Who rules this Earth after the millenium?

Question

According to premillenial eschatology, there will be a special period after Christ comes again in which He will reign on earth with His saints for a 1000 years. Their view is typically based on a specific interpretation of this verse:

Revelation 20:6 (ESV)
⁶  Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.

Who do premillenialsts identify as reigning after this period? What happens after the 1000 years?

Answer 1

As a premillennialist, here's my view:

After the 1000 years (Revelation 20:6), Satan is loosed temporarily. He gathers those who remain on Earth who want to rebel against Christ to try one more time to defeat Him (Rev 20:7-8). Those forces are destroyed by God directly (verse 9). The devil is then permanently cast into the lake of fire to be tormented forever (verse 10). After this the universe and the Earth cease to exist (verse 11; also the end of 2 Peter 3:10). The final great white throne judgment occurs (verses 12-15).

After this, only those written in the Lamb's book of life remain (Rev 20:15). The Earth and the universe are replaced with a new one (Rev 21:1). It has one city called New Jerusalem (Rev 21:2-27). It has the river of the water of life and the tree of life having 12 varieties of fruit in it (Rev 22). God the Father and Jesus in His resurrected body and the Spirit are there (Rev 22). It will be like Eden when God walked with man face to face.

Who rules it? There is one throne, therefore one authority, called the throne (singular) of God and the Lamb. So it is a co-regency of God the Father and God the Son.

The people of God are the only ones left. They are in resurrected bodies, so they will have no tendency to sin; sin will be as repulsive as eating dirt because we will see it clearly for what it is. "Government" and "ruling" will be different because we will all be in perfect harmony doing whatever good fun things we want (where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (2 Corinthians 3:17). We will have a city to explore- if each floor is 10 feet high, there will be the square footage in it of 369,600 United States. Add to that an entire new planet, a new universe, and an infinite heaven outside the universe with forever to explore and enjoy with an infinite God.

Since all good things come ultimately from God (James 1:17) and all things in this universe have been tainted by sin (Romans 8:22), and God is infinitely complex; then we can assume that the next universe will:

Look better than anything we can see, taste better than your favorite flavor, be more exciting, feel better, be more interesting, more refreshing, more fun, than anything we have now; and never boring. 1 Corinthians 2:9-10 states that "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them which love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God."

It is so worth it to live for God now. :)

Answer 2

I had this discussion not long ago (I was hosting a weekly theological discussion night) with several colleagues who ascribe to premillenial views. They nearly all came to the same conclusion, that the rulers of the earth both during and after the 1,000 years will be chosen from the among the body of believers. The two passages they used to support their argument were:

• Luke 19:11-25
  
• 2 Timothy 2:11-12

This is however the extent of their agreement on the matter, they could not agree on what happens at the end of or after the 1,000 years.

Whether or not this answer is in line with the official view on the topic (assuming there is one) I don't know, but hopefully it helps you.

Answer 3

The Book of Revelation chapter 21 verse 1 answers your question when it says: "and I saw a new heavens and a new earth." The implication here is we simply enter into a new cycle or round of Creation as a result of God the Father establishing His Kingdom in victory.

This comes into focus clearly when you understand how to decipher the Creation Account as the master blueprint for the Creation itself in order to reveal the hidden mysteries. In order to do so you take each Day of Creation as pertaining to a distinct Millennium of Creation. This means that one round or cycle of Creation has a duration of approximately 7 thousand years and that we are in the process of entering into the 7th Day of Creation, which is the Millennium when Christ rules and reigns in a period of rest from the Adversary.

Obviously there are implications in what I have said that many people will not find comfortable to contemplate. The biggest is that the Days of Creation are not directly speaking about the creation of our physical observable cosmos.

For example, if you look at Day 4 when the "greater light to rule the day" is being spoken of, you would need to interpret this as Jesus Christ, the light and life of the world who came in the 4th millennium instead of the creation of our physical sun that shines light for us day in and day out.

As another example, look at Day 5 where it speaks of the "creatures in the waters wherein dwells the breath of life". This is the part of the master blueprint calling for the ministry of the apostles to be "fishers of men" and to gather them into the body of Christianity as a new religion to begin the next level of this cycle of Creation's evolutionary stage of spiritual development. This is why Christian's put little fish symbols on their cars. It was right in the beginning of the 5th Millennium that Christianity was established, which is right on schedule according to the master blueprint.

So, just like we pass from Sunday to Monday to Tuesday to Wednesday to Thursday to Friday to Saturday and back to Sunday again, so too does the geo-geneo-political framework of things on our planet cycle through millennia such that a single cycle of Creation is like a week that repeats over and over again.

However, there is a difference that should be noted: The 7th Day is simultaneously the 1st Day as well. One cycle of Creation overlaps the adjacent cycle of Creation. This gives us the Alpha/Omega Millennial period. There are many hints to this in scripture I could elaborate upon if desired.

So, while we are looking for the Millennial Rest under Christ as King of the Father's Kingdom on Millennial Day 7, we should also be anticipating a period of great darkness and chaos preceding this because we are also approaching a new Day 1 as well. We know that prior to a new Creation's Day 1 that there is a period of darkness and chaos. This is in a geo-political sense, mind you.

So, it is the Father's Kingdom that is spoken of in Day 1 where it says the light breaks fourth putting an end to the darkness and chaos such that those of the dark are divided. This is the judgment or separation aspect that takes place during the Millennium. Those who have eyes to see and ears to hear will embrace the light of the Father's Kingdom and attain to their spiritual birth (resurrection) while all else shall remain in darkness blinded by the precepts of men. These are those who draw near unto God with their lips but whose hearts are far from Him, having the form of Godliness but who deny the powers thereof and govern themselves via the commandments of men.

In their blindness they suffer themselves to continue to practice a dead religion that leaves them bound to the Adversary's cunning deceptions as his "prison planet" system takes captive all those who reject the light and truth of the Father's Kingdom. While on the other hand those who do recognize and accept the light and truth of the Father's Kingdom and join themselves to it by covenant shall be permitted to live in that Millennial society the Adversary loses all power over.

The gulf of separation between those of the Father's Kingdom and those of the Adversary's Kingdom will become impassable. Those who the Adversary takes captive will loose all of their freedom to choose and will become mere subjects of a tyrannical state. Many will champion this as the answer to the world's problems and will be deceived into building this system of governance up and fall into the very pit they helped dig for others.

On the other hand, those in the Father's Kingdom will escape the clutches of this tyrannical system of governance and they will participate in what will appear like America rebooted, except it will be a Kingdom of kings instead of a republic of sovereigns. It will be the re-establishment of liberty where total respect will be renewed for the unalienable rights granted by our Creator.

Answer 4

1 Cor. 15:24-28 tells us that when all things have been put under Christ's feet, then He will offer it all up to the Father, and all will then be in subjection to Him.

So it seems to me that the saints will continue to reign until Christ is satisfied that this objective has been reached.

The 1000-year period does not necessarily mean the total span of the saint's reign, but is simply the length of time between the establishment of the thrones until the loosing of Satan and the judgment of the dead.