Rapture, Tribulation, Millennium: What Does Revelation Teach? - Paul Lamicela

For me personally, speaking autobiographically, that was one of the things that sort of turned me off to Revelation. It was like, it's all this weird—everyone's like all hyped up about this weird, these weird debates over arcane matters, right? And then when I started studying it more in depth, uh, in the context of New Testament studies and Second Temple Jewish literature and such, and the Old Testament, I started realizing, whoa, this book is not about quibbling over, you know, lines on a prophecy chart. It's about weaving together the whole story of the Bible and calling us to live in a certain way because, you know, a different—basically a different packaging of the same teaching that the rest of the New Testament has, you know?

And then I think it's something that can be exciting and not either dry and arcane or sort of unnecessarily, uh, divisive.

Well, Paul LaMichelle, welcome back to the podcast. So we did a podcast with you a few months ago on how to read the book of Revelation. Needless to say, we got an enormous amount of feedback and a lot of questions about that, um, and people wanting us to do follow-up. And something that maybe our audience doesn't know, but a lot of the episodes we do actually come from audience, um, questions or, or, or suggestions like, "Hey, you should, you should do one on this." And then, "Oh yeah, we'll do that." So this time around, we want to acknowledge those questions and actually just do more of a Q&A-ish on the feedback that we got, which was a lot.

That's awesome. Yeah. So there was a lot of questions, and we're just going to hit at least a—try to be representative of the main ones that we got in. No way we're going to cover them all, but, um, but yeah, so we'll jump in and just, uh, see where we end up. I've noticed there tends to be a good amount of interest in when I talk about Revelation, when, you know, it seems common that people seem to be—it's a topic people seem to be interested in. Yeah. Do you have theories as to—I mean, I am too, so I get it, but like, do you have theories as to—oh my goodness. What is it with American, um, the American interpretation of Revelation just seems to result in lots of conversation?

Yeah. You know, and maybe some people are like wondering if there's ways that they can read it that might resonate with them better. I don't know, but there's a lot of questions. It's interesting. Yeah. So one of the—one of the big ones, uh, for example, and these are more samples. So this, this was—I got this from a number of different people, so I'll just kind of do it in my own words. But what is the rapture? We did not talk about that specifically when we did the other one. It was more generally like, how do we read Revelation? So the rapture is a big one. You're going to hear about that all the time. It's—it's to the point where it's such a well-known thing.

It's essentially bled over into pop culture. Pop culture, yeah. In mainstream society, not just within the church, which kind of blows my mind. Um, yeah. So what's the rapture? Yeah. Um, and if you're in—if people are interested, uh, maybe that was an allusion to the book by Daniel Hummel called The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism. It is. Yes. Yeah. So if anyone's interested in—Fascinating. It's a great book. It talks about how dispensationalism, which is the kind of the—the father is—is the—is what made the rapture and uncertain other ideas. Well, what invented them and what made them popular, um, uh, how that dominated American evangelicalism and then mostly died out in academic circles, but at the same time crossed over into pop culture and sort of total, totally took over.

That's a great—that's a great book for anyone, any nerd out there who's interested. It's—it's—yes, it's fairly detailed. There's any—it is, but it's well—it's well done. It's very, very good. If you're like—if you're interested in modern Christian history, it's just so cool. Uh, but maybe that's just the nerds—the nerds in us talking.

Um, so the rapture is, uh, when—when we think of the rapture—now, we didn't talk about it in the other one in part, but for many reasons, but in part because Revelation never mentions it, right? It's not in Revelation at all. But when we talk about the rapture, we're usually talking about, um, this very specific dispensational idea of the rapture, which is the certain way of reading the Bible and Revelation that, uh, is very kind of literalistic.

Uh, there's a lot of things we can't go into that, but basically it was invented largely by this guy named John Nelson Darby in the 1800s in England and then came into the United States and for various, uh, reasons, including, um, uh, being—yeah, there's various reasons from Deal Moody to Schofield that made it become super popular in America, took over, uh, American evangelicalism. Uh, but basically it's—it's the idea from that way of schematizing the end times. Um, and by the end times, we're talking about sort of the last number of years before Jesus return, not the way the New Testament talks about the end times, which is the whole period of time from Jesus that's—that started with Jesus coming.

You're—you're—when you say end times, we're using in the frame of reference that you would typically see laid out in—in the United States. Yeah, that evangelical style of there's going to be this and then this is going to happen and the global government's going to take over. Like there'll be seven years of this and that. Yeah, yeah, the whole timeline that way, which is not how the New Testament uses the term, not how I like to use the term. Okay. But we're for now. Sure. So, so, um, the idea that believers will be caught up to meet Jesus as he's returning is something that Christians all, you know, all believe. But the specific kind of twist on this that dispensationalism brought was this idea, um, that that the rapture is something where it's not—it's not something that happens at the end of the age when Jesus is returning for final judgment and renewal of all things.

But it's the sort of thing that Jesus snatches away his people and then there continues to be tribulation and all sorts of problems, and then Jesus returns later, right? Yeah. And, and so there's different terms for—well, there's different understandings of this, but the most kind of classic one is pre-tribulational, uh, rapture or whatever, where God's people are taken up before a what they view as a seven-year period of of all sorts of terrible things happening before Jesus' final return. But there's been other takes. Some people think the rapture would be in the middle of those seven years or whatever. So from my perspective, there is no seven years, uh, you know, of of that. It's—we're speaking Revelation, I think, is speaking when it's—and Matthew and other places are speaking of this time of tribulation.

It's speaking of this whole era, um, where the beast is, uh, is clashing with the people of Jesus, you know, and when God's judgments, in a sense, are starting to be poured out, right? So, but the the idea of this rapture that that happens is taken really from 1 Thessalonians 4, um, where Paul says, and Paul is writing to the Thessalonians to tell them, "Hey," because apparently some of them are starting to get worried because some some of their loved ones are dying. And they're like, "Wait, but they're dying. Jesus isn't back yet. What's going to happen?" And Paul says, "Don't worry. Um, you will be with them again. We'll, we'll, we'll, we'll be together.

We'll sure you're dead now, but Jesus is going to raise them and he's going to snatch you up as well and you'll be all together." You know, that's the context. But so he says that the trumpet will sound and, uh, the Lord will descend from heaven. So he's coming down, right? Uh, and it says the dead and the Messiah will rise first, and then all of us who remain will be snatched up to meet him in the clouds, and then we will, you know, be with the Lord forever, it says. There's no hint there that this is something that is separate from, uh, at a different time period from Jesus' final return. The language of the trumpet or Jesus descending, uh, is the same types of, you know, trumpet language that we see in Revelation for Jesus' return.

Jesus descending from heaven sounds a lot like what the angels said when the disciples saw Jesus ascend. They'll say, "You'll see him in like manner descend," right? Um, so there's—and you have the resurrection of the dead at the same time, right? And some people have tried to put a wedge in between that, um, but it really doesn't work. Like the whole point is that, look, we'll all, we'll all be together. The dead in Christ will rise.

Yes, and they'll maybe be the first part of this escort committee or whatever it is. Um, but the point seems to be this is Jesus' return, right? And the snatching up is not a permanent—now we go up to heaven, but it is, um, as Jesus is, is come, is returning or whatever, we're brought to be with him, to follow him as he, as he presumably, uh, returns to earth to bring about judgment and restoration.

So all of this talk about the rapture and these elaborate models that have been built, um, around this, all of that is based on that passage in, in Thessalonians? That's the main passage. So there's also the other, the other places, um, in Matthew 24 where Jesus speaks of, you know, signs of the end, by which also I think he's speaking of this whole—well, he's speaking of the destruction of Jerusalem and then the whole tribulation of these, those days until his return. Um, and he says, you know, "Be ready."

Uh, and then he speaks of, of how, um, he will, you know, one will—there will be two people doing the same activity together. The one will be taken, the other left. Right. And that, uh, that probably provides fodder for a lot of the 90s, uh, pictures of sort of, um, from the Left Behind, you know, series, that kind of thing. That's what really brought it into pop culture. I mean, there's other things too, but that was a really—yeah, it's so cinematic. Yeah, the classic imagery of, yeah, you know, people in an airplane or whatever, and all of a sudden, like half the seats are just—they're just closed, you know? Yeah. And that, and that is such a, a stark image.

It just gets stuck in the, you know, and it's like, well, I guess it looks good in a story. Yeah. But I think the, the piece with that, and I think that's why this, this person sent this in, it was just like, okay, but like what does scripture say again? Like, like because the problem is it's so hard to, to peel back all the layers now because so many layers have been piled on top from fiction and pop culture and just the assumed everything, the dispensational edifice. It's a whole edifice, right? Yeah. There's a, this entire infrastructure around this stuff. Yeah. And so I know for myself, it's just like, I have no idea. Like how do you know?

It just gets so convoluted so quickly. So, so you're essentially saying what we think classically of this, what the rapture is going to look like is really just kind of not—that's overblown. It's a misunderstanding. Yeah. And what's happening in Matthew 24, I think when Jesus speaks of the one taken and the other left, actually some, there's no clarity on where they're taken or why or anything like that, right? So again, trying to read in a separate situation here is misguided, but also some scholars even, uh, think that that taking away, that's the negative part. We always think of the being left as the bad part, right?

Whoa. Um, but in the verse right before, um, Jesus uses the example of, um, of the flood. And he says, so his whole point is to be a stay awake and be faithful, right? And very similar, similar idea. It's not the same wording, but it's a very similar idea, uh, where he says, you know, he says, "Concerning that day or an hour, nobody knows. It's going to be like the days of Noah." And he says, uh, "As in those days, people were just eating, drinking, going about their normal life." Hmm. And, and, uh, they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away. So will be the coming of the Son of Man.

Two will be left and one—two will be in one field. One will be taken and the other left. So it by analogy from the the previous verse, the flood came and swept them all away. That leads some scholars to think that the, the ones taken away are the, are the taking away is the taking away for judgment, right? Just like at the flood when they were swept away.

Well, okay. I've never thought of it that way. So it's always—we can't be sure, right? But whatever is the case, whatever the case is, there's no details here that support a separate rapture. This is Jesus is speaking of the time when the Son of Man returns, right? The time of judgment and salvation. There's nothing there that implies that. And again, the emphasis, just like John in Revelation, is on staying away in Matthew, is staying awake, being ready, right? Not in the sense of being ready by checking the newspapers, but being faithful, right? So there's no—yeah. So the, the, the rapture as a distinct thing that's before and separate from Jesus' return, Jesus' final return, uh, you know, it doesn't seem to really have, have good grounding, right?

But if we're talking, saying the rapture in the sense that whoever's alive when Jesus returns will, will join him immediately and meet him as he, as he returns or whatever. Yes, all Christians believe that. Mm-hmm. Yeah. That, that, that helps a lot to kind of peel back the layers because it does feel like there's a lot of fog around these things. And it's just like, uh, I don't know, you know, it's just so easy to be like, I don't know what to think. Let's just not even—we're not even going to look into it. That's very helpful. So here's another comment that we got, um, from someone named Caleb. And he says this, "I fear the incursion of street-level dispensationalism in conservative Anabaptist circles."

Um, and they asked if you have any resources to point us to warn fellow Anabaptists against it. And then he says, "Maybe you should write a book on the topic." Um, so yeah, I'd be curious what you would think there because we were just talking about the dispensational framework and how that is just so infused the conversation. It's kind of hard to pull all the pieces apart anymore. Right. Um, so yeah, what would you have to say? Yeah. You know, I'm going to be less inclined to have like specific resources that are like warning of the dangers of something like this and more things that are, uh, I mean, I do think dispensationalism has some features that are, that are, uh, that are kind of not helpful and help and maybe, um, push us to think of, to miss some, some, some of the good stuff in the Bible.

But, you know, that's, that's, it's not a first-year doctrine or anything. Um, but I would be more inclined to, to say, um, there's some good resources out there that, that present, I think, better readings and that really show how the, to try to read the Bible better according to its own categories and its own storyline and genre and things and genres. And so some examples, um, I've probably mentioned some of these before in other podcasts or whatever, but, uh, I think, uh, Steve Wellam and Peter Gentry's, uh, God's Kingdom Through God's Covenants. It's a, there's, there's a big version and a small version, but God's Kingdom Through God's Covenants is the shorter, I mean, it's 250 pages or whatever.

Um, but that's a really helpful starting place for reading, putting the whole Bible together in a way that is, um, I think, much better than a dispensational framework. And they deal with, in the intro, they, they talk some about, um, about the, the sort of covenant theology, dispensationalism, and then this, you know, kind of meet this way in the middle. I think that's a good place to start for the history of dispensationalism, uh, that book by Daniel Hummel, The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism.

Um, what else? Those are a couple of good places to start. Um, but you're not necessarily saying, "Oh, we need to be out here warning people of this." You know, it's not really, you're not approaching it like that. Uh, I'm not like, I think, again, like there are so many people that we respect very highly, uh, in recent American church history have been dispensational to some degree or another. Um, good, you know, thank praise God. Um, so it's not, it's not some, uh, it's not evil or, or whatever, but I do think it produces some, some problems and things that I do think are actually significant and should be, uh, and should be avoided. Another book that deals with, um, there's one, one more book that deals with, uh, specific topics from a perspective non-dispensational, but also non-covenant theology, which is kind of the other side of that spectrum.

Um, perspective is called, uh, Progressive Covenantalism, and it has a chapter. It's edited by Steve Wellam and Brent Parker, I think. Uh, and it has chapters on different topics that, so like the Sabbath and, uh, Israel and the church, the land promise, different things like that that are treated from, from this, from, you know, a non-dispensational perspective, but also a non-covenant theology perspective. Oh, one more book. I keep saying one more. Uh, it's called From Continuity to Discontinuity. Can't remember off the top of my head the author, but maybe Ben Merkel is one of them, but from Continuity to Discontinuity, it just lays out, um, the spectrum of, of ways of reading the Bible from her dispensational on the one hand to covenant on the other hand.

So it's just kind of more of a survey type of thing. I think that would be a huge help for untangling this if you can kind of see, okay, here, here's some different options. Like here's the different frameworks actually explained pretty clearly. Because otherwise, whatever it is, whatever position you have, it just kind of actually infuses. Yeah, exactly. And you may not even know you have that. Exactly. Yeah. And some of the, like that book and also the history book, uh, we mentioned, I mentioned, um, it are helpful. It's, it's helpful to know some of the history of dispensationalism because it reminds us, it feels like it's for most evangelical Americans, when I, and I include our people in that, dispensationalism is just the air we breathe, we've grown up breathing.

Yeah. Not, not full-fledged, but some, of some of the ideas. And we don't realize that it's actually a very novel set of ideas, right? It does not, did not exist in the church before sort of the 1800s. And it's, it really dominated America. So just recognizing, having a broader perspective and say, "Hey, at least it's not a, it's not the only take on things." And historically, it's been a minority take. So, you know, that, that's some really helpful context. Because I know when I read that book, I was like, "Oh, that's really interesting." Because yeah, historically speaking, this is relatively new. It's new and it's fairly tied to North America. Yeah. That makes sense. Okay.

So another big one, back to some of these frameworks. So we talked about the rapture. Well, then what is the tribulation? That was another question we got. Well, like, what is this then? And do we have to be worried about seven years of horrendous evil that's about to hit at any moment, which is the typical, you know, uh, way of saying it. Um, again, some people saying, "Oh, well, the rapture will be before that, so we don't have to worry about it." Um, but I also have friends that say, "Oh, no, the rapture will be after the tribulation." So buckle up. We're going to have this horrid period that Revelation lays out all these terrible things that will happen.

Yeah. What's the tribulation? Yeah. And this goes back to, this is complicated because this goes back to, uh, Revelation, but also Matthew 24. And I think the rest of the New Testament, but Matthew 24 is debated. There's different readings of it. There's preterist readings, which see like pretty much all of it as referring to, um, 80, 70. Uh, so in Matthew, I don't go there. You're saying that this section in Matthew, this is the prophecy that Jesus is giving about all these things that are going to happen. And some people saying, "Oh, this, this happens within the lifetime of the apostles," like the, yes, destruction of the temple and, right, um, and so forth. So real, I'll try to be really quick here.

Um, but what prompts this is, is the disciples ask one, what will be the signs of your coming of the end of the age? And he says, Jesus says, there's going to be wars, rumors of wars. People are going to, false messiahs are going to come and lead many astray, which is interesting, right? Ooh, yeah. Many will come in my name saying, "I am the messiah." Like, who are those? You know, they're, they're anti- and they're non-messiah people, right? Mm-hmm. And they lead people astray. There'll be wars, but don't be alarmed. The end is not yet. Nation will rise up against nation, kingdom against kingdom, will be famines, earthquakes, et cetera. These are just the beginning of the birth pains, right?

This, this is tribulation language. They say this is just the beginning. They'll deliver you up to tribulation. You'll be put to death. You'll be hated by all nations for my name's sake. The one who endures to the end will be saved. And then, so this seems to be something of an overview of the type of tribulation that Jesus' own disciples are going to experience. But also what's going to happen, this is the, you know, from the beginning of the birth pains to the last push, if we want to say, right? Okay. Um, and then he zeros in on the, uh, what he speaks of as the abomination of desolation, which is drawing on Daniel's vision.

Ah, yeah. Which kind of probably some of that probably had at least one initial fulfillment in, uh, Antiochus Epiphanes, that nasty king who desecrated the temple and turned it into a, uh, you'd ban Judaism and stuff in the, in the second century BC.

Um, but that itself is sort of a prefiguration of the destruction of the temple in, um, 80, 70. Those come after Jesus. And so Jesus, Jesus speaks of the immediate destruction of Jerusalem that's coming. Uh, and he says, you know, flee, et cetera. But then he, he seems to sort of be merging that. He seems to be treating that almost as the beginning of the big tribulation, right? When you see the abomination of desolation, then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, get out, right?

And then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now and never will be. And if those days hadn't been shortened, no human being will be saved. But, and then all sorts of false messiahs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders so as to lead astray, if possible, the elect. All of this stuff, which doesn't seem to be just 80, 70, but it seems to start there, right? It's, it's just, yeah, right? And then he says, if people say, "Look, Jesus is back in the wilderness," don't go there because you'll know when he's back, right? And then he says, "After the tribulation of those days."

And those days seems to be this, this whole era from like the beginning of birth pangs to all the way to, um, you know, right before the return. And then he says, "The moon will be darkened, uh, the stars will fall from heaven, and then will appear the Son of Man, uh, coming in the clouds." Hmm. And it seems that what my understanding, my take is that what he's doing here, and, and, and if you want to, uh, read others on this, Craig Kuhner and his Matthew commentary, Osborn, uh, as well in his commentary on Matthew, there's plenty of good takes. But is that what's happening is he's, Jesus is taking, um, the destruction of, of the temple and Jerusalem that's going to happen 40 years after Jesus is saying these things is in a sense the beginning of this era of judgment that will culminate in the final, this era of tribulation that will culminate in the final judgment.

So in, um, New Testament studies, we talk about inaugurated eschatology. Interesting. Okay. The already not yet, the idea that the king, that, um, the era of salvation is both here, but not fully here. So like Jesus rose from the dead, but the rest of us haven't risen from the dead yet. Or like, um, we've, we've had the spirit, but the spirit is the first fruits of the full inheritance, right? So we're, we have it, but not yet. And I think that the flip side of that inaugurated eschatology is judgment, the judgment side, that the destruction of Jerusalem, just like Jesus' resurrection from the dead was the first installment, the first part of new creation. The destruction of the temple was sort of symbolically the first part of this judgment that will culminate in final judgment, final destruction.

And that's why it makes so much sense for Jesus to use it as to why we start. It sounds like he's mixing up the, the judgments, the, the tribulations that will, that he seems to think all of his followers will, from his immediate disciples, and it seems to drag on for a while, because he says, "I don't know when I'm coming back," and there'll be all sorts of false people arising and, you know, all that kind of thing.

Um, but in a sense, the destruction of, of Jerusalem kind of seems to mark symbolically the beginning of the end in that way, just like Jesus' resurrection marks the beginning of the beginning, right? I've never thought of that before. That's, that's really interesting. So you're, you're not saying, "Oh, the tribulation is going to be this, this chunk of time when this is going to happen." It's, you're, you're not, I don't know what the word is, boxing it in quite like that. Again, classical style of reading this stuff is like, "Oh, it's this block, this specific thing." It's all broke down. They have all these formulas, whatever, all this stuff figured out exactly how, boom, that's not what we're going for though.

I think that Jesus here is speaking of this whole era, right? That the whole time, okay, as the disciples wait for Jesus' return, we're, we see like there are signs that the end is, is upon us in all the tribulation in the world, but we still don't, we can't use any of those signs to, to know the moment Jesus is going to come back, right? I mean, he says that. See, that's, I think that's the one point there because there's, you'd mentioned this in the other episode, where it's basically the style of you like read Revelation and then read the headlines and then try to put the two together. You know, it's like, that's not what we're going for here.

Right. Because the point is not to figure out when exactly the end is, because he says, concerning the day of the hour, no one knows. But the point is, as he says, to stay awake and be ready. Right. And so all the tribulation is supposed to be a reminder. Yeah. You know, we're living in this era of judgment and that era could end and God could cut short those days at any moment. Right. Yeah. And I think that, um, fits very much with the rest, what the New Testament says, what the rest of the New Testament says about tribulation. So John 16, in the world you will have tribulation, but take heart, I have overcome the world.

Peter sees his in first Peter. It's all about, mm-hmm, expecting his readers to be living through an era of suffering that's followed by glory. First Thessalonians one, it is evidence of the righteous judgment of God that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are suffering, since God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels. This is the whole New Testament is all about, uh, we're living, is expecting that we live in a time of marked by tribulation and in a sense of the beginnings of God, the birth pains of God's judgment.

Revelation uses the word tribulation throughout in, in many, in many cases to speak of what his reader, what Christians throughout the ages are going through, right? I know your tribulation, your poverty, he says in one of the letters, mm-hmm, in Revelation seven, speaking of, I think all of the God's, the martyrs or God's people throughout the ages. Um, these are the ones who are coming out of great tribulation. Mm-hmm. Then, then the question is, well, but what about those three and a half year numbers? Right. That, that, that, right. Yeah. And what's going on there? So John uses this in chapter 11 and 12 of Revelation, and maybe 13.

These numbers come up four times. Sometimes it says, uh, 1260 days. Sometimes it's time, time and half time. And one time it's that time. And another time it's 42 months. The cup, two other times is 42 months, something like that. And, uh, but it's reversed to the same period of time. And what he's doing there is symbolically, it's kind of, to me, fairly clear because of the way he uses it, uh, in chapter 12 to speak of the entire time when this woman is being kept by God in the wilderness, but also chased down by the, by the dragon. Okay. Right. Or the whole time that those two witnesses representing the church are bearing witness, uh, and, and being opposed in chapter 11.

Um, he's drawing that from one of Daniel's visions, where the vision of the weeks, uh, where Daniel sees, um, sees this, this figure that will sort of cause great disturbance, uh, to God's people at in the half of this prophetic week of years or whatever. Right. Yeah. Okay. And, uh, or from Daniel seven 25, um, this specifically mentions that, and I think this is particularly relevant.

Yeah. As for the 10 horns, so this is the beast, the fourth beast, which is kind of the pattern that John uses for his beasts in Revelation. He has 10 horns out of this kingdom. 10 kings shall arise. Another shall arise after them. He shall be different from the former ones.

Um, he shall speak words against the Most High. He will wear out the saints of the Most High and shall think to change the time and the laws, and they shall be given into his hand for a time, times and half a time. But so that's the three and a half symbolic years. Okay. But the court shall sit in judgment and his dominion will be taken away and given to, uh, the people of the saints of the Most High. And I think what John is doing is he's taking that three and a half years, kind of like four score, you know, four score and however many years ago, the beginning of the Gettysburg address, right?

Oh yeah. It's this symbolic number. I mean, Lincoln obviously was referring to a specific number of years, but the way we say it, like four score and something, if I say it that way, I'm evoking the whole history of the civil war and blah, blah, blah. I think John's doing something similar. That three and a half years in Daniel represents this time. I don't, I think a symbolic time is half of seven. It's a limited time, but it's a time, um, of suffering and tribulation where the beast, uh, rules, you know, is given some dominion. Um, but it will end when, when the kingdom is, is fully in the hands of, uh, of the, the saints, right?

Mm-hmm. And so I, John takes that three and a half years and plops it into cases where it seems to me fairly clear that he's talking about this whole era, right? So the, the woman who's, she gives the, um, birth to the male child. Um, okay.

Uh, the woman, this is like a super cool story, but we can't talk about it. But she, so she gives, uh, she gives birth and then she flees into the wilderness where she has a place prepared by God for 1260 days. Then Michael and his angels fight against the dragon and they come down and then they try to persecute the woman. And then the dragon becomes furious with the woman, goes off to make war on the rest of her offspring. Mm-hmm. Uh, and we have the 1260 again. It seems like this whole time of where the dragon's furious, mm-hmm, is, is this 1260 or times, times and a half a time, it says here. Okay.

Period. Okay. That's, so that language of three and a half years of tribulation, I think it seems to be, it's drawing off of Daniel because that's a number that represents this finite period of time, mm-hmm, where that's marked by oppression and tribulation. And John seems to be employing that symbolically to refer to this whole age, the same age Jesus is talking about in Matthew, where he speaks of this whole era of time while we, from the destruction of Jerusalem, so to speak, to Jesus' return, that's marked by tribulation, but Jesus promised to keep us, uh, to keep his people, you know, till his return. So really some people say this is symbolic of a seven years of tribulation, blah, blah, blah.

Um, you're saying no, this is symbolic of something else, essentially. Yeah. I think it's symbolic of the whole era that we're, that we're, yeah, this whole era is marked both by salvation for us and also by tribulation for us and for the world. Yeah. I think that's, that's how I, that's how I understand it. That's, that's really interesting because I, because yeah, you have to, you can go down some interesting streets if you're like, well, there's this, there's a set time in the future where tribulation is coming and all this, you can start, I don't know, you get to, you can get down some interesting paths, but yeah, really, really quickly. And I don't know.

It's, yeah, I'm often kind of wondered about that. You can, you can go down a fear mongering really quickly as well. And then maybe not, you know, but, um, okay. So that's really interesting. So again, this, this then corresponds pretty well with what we read in the whole rest of the New Testament, right? Yeah. This expectation of God's judgment that comes throughout this, these last, these last days, if we want to call them this whole era, um, the expectation that believers suffer, you know, it's what we read the whole rest of the New Testament. So, and it's what most many Christians throughout history have experienced.

Wow. That, that's a, that is a really good point. It's easier for us to say, well, maybe there's going to be seven bad years in the future. But for believers and persecuted believers in the Middle East or Asia or whatever, that makes less sense, right? It makes a lot more sense to say, yeah, this is the time of, this is a time marked by tribulation. Mm-hmm. You know, that, that does. And it also takes Revelation instead of being something out there somewhere, it like brings it down right to us, which is, and makes it immediately relevant to us again. Yeah. Yeah. Just John tells the people, yeah. That makes sense. So another one, uh, that obviously came up when we're doing rapture or tribulation.

Yes. What's the millennium? Yeah. So this we can be quick on, I think, hopefully. I say that, but then I'm not. So the millennium refers to how you understand Revelation chapter 20, which speaks of Satan being bound for a thousand years. Yeah. What, what's that all about? Yeah. As it only comes from there. And then after the thousand years, he seems to be released from his cage and he wreaks some final havoc and then is destroyed. Yeah. Right.

Um, and this issue, you know, I, I want to stress that you can, you can hold to any of the, any of the, the, the common views on the millennium and still read Revelation well. Mm-hmm. Uh, you know, this is not a, it's not a big deal. And the history in recent American history, it has been a big deal, right? Your view on the millennium has been a litmus test of orthodoxy in some places, unfortunately.

Um, but yeah, you can read Revelation well and hold to different views. So the three main views have been that, um, first, that, that this period of time is a literal period of time, whether it's exactly a thousand years or it stands for a different period of time, whatever. But it's a specific period of time that comes, um, so pre-millennialism means that Jesus returns first and then he, and then there's this thousand year reign of prosperity on with him ruling on, on this earth before the final judgment and the new heavens and the new earth. So Jesus is ruling on the current sort of unrestored earth. And then at the end of that, Satan comes back out, uh, and then he's finally, everything's finally destroyed and, um, and, and renewed.

So that's pre-millennialism. There has, there have been some people who've held that throughout church, well, especially in the early church, there were people who held a version of that. Um, but it's not been the dominant view in church history. Um, then dispensationalism came along with its own version of this. Um, that's when the rapture, the rapture, you know, all gets tied into and the, and the literal tribulation, all that kind of stuff gets tied into this. And that then became the dominant view in the United States. Um, so that's, that's that post-millennialism, uh, is like a really interesting one. I still think you don't, you, you have to be, have a certain, um, I don't know, temperament, very optimistic temperament.

Yeah. But this, it was a big thing back in the day. It was. Yeah. Really interesting. So post-millennialism is the idea that again, there's the thousand years, it's not a literal thousand years, but it represents this period of time where the current earth will basically, the gospel will have triumphed and, you know, people, the, the earth as we, you know, the current society will have become largely Christianized and will be, you know, basically Christian, you know, and, and everything will be awesome before Jesus returns. So it's just that the gospel advances and everyone kind of gets, people just keep getting saved and like stuff gets better. And, uh, and then at the sort of the grand finale of that, Jesus returns.

And that view has been held by some significant people, Jonathan Edwards, B.B. Warfield, et cetera, seems to have fallen out of fashion around World War I. That would make sense. Everyone got depressed to how terrible things were. So, um, yeah. So that's, uh, that is that. Then the final major position, there is another position that's been advocated more recently called new creation millennialism, but we won't get into that. Um, but the final position, which has been the dominant position in the history of the church is a millennialism, the a meaning no. But it doesn't mean that there's, it's kind of a misnomer because, um, it doesn't mean that there's no millennium, but it, it, it understands that what Revelation's talking about, this thousand year period where Satan is bound, it understands that as referring to this whole era from, of, of, uh, between Jesus' ascension basically and his return.

So between Pentecost and Jesus' return, that whole era is, is this period. Okay. And that would've been a, a fairly common view in like, say the early church, for example. Uh, yes, that, that, I, I think that was the more common view in the early church, I think. But then it became the dominant view kind of once Augustine changed, you know, when Augustine, I think Augustine changed his mind in favor of this view. Oh, interesting. And then it kind of became the dominant view as most things, you know, whatever, whatever Augustine believed kind of, kind of became the dominant view for a long time. He had a lot of influence. He did. Yeah. So those are kind of the three main ones to keep in mind.

It is. Yeah. Now what's weird is that people, I mean, people could say like, how Satan being bound, that just seems bonkers. Like how can that refer to this whole era when you've also just said this is the time when the beast reigns and all this kind of stuff, right? Yes. How? Right. So I think, I think the key understanding here is that Revelation 20 speaks of Satan being bound so that he might not deceive the nations any longer. To me, that's the key part of that. Interesting. Right. And when you look at the history of what God has been trying to do in the world, Mm - hmm from creation to network, from the fall, let's say to now and redemptive history, Mm - hmm Pentecost marks this moment Mm - hmm where from then on the gospel has like exploded.

Okay. There's been highs and lows, but, um, people from all over the world, um, are believing God and Israel's God and submit to Jesus now, Mm - hmm like in ways that before Jesus coming were not the case, right? There was this one little camp, Israel, who had the knowledge of God and the rest, like, so Paul says, you know, these times of ignorance, God winked at, he overlooked, right? But now he commands all people everywhere to repent. And so a millennialism says, yes, the devil, sure, there's another, there is one from what taken from one angle, the devil has lots of power and he's doing all sorts of crazy stuff. The beast is very much roaming.

But from another angle, the Satan's ability to keep the gospel from it spreading to the nations has been curtailed in a way, right? We have like the, the, the way the gospel has spread in the last couple thousand years, the way that the reason any of us are sitting here just obviously assuming that, that the Bible, that we have a direct relationship to Yahweh through Jesus. I mean, that's, that's so unheard of in the Old Testament, right? And it's only when the spirit is poured out, uh, that this changed and you start having people from the nations that embrace, embrace the true God. So that's the understanding of, of how that, how that works. And then, and then the understanding, then they say, well, um, so that, that's what that, that means.

And then right when Jesus comes back, the devil will do his last to try to, to try to bring everyone in rebellion against, against God. And Jesus will triumph. That, that's, that's a summary, if that makes sense. Yeah. That's okay.

That actually kind of, it does kind of make sense when, when you think about it, like they do have some points there, you know, about the gospel spreading to every corner of the globe, which is, which is true. Um, and, and the growth of the church that we've seen in the last 2000 years. Fascinating. Yeah. So all views, you know, you can, you can have, I think post-millennialism is the least plausible to me. Um, I, I lean, I lean a millennial, but, um, but I think that all of these views have, have their weaknesses too, right? And so, uh, I, I think we don't want, because it's mostly just a matter of interpreting one chapter of Revelation, this doctrine doesn't show up other places.

It's one of the reasons I'm hesitant to say, yeah, this is definitely teaching a literal millennial, 'cause I'm like, eh, it's nowhere else in the Bible. And Revelation is, speaks in figures and, and imagery. Mm - hmm. Um, so it's, you know, it's something that we should certainly shouldn't make a big issue out of. Um, but those are kind of, that's kind of an overview of the, overview of the views and, uh, you know. Yeah. So maybe, maybe the, the takeaway being, don't, don't worry about this, but, but so much, like it would be easy to, to overemphasize the importance of this particular view of this or that or exactly. Yeah. 'Cause, 'cause like you had said in, in the American church, there would've been a time, it maybe still is in some places, you know, pre-millennialism was essentially a litmus test in some cases of like, well, if you don't believe this, I don't know, you're kind of outside the bounds of what we can handle here, you know, and that's, and, and that just see, it, it does seem really sad that you would make, there are some things that are worth drawing lines over, you know, and being tests of orthodoxy and that just seems too much to me now.