Sabbath Afternoon, June 22
Memory Text:
“And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. KJV — Revelation 21:3, 4
“The Lord of heaven has an eternity of happiness for His children in the earth made new. John says, “I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.” Revelation 21:1-4. 3MR 86.1
“Here are inducements for those who will live holy lives; and those who will not earnestly comply with the requirements after such inducements are offered are like those whom Paul admonishes in the following words: “O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth...?” Galatians 3:1. If the fear of God is before us then we shall be enabled to endure and to have a recompense of reward. I see that many of the youth will have a terrible disappointment when they find that they have lost heaven. Oh, how important it is for us to understand our relation to God, and to know that we are in harmony with His divine will!” 3MR 86.
Sunday, June 23
Hope in the Time of Trouble
Read Revelation 22:11, 12; Daniel 12:1, 2; and Jeremiah 30:5-7. What events occur just before the Second Advent?
“And at that time” – that is, at the time the king of the north comes to his end (chapter 11, verse 45) – shall Michael stand up and deliver His people, the Church, all who are written in the Book. What else takes place?
Verse 2 – “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”
Here is projected a resurrection of a mixed multitude, wicked and righteous – foolish and wise. This resurrection, then, is not the pre-millennial “first resurrection,” nor the post-millennial resurrection of the wicked (Rev. 20:5, 6), but a special one. If the wise who turn many to righteousness are of the resurrected in this special resurrection, and if they shine as the stars forever and ever, then this special resurrection takes place in probationary time.
Read 1 John 3:1-3, John 8:29, and John 14:30. What is the only sufficient preparation for the coming time of trouble?
At that time (that is, at the time the king of the north comes to his end and none help him) shall Michael stand; and at the same time there shall be trouble such as never was even to that very time. Only God’s people, who have their names written in the book, will be delivered. None other.
Through this study we see that the time of trouble is but a step in the future, that the only event yet to be fulfilled before the trouble begins is the king of the north coming to his end. Then follows the reward of the faithful.
What a solemn time we have come to, Brothers, Sisters. Do you realize that if you do not now make an effort to put your name in the book, it may be forever too late? And is it not better to have your name there even if the trouble were a hundred years in the future? Now is the time to act. Now is the day of salvation brought to you. Today Inspiration pleads; if you hear His voice harden not your hearts. Only those who heed the revealed Word of God will find deliverance and peace, —none others will.
Read Psalm 27:5, Psalm 91:1-11, and Revelation 3:10-12. What reassuring promises does God give us for the time of trouble?
Do you now realize that not only the time of trouble is at the door, but even this special resurrection? Do you actually see that in the time of trouble, while the living saints are being delivered these dead who rise "to everlasting life," are also delivered from their graves? Do you realize that this time of trouble is in "the great and dreadful day of the Lord," the day which the promised prophet Elijah announces? Do you actually know that he is to turn the hearts of the fathers and of the children toward each other? lest the Lord smite "the earth with a curse." Mal. 4:5, 6. Do you see that the prophet appears in a day he can restore all things, everything that was lost through sin, even the Kingdom? Do you know that the resurrection of Daniel 12 is not the same as the resurrections of 1 Thessalonians and of Revelation 20:5?
Monday, June 24
Hope in Jesus’ Soon Return
Read John 14:1-3 and Titus 2:11-14. In the light of the challenges of the future and the coming time of trouble, why are these verses so encouraging?
The millennial age of peace is hence, plainly, to be spent, not on the earth, but in the “mansions” above, for the Lord’s promise is: “I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” John 14:2, 3.
Thus, at Christ’s second appearing, both all the righteous and all the wicked receive their rewards: the righteous dead are raised to life everlasting, and the righteous living are changed to immortality in the twinkling of an eye, and are then with the resurrected taken to heaven (1 Cor. 15:52, 53; 1 Thess. 4:15-17) while the wicked living go into their graves (2 Thess. 2:8; Isa. 11:4; Heb. 10:27; Luke 19:27). And since from the resurrection of all the righteous to the resurrection of all the wicked (Rev. 20:5), there stretch a thousand years (the millennium), this period, obviously, then, cannot be a time of receiving rewards, but rather must be a time in which the righteous enjoy in heaven the rewards already received, and in which the wicked rest in their graves.
Read Revelation 6:15-17 and Isaiah 25:8, 9. Contrast the attitude of the saved and the lost revealed in these verses. What explains the difference between these two mindsets?
In these verses are pictured the fate, the fear, and the smitten conscience of all who are not able to stand in the day of the Judgment of the living, the great and dreadful day of the Lord – the wrath of the Lamb in the great “time of trouble such as never was” (Dan. 12:1), the day following the appearance of the antitypical “Elijah the prophet” (Mal. 4:5) – yes, the day in which those who have not clad themselves in the wedding garment, are cast into outer darkness, there to gnash their teeth (Matt. 22:11-13).
“In these scriptures two parties are brought to view. One party permitted themselves to be deceived and took sides with those with whom the Lord has a controversy. They misinterpreted the messages sent them and clothed themselves in robes of self-righteousness. Sin was not sinful in their eyes. They taught falsehood as truth, and by them many souls were led astray.” 9T 268.1
Read Revelation 15:3, 4 and Revelation 19:7 How will the redeemed respond to the glorious salvation provided so freely through Christ?
“Upon the crystal sea before the throne, that sea of glass as it were mingled with fire,—so resplendent is it with the glory of God,—are gathered the company that have “gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name.” With the Lamb upon Mount Zion, “having the harps of God,” they stand, the hundred and forty and four thousand that were redeemed from among men; and there is heard, as the sound of many waters, and as the sound of a great thunder, “the voice of harpers harping with their harps.” And they sing “a new song” before the throne, a song which no man can learn save the hundred and forty and four thousand. It is the song of Moses and the Lamb—a song of deliverance. None but the hundred and forty-four thousand can learn that song; for it is the song of their experience—an experience such as no other company have ever had. “These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth.” These, having been translated from the earth, from among the living, are counted as “the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb.” Revelation 15:2, 3; 14:1-5. “These are they which came out of great tribulation;” they have passed through the time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation; they have endured the anguish of the time of Jacob's trouble; they have stood without an intercessor through the final outpouring of God's judgments. But they have been delivered, for they have “washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” “In their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault” before God. ‘Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple: and He that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.’” GC 648.3
Tuesday, June 25
The Millennium on Earth
Read Revelation 20:1-3. What is Satan’s fate when Jesus returns?
In his key vision, embracing the millennium, John “saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.
As The Revelation says that “they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years” (Rev. 20:4), Christ does not therefore, live with them on the earth, but rather they live with Him in “the place” which He prepared for them, and of which John says (after seeing “the first heaven and the first earth were passed away” and replaced with “new heaven and a new earth” – Rev. 21:1): “And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” Rev. 21:2.
The wicked being then hid in their graves, and the righteous being gone to live with Christ, hence---Satan Is Left Alone.
Wandering in the earth until the resurrection of the wicked (Rev. 20:13), Satan is confined to a thousand years of solitaire! Bound by this chain of circumstances, he is unable to “deceive the nations” (Rev. 20:3), till the dead who “lived not again until the thousand years were finished,” arise to life, following the---Judgment During the Millennium.
Read Revelation 20:1-3. What is Satan’s fate when Jesus returns?
The action here projected against a backdrop of God’s coming judgments upon the land of ancient Israel, because of their rebellion, cannot possibly, in the very reason of things, be limited merely to that land. It simply cannot, in other words, be narrowed down, as some think it can, to mean that only the land of God’s people has been or will be made “void” and left “desolate” and “without form”, – without light and without bird or beast or inhabitant, – and the rest of the earth be left to enjoy all these blessings. The scripture must, on the contrary, be taken just as it reads, showing that the whole earth is to suffer the same end. In view of this fact, therefore, the term the earthobviously cannot be interpreted, as has been done by some, to mean the “land” – Palestine only.
When ancient Israel, moreover, was taken by the nations, the mountains and hills were not made to tremble and to “move lightly”; the cities were not entirely broken down and left without inhabitant; the birds were not forced to fly away from the land; and the land was not left in darkness.So, obviously, the dispersing of the Jews did not in the least fulfill the prophecy of Jeremiah 4:23-28. The earth, therefore, shall necessarily again be, as in the first day of creation, “without form, and void.” Gen. 1:2. And just as there was then “darkness…upon the face of the deep,” so shall there be again.
From the preceding paragraphs, we see that whereas the first twenty-two verses of Jeremiah 4 speak against the wickedness of ancient Israel, the twenty-third to the twenty-seventh verses are parenthetical, and declare the desolation of the earth and the destruction of all the wicked wherever they may be. By omitting the parenthetical verses, the continuity of thought is joined:
Wednesday, June 26
Judgment in the Millennium
Read Revelation 20:4-6. What are the righteous doing during the 1,000 years, and why is it important?
Thus the millennium commences, and thus the angel casts the Devil into the bottomless pit – into a place where it is impossible for any other being to stand – shuts him up, and sets a seal upon him, “that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled [till the second resurrection]: and after that he must be loosed a little season. And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and Judgment was given unto them” during the thousand years.
“And I saw a Great White Throne, and Him that sat on it, from Whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” Rev. 20:1-5, 11, 12.
John saw that after these things took place, “the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.” Rev. 20:13-15. (See also The Great Controversy, p. 480.)
Read Revelation 20:7-9. How do the 1,000 years conclude? What is the fate of Satan and his followers?
But the dead, “small and great,” who do not rise in the first resurrection (Rev. 20:6), John saw figuratively “stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the Book of Life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” Rev. 20:12. With the close of this work, come the events---After the Judgment.
When the judgment was over and the thousand years gone, “the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. “Rev. 20: 13.
Thursday, June 27
Two Eternities
Read 2 Corinthians 5:10; Romans 14: 10, 11; and Revelation 20:11-15, what do they say about why the wicked are raised to life again?
It is strictly Biblical that at the commencement of the millennium all the wicked are “slain with the sword of Him that sat upon the horse which sword proceeded out of His mouth: and all the fowls [are] filled with their flesh” (Rev. 19:21), and that the judged at the Great White Throne are the dead, and also that subsequently all the judged are resurrected at the end of the thousand years; that is, as John puts it, then “the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them.” These facts certify in no uncertain terms that there are none living on the earth during the “thousand years,” and that those who do come up in the second resurrection, are all the unholy ones – all those who do not come up in “the first resurrection” (Rev. 20:6), all who are subject to the second death (Rev. 20:14).
Moreover, as there is but one Judicial sitting during the millennium, the “thrones” of Rev. 20:4 must be in session jointly with the Great White Throne. Furthermore, it is not likely that “the Great White Throne” would be in session all by itself.
Read Revelation 20:9; Psalm 37:20; and Malachi 4:1, 2. What insights do these passages give us about the ultimate destruction of sin and sinners and the reward of the righteous?
“And they went up on the breadth of the earth and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them. And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever…. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.” Rev. 20:9, 10, 14, 15.
Since not only Satan, but also “whosoever was not found written in the Book of Life, was cast into the lake of fire,” the fire in the lake simply continues the same destruction wrought by the fire which comes “down from God out of heaven.” Rev. 20:9. After the thousand years, in other words, the fire which comes “down from God out of heaven,” results in “the lake of fire” (Rev. 20:10) and in eternal extermination of all sinners. Of this final destruction, a pre-millennial demonstration is to be given when the beast and the false prophet are cast into the “lake of fire” – their grave for the thousand years. And as the fire does not, of course, keep burning during the thousand years, the statement, “the devil…was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are” (Rev. 20:10), shows therefore that there are both a typical and an antitypical destruction; the lake of fire before the millennium, being a type of the one after the millennium.
Friday, June 28
Further Thought
“Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved,” says the apostle,---“What Manner of Persons Ought Ye To Be?”
The Scriptures exhort that those in the Truth be “in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. Wherefore beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot, and blameless” (2 Pet. 3:11-14), and the more so now while He is---SETTING UP HIS KINGDOM.
“In that day” (when the Lord is about to make empty the earth), He “shall set His hand again the second time,” says the prophet Isaiah, “to recover the remnant of His people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. And He shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four comers of the earth.” Isa. 11:11, 12.
The work of gathering set forth in these scriptures, shows that before the resurrection of the righteous (1 Thess. 4:16) and before the pre-millennial destruction of the nations, the Lord is to make up His kingdom at first of the living saints only, as seen from the prophecy of Daniel 2: the “stone” being “cut out” of the mountain (Dan. 2:45), and being symbolical of the kingdom of Christ in its beginning (Dan.2:44), then the mountain from which it is cut out, must necessarily represent the church from which the first fruits of the kingdom, the 144,000, are gathered. And as the stone grows and becomes “a great mountain” (Dan. 2:35) after it is “cut out,” it obviously at first represents the kingdom in its infancy – the “first fruits” only. The fact, also, that the stone grows and fills “the whole earth,” is another evidence in the proof that after this long-looked-for kingdom is “set up,” a great multitude is to join it. Were this not so, then the stone could not become “a great mountain.” Its being, furthermore, at first but a very small part of the mountain, shows that the kingdom has a very small beginning, just as the Lord says: “The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed,…which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs.” Matt. 13:31, 32.