See the series here
As noted, I have written extensively about The Millennial Reign of Jesus Christ from every angle imaginable. It dawned on me that I have yet to examine the possible strategic rationale for The Millennial Reign age. So let’s continue to dig in and see what The Lord reveals. Keep in mind the apparent strategic objective of His multi-millennial strategic plan for humanity:
To recruit, orient, train, then ‘harvest’ from humanity a tested, proven, righteous remnant to whom He will show everlasting Grace and Mercy as immortal, ‘like-angel’ beings
(but not angels!)
(NB: The strategic objective of any strategy is not the goal or purpose. It serves as a high bridge between periodic programs, projects and activities, each with their purposes and objectives. The intent of this series is not to address these, but to examine The Lord’s likely highest level, over-arching principle that is governing achievement of His multi-millennial strategic plan for humanity. I trust this is clear.)
Continuing from Part 2…
The Final Strategic Objective Events
In light of the questionable progress to-date, it appears The Lord intends two final, major events to achieve all remaining aspects of His strategic objective. These two events are as follows.
1. The Great Tribulation
The Bible predicts, during the great tribulation plagues, a massive number of people will embrace His offer of eternal salvation. (Revelation 7) They will be aided in their choice by a specially-anointed group of 144,000 Jewish witnesses, plus a few angels who, together, will complete the job the Church did not or could not complete. I asked The Lord, ‘How will such a small group of witnesses, in such a short period of time (31/2 years or less), be so incredibly successful in winning souls for You, while the Church, in 2,000+ years seems to be relatively less successful?' Well, we all know how intense persecution can be an incredible motivator for people to do what they perceive they really need to do! Intense persecution motivated first-century Christians to withstand horrible attacks, first in Jerusalem, then across Israel, and later across Eurasia. The Lord gave me an answer I did not anticipate:
All people in the great tribulation will have missed the rapture of the Church. Yet many of them will have just enough Bible knowledge to recognize the anti-Christ, especially when he stands in the new Jewish temple in Jerusalem and declares, ‘I am God! Worship me!’, and demands all people the world over accept his permanent mark on their bodies (‘the mark of the beast’). Many will quickly reject both him and his mark, even at the peril of certain death by beheading! (Revelation 14:6-11) (Please see: Christians in the Apocalypse (poem))
Voila! Could this possibly be how The Lord might reclaim folks who are alive at that time, who were ‘lukewarm in their love for The Lord', and eventually fell away’ from the faith. Sadly, there will be no such opportunity for folks who will have died in this condition before the rapture! Caveat~
2. Removing All Constraints
During the Millennial Reign age, The Lord will remove ALL constraints to achieving His strategic objective for humanity. Constraints to achieving this objective currently are:
(a) His physical absence from Earth, thus requiring faith to believe,
(b) devils’ resistance operations, thus requiring faith, wisdom and spiritual strength to overcome, and
(c) peoples’ evil choices, thus requiring the will to learn and the tenacity to make righteous choices.
How will He will remove these constraints, and what might be the broad implications of such?
First, He will be physically present on Earth for a thousand years, demonstrating and proving to everyone, especially the great tribulation remnant, He IS The Lord God Almighty!!! No one will need faith to believe this!
Second, He will lock away satan’s kingdom of devils and demons. People born during that age will not know direct devilish deceptions, temptations and tests. Their innate, rebellious human nature will remain, including their proclivity to disobey The Lord God. (See: Zechariah 14:16-19)
Third, He and His immortal saints from previous ages will rule the world with a rod of iron! That means enforcing righteous choices and peace, thus controlling, but not removing, people’s freedom of choice. Ruling with an iron rod (e.g., iron fist!) for righteousness sake is akin to a strong man or dictator today ruling a nation, but typically for selfish, evil sake. A bonus factor will be giving people born during the Millennial Reign a clear SAMPLE or ‘demonstration effect’ of the eternal bodies The Lord has planned for everyone who becomes His saints! Don’t underestimate the power of this demonstration effect.
Ponder this: To you, does it seem fair and wise for The Lord to remove all constraints to achieving His strategic objective?? He clearly is ...the ultimate boss, giving Grace to whomever He wills.
Let’s examine the broad implications and then the wisdom of His odd (to us) strategic approach.
Removing these constraints indicates all conditions and requirements for salvation, as we currently understand them, will not be present during the Millennial Reign age. As such, I surmise salvation (as we currently understand it) may not be immediately available to people born in that age. We already know salvation will not be available to great tribulation remnants, according to Revelation 14, because during the great tribulation, they will have willingly embraced the anti-Christ and his mark of the beast. When they die early during The Millennial Reign age, these people will be eternally lost.
If/if The Lord intends to extend His offer of salvation (as we currently know it) to those who will be born during that age (The Bible indicates He does), then it seems they would have to remain alive until all the above constraints are back in place:
(a) Jesus and His immortal saints are physically absence from Earth,
(b) devis’ resistance operations resume with the release of satan’s kingdom, and
(c) people are free to make evil choices without external controls.
Bible students will quickly recognize these are the exact conditions that will exist ‘for a little while’ at the end of The Millennial Reign age! This scenario seems to confirm my belief there will very likely be no salvation during the Millennial Reign age. This could possibly be the core reason why satan (and presumably his kingdom of devils and demons) must be released at the end of The Millennial Reign age! (Revelation 20:1-3) The Lord obviously has more resistance operations for him to orchestrate during the post-Millennial Reign age. Makes sense?
If I am correct, people born during the Millennial Reign age will not die until sometime in the post-Millennial Reign age. How can this be?! First, recall how long people lived in the pre-flood age. The longest recorded lifespan was that of Methuselah who lived 969 years, just short of ‘a day’ if, as Moses wrote in Psalm 90:4, and Peter reiterated in 2 Peter 3:8. But that age was rife with sinfulness on the pristine Earth! Moreover, some devils exponentially increased sinfulness by becoming humans (‘leaving their proper domain’, per Jude 6), and marrying women!
Now imagine this:
—Earth, once again pristine,
—humans and the entire animal/sea/insect kingdoms are back on their original Genesis 1:29-30 diets,
—all devils are locked away, and
—The Lord, with all His saints and angels, are policing righteousness worldwide.
In such conditions, I have absolutely no problems believing people born under such conditions could live much longer than a thousand years. Do you?
Admittedly, without clear, specific Bible guidance, this is obviously a controversial topic. My opinions are derived from a broad and deep strategic understanding of The Bible’s ‘salvation context’. Believe as you are led, and feel free to share your comments below. (See: Salvation in the Millennium (Series))
If my understanding is correct, it stands to reason that the post-Millennial Reign age will be the final opportunity for The Lord to complete His strategic objective for humanity. The Bible explains this age will last ‘a little while’. (Revelation 30:3) I have long pondered how long is ‘a little while’, when thousands of (our) years ago, an angel declared satan had come down to Earth with great wrath because he knows he has a short time [to deceive humans]. (Revelation 12:12) Also, thousands of years ago, The Lord declared to Apostle John the bulk of his Revelation vision were of things 'which must shortly take place'. (Revelation 22:6) Clearly, our concept of time is massively different from His. ;o)
The results of The Lord’s ‘constraints-moving’ approach to completing His strategic objective will be realized during the last resurrection when all peoples ever born across the initial 6 ages of humanity, and who will have missed the previous resurrections, will then be resurrected, and will stand before The Lord in their new, immortal bodies. He will consult His ‘Book of [Eternal] Life’ (Revelation 20:11-15) to confirm who embraced His offer of eternal salvation during the post-Millennial Reign age, and is, therefore, eligible to join His immortal saints on the new Earth. Everyone else whose names will evidently not be found in His Book, along with every devil and demon, will then be cast in to the eternal lake of fire, also somewhere on the new Earth, according to Isaiah 66:22-24. The Bible indicates every resident of the eternal lake of fire, including all devils and demons, will be in an immortal body, soul and spirit. (See: Earth’s Next Versions (Series) and Hell: Is This the Man? (Poem))
Thus, the strategic rationale for the Millennial Reign age appears to be:
To remove ALL constraints humans previously encountered to embracing salvation in Jesus Christ, so His highly effective and efficient ‘demonstration effect’ will greatly increase the likelihood many will embrace Him during the subsequent, short age.
This insight uncloaks The Lord’s GREAT wisdom. Moreover, He foreknows who will and who won’t embrace His offer of salvation!
From the lessons we learned following His past, protracted sojourns on Earth, faith in Him across the growing human populations was likely very strong for a long while (a) after Adam and Eve left Eden, (b) after Moses and his family left the ark, and (c) after He left Earth following His resurrection. But then, over time, faith in Him rapidly diminished, and even died out in many areas across the world, just like it has done today! So in a sense, The Millennial Reign, His presence on Earth for a thousand years, will be an opportunity to ensure much more SUSTAINABLE faith during the post-Millennial Reign age. Keeping that age relatively short, in comparison to these earlier times, should help to maximize the number of people who will successfully overcome satan's resistance operations in those days. This applies to (a) all people who will have been born during the Millennial Reign age, who will live long enough to see the post-Millennial Reign age, and also (b) those who will be born during the post-Millennial Reign age. This is very wise in my eyes!
NB. The Book of [Eternal] Life is mentioned once in Philippians 4:3, and a whopping seven times in Revelation chapters 3, 13, 17, 20 (twice), 21 and 22. These references confirm a person’s name can be written in and blotted out of this Book. Caveat~
Is your name written therein …sustainably?
