All right, let me pray for us and then we'll start today. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the opportunity for us to gather together and study your Word. We pray, Father, that you'd continue to guide us, lead us, illuminate our thoughts, that as we dig into this book, Lord God, that remains a mystery to so many of us.

We pray, Father, that you would help us to see the larger theme of your victory and your promises, Lord God, that all of them are absolutely certain. I pray that you would give us a greater sense of confidence, Lord, in our walk with you, greater sense of hope for the end.

Even the things that we don't understand, I pray, Father God, that your Holy Spirit would clearly guide and lead us, Lord God, that we may be able to glean what you desire of us. So, we pray for grace. We pray, Lord God, that the next few months as we commit our time to you in this letter, give us guidance.

Speak to us, Lord God, that we may grow and mature in you. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, so the theme of the letter, I put certainty of the victory in Christ. So obviously we are going to go into the book of Revelation and go into the details of the meanings behind the different prophecies and different visions, and we're going to try to dive into that.

But if you dive into it, then you missed a bigger picture. The bigger picture of the book of Revelation, the theme is absolute certainty in the victory of Christ. So what we are studying in the book of Revelation is not, hopefully this is going to happen. Every single part of what we're going to be studying has already been laid out, and so we're waiting for it to be fulfilled.

So the larger theme behind the book of Revelation is to give us absolute certainty in victory in Christ. So we're going to be, that's the larger picture and that's the theme that we're going to be covering over. So everything that we're studying, even if I don't mention it, just don't forget that that's the ultimate reason.

Just to give you the introduction, the word revelation, where we get the title of the book, in Greek apokalipsis, where we get the word apokalipsis, and don't confuse that with apocrypha. Apocrypha basically means extra writing. It's not the Bible. There's other writings that were written that's not part of the canon.

It's not apocrypha, but apocalyptic, meaning an uncovering or unveiling. It's a book designed to uncover and unveil, not to conceal. And so sometimes when we study the book of Revelation, because it's difficult and there's a lot of things that we don't clearly understand, that you come and think, "Oh, God deliberately made it difficult.

He deliberately sealed it so that we wouldn't know." That's not the point of the book of Revelation. Just because we don't understand it doesn't mean that God deliberately hid it from us, like He doesn't really want us to know. There's a reason why He puts it in this form, and hopefully as we're studying through it, we'll be able to glean some of that.

The author of the book, again, today is an introduction study, the author of the book of Revelation is Apostle John. If you ever read the introduction of any commentary, they'll always tell you that there's always somebody questioning or debating. But as far as the book of Revelation, his name is mentioned four separate times.

The early church fathers, there was absolutely no question about it. Universally, they accepted that this was Apostle John, the one of the 12 disciples, the one of the sons of thunder, his brother is James. You may have heard of this, but according to the early church history, that Apostle John was exiled to the island of Patmos for preaching the gospel in Asia.

And some say that the Romans dropped him into a vat of boiling oil, and then expecting him to die. So they actually attempted to kill him, and then he ended up not dying and coming out. And obviously, you can imagine the excruciating pain that he was in. And the only reason why they didn't try it again is because of their superstition.

They thought that if you try to attempt to kill somebody and they don't die, it may be because God has some special favor on that individual. So they were afraid to attempt to kill him again, so they ended up banishing him at the island of Patmos, which was considered a complete desert.

So while he was there, he has a vision from God, and he begins to write the revelation. So whenever we talk about all the disciples being martyred except for one, if you really consider what Apostle John had to go through, it might have been easier for him just to die.

You can imagine going into boiling oil, coming out and surviving that, and how miserable the rest of his life was. So you can imagine the man who wrote the book of Revelation was physically in tremendous pain, physically in tremendous pain, and he sees this vision of Christ. So in my mind, a man who is suffering like the way he's suffering, obviously he sees the vision, but can you imagine what this does for John?

My guess is it would be a source of tremendous encouragement to John that he probably wanted to die. He probably wanted to finish his life, and then when he sees this vision, he sees what's coming. He doesn't know exactly when, but God, through what he sees, probably was a source of tremendous comfort to him.

So I can see that obviously everything written in the book of Revelation, it was meant for all of us, but specifically for John, I can imagine it would be a source of tremendous encouragement to him and relief for him. Date of his writing, again, you'll see that some people will argue that this was written earlier, maybe 60, 65 AD during Nero's persecution, and then some will say even later on, right?

But again, most scholars today believe that it was written anywhere between 90 to 102 AD, so somewhere around 95 AD. The significance behind that is that it helps us to identify the historical background behind some of the prophecies mentioned in this letter. Part of the reason why some people will date it 65 AD is because that's about the time when Nero was in power.

So they're kind of going back and looking at some of the prophecies that he's saying and saying, "Well, this looks a lot like the intense persecution that Nero started, so therefore this must have been written during that period," and that's why they date it 65. But outside of preemptively setting a date behind the prophecies, most early church fathers also believe that this was written around that time.

Again, there was intense persecution also at 95 by a name of Dionysus. He was the emperor at that time in 95, and it wasn't like there wasn't persecution, but it wasn't the one under Nero. And so why the dating of it is important for this particular thing is while we're studying it, we're going to see some historical background and what it may be relating to what was going on at that particular time.

So again, we're looking at 95 AD as the writing of this letter. Why is the study of Revelation important? We are told that the second coming of Jesus would be like a thief coming at night. Jesus talks about it, Paul talks about it in several of his letters, that it's going to be coming like a thief at night.

So when you hear the imagery of thief coming at night, is that a welcome scene? Obviously not, meaning that it's going to be unwelcome, it's going to be sudden, and it's going to be negative, and that's how the world is going to receive the coming of Christ. But then we're warned as Christians or exhorted that we would not be caught off guard to stay alert and to watch.

So the book of Revelation is a book that helps us to watch carefully. So if you read, I'm just going to try this. Did it work? Okay, all right. First Thessalonians 5, 2-5. It says, "For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night, which we are warned." While the people are saying there is peace and security, then suddenly, sudden destruction is going to come.

As labor pains comes upon a pregnant woman and they will not escape, but you are not to be in darkness so that the day does not surprise you. So if you look at some of the things that we are exhorted in First Thessalonians 5, 2-5, the day of the Lord, oftentimes could be referring to the whole end period from the time of Christ until his second coming, but specifically here, if you understand the context of First Thessalonians, he's talking about the revelation of the man of lawlessness as the end times.

So this is, he's talking about a period that the book of Revelation is most likely talking about, that it's going to come like a thief in the night, it's going to be very sudden and negative to the world, and it's going to come during a time when people are not going to be expecting it.

That people are not, are just enjoying their life, peace and safety, and when that comes, it's going to come suddenly, and he says, "But you, to not to be in darkness." Remember when Jesus rebuked the Jews, he said, "How are you able to tell the seasons, when it's going to rain and when it's not going to rain, you know when the harvest is coming and not coming, but how do you not know the time of the Son of Man coming?" In other words, it was prophesied in the Old Testament, and they were completely oblivious, right?

So what Paul is saying, or what God is saying in First Thessalonians, that that would not happen to us in his second coming. So in the first coming, the Jews completely missed it because they weren't paying attention, right? You're looking for, you're looking to the scriptures, thinking that you have life in them, but all the scripture really points to me, was preparing for me to come, and then when I came, you completely missed it because you didn't pay attention.

So what Paul is saying, do not be like that, right? Do not be in darkness, and don't be caught up with the rest of the world looking for peace and safety, and all of a sudden when Jesus comes, like, "Oh my gosh, he's coming," right? So part of why we need to study the book of Revelation is that Revelation is a letter that's given to us so that we wouldn't be caught off guard, right?

We may study it, and at the end you say, "Well, I don't know a clear picture. It doesn't tell me exactly the right date." Like, some people study the book of Revelation to look for, "Well, Jesus is going to come in the year 2025, February 18th," and they do all these weird calculations, right?

Now, scripture doesn't do that. In fact, actually, it's very dangerous that we do that, but it's equally dangerous not to be paying attention, right? It's equally dangerous so when we see the signs of the end times coming, and you're just completely oblivious, you know? And you're just kind of like, "We're going to make business, we're going to make money, we're only thinking about the next 10 years or the 20 years and not really eagerly waiting.

What are some of the signs that he gave us that we ought to be looking for?" So the study of the book of Revelation is important for that reason. The next verse in Revelation 16, 15, "Behold, I am coming like a thief, but blessed is the one who stays awake," right?

"Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on," meaning he's ready for action. He's not at home relaxed in his sweatpants. He's ready for action. "That they may not go about naked and be exposed." In other words, he's warning, saying that we should be ready. We should always be watching and ready.

And I think in God's wisdom, he left it like that on purpose. Just like in the Old Testament when all these prophecies, when we look in retrospect, it was clear. There's all kinds of prophetic utterances that Jesus was going to come when we look back at it. But then the Jews, because they weren't paying attention, they weren't looking to see and understand the prophecies.

Instead, they were so consumed with their daily well-being that they weren't paying attention to this. So the warning that, again, in Revelation 16, 15, that we do not get caught off guard, but be ready, that we would live. And in his wisdom, he doesn't pinpoint a day. Because if he pinpoints a day, I think our human response would be, if he's not going to come for the next 30 years, that means we've got 30 years to do whatever we want.

He left it so that he could have come. He could have come in the first century. He could have come in 500 AD. He could come tomorrow. Or he could come a thousand years later. But he left it like that on purpose so that every generation of Christian would live eagerly waiting.

But no matter how eagerly you wait, nobody waits more than 100 years. Even if you're a Christian all your life, nobody waits more than 100 years. But during that period that we wait, he wants us to live as if he can come in our lifetime. And I think in God's wisdom, he did that on purpose.

This book was written to cause God's people to live lives eagerly watching and waiting for his coming. And so hopefully as we're studying through the book of Revelation, that that's what would incite us as a church to have our paradigm of our future not to be short-sighted. If I work hard and sacrifice that maybe next year I'm going to get this, or if I invest properly, maybe our property value is going to go up in the next five years, that we would not live short-sighted, that we would be able to live with eternity in mind.

Revelation provides a church with the clearest vision of the conclusion of the end, end times, of the work that Jesus initiated on the cross and how it will affect the church and the world. So all that we know about the New Testament is about the effects of Jesus' work.

The whole book of Revelation is about the end, the end conclusion of the church, of evangelism, of discipleship. Everything that we're doing, everything that God initiated, the theology of here, not yet, is going to be concluded in the book of Revelation. So Revelation is the clearest vision of what God intended, what Christ intended when he was crucified on the cross and where he is taking us.

So it's kind of like seeing the end point of the journey that we're on, and that's the book of Revelation. Now what makes the study of the book of Revelation difficult, as you probably already know? How many of you, I actually asked this in one of the discussion questions, how many of you have actually studied systematically through the book of Revelation before?

Okay, so a few of you, four or five of you. Now when you studied it, did you study by yourself or was it taught in a Bible study? Okay, well actually that wouldn't answer your question, right? How many of you actually sat in a teaching or a Bible study where somebody else was teaching that?

Okay, all right. And let me ask a few more specific. How many of you studied under a dispensational teaching? Okay, so some of you guys may not know what I'm talking about. How many of you studied that under a covenant teaching? Okay, you took two classes or something? Okay, okay.

But it was under a directive of somebody who believed in dispensationalism, right? Okay, yeah, that's what I meant. All right, the reason why I asked that is depending on your theological perspective, how you interpret the book of Revelation is going to sound very, very different. And I'm going to go over that.

And I'm going to kind of give you a preview of our philosophy of approach to the book of Revelation so that you guys have some idea. Most of you are probably thinking, well, dispensationalism, covenant, like what's the difference and why does it affect the way we study it? Okay, there's four main approaches to the interpretation of the book of Revelation.

The first one is called the Preterist, the contemporary historical approach. Do I have that? The contemporary historical approach. Do you have that on your sheet or did I erase it? You have it there? Okay. All right, so Preterist is a contemporary historical approach. This approach attempts to apply the book to the actual events of the first century historical setting, meaning that the people who approach it this way basically look for every part of the revelation here all the way from chapter 1 to chapter 22 that he's referring to something that was happening that he's actually seeing.

And so it has nothing to do with the future. It's just something that's happening in the past. So all of this stuff is allegorically or symbolically represents something historical. So they're going to be looking for, if they believe in that the Antichrist is Nero, they're going to look around all the other stuff.

Who was his helpers? Maybe that's who the beast is and that's how they do the interpretation. So that's called the Preterist view. Their primary interpretation will look for current events at the time that John was writing it and these are the people who will probably give the dating to 65 AD because there was a lot of stuff going on at that time they think looks a little bit more similar.

That's the Preterist view. The second view is called the historical view or historicist approach. In comparison to the Preterist which placed a book entirely within the first century, the historicist interpret as a forecast of the course of history. In other words, they're also looking for historical pointers but they don't limit it to the first century, they don't limit it to the time that John was writing it.

In fact, most of their interpretation is looking forward and they're looking for certain historical things that will take place, have taken place and will take place. So these people will interpret saying that the Pope may have been the Antichrist. Now who would think that the Pope was the Antichrist in history?

The reformers, right? The reformers. The reformers because they were battling at that time their biggest enemy was the Catholic Church. And so during the period of the Reformation a lot of the reformers, John Calvin and Martin Luther, all of these guys, they kind of adhere to this interpretation because they interpreted the evil kingdom as the Catholic Church and the Pope as the Antichrist, right?

He's a religious figure and so if you go to a Presbyterian, and this is, those of you who study the book of Revelation under the covenant theological bent, this is the primary approach that you probably saw or heard, right? They'll interpret the Reformation as a, again, as certain things that are mentioned in the Revelation chapter 20 and so they're the historicists.

And this is, again, primarily if you go to a Presbyterian church that this is the view that they're going to be telling you. You have the futurist approach. The futurist approach regards everything from Revelation 4-1. So what's in Revelations 1-3? The seven churches, right? So seven churches obviously are historical.

There's specific churches that he's mentioning, but starting from chapter 4 and on, it is all referring to the end times, right? And when you say end times, we're not talking about years removed from them. We're talking about the very end, the second coming of Christ, the tribulation, the rapture, the Armageddon, the white throne, judgment seat of Christ, the millennium, all of that, that all of this is referring to that period of time.

The group that holds to this view, this teaching, are the dispensationalists. So if you've ever gone and sat through teaching, in fact, a lot of times when there's heavy emphasis on the teaching of the end times, it's usually coming from this camp. And this is the camp that's looking for the dates and looking for specific pointers and, you know, Russia is the Antichrist or Kim Jong-un is the Antichrist or, you know, and I've heard people say Reagan was the Antichrist when he was Reagan.

I mean, he was the president of the United States. But these guys are always looking for certain things that they think are going to trigger the tribulation. And this is the traditional dispensational view. Now within each one of these views, there are variations, but this is just kind of a broad stroke, right?

So even dispensationalists, they have progressive dispensationalists that whose, their view is a bit different than this. But this is just broadly. So you can see if you think that all of Revelation is written for, written about a historical thing in the first century, you can see how that's going to affect the way you interpret the book of Revelation, right?

If you're studying the book of Revelation just to look for, you know, the seven churches represent the seven different eras of church history before he comes, whether it's a thousand years, two thousand years, three thousand years, you're always going to be looking at history and saying, "Oh, maybe Hitler was the Antichrist." You know, "Oh, this must be referring to Hitler," or "This must be referring to Mussolini," right?

You see how that would affect the way you interpret, right, the book of Revelation? And if you think everything's on the end time, you're going to be looking for triggers. There's going to be, you know, wars and rumors of war, so you're always looking for what's, is it tribulation?

Is it going to come now? Is it going to come now? So, how many of you have, I'm guessing you didn't, left behind the movie? Maybe some of you guys were kids and your youth pastor made you watch it, right? That was the whole thing about, you know, the tribulation and the church going through the tribulation, and again, that would fall under this category, the futurist view.

The idealist view, they just discard all of it. Their approach is that the Revelation is not to be taken literally, not to be taken in reference to any specific event. Everything is interpreted ideologically or allegorically, meaning it has nothing to do with history. These are just Christian principles that are taught.

Jesus reigns, well, how does the book of Revelation teach he reigns? Well, he comes on a cloud, right? He has thunder in his mouth, and all of this symbolizes the attributes of God. So it has nothing to do with his coming, it's just revelation of God's attributes, right? And the different seals and all of these things are pointers of biblical principles that we are to glean from, and so they allegorize pretty much everything, right?

They don't look for any historical connection to the book of Revelation. These are called, these people are called idealists. As I said, these are four very broad pointers, like this is typically, if you are any one of these, you're going to have a certain bent toward the book of Revelation, right?

Take a guess. We are Baptists, right? And those of you who've been at our church for a while, like what is, I'm talking about our bent. I don't think any one of these completely represents us, but what would be our bent? You're afraid to say? Probably, right? We probably lean more toward the futurist, but I was taught at a dispensational school.

I actually took a class on the book of Revelation with a heavy dispensational view. I was taught the pre-trib, pre-millennial, pre-rapture, you know, I was taught the very traditional view of the dispensational view of the end times. They actually have a chart and they go through, and then so if you go to a very heavy dispensational church, they'll actually have a chart on the wall.

You know what I mean? Like we have, I don't know what we have, we have whatever, we have our church vision, right? We have a four-fold church vision hanging on the wall because it's important to us, right? So if you go to a very traditional dispensational view, they'll actually have a chart of the end times about when Jesus is going to come, when he's going to go up, what happens when they go up, how long they're going to stay there when he comes down, what is the Armageddon, and they'll interpret all of that.

Now that's how I learned it, okay? After I came out, I was thoroughly confused, right? One, because I didn't realize Jesus was going to come back that many times. You know, I thought, my dad was a Presbyterian, I grew up in a, even though I didn't pay attention, I wasn't a Christian, I never heard of this before, right?

I've never heard of tribulation and Armageddon, I've never heard of these things before. So when I was taught this at school, it seemed so foreign. But you know, who am I to question? I don't know the Bible like these people do. So I came out and I wrestled, I studied through it, did the book of Revelation and doing quiet time, taught certain passages, and I came out and say, you know, I thought that at least at this point, like everything would be clear, and it's still not clear to me, right?

There are certain things, there was a point in my wrestling with all of this where I was very interested in converting to covenant theology. Now most of you guys could care less. I think a few of you may be interested. I almost went to that point until I realized I don't agree with the way they interpreted the Old Testament, right?

The Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled literally, majority of it. But they'll take a few examples of an allegorical interpretation of the Old Testament, they'll apply to everything in the Old Testament, and I realize that that's not what I believed. Now the reason why that's significant is because if you take the Old Testament to prophecies being fulfilled literally, it doesn't make sense to not interpret all the other prophecies the same way, because that's the pattern that we see.

Now that doesn't mean that therefore everything is going to happen exactly, that when the end time comes that a white, literal white horse is going to be galloping around and a red horse is going to be coming, you know. It doesn't mean that every single thing that we see in the book of Revelation should be taken perfectly literally.

But the literal approach to understanding and interpreting Scripture seems to be the most consistent way that I see that the Old Testament was fulfilled. He said he was going to ride on a donkey, he rode on a donkey. He said somebody was going to betray him, he was betrayed.

That he was going to be born in Bethlehem, he was born in Bethlehem. He was going to be, he was going to suffer, and he suffered, right? I mean so all of these prophecies in the Old Testament was literally fulfilled. Why would the king, why would the Messiah suffer?

So because it didn't make sense to the Jews, they just dismissed it. So when it actually happened, like what was going on? He said it was written, it was written. So how many times does Jesus say in the course of his three years, "Have you not read? Have you not read?" And then he says to fulfill all prophecy, he would do something, right?

Whether it's the Lord's Supper, whether it's his crucifixion, even the details of how he was going to go to the cross, who was going to hand him over, all of that is fulfilled literally exactly the way it says. Now are there some certain things that were not completely literal?

Of course. But for the most part it was literal. It happened literally, right? So having said that, am I a pre-tribulation, pre-millennial? I would say what I lean toward, and I'm thinking at the end of the study of the book of Revelation, I may change. I don't know, right?

I may change. I'm not going to go in there looking for my view. I'm going to go in there just like you guys, just study from passage to passage, and I'm not so committed to any of the things that I have that I can't change. If I see something that I can't interpret in any other way, I'm just going to present it as I see it, and then you guys can judge for yourself.

But having said all that, do I have a predisposition? Yes, I do. I'm a post-trib, pre-millennial. That may mean something to some of you, and it may not mean anything to any of you, but we're going to study that as we go along. I believe in the traditional dispensational camp, post-trib is not a majority view.

There are a few people, a few very smart, good people. But there's some, but they're not the majority. But to me, it seems like the church is going to go through the tribulation. The millennium seems very confusing, and I'm going to get to that in a minute. It seems very confusing, but if we take his promises to the nation of Israel literally, if we take the revelation in the book of Revelation literally as much as possible, then the millennium seems like a literal kingdom.

And I'll explain that. Again, I'm not going to go into all of that today, but this is just kind of give you a preview of how we're going to be approaching this book. So I've mentioned all of this. We'll be approaching the book of Revelation with a combination of bits and pieces from all of the views above, meaning I think in the second part of this, it says it is consistent with the interpretation and application of the properties of the prophecy of the Old Testament to apply a tri-layered, tri-level method of interpretation.

Those of you who are with us in the study of the book of Isaiah, remember I mentioned this repeatedly over and over, that most of the prophecies in the Old Testament in the minor prophets and the major prophets has three applications. One is the historical thing that they were seeing.

So when we started the book of Isaiah, Isaiah was prophesying about the judgment coming, that because of all their sins, the Babylonians are going to come and take them into captivity. And so there was a physical, historical thing that they were seeing and God was using that to prophesy.

But just like a lot of the other prophecies, God uses that as an opportunity to prophesy something further than that. And so the second level of interpretation is how that's fulfilled. So when these prophecies about the Israelites returning, right, the remnant of Israel is going to return, when did that happen physically?

After 70 years. They went to Babylon, Babylonia for 70 years and then King Cyrus is raised up and a small, very small remnant of the Israelites come back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. So there's prophecies about them being taken out and then there's a fulfillment of them returning with the remnants historically, right?

But there's a second level of restoration when, remember we just talked about that this week, the remnant of the Israelites, right? Those of you guys who are paying attention to Sunday's message, right, where Paul takes the prophecies of the book of Isaiah and he says, remember God says that a remnant will return and he's talking about the fulfillment in Christ.

That not everybody's going to receive the gospel, a remnant of Israelites are going to receive the gospel and a small percentage of them are going to return to Christ. So there's a second level of application that's fulfilled because of what Jesus has done on the cross, right? And then the third and final application of the remnant and the kingdom of God being restored is at the end time.

When what he started is completed at the end, right, the real fulfillment of his kingdom and all his people coming together is going to be fulfilled at the end. So as we're studying through the book of Isaiah, we are always looking for the historical, at least as much as we could if there was something clear.

We're looking for how does this fulfilled in Christ and his coming, death and resurrection, establishment of the church and then ultimately what does this point to in the end times, whether it's in the millennium or in the eternal kingdom of God, how is this fulfilled, right? That's how we approach the prophecy in the Old Testament and that's how we're going to approach the book of Revelation.

We're going to be looking for historical things that he must be pointing to, like what is John seeing and how would have John interpreted this and how would he have applied this in what he was seeing, right? And then the second application of that is the prophecies that he's talking about, how is that fulfilled in Christ, right?

Now John is on this side of the covenant, the new covenant, so how is that in the church fulfilled? And then third and finally, how is it going to point to the future? So our approach is going to be a combination of all of them, right? Are there certain things that we should take as allegorical?

Yes, there are certain things that are going to look like it's meant to be taken allegorically. And so when those things come, we're going to do our best to see, well, why did God put that in there? What did he mean by that? So our interpretation is not going to be just one base.

We're not going to look for a pre-tribulation or post-tribulation view and then force it to fit, right? If it doesn't fit, we're just going to admit, hey, this is one of those verses that's not going to fit that, okay? Did I lose you? Okay. I know it's a little bit tricky, but I feel like it's necessary at least for some of you guys who are coming in thinking, I want to jump in, I want to dig through the book of Revelation.

All these things are kind of like boundaries to help you to see how we're approaching this, okay? Some helpful terms, eschatology, the term, it's not in the book of Revelation. It just basically means the study of end times. I've mentioned the term millennium a bunch of times already. If you don't know this term, don't feel bad.

First time I heard this term was in seminary, right, when I was taking systematic theology and said, "Millenniums, hmm, what does that word mean?" As we were being taught. So if you don't know it, hopefully you'll know it by the end of the study. It's after the tribulation, again, this is a pre-trib view or post-trib view.

Jesus Christ will set up an earthly kingdom where he will rule for a thousand years. And that is a specific interpretation of Revelation chapter 20 verses 3 and 4. Amillennialism, it's the belief that there will be no literal thousand-year reign of Christ. Thus, Revelation chapter 20 is taken symbolically, not literally, by the adherence of this view.

Is it big enough that you can see? People in the back, are the letters big enough that you can see? That's okay? All right. Okay, so amillennial, just like the word says, is they don't believe in a literal millennial. So if you're an amillennial, what does Revelation chapter 20 mean?

The way they will interpret it is the millennial reign of Christ is through the church. This is the millennium now, right? And the word thousand is just a symbolic word. It doesn't mean a literal thousand words. So amillennialists will simply say from the time of Christ until his second coming, we're in the thousand-year reign of Christ and his kingdom is his church.

That's how they'll interpret it. But within the amillennial view, there is a post-millennial. Post-millennial, which is right there. So the post-millennial view, which is right here, should have separated these. The post-millennial view believe that Jesus will gradually establish his kingdom on earth through the gospel preaching of his body in the church.

So the difference between the amillennial and the post-millennial, the post-millennial and amillennial pretty much hold the same view, except post-millennials believe that because of the reign of Christ through his church, that everything is going to become better and better, that more and more people are going to convert. And as a result of more and more people converting, the earth is going to get better.

There's going to be peace on earth and Christianity is going to dominate the world. And that's how the millennium is going to be established, right? Now, post-millennial view, if you were not a futurist, if you're not a dispensationalist, the term amillennialism didn't even exist until probably after World War I or II.

Or if it existed, it wasn't very popular, right? So people who held to the historical view typically were post-millennialists. Do you understand what I'm saying? Because they believe that this whole period of time between Christ and then the second coming of, second coming, is during the period of Christ's reign.

That's a thousand year reign of Christ. And so they believed that as the gospel goes forth and more and more people are converted to Christianity, that this is going to somehow make the world better. And as the world gets better, Christ's second coming is going to, at the end, he's going to come when it gets better and better and better.

Now why do you think that the amillennial view came in after World War I? It was pretty clear, right? After they see the world just going nuts, right? They've seen more people killed. And this wasn't just one nation against a nation. This was like half the world fighting against the other half the world.

And actually happens twice. And as a result of that, they start losing hope that maybe the world isn't going to get better, right? They thought with the advancement of technology, the more and more missionaries going out. So those of you guys who studied European history, you know that a lot of the Christianities and the missionaries, they would typically sail along with the colonialists.

And they would a lot of times forcibly convert people. And then you would call it revival. So if you ever go to any country where they were colonized, there's usually some mission organization or mission something there that the missionaries kind of got on the same boat as these colonialists and came and evangelized.

But when they saw what they were doing, you know, because a lot of them were forcefully converting people to Christianity, the emperors at one point got mad because of the Christians. So they didn't distinguish between the Christians and the soldiers that was coming and the businessmen. They looked at them all the same.

And so when they realized what they were doing, they kicked everybody out. That happened in China, that happened in Japan, that happened in India. Actually it's kind of happening in India now, right? Because they had this mentality that Christ is going to return when the whole world converts to Christians.

And that was the post-millennial view, right? So obviously God, Jesus doesn't say to go forcefully convert people, but they kind of misapplied it. And then when it looked like that Christianity wasn't going to be, it wasn't this utopia that the world is headed toward, in fact it's going exactly the opposite, a lot of them converted to amillennialism, right?

So post-millennial view today is very, very minor, small group of people believe in this view. Most people who are not dispensationalists will adhere to the amillennial view, just because the reality is the world is not getting better, okay? A couple more things. Tribulation is a period of time lasting seven years.

And then we don't need to worry about the three and a half years and what happens in between and what happens at the end. We'll talk about that a little bit when we get there. Then within the tribulation, there's pre-trip, mid-trip, post-trip. And the reason why there's pre-trip, mid-trip, post-trip is when is exactly Jesus is going to come?

Is he going to come before the pre-trip? So typical pre-tribulation view is that there's going to be seven years. So all of these warnings about disaster, about the third of the world being wiped out, the disease and natural disasters and wars, that all of this is taking place during the seven years.

The three and a half years begins it. And then the second half of the tribulation is intense where all the horrific things that are described in the book of Revelation, they believe it's going to happen the second part of the seven years. So pre-trip, people believe that the church is going to be saved from that.

How are we saved? What's called a rapture, right? And those of you guys who saw Left Behind, that's what that whole thing was about, that the rapture takes place and church is preserved from that. Pre-trip believes that the church is going to go through the non-intense, right? They're going to go through it, but they're not going to go through all of it.

You're going to be preserved from the intense part, the second three and a half years. That's the mid-trip. Post-trip view, which is what I lean toward, is that the church is going to go through all of it. It's going to experience the intense persecution and Christians dying, being martyred left and right.

And then at the end of that, Christ is going to come and he's going to establish his millennium, his kingdom on earth. But it's all going to happen with the persecution toward Christians intensifying more and more. And again, whether you believe that the literal seven years or it's a figurative number, that's what the tribulation is referring to typically.

Okay? And we'll go over that a little bit more when we get to it. Okay? All right. So that's it for the orientation for today. And again, you have this in front of you. Those of you guys who've never studied through the book of Revelation or any prophetic writings, I know some of you guys may have been interested, thinking like, "Oh, I'm so excited to study book of Revelation so that I can know exactly when Jesus is going to come." Or maybe talk about Kim Jong-un and how he fits into the prophecies of the book of Revelation.

Or where does America fit in to all these prophecies? Maybe you came in with those kinds of curiosities. And I can tell you already that I'm probably not going to go there. In fact, I'm absolutely certain I'm not going to go there. You know, because all of these things, the best that I can tell you is it could be.

No one knows, right, until it happens. But I believe that God left enough so that when it happens, you'll know. If you've been studying through the book of Revelation carefully, when it happens, you'll be able to identify, right? Same thing with Jesus. There was enough about Jesus that if you knew the prophecies about him, you could see, "Wow, he clearly fits that." Remember Apollos?

Apollos was teaching through the Old Testament and then he didn't even know that Jesus came. And then Priscilla and Achilla heard him and say, "Hey, that sounds like he's talking about the Messiah." And he actually pulls him aside, goes to the Old Testament and say, "This man was here." You know, he actually was here.

And so that's how much, how clear it was that he was preaching about the Messiah from the Old Testament. And so I believe that the Revelation was given for that purpose so that we would look at it carefully, study it, and maybe even contemplate, "Could it be this? Maybe Kim Jong-un is going to play a role.

Who knows?" You know, we don't know. But at least it's enough so that when it does happen, when the things of the prophecies of the Revelation happens, that there's enough, there's enough glimpses of it, shadows of it that you can clearly say, "It must be this." And that's what he was telling us to live each day, eagerly waiting for that, that this is coming.

It may come in your lifetime. It may come maybe after your lifetime, but there clearly is an end to all of this. All of this sanctification, struggling and striving, preaching the gospel, wrestling, that our time on earth, whether we die physically or whether he comes, is limited. And there is a clear ending to all of this.

And that's what this book of Revelation is really to point to, is to remind us that victory in Christ is absolutely certain. And so hopefully that, as we're studying through this, that that's the message that you're going to be getting over and over, right? So I think we should be curious.

If you have questions, I encourage you to ask them and have honest conversations in your small groups, and even with me, you can come and ask. I can give you my two cents. Doesn't mean it's right, but I can just give you my boot. But I think the discussion of these things will be sanctifying for our church.

Even if it comes out and say, "I'm confused," I think that confusion is healthy. That means you are wrestling with the text. And I think that ultimately that's our goal in this book of Revelation. Okay? All right, some discussion questions that I have, which I can't read. Okay, this definitely is too small.

I can't read it. So you, yeah. So today you guys don't have small groups, so if you guys can just make small groups from your group for today, and then take some time to discuss these questions. Does this need to be bigger? Or can you actually see it? You can see it?

Okay. If not, just come up and take a picture or something. Okay? So get into groups of maybe about four or five and take some time to discuss this. And then afterwards, we'll have some snacks set up in the back. And then starting from next week, we'll start your small groups.

Okay? Oh, sorry, sorry. If you haven't signed up, we need you to sign up. How are we going to put them in groups? >> It's going to be generally with your similar age groups. >> Okay. All right, we'll figure it out. All right. But if you haven't signed up, please sign up so that at least we'll have your name and be able to put you in it.

So if you happen to be in a group and say, "Hey, we don't want to be split up. There's six of us that wants to stay together," please email us ahead of time. Okay? And you're going to have to do it together so that we'll be able to do that together.

Okay? All right, let me pray for us, and then I'll ask you guys to get in your small group. Heavenly Father, we thank you for just the privilege that we have to be able to gather together and study your Word. And there's a lot of things that are confusing about this book, a lot of things, Lord, that even after we study, we may not clearly know.

But I pray that every single minute that we spend wrestling with the text and trying to figure out the meaning and application of all of these things will be sanctifying to our souls. Help us to think more deeply upon the coming of Christ and to eagerly wait for him to live each day, knowing, Father God, that our days here are numbered, whether it is just physically living our days out or at some point Christ returning, maybe even possibly in our life.

I pray, Father God, that whatever the case may be, help us to live each day to know that this is not our home, that you will one day bring to completion what you started on the cross. And I pray, Father God, that our church may be sanctified, that we will grow and mature and sober as we eagerly wait for your return.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen.