31-Chapter 3. World Ruin And World Judgment
Chapter 3. World Ruin And World Judgment [1] World Imperfection In spite of all its glory the Millennial kingdom comes at first to a terrible end. Not even the visible kingdom of peace on earth is the full consummation. Sin and death are still there, with the possibility of the guilty being accursed (Isaiah 65:20); indeed, the possibility of national disobedience by whole groups of peoples (Zechariah 14:17-18). Righteousness indeed rules on the earth; it does not yet dwell absolutely in all. Much rather this will first be the case on the new earth (2 Peter 3:13; Revelation 21:3).
Nevertheless Satan is bound, which eliminates his power to mislead (Revelation 20:2-3). On the one hand this will be an easing of man’s lot, because it will no longer be so hard not to sin; on the other hand it will involve an increase of their responsibility, if nevertheless they should sin. Hence also the severer judgment in the coming kingdom of God. Sin no longer stands, as before, under Divine forbearance (Matthew 5:45; Matthew 13:30; Genesis 8:21; Romans 3:25; Romans 9:22; 2 Peter 3:9; 2 Peter 3:15), but is judged unsparingly. The nations that will not follow will be shepherded with an iron sceptre, those who resist will be shattered to pieces as a potter’s vessel (Psalms 2:8-9; Revelation 19:15; Revelation 12:5; Revelation 2:26-27), and the lawless will be slain by the Lord with the breath of His mouth (Isaiah 11:4). Obedience or destruction—this is the alternative for all alike at the very beginning of the kingdom. Every false prophet will be killed (Zechariah 13:3), each people that does not worship will be visited with lack of rain (Zechariah 14:17-19), each nation that rebels will be stricken to the ground (Micah 5:7-8; Obadiah 1:18; Zechariah 12:6).
[2] World Rebellion But at last Satan must be let loose so as once again to attempt to seduce (Revelation 20:3; Revelation 20:7-8). “God’s righteousness does not permit that unrighteousness shall be exterminated before it has become fully ripe” (comp. Revelation 14:15; [Genesis 15:16]). This is a Divine rule which will be followed in the case of even Satan himself. Even the Millennial kingdom must be tested for results. Even the nations of the kingdom of glory must be given opportunity to decide of their own free will. None shall be hindered from freely joining the host behind Satan. No one shall serve the Lord in eternity unwillingly. Even this brilliant period of human history must be shown to be incapable of breaking the inborn obstinacy of the sinner.
What in fact is the outcome of all that glory and blessing of a thousand long years? Rebellion of the peoples over the widest area. From all the ends of the earth they gather against Jerusalem, the massing of the peoples like the sand of the sea, under the supreme command of Gog and Magog (Revelation 20:8-9; Ezech. 38:39; Genesis 10:1-2). This is the last rebellion of history, the last religious war of the peoples, the last convulsive effort of human revolt against the Most High. Therewith sin has attained its full measure. Mankind has rejected even the visible lordship of the Godhead. They have despised the very greatest of His blessing with most disdainful ingratitude, and His personal glory they have trodden under foot. And what was their choice? In place of the leadership of God they chose to be seduced by Satan. In place of unity and peace they chose conspiracy and insurrection. In place the heavenly Christ they chose His deadly foe, the Devil. To this there can be only one answer: destruction and ruin. But before it can come to a battle, fire falls from heaven and consumes them, and the Devil who deceived them is cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the Beast and the false Prophet are (Revelation 20:9-10). That of the three persons of the infernal trinity Satan will be the last to be judged has its own internal reason.
It is a fact that, in the whole course of world affairs, copy and original are at first commingled, but the further world development advances the essential elements come ever more clearly to light. This is the case in both kingdoms, both that of light and that of darkness.
Thus in the history of the revelation of the Divine Being we perceive three chief stages corresponding to the three Divine Persons: the age of the working of the Spirit (in the church age), the age of the visible kingly rule of the Son (the Millennium), the eternal kingdom of God the Father (in the ultimate perfect condition). But the self-revelation of the Demonic also completes itself in three corresponding stages. In the present age of the world Satan works under a veil, camouflaged as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14), as a “mystery” of lawlessness (2 Thessalonians 2:7), as the spirit of Antichristianism (1 John 4:3), for the more part even denying his own personal existence. But then, after he has throughout thousands of years plunged mankind into destruction by means of evil lusts, misleading religions, liars and deceivers in both personal and world history, at the end of the age he will speak to them through the appearing of his Antichrist, through the special revelation of himself in the Man of sin (2 Thessalonians 2:3), through his satanic counterpart to the heavenly Christ. But finally, when this Lawless One collapses and is cast into the lake of fire, he will himself, after the thousand years, step forth on to the battlefield and appear as the direct immediate Deceiver, but will himself also be conquered and thrown into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:7-10). Thus in the period of the church there corresponds to the Spirit of God the demonic as an invisible spirit activity (1 John 4:3); in the period just before the opening of Messiah’s kingdom there corresponds to the manifestation of the Christ of God the demonic as the coming forth of the Antichrist; in the period immediately before the arrival of the perfect condition, to the final victory of God the Father, the Head of all the Divine realm, there corresponds the demonic as the direct rebellion of the head of the demonic realm, as the final rebellion of Satan, himself the origin of all that is infernal.
Therefore must the “first” person of the Satanic trinity be the last to be judged, because as the origin of all that is demonic it is only at the last that he fully reveals himself. At the appearing of the Son the Anti-son (Antichrist) will be judged; at the manifestation of the Father, and so of God, the Anti-god, the Dragon himself, will be judged. The second Person of the Divine trinity triumphs over the “second” person of the demonic infernal trinity, the first Person of the Divine Being over the “first” person of the demonic. “For the attitude of the Father to the Son is the attitude of Satan to the Antichrist. As with the coming of the Father the deepest element of the kingdom of light is revealed, so in the kingdom of darkness the deepest element must be forced to the light and Satan himself be judged.”
Thus it becomes manifest that in the whole universe there lies a mighty parallelism, and inner law of consequence, a spiritual law, clearly to be recognized, of historical and super-historical development and consummation.
[3] World Destruction
Now the last judgment breaks loose. The universal structure goes up in flames. Earth destruction! Star destruction! World destruction! Heaven and earth are shattered (Haggai 2:6; Hebrews 12:26-28), disappear as smoke, perish as a garment (Isaiah 51:6);all the godless are burnt up as in a fiery oven (Malachi 4:1). The earth shivers to pieces (Isaiah 24:19); the stars melt (Isaiah 34:4); the heaven is rolled together as a scroll (Hebrews 1:12; Psalms 102:26). The splitting of the atom! the dissolving of the elements (2 Peter 3:12; 2 Peter 3:7)! the shattering of the universe with mighty roaring (2 Peter 3:10)!
Such is the answer of the Almighty to this most despicable rebellion of His creatures. Such is the counterstroke of the Lord of the worlds against the most hellish revolt of His universe. Such is the final revelation of the righteous wrath of God over the whole scene of sin, earthly and heavenly. But then out of this fiery judgment there emerges a new and glorious world. Not mere annihilation (Revelation 20:11), but transformation was God’s final goal in the destruction (Psalms 102:26; Hebrews 1:12; Hebrews 12:27), not mere dissolution but new creation, not desolation but transfiguration. Out of the passing away of heaven and earth (Matthew 5:18; Matthew 24:35) there will come, under Divine government, a transition of both into a new heaven and a new earth (Revelation 21:1; 2 Peter 3:13).
[4] World Judgment
“And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat upon it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne; and the books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of the things which were written in the books, according to their works” (Revelation 20:11-12).
1. The Throne. The throne is great on account of its majesty, white because of its holiness. The earth must flee on account of the sins of men and its defilement with the blood of God’s Son. The heaven must flee because of the sins of spirits and the wickedness of the World Rulers in the heavenly places, whose seat they had been (Ephesians 6:12; Ephesians 2:2). So heaven and earth must flee from before the great white throne, and every scene of sin is dissolved.
2. The Judge is Christ. For the Father has committed all judgment unto the Son (John 5:22; John 5:27), He is the Man whom the Highest has appointed to judge the earth in righteousness (Acts 17:31), “The Judge ordained by God of the living and the dead” (Acts 10:42; 2 Timothy 4:8; 1 Peter 4:5), who exercises His judgment in accord with the Father (John 5:30; John 8:16).
3. The Standard is the Word of God. “He who despises me, and receives not my word, has already his judge: the word which I have spoken to you, the same will judge him at the last day (John 12:48).
4. Those judged are all the dead, the great and the small, that is, all men of all lands and all times, with the exception of those raised at the beginning of the Millennial kingdom. The Old Testament saints, as well as the members of the glorified church and the saved of the Tribulation time, had been already raised at the first resurrection before Messiah’s kingdom (Revelation 20:4-5); had thus already been before the judgment seat of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10), and consequently had been already a thousand years in glorified spirit-bodies (Php 3:20-21). At the coming of the Son those of the dead will be raised who belong to Christ and whose relationship to the Father is therefore that of sonship (1 Corinthians 15:23). At the last judgment the deeper-lying regions will awake which had not been touched by the coming of the Son (Revelation 20:5; 1 Corinthians 15:24). The final resurrection follows which includes all who stand in more general relationships to God than that of sonship (Revelation 20:12). Thus the two chief stages of the resurrection of all men correspond to the two stages of the victorious march of the Divine plan for final perfecting: i.e. to the coming of the Son before the opening of the visible kingdom of God on earth, and to the appearing of the eternal kingdom of God the Father in the transfigured universe. Here also, in this parallelism of the events, is seen again that the Divine government of the history of salvation follows its own inner law.
5. The Severity. The others must now all appear before he judgment seat of God. All their works are recorded in “books,” their deeds and thoughts, their acts and omissions (Revelation 20:12). They must give account of every unprofitable word (Matthew 12:36-37), and everything will be manifest, even the most secret things of the soul (Hebrews 4:13). There the Lord will look into the eye of each, and each into His eye. There will the Judge, with glance of flame, instantly see through the most inward parts of each individual (comp. Revelation 1:14; Daniel 7:9-10). There will the King, with holy unsparingness, drag completely into light every second of their life.
There will they be dumb, the vain babblers (Job 9:3; Matthew 22:12). There will they be broken to pieces, the haughty boasters (Jude v. 15). There will they be manifested in their pitiable wretchedness all the “great minds” and “heroes” of human history (Psalms 2:1-5).
There all supports snap. There all religions collapse. There all self-righteousness is seen as a filthy garment (Isaiah 64:6). Deceit is no more possible. No hiding-place is to be found (Psalms 139:1-12). All self-deception becomes disappointment, unmasked by the truth. Each must bow (Romans 14:11; Php 2:10). Each must yield assent (comp. Romans 9:20). Each must acknowledge that God is just.
6. The Result. Not all receive alike; each receives his portion, that is the portion that belongs to him (Matthew 24:51), be greater or lesser. It will go easier with Sodom and Gomorrah than with the cities that rejected the message of the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 10:15); easier for Tyre and Sidon than Chorazin and Bethsaida (Matthew 11:21-22); easier with the land of Sodom than with Capernaum, the city of Jesus (Matthew 11:23-24; comp. 4:13). The Queen of Sheba will condemn the contemporaries of Jesus (Matthew 12:42), and so also will the men of Nineveh (Matthew 12:41). To any teachers falsely called “Christian” God will add plagues (Revelation 22:18); and, in general, to all pious shams and the stiff-necked He will cry: “Depart from me, ye cursed, into the eternal fire, prepared for the Devil and his angels” (Matthew 25:41; Matthew 7:23).
Nevertheless not all will be condemned. The doctrine that none who stand before the great white throne will be saved goes beyond Scripture. For the Revelation does not say, “Because noone was found written in the book of life they were all cast into the lake of fire,” but “If any one was not found written in the book of life he was cast into the lake of fire” (Revelation 20:15). The converted nation of the Millennial kingdom have not before been judged and must therefore appear before the great white throne. And when it is further said in the account in the Revelation that the dead were judged “according to their works,” it is to be remembered that faith itself is a “work,” the work and attitude which is the will of God, as Christ Himself declared in the words, “This is the work of him that sent me, that ye believe on him,” etc. This was His answer to the question “What must we do that we may work the works of God” (John 6:28-29). And as regards particular deeds, there are two kinds of these: the works of the flesh and the law done by the unregenerate, through which, of course, no man can be justified before God (Romans 3:28), so that he who has these only will be cast into the lake of fire; and then the “good” works, the works of faith of the regenerate, which, according to Scripture, and in spite of all redemption and grace, are nevertheless required from the justified (Titus 2:7; Titus 2:14; Titus 3:1; Titus 3:8; Titus 3:14; James 2:26). The Scripture does not deal fully with the question of how God will treat the Gentiles of the times before the Millennium who had not heard the gospel. Romans 2:1-16 should be considered. It is enough for us to expect by faith that God will act righteously. “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” When Jesus was once asked, “Lord, do you mean that few will be saved?” He answered quite simply. “Strive that you enter in through the narrow gate” (Luke 13:23-24). At the close of the judgment each will recognize that he has received only his due. This is enough. The rest we leave to God (Romans 11:34).
7. The Second Resurrection. A resurrection is connected with the great white throne, the so-called “second” resurrection in distinction from the “first” resurrection before the Millennial kingdom (Revelation 20:12; comp. 5). The Scripture plainly teaches a bodily resurrection of the lost. It calls it the “resurrection of the unrighteous” (Acts 24:15), the “resurrection unto judgment” (John 5:29), the “resurrection unto eternal disgrace and shame” (Daniel 12:2). This also will be wrought by Christ, the Awaken of the dead (1 Corinthians 15:21-22; John 5:26-29), and in it God is the one who is able to destroy even the body in hell (Matthew 10:28).
Terrible is the difference between it and the resurrection unto life. In both cases the new body has in itself the nature and the essence of the old body, but each in a contrary direction and a fully matured form. In the case of the redeemed the earthly body had been a “temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19), its members, in principle, “instruments of righteousness” (Romans 6:13), and its resurrection element a seed of God; therefore it will be raised unto salvation. But in the case of the lost it had been only a body of sin and death (comp. Romans 6:6; Romans 7:24), its members “instruments of unrighteousness” Romans 6:13), and its resurrection element a seed of the Devil; therefore will it now become a body of darkness and damnation.
Thus does all “seed” attain to ripeness (1 Corinthians 15:42-44). Every body is at the same time an expression of inner spirit reality; and as the body of the saved bears the imprint of holiness, so the body of condemnation of the lost bears the imprint of godlessness, and it brings them to “shame and eternal abhorrence” (Daniel 12:2).
Yet even their resurrection will show to the lost that they had no need to have remained in death, for their resurrection also is an outcome of the bodily resurrection of the Crucified One (John 5:26-29; 1 Corinthians 15:20-22); and Christ, the Prince of Life, whose resurrection power they now experience in their own bodies for a purely judicial reason, would have been able to have freed them, exactly as the others from the bands of every form of death. But now this kind of resurrection grants them nothing. It is only, as the Scripture says, the “other death” (Revelation 20:14; Revelation 2:11); the passing from the forecourt of hell into hell itself, the transfer from the intermediate place, the place of “torment” (Luke 16:23; Luke 16:28), into the “eternal fire.” The Scripture gives a fearful picture of the lot of these the lost. It speaks of “tribulation and anguish” (Romans 2:9), of “howling and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 22:13; Matthew 25:30), of “eternal destruction” (2 Thessalonians 1:9). It speaks of a “furnace” and of a “place of horror” [Topheth] (Matthew 13:42; Matthew 13:50; Psalms 21:9; Isaiah 30:33), of a “prison” and an “abyss” (Matthew 5:25; 2 Peter 2:4, [Tartarus], of a “hell” and “eternal torment” (Matthew 25:46). It speaks of a “worm that dieth not” (Mark 9:48), a “fire that goes not out” (Mark 9:43; Mark 9:48; Matthew 25:41), a “sea which burns with fire and brimstone” (Revelation 20:15; Revelation 20:10; Revelation 19:20). It says: “it is fearful to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31). “It were better for that man (Judas, for example) never to have been born” (Matthew 26:24), and “the smoke of their torment goeth up for ever and ever” (Revelation 14:11; Revelation 20:10).
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