we have imagined belonged to the Millennium, will prove to belong to the

period that follows.  The day of the Lord is followed by the day of God, the

Sabbath followed by 'the first or eighth day'.

If we keep strictly to the record of Revelation 20 we shall see that

the so -called Millennial kingdom is the period when the suffering overcomer

who has refused to recognize the Beast or his authority, will 'live and reign

with Christ, a thousand years', but nothing is said of the bulk of the nation

of Israel, except to reveal that there was also on the earth at the same time

'the camp of the saints' and 'the beloved city'.  To a large extent this

phase of the kingdom is God's answer to the only Pre -Millennial kingdom

known in the Apocalypse, namely The PreMillennial kingdom of the Beast!  When

Jerusalem is created a rejoicing and her people a joy, it is then that 'The

wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the

bullock: and (yet, at the selfsame time) dust shall be the serpent's meat.

They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain, saith the Lord'

(Isa. 65:18,19,25).

The reference to the serpent here suggests that the perfect kingdom has

not yet arrived, and in line with this, in the midst of this section when 'as

the days of a tree' shall be the days of His elect (Isa. 65:22), we learn

that a 'child shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner being an hundred

years old shall be accursed' (Isa. 65:20).  While the age of Methuselah is

proverbial, and the age of many of the patriarchs of Genesis 1 to 11

approached to the 1,000 -year limit, not one ever reached it.  'The days of a

tree' may mean a thousand years, and for any one in that day to die at a

hundred years of age would be like a child dying.  The fact, however, that it

can be contemplated that a 'sinner' should 'die' at a hundred years of age or

be 'accursed' (however difficult may be the true exposition of Isaiah 65:20),

makes one thing certain, that at the commencement of that period, namely,

'The new heaven and the new earth', death will not have been eradicated.  It

is there in Isaiah 65:20, in Isaiah 66:24 and in Revelation 21:7,8.  In

addition 1 Corinthians 15:24 -28 shows that death persists to the end.

Positive teaching concerning the Millennium is limited to ten

verses in Revelation 20.  All else is a matter of inference,

legitimate possibly, but to be treated with necessary reserve.

The term 'the Millennium' is a title chosen by man for the period

covered by Revelation 20:1 -10, for the word is simply Latin for

1,000 years and that is the number of years covered by this

prophecy, and expressed six times over, in verses 2,3,4,5,6 and

7.  The term however must not be invested with meanings and

characteristics that belie or ignore what is written in

Revelation 20.

It is correct to speak of this period as a 'kingdom', for the

overcomers not only 'live' but 'reign' with Christ a thousand

years (Rev. 20:4,6).  The Greek word for kingdom is basileia, the

Greek word for reign is basileuo.  (See article Kingdom2).

Strictly speaking the overcomer (Rev. 2:7,11,17,26; 3:5,12,21;

12:11; 15:2 and 21:7) is the thread that links all the prodigious

events of this Prophecy together, and unites both passages under

Revelation 3:21 thus: