Lake of Fire. So the reason, what's the reason for this Great White Throne Judgment? Well, one reason, really the main reason is to vindicate the condemnation that God had upon all those who rejected

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Him. So somehow it's going to be His final judgment for everybody to see. And who's the judge?

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Well, God is the judge. Who are the defenders? Those who rejected

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Christ. Those who are going to trust Him. By the way, the name of that second book is called the

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Book of Life. Sorry, Book of Works. So you have the Book of Life, those who have eternal life, those who know

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Christ. According to John, he says that, and this is the eternal life, that they know

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God and Him whom He sent. So knowing God, knowing

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Christ is to have eternal life. That's to have your name in that Book of Life. If your name is not in that book, then you're judged by the

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Book of Works. That's right. The very works that everyone is trusting to get them to heaven is the very thing they're going to be judged by and condemned by.

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Well, what's the evidence that's going to be used against them? Well, it's those works that are recorded in the

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Book of Works. Their attitudes, their actions, their motivations, their words.

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These are the things that they're going to be judged by. They're also going to be judged by another book called the

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Book of Life. Like I said, your name's in that? Good. What's the result of this? Well, the result is because of the recorded works and their names not being in the

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Book of Life, in other words, they didn't have salvation, they didn't have regeneration, the result of the

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Great White Throne judgment will be, according to what we read, the Lake of Fire. Yeah.

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Doesn't sound so good. So we see that some of the things that are going to happen, there's going to be the dissolving of the earth, there's going to be the

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Great White Throne judgment. Number three, the creation of a new heaven and new earth.

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We see this in Revelation 21, verse 1. Then I saw the new heaven and new earth, for the first heaven and first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

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My wife does not like that verse. Why does my wife not like that verse? Because she loves seafood.

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One day she was reading the Bible and went, if there's no more sea, there's no more sea food.

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Ah! Yeah, I think in heaven we'll be vegetarians. That's my theory. Can't prove it.

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But my wife was like, no fish! No fish in heaven, to which I say, amen!

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Okay, she reminds me sushi is a fish, and I like sushi, but I don't like fish. She gives me fish with all the bones in it, it's just too much work.

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But she loves fish, I don't love fish, so I say no seafood is an amen. I could deal with the sushi though,

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I'm just saying. So, let's look at the final part of this, and that is now the eternal state.

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The existence of humanity for eternity. What are we going to look like? What's eternity look like?

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Well, there's two scenarios. First, let's look at the scenario for the wicked.

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Letter A, it will be an eternal punishment. By the way, for those who have the first edition of the book, you're going to see a blank.

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And then you see in parentheses it says eternal. That's the answer. These didn't get edited out, and so for the next three, if you're going, hey, what is the blank?

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The blank's actually in the book if you have the first edition. If you don't, well, then you know you got the second edition. But it will be eternal.

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An eternal punishment. And so this is something I know a lot of people don't like to think about, but there is going to be an eternal punishment that's going to last forever.

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We see this in, let's look, Matthew 25, 41. Then he will say to those on his left, depart from me, you cursed into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.

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2 Thessalonians 1, 9. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the

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Lord and from the glory of His might. Revelation 14, 11. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they will have no rest day or night, these worshippers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of his name.

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Revelation 20, 10. And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire with sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever.

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What you see here is this idea that this is something that's only going to last forever, but it's day and night torment.

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Why do I make that emphasis? There are some who try to say that this fire is not eternal, it gets consumed, it burns up.

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So there will be this judgment, people get thrown into the fire, and they burn up into non -existence. Because fires consume.

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Not all fires consume. The burning bush did not consume. The stars were created before sin cursed the galaxy.

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Therefore, stars wouldn't have consumed. We see that stars burn out, or so we say.

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None of us have lived long enough to watch a star burn out, nor are we close enough to one to see it. But the idea that science has is that stars would burn up eventually.

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They would eventually consume and be done. But what we do know is they're not doing that now. They're burning for a hot,

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I mean really, really hot, for a really, really long time, these big balls of fire. And they're not burning everything up.

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And so God can create a fire that does not consume. But notice, the passages we looked at would make absolutely no sense if this was some sort of temporal thing.

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Because he's saying that forever, night and day. This also goes against some of the more recent arguments people are making that it is an eternal punishment when you are annihilated because you're eternally separate from God.

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That's not what's described as eternal here. What's being described as eternal is the punishment both day and night.

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That's conscious, which is the second. The second part is it will be a conscious punishment.

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So not only will it last forever and ever and ever, but we are going to be aware of it.

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Just looking at the passages that we saw already, you see that. Don't put it up, but Luke 16, if you see this, this is a parable,

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I believe, but Luke 16, 23, 24, this would make no sense, even as a parable, if this punishment in the next life is not conscious.

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But 2 Thessalonians 1 .9 would be another one to show that we're conscious of it. We already read a bunch.

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We already read 2 Thessalonians 1 .9 along with Revelation 14, Revelation 20, Matthew 25, and you see that it's ongoing and they're aware of it.

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Also, it is a just punishment. Yeah, I said it.

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It's just. God is absolutely just in punishing evil doers.

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Let's look at some of these. Matthew 11, 22 -24. But I tell you, it will be more terrible on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you.

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And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades.

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For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, they would have remained until today.

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But I tell you, it will be more terrible on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.

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Luke 12, 47 -48. And the servant who knew his master, his master's will, but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating.

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But the one who did not know, he did not deserve a beating, will receive a light beating.

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Everyone to whom much was given, to him much will be required. And of him whom they entrust, much will demand much more.

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That is why I say God's just in judging everyone, because everyone knows God exists. And they have a conscience they know right from wrong.

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Revelation 20, verse 12. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne.

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The books were opened. Then another book was opened, and the book of life and the dead were judged by what was written in the books according to all they had done.

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So it is just, it's just because they did these things. So to the wicked, the eternal state is going to represent an everlasting, conscious, just punishment.

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Those are also all your blanks there. Eternal, conscious, and just. That describes this punishment.

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What about to the believers? Well, for the righteous, we see it's a place of no more pain, no more suffering, no more death.

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I like that. That's Revelation 21, verse 4. No more pain.

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Every tear of your eye will be wiped away. We will understand things. People often ask, what about, you know, the fact that you're going to have a knowledge that your parents or loved ones or friends are in hell?

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Well, we're going to understand that justice really, really well. And though we may have loved them, the relationship we have to them is going to change.

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There's not going to be any marriage, by the way, in heaven, in the eternal state. That's what Jesus said.

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So, no more pain, no more suffering, no more death. That's the first one. Second, no more social classes or poverty.

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We're not going to have any of that. We're not going to, you know, are the relationships that we have are going to change.

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You could see this in Revelation 21, 9 to 21. We're not going to read that too long, and we want to finish class.

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We see there's going to be no more darkness. Again, Revelation 21, verses 23 now to 24.

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There's no more darkness. Christ as a God is actually going to be the light. He's going to provide the light himself.

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Continuing on, Revelation 21, and basically just read Revelation 21. You're going to see all this. But Revelation 21, verse 27 says there's going to be no more sin.

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Ah, I can't wait for that. Just, if you ever want something to really rejoice in, just read 2

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Corinthians 5. Great passage. This temporal body being done away with.

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Ah, Revelation 21, we're going to be in a place where there is no sin. Ah, I can't wait to be done with this body of death, right?

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Lastly, in Revelation 22, verses 1 and 2, there's going to be no more hunger. So this is what this describes.

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No more pain and suffering or death. No more class systems or poverty. No more darkness. No more sin.

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And no more hunger. That sounds like really good. But you know what the best thing is for the righteous?

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Christ is there. We get to be with the one we love. Now, for those who sit there and say, well, the punishment, this is so wrong.

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You're telling me God's going to punish me because I don't obey Him? Quite frankly, are you telling me, Mr. Professing Atheist, that you want to be in Heaven where you can be by God's side, worshiping

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Him all day? No. You don't want that. You hate Him. You hate

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God. That's why you don't want to be there. So don't complain that you're going to be judged. It's what you want.

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But I'd strongly say this, to give serious consideration, because the reality is,

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I cannot end this class, and end this specifically, this lesson, and end this entire series, without pointing out the fact that as we look at this, it should be a very strong warning to all of us.

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Those who don't know Christ, this should be a warning to you. Please recognize the judgment that's coming, and turn to Christ, and live.

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That is my challenge to you. I really want to challenge you to consider this is something you must get right.

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We must realize that a day of judgment is coming for every one of us.

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We've got to be right in God's eyes. Turn from trusting yourself as a good person. Turn from trusting in your good works.

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Turn from trusting in your birthright, as whatever religion you are thinking that's going to get you there. Turn to Christ, and live.

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It is only in Jesus Christ that we can have eternal life, because He is fully God, so He could pay this eternal fine.

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If this punishment is eternal, it would take forever to pay it.

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Therefore, we could never stop paying it, and I could never pay it for you, you could never pay it for me, because it would take forever to pay it.

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It's never paid off. Why? Because God is infinitely holy, and it is just because we violated

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His law. And because He's infinitely holy, it has an infinite consequence.

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So I challenge you to consider, please consider getting right with God today.

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Ask forgiveness for the things you've done wrong. Trust in Jesus and Jesus alone, and what

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He did on that cross, is the only possible payment for your crimes against God.

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That you may be forgiven. That you may be able to be in the state of righteousness, and have eternal life.

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And with that, we are going to close out the final lesson in our systematic theology.

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And I hope you continue studying with us as we continue adding more and more classes for you to hopefully enjoy and learn from.

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Now I do want to say, if you have questions about this or any other of our classes, you can email us at academy at strivingforeternity .org

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academy at strivingforeternity .org Again, I'd encourage you to go to our website, strivingforeternity .org

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Get the syllabus, even though this is the last class, you can go back to the beginning, pick up all four syllabuses for the theology class, and enjoy those.

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We do want to say, if you're at the website, you could pick up my book, What Do They Believe? And maybe sometime shortly, the counterpart to What Do They Believe?

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What Do They Believe? is the systematic theology of the major western religions. This will have a counterpart book, which is going to be out hopefully shortly, which is called

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What Do We Believe? It'll be a Christian theology. We'll have that out. While you're at the website, go to host our

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Bible Interpretation Made Easy seminar. This is where we come into your church, and we will train your church to learn how to interpret the

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Bible in just one weekend, right? That's it, just one weekend.

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Eight hours, in six sessions, and we will teach you how to interpret God's Word.

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Another way you could support us, by the way, is if you go to Amazon. You could go to smile .amazon

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.com and look up our page, our specific page is on the bottom if you're watching the video.

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If not, just go to smile .amazon .com, do a search for Striving for Eternity Ministries, add us, and please do that.

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People are doing that. Half of every percent that you spend, they send us,

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Amazon does, as a donation. So you don't have to change your spending habits at all. You just go to Amazon, just make sure you go to smile .amazon

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.com when you log in, and then everything that you spend goes as a donation to us.

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Really thank some of those who are out there. Someone just contacted me and said they do this for their work, their company, has allowed them to use smile .amazon

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.com because it doesn't cost them any more, and so as they purchase things, someone just made a $2 ,000 purchase, which means that Amazon will send us $10 from that, from that one purchase.

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So just a creative way that you can help support the ministry. A more creative way, of course, would be to go to strivingforeternity .org,

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go to the Donate button or page, and sign up monthly. Monthly support is really, really important to us because monthly support allows us to pay people's bill, pay people's salaries, pay things monthly that occur, and really, just a little secret, we're going to be radically changing these.

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These classes that are on YouTube are always going to remain out here for free for as long as YouTube has them, but this is going to change.

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We're going to be doing very different type of classes, hopefully soon. We're going to do them in studio, have them professionally edited, make them look really snazzy, and you're going to have to pay for them.

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Just saying, but you're going to get a certificate when you're done with the classes. We're working toward that.

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It's something we have in the works, and we're excited for that, and until it happens, we're going to have to wait, but until next time, we want to encourage you to strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.