The next act of, judgment falls on Satan. The time is come that he should be bound, and cast into the bottomless pit. This is absolutely necessary during the thousand years blessed reign of Christ! Could Christ and Satan reign at the same time? Impossible. Now Satan is the god of this world. We have seen in Revelation 12 that he is, as the dragon, the very source of the power of the Roman empire, both past and to come. But you ask, “Are not the ‘powers that be’ (Rom. 13:11Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. (Romans 13:1)) ordained of God?” Most surely. But have not those “powers that be” rejected and murdered the Son of God, the rightful King? And does not the whole world lie in the hands of the wicked one? This is a solemn question to be quite clear about. Is Satan the god of this world? And does he continue to be so until the event foretold in this chapter? Perhaps my reader asks, “If the world has rebelled against Christ, murdered Him, and is now led on and ruled over by Satan, How can a Christian take part in the politics of the world, instead of taking his place with Christ in rejection?” I do not see how he can, without being unfaithful to Christ. No doubt many do so, through ignorance; but not without great loss to their souls. God in His providence does overrule; but the present reign of Satan in this world is a fearful fact. A little while then, and the apostate church, or Christendom, shall be fully judged; and then the apostate empire; and then Satan, the prime mover in all this iniquity. Who can conceive the blessed contrast, when the old serpent, the devil, Satan, shall be cast out. Men have no idea how he leads them on.
And then the first resurrection will be completed. Could there be a more certain proof that many will be saved who do not form part of the Church, the bride of the Lamb? Surely the bride was completed when the marriage took place in heaven (Rev. 19). And yet all these are raised from the dead, and form the completion of the first resurrection. All who had been slain, refusing to worship the beast, will live and reign with Christ a thousand years. This is all a new revelation, and embraces a company not included in the extent of this resurrection, as made known to Paul: but it is clearly revealed here. The rest of the dead will not live again until the thousand years are finished. The first resurrection is very blessed. How surely the Church has lost all this precious teaching, and gone back to the old Jewish idea of a general resurrection of the righteous and the wicked together. Scripture never contradicts itself, and nowhere does it teach a general resurrection.
There is then most certainly, not only a first resurrection, but a thousand years — the glorious millennial reign of Christ — before the second resurrection. That this first resurrection refers to the persons of the redeemed is most clear, for “they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years” (Rev. 20:66Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years. (Revelation 20:6)).
Unspeakably blessed as will be this period of the reign of Christ, and no enemy to tempt and deceive; yet from Revelation 20:7-107And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, 8And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. 9And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them. 10And 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 for ever and ever. (Revelation 20:7‑10) we have the fact made known that even after all this happy season of millennial rest — when Satan is let loose for a little, and the last time, on earth — the nations immediately fall into the snare of Satan: the final proof that the creature, if left to himself in any circumstance, cannot stand.
We have no information that the nations will all be born again. During the millennium, righteousness shall reign; in the eternal state righteousness shall dwell. Judgment from God falls on the rebellious host, and Satan is cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet have been during the thousand years.
Then takes place the judgment of the great white throne; and the dead stand before God. At this point the reader may remember the judgment in Matthew 25: the sheep and the goats. Perhaps you ask, “Is not that the general judgment? Are not the wicked dead and the righteous both raised up together, and then separated by the Judge?” How strange that such an error should have become so common! If you read that parable again, you will find there is no thought either of the righteous or wicked dead; no thought of the resurrection at all; but simply the judgment of the living nations, at the coming of Christ. That is quite a different scene from this judgment of the dead, and will evidently take place a thousand years before this. This is not at the coming of Christ in the clouds of heaven; but the heavens and the earth fled away. Woe to you, my reader, if you are one of those who stand before this white throne. Judgment there must be, either on the cross, or on the throne. If you can look back in faith to the cross, then sins are put away, to be remembered no more. If your sins shall be judged at the great white throne, then your place must be in the lake of fire forever and ever. Oh, ponder this revelation of the great white throne! Deepen, Oh my God, in my soul, the sense of thy mercy to me!