JEAN'S BIBLE STUDY

Chapter 7:

Second Resurrection

I saw a great white throne and him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. There was found no place for them. I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and they opened books. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged out of the things which were written in the books, according to their works. The sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them. They were judged, each one according to his works. Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. If anyone was not found written in the book of life, he was cast into the lake of fire – Rev 20,11-15

Jesus and His people were still on the old earth, the very planet where they were born and raised, and they were nearing the end of the thousand-year reign of Christ, the Millennium. Jesus assembled His people together and asked them if anyone had a question about what He was about to do, regarding the second resurrection. One of them, Morris, raised his hand; Jesus invited him to stand and come forward; he stood at Jesus’ side and asked his question, “Why is it necessary to have a hell, a Lake of Fire, and why is it necessary to cast everyone into it who will not worship God?” Jesus replied, “Morris, I can answer your question in one word: sovereignty. God made man to worship Him, and if he refuses, man becomes a monster. Remember the Law from your former life. The very first commandment was that you should have no other gods before you. Therefore, idolatry is the greatest offense against God, why? You were created in His image, and to worship other gods distorts your identity more than anything else you could do. As you know, violating the Law turned mankind insane.

“My Father is sovereign; there is no other god besides Him; He is aware of His own greatness; no one can match His power and authority; He cannot create something greater than Himself; and if He could, He wouldn’t. God is sovereign, and He is the only one worthy of worship. Sin is therefore defined as: ‘refusing to worship God’. It was their lack of repentance that made them partakers of the second resurrection. For the very reason you were made in His image, worshipping God proves that more than anything you could do. Consequently, worshipping other gods does the exact opposite; it turns people into monsters. More than anything, to be made in His image means that you know about sin. No one whom God has made understands this like you do. This one trait, worshipping God, defines you as human (made in His image) more than any other trait. Therefore, He has defined sin as idolatry. You worship God because you were made in His image, and you rejoice in it. He made you for worship, and if you don’t worship Him, you will worship something else; whatever is most important to you; that is your God. Everyone who is thrown into the lake of fire is primarily an idolater.

Morris asked Jesus another question, “What about the angels; were they made in the image of God? The fallen angels have sinned; will they be thrown into the Lake of Fire too?” Jesus answered, “Yes, Morris, they will. The angels that fell, particularly Lucifer; he is the origin of the mystery of lawlessness, as Paul pointed out to you in his epistles,” waving at Paul in the back, Paul waving back. “The fallen angels are an example of a created being seeking the position of man and inadvertently turning into monsters. This was the fate of ‘angels who didn’t keep their first domain, but deserted their proper abode’ (Jd-6), and through jealousy they sought a place higher than God had given them, which led to their ruin. Seeking a position greater than the one assigned to them is tantamount to wanting to be God. All sin reduces to this, and wishing they were God eventually leads to making an attempt on His throne; when these thoughts are swimming in their hearts, it is inevitable they will act on it. For this reason they cannot live with Me or anywhere in My kingdom, and the only place in all creation where My kingdom does not exist is under My feet.”

Another one raised her hand with a question, Carrie, stepping to the front, “Lord, why doesn’t God just annihilate the people, instead of sending them to hell; wouldn’t that be more merciful?” Jesus answered, “I suppose it would be, but if My Father annihilated them, it would undo the fact that they were made in His image, for God is an eternal being and so is man. You were born, which began your existence, but now that you exist, your life will never end, which is an attribute of God. If He changed His mind about them, He would have to change His mind about you too, Carrie. How would you like to lose your place as God’s daughter and co-ruler of His kingdom?” Carrie said, “No thanks, I love it here with You and my friends.” Jesus replied, “All this would be taken from you if God annihilated the wicked, for if He destroyed them, He would have to destroy you too, for He cannot have you without them. Besides, why would God reward them for being evil and deny Himself a people for His own possession? It would be a lose-lose outcome for everyone except the wicked, and even they would no longer exist.” “Why couldn’t He have me without them?” Carrie asked. Jesus answered, “He couldn’t make a free people without some of them rebelling. You are no longer able to sin against God, because He took that from you, only with your permission. So now you know about sin but don’t want any part of it and couldn’t sin if you tried. This is exactly how He wanted to make you.”

A thousand years had passed during Jesus’ reign on earth without a single war, though there were disputes and skirmishes that arose among the people, yet they were immediately resolved, according to the wisdom of Jesus and the rulers He hand-picked from among His people, who were martyrs in their former lives for the cause of Christ (Rev 20-4). They taught the people right from wrong and established proper weights and balances of truth and justice. The mortality rate was low; reaching the age of 100 was common throughout the Millennium, causing the populations of the earth to rise very quickly (Isaiah 65-20). Twenty billion people were alive at one time, yet no one was hungry or oppressed. The seventh Bowl, referring to a terrible earthquake of God’s fierce wrath during the tribulation restructured the surface of the earth in preparation for the Millennium. It leveled all the mountains and filled all the valleys, providing more land space for man to live (Rev 16,17-20). The earthquake created fissures in the earth and under the oceans, and the oceans fell into these deep trenches, reaching the hot magma beneath the earth’s crust, turning the water to steam, which rose far into the stratosphere, creating a vapor-canopy that enveloped the earth and protected man from direct sunlight, similar to the days of Noah before the flood (Genesis 2-6). Thus people lived longer, and it reduced the size of the oceans, giving still more land to inhabit.

At the end of the Millennium the people became restless and discontent, wanting to leave the agrarian lifestyle and become a modern, technological society, as man was before the tribulation. The people became adamant and overruled their benevolent government that Christ furnished them and went ahead with their plans in disregard of Christ. This prompted Him to make a declaration to His saints. He rounded up His people and said to them, “Since mankind on earth doesn’t want me to be their king anymore, I will give them a king they desire that will give them everything their flesh craves.” Then He said something that caused all His saints to gasp. He looked at Michael the archangel and said, “Release Satan from his prison!”

Throughout the Millennium Satan had begged Jesus for leniency and mercy, promising that he would be good if God would only give him a second chance. Michael took the chain in his right hand that was attached to a great lid and pulled on it, and the lid slid open to release the monstrous creature (Rev 20-1,2). He crawled from his dungeon and a stench followed him; he looked at Jesus and lied to His face. Instead of thanking Him for his leniency, he said, “I have had time to think about my old ways and feel remorseful; I have decided to repent if you will let me go.” Jesus answered, “Go and do what you must” (Jn 13-27).                                                              

Jesus released Satan to show His saints that when souls, angelic or human, die corrupted, they remain corrupted forever. The moment Jesus turned His back, Satan immediately began devising a plan of attack on Christ’s throne. Although Satan was imprisoned throughout the Millennium, his cohort of demons was not, though the demons didn’t have their leader to organize an effort to subvert mankind or to orchestrate a coup against Jesus’ throne, seated in Jerusalem. Man was already headed in the general direction that Satan wanted to lead them. They were simply rebelling against an agrarian lifestyle, but that was not good enough for Satan. He knew the antichrist, before the war of Armageddon, had transferred all the gold of the world from the Vatican in Rome to Jerusalem (Jm 5,1-3; Rev 11-1,2), and that Jesus had built His throne on it and was sitting on it. Satan and his demons conveyed this to sinful man through a spirit of deception: if they defeated Christ's throne, he would help them establish a one-world economy based on a gold standard. In this way the demons incensed mankind to rebel against Jesus Himself, and they organized an army against His throne, whispering lies in the ears of mankind how Christ had mistreated them throughout the centuries and used them for His own purposes and subjected them to all forms of mistreatment, bondage and tyranny. On the contrary, this was the very thing that Satan had planned for them! Of course the people believed what the demons were whispering in their ears, so they formed an army, and a cloud of soldiers came over the horizon toward Jerusalem to attack the throne of Christ, and fire descended from heaven and consumed them before they came close to the Holy City (Rev 20,7-10).

Satan figured he had nothing to lose. If he succeeded, he finally defeated his archenemy, Christ; but if he failed, he just threw more of God’s beloved people into the wood chipper, and so either way he wins. However, Satan didn't take into account the fact that he was increasing the fire of his own judgment. His aim was to form an army to fight against Jesus to dethrone Him and somehow kill Him, as he tried to kill Jesus at His crucifixion and failed. In Satan’s mind he hoped this time He would stay dead. This was Satan’s strategy because he was completely out of ideas how to permanently cancel his impending judgment that continually tormented his mind, though he would never let himself think about it.

Satan had been reduced so many times to a smaller and smaller radius, until now God has revealed Him to be nothing more than an angry, spoiled, little imp. God created Him as Lucifer the great, giving him the entire universe as his possession, galaxies reaching infinity in number. They all belonged to Lucifer, whose name means “Light bearer” (Isaiah 14,12-17). When God revealed to Lucifer and the angels that He was about to create man, who would be a superior being, made in God’s image, Lucifer became jealous and rebelled; and when he made an attempt on God's throne, He cursed Lucifer and the angels that rebelled with him, along with his inheritance, the entire universe. So, he became a disembodied spirit, unable to manipulate the physical realm, and then cast him to the earth to become its prisoner, and following him were all the fallen angels. Before this he owned an infinite universe; now he was confined to a single planet. God cursed his inheritance by removing His Holy Spirit from it, including the earth; then He created man to spite Satan, and through his jealous rage Satan enticed man to rebel against God, which led to the Father sending Jesus. Satan incited man to kill Jesus, inspiring the Roman soldiers to flog Him so severely that it would have killed just about anybody else, depicting the rage in Satan’s heart against the Lord. They hung Him on a cross to die, but the Father raised Him from the dead. This had the by-product of further judging Satan, for in the resurrection Jesus took ownership of the keys of death and hell (Rev 1-18). That is, Jesus is now in charge of who goes to hell and who doesn't. If it were up to Satan, everybody would have gone there with him. Satan touched the apple of God’s eye, proving that this was the intent of his heart all along in his initial rebellion.

This opened heaven for anyone willing to come, and it ultimately led to Michael the archangel, prior to the Millennium, locking Satan in prison, which further reduced his radius. Then, at the end of the Millennium Jesus told Michael to release him, because the people wanted a different ruler. God released him for a little while, and the first thing he did was form another rebellion against Christ. To deal with the rebellion God consumed His enemies with fire that fell from the sky, and He threw Satan into the Lake of Fire, where he will be tormented day and night forever and ever (Rev 2,26-29). This is his final resting place. God reduced Him in stages, giving Him ample opportunity to repent at each stage, but he would not. Satan’s only consolation is that he doesn’t have to suffer alone, but he didn’t take into account that God remembered every sin that Satan committed against unsuspecting mankind over the millennia. Satan didn’t let himself remember that the sting of hell is sin, and that the more he sins, the greater his judgment. In the eons to come God will eventually get through to Satan that he should not have made any of the decisions that led him to the Lake of Fire, which is the only place he would understand this. It is very important that all creation, including Satan, understand and agree with the justice of God. Satan cannot say that this is unfair, because at every point God gave him opportunities to bend the knee to His authority and worship God, but he refused. The Father dwells in smoke and fire, but it doesn’t hurt Him because He never contradicted Himself (Deut 4,11-16).

This last war marked the end of the temporal world, temporal referring to time that measures the beginning and end of things, but where there is no end, neither is there time. Jesus led His saints to the New Jerusalem, and they all stood in space outside the gate (Lk 13-28). Once assembled the Father instructed His Son to raise the wicked. Jesus spoke to the earth and commanded it to give up its dead who died in their sins. Hades was evacuated, and bodies burst from their tombs; the dust of the earth assembled to make bodies for souls who died in their sins. They nullified the grace of God by their unbelief, as though the Father did not love the world enough to send His only born Son to shed His blood on the cross, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life (Jn 3-16). All the evil dead came to life in bodies that resembled their hearts and stood before Christ, and the saints assembled behind Him.

Then God the Father instructed His Son to destroy this present universe. As He opened His mouth the Father did His work through Christ; He spoke to the infinite universe and to the infinitesimal particles that composed every atom, “I command all matter everywhere to diffuse.” Every galaxy, star, planet and moon, and every atom and particle and subatomic particle in the universe disassembled and disappeared with a mighty roar (Col 1-16,17; 2Pet 3,12-14). Matter ceased to exist, against all the laws of physics, for they did not apply to God, and since space is defined by the things in it, when the matter ceased to exist, space itself became null and void. All that remained was God, the New Jerusalem, His angels, His saints, the Lake of Fire and the wicked. Fallen man and angels facing judgment were all silent, looking at Jesus, dreading His words.

The wicked found themselves at the White Throne Judgment, floating in space, equidistant from each other, the New Jerusalem in view but not within reach (Mat 8-11,12). They were all clothed in earthly bodies but otherwise naked. He took down his robe and showed them His back that was still brutally scared from the flogging He received, His body mutilated before they nailed Him to a cross to die. He replaced his robe, turned and faced them again and said, “I went to the cross and suffered that you might live with Me in paradise, but you would not have it. You rejected My blood sacrifice for the forgiveness of your sins.” Each one objected, reminding the Lord of various good works they performed, but Jesus cut through all their excuses, saying, “I notice that My Spirit does not dwell in you.” God promised the Spirit to all who would believe in Me, as a helper and a counselor and an advocate of your faith, but you rejected Him, and to reject Him is to reject Me.

Standing at the White Throne Judgment, the wicked were judged according to the books that were opened, containing their deeds. Then He opened another book, the book of life, and saw that their names were not written in it. They were not allowed in heaven based on the fact that their names were not written in the Lamb's Book of Life (Rev 20,11-15). God was able to partition Himself in an infinite array of cubicles, one person per cell; and He judged each person separately, yet all at once. The amount of time it took to judge one person is how long it took to judge them all, who lived and died apart from God’s love for mankind, all the way back to Adam and Eve. He went over their deeds one-by-one and scrutinized them, looking for perfection but finding a crumbled life of flaws. In anger He reviewed their lives, saying that He had no intension of forgiving them for anything. He judged each person according to their deeds, while the saints testified against them, and their sins clung to their resurrected bodies like chains tied to heavy anchors, each having varying weights according to their sins.

God gave us His Laws and man broke them. His people sought repentance and forgiveness, while those of the second resurrection excused themselves and ignored God. There are many levels of judgment in the Lake of Fire, based on the amount of sin a person committed, and since Satan is the origin of sin, his judgment will be most severe. Satan doesn’t have a conscience, but God will give him one before he enters the Lake of Fire, sensitizing both man and demon before their sentence, and they will become sin. They are opposite the saints, like light and darkness, who became the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

Jesus said to them, “You rejected Me because you knew I would hinder you from living the way you wanted, yet the way you lived enslaved you in its evil passions and desires. You believed God was evil for placing you in a cursed world. In seeing the evil you hated God, but in the enjoyment of your lives you gave Him no credit. They all begged for mercy, but the Lord said, “Your flesh corrupted you; and now your new body has taken on the contours of your heart, and for this reason your appearance is grotesque. If I let you into My heaven, you would eventually form a rebellion against Me, and you are unwilling to let Me be God. You want to be god of your own life instead of letting Me direct you in paths of righteousness (Psalm 23-3), and you want to rule over the lives of others instead of ruling over the evil passions and desires that have led you to hate Me. I have no choice but to banish you to a world apart from Me, which is what you always wanted, but this world excludes all things you once enjoyed, such as a balmy blue sky with cottony clouds and a cold drink of water, proving that these were gifts from My hand, but you didn’t glorify Me as God or give thanks, but became vain in your reasoning, and your senseless heart was darkened (Rom 1-21). You will never see any of these things again.” You are going to lose the kingdom that I wanted to give you, had you only submitted to Me. Instead, you traded it all for the passing pleasures of sin (Heb 11-24,25; Mat 24,48-51). You have no love in yourselves and have believed the lies of Satan. He has told you that God doesn’t exist, and if He does, He is an ogre, but He is not an ogre to those who know and love Him (Psalm 18-25,26).

The Lake of Fire, where Satan, the beast and the false prophet were previously thrown, was a giant ball of liquid magma that burns forever. It suddenly appeared behind the wicked, whose attention was completely fixed on Christ at the White Throne Judgment, agonizing in hopeless fear. The inhabitants of heaven were present and witnessed all the proceedings. Those being judged were floating in space, and the ball of fire behind them had mass and gravity, which attracted the wicked to itself. They didn’t notice that all the while being judged they were slowly being pulled toward it. Their judgment clung to them and pulled them deep into the magma, and they disappeared into it, and all of God’s people witnessed His judgment on the wicked, and they all agreed that it was just, and they all understood that if not for the grace of God, they all would have had the same fate. They were tormented day and night by their sins, for the sting of hell is sin, which is the second death (1Cor 15-56; Rev 20-14).

As they were slowly and inevitably pulled into the flames, Jesus turned to His people and to the angels in attendance and said to them, “Do you see these people going to their doom? Do you know what they represent to you?” Everyone was silent in dread of what they were seeing and hearing. “Without them you would not know exactly what you have come to possess. If God were not the judge of all, neither could He show mercy on you; and if His judgments were not severe, then His mercy could not be glorious (Rom 9,21-23). My Father did not send these into everlasting punishment for your sake, but for His own hatred of rebellion; and be sure of this: because they refused to worship Him He cast them in to the lake of burning fire. God created His people for the express purpose of worshipping Him; and if they will not worship Him, they will inevitably lose their sense of humanity and become like beasts to be captured and killed, even as they kill and devour each other (2Pet 2-12; Gal 5-15). If the Lake of Fire were not filled with inhabitants, you might come to think lightly of His love and mercy, but now you know that your life in heaven has come at a great cost, not only to your Lord who was crucified, but to your brethren who have defined how much God loves righteousness and hates lawlessness.” We were witnesses of these things.

The Lord began building a hard crust over the Lake of Fire, consisting of rock, containing it entirely, except for a single hole He left open. The curst grew thicker, taking the shape of a planet, and Jesus called it the New Earth. The hole he left open reaching to the surface He called the bottomless pit, where the saints would go and see the wicked suffering in torment and remember God’s judgment and renew their gratitude of God’s kindness on them. The New Earth was over two hundred times larger than the old earth. More specifically, while the old earth was seven thousand miles in diameter, the New Earth was over 1,400,000 miles in diameter, giving the New Earth a circumference of over 4,396,000 miles, whereas the old earth was only twenty thousand miles in circumference. These figures are taken from the fact that the New Jerusalem, being a 1500 mile cube, will rest upon the earth. From space the earth appears as a perfectly round ball, though mountains cover its surface, the largest being Mount Everest, which is seven miles high. Therefore the New Earth, if it is to be seen from space as a perfectly round ball, would have to be 1500 ÷ by 7 = 214.29 times larger than the old earth. That would make the New Earth 1.5 million miles in diameter and 4.75 million miles in circumference. The New Earth was devoid of any oceans, giving man large spaces to live and grow, where God will begin building His kingdom.

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