What is amillennialism?

Question 10051.

Amillennialism is the view that there will be no literal thousand-year reign of Christ upon the earth, and that the millennium of Revelation 20 is a symbolic description of the present age lying between the two comings of Jesus. The prefix a simply means no or not, so the term means, roughly, no millennium in the literal sense of the word. I do not myself hold this view, but I want to explain it fully and fairly here, because it is held by a great many godly and thoughtful believers across the centuries, and it plainly deserves a careful and honest hearing rather than a lazy caricature drawn up only to be knocked down.

Amillennialism is emphatically not a denial that Christ reigns as King. Far from it. Those who hold it insist warmly that Jesus reigns even now, from heaven, over His gathered church, and that the thousand years of Revelation 20 pictures precisely this present spiritual reign of His. The real disagreement between us is not about whether Christ is King at all, which we both gladly confess, but about whether there is a future, earthly, thousand-year kingdom still genuinely to come. On that one question this position says a firm no, and I say a firm yes, and the whole difference finally turns on how each of us reads prophecy.

What amillennialism teaches

Amillennialism teaches that we are living within the millennium right now, in a symbolic rather than a literal sense of the word. The binding of Satan in Revelation 20 is understood as the real but limited restraint placed upon him by the cross and by the wide spread of the gospel, so that he can no longer deceive the nations as freely as he once did in the ages before Christ. The reign of the saints is understood as the present reign of believers together with Christ, whether in heaven after their death or here on earth in the ongoing life of the church. There is no future earthly kingdom in this scheme, only this present age followed directly by the eternal state.

On this reading, the Second Coming, the general resurrection of all the dead, and the final judgement of all mankind all happen together at the very end of the present age, with no thousand-year interval set between them at all. Amillennialism therefore expects history simply to run on as it is until Christ returns, at which single point the wicked and the righteous are raised up together, judged together, and sent away to their separate eternal destinies. It is admittedly a tidy and economical scheme, and I do genuinely understand its appeal, but I am persuaded it is bought at far too high a price when you look closely at the actual texts involved.

The case that is made for it

In all fairness, amillennialism marshals some real and serious arguments in its favour. Its defenders rightly point out that Revelation is a book positively full of vivid symbols, so that a symbolic thousand years fits comfortably within the genre. They note that the New Testament very often seems to speak of one future coming and one general resurrection, and they argue that a literal millennium needlessly complicates that apparent simplicity. They read the promises once made to Israel as now fulfilled in the church, the true Israel of God, so that no separate earthly kingdom is required at all. I take every one of these points seriously, and I would never pretend for a moment that they are foolish.

Amillennialism also appeals warmly to those passages where the present reign of Christ is plainly affirmed, and to the real danger of an overly earthly, purely political sort of hope. Its underlying instinct to guard the spiritual reality of Christ’s present kingship is genuinely a good and healthy one. Where I finally part company with it is not over whether Jesus reigns now, which I gladly and fully affirm alongside them, but over whether that present reign completely exhausts the rich prophetic promise of a coming earthly kingdom. This position says that it does. I am persuaded, on balance, that the Scriptures themselves say plainly that it does not.

Why I cannot accept amillennialism

My deepest single problem with amillennialism is its handling of Revelation 20 itself. The passage names the thousand years, the chilioi, six separate times over, and it carefully distinguishes a first resurrection from a second one, with the reign of the saints falling squarely between the two. To read those resurrections as real, bodily events while reading the thousand years alone as a floating symbol seems to me plainly inconsistent, taking the surrounding details literally but the central number figuratively for no clear reason. I develop this at length in my study of what the millennium is, where the plain and consistent reading points steadily toward a literal reign.

My second real problem concerns the place of Israel in God’s purposes. To make the church into the new Israel and then dissolve all the national promises into general spiritual blessings requires, as I see it, a very great deal of spiritualising of some extremely concrete and specific texts, as I argue in my study of whether the church has replaced Israel. The covenants sworn with Abraham and with David were made with a real nation and were sworn unconditionally by God Himself. This position must somehow reassign them all to another people, and I am simply not willing to do that to God’s plain and sworn word.

The binding of Satan

A particular difficulty I have concerns the claim that Satan is already bound in our own day. Revelation 20 says that the binding is so complete and thorough that the devil can no longer deceive the nations at all during that period, and yet the apostle Peter describes the devil in this present age as a roaring lion prowling about, actively seeking someone to devour, while Paul calls him the god of this age who blinds the minds of unbelievers. Those vivid descriptions of a very active and dangerous enemy sit extremely awkwardly, to my mind, with the claim that his deceiving work has already been decisively ended.

The premillennial reading, by welcome contrast, simply places that binding of Satan in the future, at the very start of the coming kingdom, which fits the total and thorough restraint that Revelation 20 actually describes. This is one of several points where this alternative view seems to me to strain hard against the plain sense of the text in order to hold its wider system together. I say this not to score cheap points against a brother, but because these are the very details that honestly kept me from ever embracing the position myself when I first weighed it carefully with an open Bible.

Holding the difference with grace

Though I disagree with amillennialism, I want to be entirely clear that it is a view held squarely within historic, orthodox Christianity by a great many believers whom I deeply respect and love. This is not in any way a matter of the gospel itself, and I would never dream of treating a brother’s honest millennial convictions as some black mark against the reality of his faith. We share the very same Lord, the same precious cross, and the same living hope of His certain return in glory. We differ only over the shape of what follows that return, and that difference, real as it is, remains a family disagreement and never a dividing wall between us.

So I hold my own premillennial conviction firmly, and I try to hold my charity toward those who differ from me just as firmly alongside it. I would far rather reason patiently and prayerfully through Revelation 20 with a brother who differs than ever score a cheap and hollow point against him in debate. The end itself will settle all our arguments soon enough, and I strongly suspect that we will both discover on that day that we understood rather less than we had confidently thought. Until then I commend the plain reading warmly, while gladly and sincerely calling those who differ my brothers and sisters in Christ.

So, now what?

Whatever you finally make of amillennialism, do not let the debate itself distract you for a moment from the one thing that is entirely beyond all dispute. Jesus Christ is coming again, and you personally must be ready to meet Him when He does. The millennial question is well worth studying with care, but it will profit you precisely nothing in the end if you are not first found safely in Christ, forgiven and eternally secure in Him. Do settle the one great matter before you ever move on to settle the smaller and finer one.

If you already belong to Jesus, then study all these things with an open Bible and a genuinely humble heart, and hold your firm conclusions with real grace toward all those who differ. And if you do not yet belong to Him at all, then let the sheer certainty of His return move you to trust Him without delay today. The King is coming, on whatever exact timetable you finally settle upon, and the only truly safe place to be standing on that day is squarely within His mercy. Are you standing there this morning?

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed… They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.

Revelation 20:4 (ESV)