Bible In A Year - Revelation (part 4)

Revelation 17 and 18 as a Parenthesis in the Tribulation Judgments

OK, this morning brings us to our final, until next time, section on the book of Revelation. It also marks the time that we finally did get through the Bible in a year, or two, or three, or four, or however long this has taken, so that we can start over.

At any rate, turn with me, if you will, to Revelation chapter 17. What we have in Revelation chapter 17 and 18 are sort of a parenthesis that goes in. These two chapters do not follow chronologically with the rest of the book, so that we have just gone through all of the judgments.

We got to the end of the trumpet judgments and the bowl judgments, and that's at the end of chapter 16. And then chronologically, the events of chapter 19 begin immediately after the events of chapter 16.

There's no gap in here. Judgment is being poured out upon the earth, and the return of Jesus Christ in triumph and glory is about to happen, and judgment is coming. But chapters 17 and 18 are inserted to tell us what is being judged.

Babylon the Great as World Religion

Now, we have skipped over a lot of things. We could spend years, months, years studying the book of Revelation and still only scratch the surface. But we've touched on a number of things. And what has happened during this period of time that we call the tribulation and then the great tribulation, which is the last three and a half years of that, there has been a worldwide government.

There has been a worldwide economic system. There has been a worldwide religious system set up. And as time goes by and all of these things begin to collapse, the whole system is imploding in on itself, and everything begins to collapse.

And that is what is laid out in chapters 17 and 18. And the first thing that it talks about is how Babylon the Great, she's identified as Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth.

This is world religion. This is the world religious system led by the false prophet. And as all of this happens on earth, it's characteristic of mankind that when bad times come, we turn to religion. We don't necessarily turn to God, but we turn to religion.

That it's truly said, you know, there are no atheists in foxholes, and that tends to be true. You know, when someone's shooting at you, it tends to focus your attention. And that's what's happened on a worldwide scale.

There has been in the past, the previous seven years from the time that we're talking about right now, there's been unprecedented disaster. Natural disaster, disaster caused by human beings upon each other.

There have been wars which make all previous wars pale by insignificance. There have been earthquakes that redefined the term earthquake. All kinds of things have happened. There's been mass kill-offs of all sorts of livestock and animals and flora and fauna, not to mention human beings.

The population of the earth is radically reduced from what it was. And as a result of all of this, people are driven to certain things, and they've been driven to this one world government. Anybody who can come along and say, you know, I feel your pain and I can get you out of this, you know, he gets followed.

And then also a worldwide religious system. And in the Bible, the worldwide religious system is likened to Babylon. And because Babylon has been a center of false religion throughout history, where did it all start besides the Garden of Eden?

We have the flood, right? And then only about a thousand years after the flood, when God said, you know, go forth, be fruitful, multiply, populate the earth, everyone's gathered together at Babel to build the Tower of Babel, where we're going to build this tower and we're going to reach up to heaven.

You know, we are going to make ourselves like God. And it all starts there. And it's way outside the realm of what we can talk about, but you hear things about the Chaldean mysteries. Have you ever heard that term, the Chaldean mysteries, or an interesting individual named Nimrod, and an interesting individual named Ishtar?

Now, you may wonder where the mother-baby cult got started. It got started at Babel with Ishtar. And Ishtar had a son named Tammuz. And one of the idolatrous practices that the Israelites followed, for which they were roundly judged, was Ishtar and Tammuz worship.

You can read about that in the Old Testament. So defiance of God, and Moses sort of, or not Moses, but when it says, let us go down and see what they're doing. James Boyce, James Montgomery Boyce, commented that this is sort of a little bit of divine poking fun that God had to lean way, way over, and maybe get out the divine magnifying glass to see this little tiny tower that his creatures were building down there on earth, but they were gonna try to reach up to heaven.

It was the first great humanistic effort. Let us make us a name, he said. And Nimrod, who was the leader of all of this, was Noah's great-grandson. We have very short memories. And pagan worship had started.

And so the Bible also calls her the harlot, which is a metaphor for false religion. It's used throughout all of the Bible. Cities are referred to as being harlot cities. Nineveh was called that, Tyre was called that, Babylon herself, the real physical Babylon was called that, and Jerusalem was called that, unfortunately.

And so this worldwide religion has attained great authority. It's dominating all peoples, all multitudes, all nations, all tongues, and yet there will be total destruction, total destruction of the world religious system because Antichrist will turn against the world religious system.

He wants people to worship him, not any other God. And so Babylon is destroyed, and that is recorded in chapter 17. And in this case, Babylon, when it says Babylon, the mother of harlots, that's referring to this religious system.

Babylon the Great as the Center of the World Economy

Now we get to chapter 18, where Babylon was referred to again, and very probably in chapter 18, Babylon refers to a real place, not necessarily where the ruins of ancient Babylon happened to exist in Iraq, but at least it's a physical place, and it's the center of the world's economic system.

Right now, New York City is one of the great centers of the world's economic system. It's the center of the United States economic system, certainly, and you could make an argument that it's the center of the world economic system as well.

Well, during the tribulation period, on a scale unprecedented before, there's going to be a worldwide economic system. And if you want to buy and sell, if you want to trade, if you want to engage in business, you will have to be a part of this, and you will have to have the mark.

If you don't have the mark, you can't trade, you can't buy, you can't sell. You have no way of getting anything that you need unless you're a part of this system. And so, the Babylon spoken of in chapter 18 becomes the capital of the Antichrist, and it's the hub of his economic and commercial empire.

Now, it's going to be destroyed as well, and the whole system that it supports is going to be destroyed. And it's not like this is a big surprise. They've had plenty of warning. First of all, there are the 144 ,000 Jewish evangelists that have been going around preaching, you know, repent.

And the two witnesses that we talked about two weeks ago, they've been preaching repent, and there's been an angel flying, you know, proclaiming woe from the skies. So, plenty of warning, and yet they refuse to repent.

The more disastrous things become, the more individuals dig their heels in. By this time, in the chronology of things, people are well aware that it's an almighty God who's up there sending all this judgment upon them.

You know, they have long since become disabused of the idea that maybe this is just really, really bad times, or, you know, isn't it terrible that we're having all these natural disasters following one on top of another?

No, they fully understand that there is a God. He's really there, and He is judging them. But their reaction is to shake their fist in His face. Even while they are looking for the caves to hide in and calling for the rocks to fall on them and hide them from this wrathful God, nonetheless, they refuse to repent and beg Him for mercy.

And that's what's happening. That's what's going on. And so the chapter outlines some reasons for judgment. First of all, this capital city is the dwelling place of demons because, you remember, bound demons have been released upon the earth, and they were released near this place, wherever it is.

And this city has influenced all nations. The entire world has followed her example. And she has no self-control at all. It's a place of total immorality, and sins have been heaped up. But God remembers.

God doesn't forget. God keeps accurate books. And He is going to extract retribution because He is qualified to do that. We are told as individuals, as Christians, we do not take our own retribution. That is to be left to God because God has all the facts.

God is capable of doing this. And it's going to happen. It's about to happen. And so there's going to be total judgment. It says Babylon receives double for all of her sins. There's torment and mourning.

There are all kinds of specific plagues. And it says everything is burned with fire. And there's been a lot of speculation about what does that refer to? It's been suggested that perhaps this refers to thermonuclear activity.

If you've seen pictures of the aftermath of what happens when you drop an atomic bomb, that's exactly what it looks like. But again, I'll point out a lot of these things that you read about, particularly when you're reading about all of the judgments that are poured out, you know, the bowl judgments and the seal judgments and the trumpet judgments, it is certainly possible that God could use natural phenomenon to bring about a lot of those things.

But it is also equally likely that what's being described is direct divine intervention, miraculous intervention. And so what I'm saying here is when you study revelation, don't spend a whole lot of time speculating on how is this thing going to be brought about.

The point is that God is judging and he's judging in very severe ways that have never been duplicated before. And we can very safely leave how he actually does this in his hands. And so here we have all of these things, absolutely certain destruction.

The whole system is collapsing in on itself. And the result is worldwide repentance. No, it's worldwide mourning. Why? Because all of this is bad for business. All of this is bad for business. You remember the reaction of the citizens with when Jesus visited the demoniac?

You know, instead of saying, isn't this a marvelous miracle that this man, Jesus Christ has put this man in his right mind, for the first time in our memory, he's sitting here, he's clothed, he's had a shave, he's had a bath, he's in his right mind.

Isn't this marvelous? Instead of concentrating on that, it's, oh no, this is bad for business. We've just lost 2000 pigs or however many it was. And it's the same type of reaction here. There's no mourning, there's no repenting for sin.

Among the world leaders of the world and the kings of the world. No, it's bad for business. And that's the reaction they focus on. And so all of these people who are specified as mourning about all of this, it starts off with the kings and the leaders of the world and then the merchants.

And then interestingly enough, it specifies the ship masters and the sailors, because there's no business for them anymore. There's nothing to transport. So the guys that are in the transport business are out of a job.

But in heaven, there's great rejoicing. There's great rejoicing because this judgment is complete, 100 justified. Because Babylon has deceived all nations and it's now totally 100 destroyed. Okay, that brings us up to chapter 19.

The Hallelujah Chorus and the Marriage of the Lamb

So take a look at chapter 19 and it starts off, after these things, I heard a great voice of many people in heaven saying, hallelujah, salvation and glory and honor and power unto the Lord our God. For true and righteous are his judgments.

He's judged the great harlot who did corrupt the earth with her fornication and have avenged the blood of his servants at her hands. And they said, hallelujah. And her smoke rose up forever and ever. And the four and 20 elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God that sat on the throne saying, amen, hallelujah.

And a voice came out of the throne saying, praise our God, all ye his servants and all ye that fear him, both small and great. And I heard as it were, the voice of a great multitude and like the voice of many waters and like the voice of many peals of thunder saying, hallelujah, for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

This by the way is the passage that inspired, one of the passages anyway that inspired Handel to write the hallelujah chorus. But there's this great rejoicing that goes up in heaven because first of all, full salvation has come.

It's about to wrap up. Jesus is right on the verge now of actually appearing on earth. And justice has come. What he's done is true and righteous because what's been going on throughout all of human history God is saying, leave it alone.

I will take care of it in time. And now it's all coming. It's all coming to a close. It's all coming together. The rebellion is ended and God is in control. God really is in control. I mean, people go around singing, God is in control.

I wonder if they, what would happen if they really, if they really understood what that phrase meant. If you really believe that God is in control, it will have a profound effect upon your life. And the marriage of the lamb is complete.

The church by the way is the bride of Christ and the marriage of the lamb, the marriage supper has taken place. And so we're about to go. We at, starting with verse 11, we go into the glorious return of Jesus Christ.

The Return of the King and the Imminent Hope of the Church

Now, historically, the Bible is, most of you are aware by now that the Bible is in complete opposition to the world's view of things. You can just write it down. Whatever the world thinks about the way things are going, the Bible will say it's going the other way.

But throughout history, we have always taken the view that man started out down here and has been slowly clawing his way up to here, right? Things are slowly getting better. That's the exact opposite of the Bible's view.

The Bible's view is that man started up here. He was created innocent, no sin. Sin didn't exist in the universe and it's been downhill ever since, since the fall. And the view that things are getting ever better, we're moving towards man-made utopia.

You know, after the revolution, comrade, things will be better, things will be different. And, but it doesn't work. Our own experience tells us that things are not getting better, they're getting worse.

And that's the biblical view. The biblical view is that things will eventually become wonderfully better, but only after they become unimaginably worse. And this, of course, is one of the big criticisms that we get of the whole premillennial view is that it's very pessimistic, and it is.

The premill, pre-trib position is quite pessimistic because we, basically, we hold the position that things are going to get much, much worse before they get better. That until Jesus Christ comes, man will be on a continuing downhill slide and the slide is getting steeper as we're charging downhill.

And so we are not to be surprised that man whacks worse and worse. We are not supposed to become complacent now. We are to resist evil whenever it is in our power to do that. But nonetheless, overall, we should not be surprised when the situation gets continuously worse because the Bible promises us that's exactly what's going to happen until Jesus Christ comes.

But then we still have what's laid out for us in Revelation that assures us that at the very end, it will all be set right. It's going to all be set right, and that's what's in view here. That the solution to the world's problems is the return of the king.

He's going to set up an absolute monarchy and there will be total justice upon the earth. And so it's our job, and God's people throughout all of history have anticipated the return of Jesus Christ to reign.

We don't always get the timing right, but we always anticipate that. And one of the hallmarks of the New Testament age in particular is supposed to be the imminent return of Jesus Christ. We are to anticipate his return at any moment.

And that's why they say they're very careful to set out that the return of Jesus Christ for his saints is not preceded by any kinds of signs. Otherwise we would be waiting around for the signs, wouldn't we?

And because that's just the way we are. But since the return of Jesus Christ to rapture the church and take us out, there's not going to be any preceding signs of that. It's just the trumpet's going to blow and we're gone like that.

And so we're to look for his imminent return. And there's all kinds of reasons for this. First of all, they're the promises of God in scripture, all through scripture. God himself has promised that I'm going to set everything right.

Jesus also made promises. He said, I'm going to come back. I'm going to leave, but I'm going to come back. He promised us. There's also the guarantee of the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ will return. And the inspired writers wrote repeatedly.

The Holy Spirit had the inspired writers write repeatedly that Jesus Christ is coming back. Don't worry. Don't be concerned. Don't wring your hands. Jesus Christ is going to come back and set everything right.

And if he doesn't return, all of these promises turn out to be false. And if those promises are false, then the whole thing is false, isn't it? And God's plan for his church requires that he return. And God's plan for the nations require Jesus to return.

There's supposed to be judgment for the Gentiles. There's supposed to be a salvation for national Israel. All of those things require the return of the king. And so the return of the king is laid out for us starting in verse 11 of chapter 19.

He said, and I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse. And he that sat upon him was called faithful and true. And in righteousness, he doth judge and make war. His eyes were like a flame of fire and on his head were many crowns.

And he had a name written that no man knew, but he himself. And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood and his name is called the word of God. And his armies that were in heaven followed him upon white horses clothed in fine linen, white and clean.

And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword that with it he should smite the nations. And he shall rule them with a rod of iron and he treadeth the wine press and the fierceness and wrath of almighty God.

And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, king of kings and Lord of lords. And this is John's vision of the returning Christ. Now notice, first of all, he's on a white horse and that is throughout history that's been the symbol of conquerors.

I don't want to cheapen this, but any kid that used to watch Westerns knows the good guys are always on the white horse, right? And wearing the white hat. Well, here comes Jesus Christ and he's right.

Is this a literal horse? I don't know, but he's conquering. He is at the head of his army. Again, the symbolism is the armies as John knew them which would have been the Roman legions. And in those days, the general led from the front not from some headquarters, you know, 10 miles behind the lines.

The generals basically got out in front, drew the swords and forward and there they went. And that's what John is visualizing here. Jesus Christ is leading his heavenly army and he's in front. And he's got this name, his name is faithful and true.

And that's in total contrast to antichrist. Antichrist is all about lies and deception. And so are the false prophet and Satan himself. Jesus Christ is true and he's faithful. He says what he means and he means what he says and he carries out exactly what he promised he would carry out.

And that is true whether you're a believer or non-believer. If you're a believer, Jesus Christ will do for you exactly what he said he would. You'll be with him and you will reign with him as we're going to see.

If you're an unbeliever, you get judgment because that's what he promised you. Excuse me, faithful and true. He's faithful to his word. He's faithful to his character and he wages war. He wages war. This is not the suffering servant.

This is not the one who came to seek and to save the lost. This is not the one who came to call sinners to repentance. All of those things were characteristics of him at his first advent. This time he's waging war.

He's the warrior king. And he is the executioner of unbelievers because his enemies are the hardened sinners. They refuse to repent in spite of all of this that's happened. And it's not that there haven't been people going around proclaiming, repent and believe.

There have been. And so here comes the warrior king. He comes in righteousness. His motives are 100 pure, 100 right. All previous conquerors throughout human history have had hidden agendas. They wanted power for themselves.

Whether it's Alexander the Great or Caesar or Napoleon or whoever you can name. More modern times, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Paul Pott. Men, evil men conquering the world for evil purposes. Jesus Christ comes in righteousness.

His motives are 100 pure, 100 right. He's got blazing eyes. Nothing escapes his notice. No place to hide. No place to keep a low profile. You know, in times of change, that's one of the bureaucrat's mottos.

In times of change, keep a low profile. Can't do that here because Jesus Christ sees everything. And he's got many crowns on his head, it says. Now, this is an interesting reference to what was done in this time when some king conquered another one.

What you would do is you would take the crown of the king you had conquered and you'd put it on your own head, symbolizing that, you know, I'm now in charge. And Jesus Christ has all the crowns from all the kingdoms of the world.

He's conquered everybody. He is the one undisputed ruler of the earth. Now, consider what it must be, it's gonna be like, because there's going to be individuals on earth who are believers and it's very, very hard for them during this period of time.

You know, they're cut off from the world's economic system because they haven't taken the mark. They're almost starving. They have no resources, no medical resources. They're in hiding. If they stay alive at all, and just imagine what this is like, you wake up some morning and you wonder, am I gonna get through today?

That's the question you had in your mind every day that you've woken up for the last seven years. Am I gonna make it through this day? And all of a sudden, it gets light. And it gets light in a way that it's never gotten light before.

This is not the sun coming up. And you look up and there he is, there he comes. And his army is spread out behind him. And you realize that, you know, you feel like jumping up in the end zone and going, yes, you know, at the end, because here he is, here he is.

And notice what else about him. He's wearing a robe dipped in blood. And this is not the blood of his sacrifice. This is not the blood of salvation. This is the blood of his enemies. This is the blood of his enemies that spattered his robe.

The blood from previous battles. And he's come for the last battle. And his name is the word of God. Now compare that with John 1 .1. In the beginning was the word. And notice also, this is how he slays.

It says, and out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword that it should smite the nations. He slays with his word. And notice also this entire army, he's the only one that's got a weapon. Nobody else has a weapon.

Now we're all there. This heavenly army consists of saints throughout all of history. You know, it's the Old Testament saints. It's the church age saints. It's the martyrs of the tribulation period. We're all there.

We're all there. And we're just the cheering section. That's all we're there for, is to cheer him on. Because he slays with the word of his mouth. And apparently this is instantaneous. You know, it's an exaggeration to call this a battle.

This is not a battle, it's an execution. Because apparently he speaks a word and his enemies are done for. Right there. And so he strikes down the nations and no one escapes. The armies were gathered together at Armageddon and they're all dead.

Revelation uses the names Gog and Magog to describe this army, to name this army. And this is roughly a 200 million man army and suddenly they're all dead. You know, we have gone from a period of time, you remember right after the rapture, there was not a single believer on earth for that brief period right after the rapture.

And now we've gone completely full circle. There's not a single unbeliever on earth. The only people that are left alive on earth are believers. Because the victory is absolute and total. It's the day of the Lord.

It's this brief but very catastrophic and millions are dead along this battlefield. The valley of Megiddo, the plain of Megiddo is about 200 miles long. And there's dead people all over there. It's gonna take seven months to bury what remains.

The call goes out to all the birds that are still alive on earth, come feast on the great feast of God. And what's left after all of that takes place is gonna take seven months to bury. And so what happens?

The Antichrist and the false prophet are apparently taken alive because it doesn't speak of their deaths, but they are thrown into the lake of fire. This is the first mention of the lake of fire in the Bible.

The place that is prepared for Satan and his demons, but the Antichrist and the false prophet are consigned there. And everyone else that was gathered for the final battle is killed instantly. And so the battle is over.

And the nations are judged. And Jesus Christ establishes a literal earthly kingdom. And now I'll say again, this is pre-millennial eschatology. That's what we hold to here. But what are the characteristics of this?

And we need to move ahead here. First of all, he's going to establish a kingdom that's gonna last for 1 ,000 literal years. The term 1 ,000 years appears, I believe it's 10 times. I didn't count them all exactly.

But in chapter 20, it talks about reigning 1 ,000 years, bound 1 ,000 years, till the 1 ,000 years should be fulfilled. But this kingdom is going to be set up. And one of the purposes for this kingdom is the final fulfillment of all of the promises that God has made to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob and renewed to David.

And it allows the fulfillment of prophecies like the prophecies that were given when Jesus Christ was born. He shall be great, shall be called the son of the highest. And the Lord God will give unto him the throne of his father, David.

And in case you missed it, that hasn't happened. In human history yet. And I know people tend to spiritualize this. They say, well, that's a spiritual throne. But David didn't rule over a spiritual kingdom.

He ruled over flesh and blood. And the angel Gabriel told Mary that her son would sit on David's throne. Well, that's going to happen. It happens here. And so what else goes on? Satan and all of his demons are bound.

They are not permitted access to the earth. They are confined. They're tossed into jail, if you will. And the kingdom is populated by believers who have survived the tribulation. Now there's 144 ,000 Jewish evangelists that were sealed and they were guaranteed they were going to make it through the tribulation.

And so there are those guys. Then there are also other Jews that have believed during this period of time. Men and women, both children. There are Gentile believers who have not been martyred, who will make it through this period of time.

And so this group of people are going to populate this new kingdom. Now, we will also be present from time to time. We being church age saints, Old Testament saints, tribulation martyrs. But the difference is that we have glorified bodies now.

The people that are populating the kingdom on earth have the same bodies just like you and I have. And they're going to do the same things that we do. They're going to get married. They're going to have children.

There's going to be a population explosion like nothing you've ever seen because all of a sudden, nobody's dying. Everything is good. They're living a long time. Talks about somebody's going to die at the age of three or 400 years old.

And they say, oh, this poor young guy died. Question. Excellent question. The question was, for the recording, what about the children of the people that populate the kingdom? Is the gospel preached to them?

The short answer is yes, it is. It's the job of their parents to preach to them. And I'll address that a little bit further down the road because there's a rebellion at the end of all of this. And that's where some of the rebels are going to come.

We'll see that in just a moment. There's absolute justice on earth because Jesus is ruling with a rod of iron. There's never going to be a bad court decision. There's never going to be an incorrect rendering of anything that has to do with justice because there will be absolute justice on earth.

Absolute justice on earth. There will be a truly perfect environment if you want to call it that with the exception that the human, that the population of the earth, they still have the fallen gene, if you will, which they're going to pass on to their children.

Their children are not automatically saved. We'll get to that in just a moment. And saints are going to reign with Jesus. We are promised. First of all, Old Testament saints are promised that they will reign.

That's Daniel 727. The apostles, and by extension, that the apostles were promised that they will reign. That's Matthew 1928. New Testament believers are promised that we will reign with him. That's 1 Corinthians 6 .2, 2 Timothy 2 .12, and also Revelation 2 .26.

And finally, the tribulation martyrs. That's Revelation 6 .9, chapter seven, verses nine to 17, and 12 .11. All of those groups of people will be reigning with him on earth. And then the rest of the dead, the rest, that is unbelievers, will remain dead until the great white throne judgment.

And we'll address that in just a moment. So now back to what happens to the believers who survived the tribulation. Well, first of all, the individuals that survived the tribulation and go into the millennial kingdom, they're all saved.

They're all believers. Because if you're an unbeliever, you're dead at this point. So they enter the millennial kingdom, but they are not glorified. They still have, they are still, the sin nature is still present.

And so they have children. They live, they marry, they procreate in the normal manner. And their children, they pass the sin nature along to their children, just as our fathers did to us. And their children have the same obligation, the same need to repent and believe.

And you would think, you would think that, well, all I have to do is look around and they see all this perfection around them. And their parents are preaching the gospel to them. And they can look around and see how great everything is.

And there's no temptation because all of the demons and Satan are all bound. They're not permitted to come to the earth. And so obviously they're all going to get saved, right? Wrong. If there's an ultimate answer to the argument that, well, if we put people in a good environment, then they will be good.

Here's your answer. You have a thousand years of absolutely perfect environment. Not pretty good, perfect. No injustice. It's perfect because Jesus Christ himself is ruling here. And then what happens?

Satan is released at the end of the thousand years and he resumes his activity and he deceives and foments rebellion. And the unregenerate descendants of the millennium kingdom citizens join the rebellion.

There's a thousand years of perfect environment and they still haven't learned anything. And it's a big number. Verse eight says, verse eight says, and shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth.

That's the four points of the compass. Gog and Magog to gather them together to battle. And the number of them is as the sand of the sea. This is a big number of people that have chosen to rebel. And so there is the final, final battle that takes place.

And that also is essentially an execution. Verse nine, he said, they went up on the breadth of the earth and compass the camp of the saints about and the beloved city that's Jerusalem and fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them.

And now the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever. And then we come to the great white throne judgment.

The Great White Throne Judgment and the Lake of Fire

Now, I want to wrap up here. We got to move kind of fast, but one of the points of discussion among theologians concerns the resurrection. It is generally characteristic of amillennial theologians that they see one resurrection, only one.

Premillennial theologians see two. There is a resurrection that applies to the saints. And this sort of is staged. It's not all at exactly the same instant, but there's a resurrection for the just and a resurrection for the unjust.

And we can preach a whole lesson on that. So we might address that later. But notice some things about the great white throne judgment. First of all, the subjects are the dead. I saw the dead small and great.

That means unbelievers, because believers are alive. Believers have been alive for the last thousand years, even if they were already killed. You know, if you are a resurrected saint, you had your glorified body and you've been moving around on the earth.

And then the only other folks that are left on earth, all the unbelievers were killed at the end of the rebellion. And so all the believers are alive. The subjects here are the dead. Jesus Christ is the judge.