Series: “The Great War” (post #5, last one)

This post will finish up the series “The Great War.” The Great War between Satan and God produces at least four results. Result #1 is: Soldiers are enlisted for the war. Result #2 is: The war produces casualties on both sides. Result #3 is: The war produces injuries on both sides. And what is the fourth result? It is this: In the end, God will be declared the victor in the war.

Bible prophecy is a big, rich, complex subject. It plays itself out over vast eons of time, and it is always working toward the grand finale of The Great War. With this in mind here is the sequence of events that will culminate in God being declared the eternal victor:

1. Jesus will come to earth’s sky for the Rapture and snatch away the bodies of all Christians. (1 Corinthians 15:50-58; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
2. The earth will experience a seven-year period of tribulation which will include: the rise to world power of The Antichrist and his minister of propaganda, The False Prophet; numerous wars between human armies; famine; the deaths of billions of people; and great cataclysmic events. (Revelation chapters 6 through 18)
3. At the close of the seven-year tribulation period Jesus will formally return to the earth to walk it again and establish His 1,000-year kingdom upon it. (Revelation 19:1-16; 20:1-6)
4. Upon His return Jesus will win the Battle of Armageddon (the battle that will bring the tribulation period to a close). He will merely speak the word and all the soldiers involved in the fighting will be immediately slain. These casualties will be more evidence of the second result of The Great War. (Revelation 19:17-19)
5. The Antichrist and The False Prophet will become the first occupants of a place known as “the eternal lake of fire.” This hellish site is called Gehenna in the Greek language, and it is even worse than the hell that exists now, which is called Hades in the Greek language. (Revelation 19:20-21)
6. Satan and all the other fallen angels will be imprisoned in a place called “the bottomless pit” (Tartarus, in the Greek language) for the duration of Christ’s 1,000-year reign. (Revelation 20:1-3; Isaiah 24:21-22)
7. Jesus will send out His angels all over the world to separate the world’s inhabitants who will have lived to see the end of the tribulation period. These inhabitants will be separated into two categories: saved (the sheep) and lost (the goats). The saved will be those who will have placed saving belief in Jesus during the tribulation period. The lost will be those who will have failed to place saving belief in Jesus during the tribulation period. The saved will be welcomed into Christ’s 1,000-year reign on earth. The lost will be put to death and have their souls banished to the hell (Hades) that exists now. (Matthew 25:31-46)
8. After Jesus has ruled over the earth for 1,000 years, Satan and the other fallen angels will be released from their imprisonment in “the bottomless pit” (Tartarus). (Revelation 20:7)
9. Satan will immediately go throughout all the world and gather a new human army that will consist of millions of humans. This will be his final attempt to overthrow Jesus. The humans who will follow Satan at this time will be the descendants of those saved believers who will have entered into Christ’s 1000-year reign in their earthly bodies in the aftermath of the tribulation period. These “kingdom kids” will grow up in a world that will have had Jesus as its King, but as soon as another alternative (Satan) is presented they will align themselves with Satan. (Revelation 20:8)
10. Satan and his new army will march to Jerusalem where Jesus will be sitting upon His earthly throne. They will surround the city, but God the Father will cast fire down from heaven and that fire will devour Satan’s human soldiers. (Revelation 20:9)
11. Following this final defeat Satan and all the other fallen angels will join The Antichrist and The False Prophet eternally in “the eternal lake of fire” (Gehenna). (Revelation 20:10; Matthew 25:41)
12. The souls of all of history’s lost people (beginning with Cain and running all the way through every single one of those “kingdom kids”) will be called forth from Hades (the hell that exists now). Each soul will be eternally reunited with the body it once inhabited. These bodies will all be resurrected in a mass resurrection that Jesus described as “the resurrection of condemnation.” Each lost person will stand body and soul before Jesus for a time of judgment called The Great White Throne Judgment and then be cast body and soul into “the eternal lake of fire” (Gehenna) to join Satan, the other fallen angels, The Antichrist, and The False Prophet there eternally. (Revelation 20:11-15; John 5:25-30)
13. At this point The Great War will finally be 100% concluded as each angel and each human will be properly stationed once and for all in their eternal categories.
14. The heaven and earth that exist now will then pass away by fire and God will create a new heaven and a new earth to stand in their places. There is considerable debate as to whether this new heaven and new earth will be completely new versions or merely the old heaven and the old earth purged and renewed by fire. At any rate, there will be some kind of a new heaven and a new earth. (Revelation 21:1-8; 2 Peter 3:10-13)
15. Following the emergence of the new heaven and the new earth, the eternal city of New Jerusalem will begin accepting occupants. These occupants will be the saved from all of history. This is the city in which they will spend the rest of eternity. (Revelation 21:9-27; 22:1-5)

Now, in conclusion, let me leave you with a thought. The average Christian’s goal in life is to make life as easy and as comfortable as possible. We want the money, the possessions, the health, the friends, the family, etc. that come with “the good life.” But what God would say to each of us is, “There is a great war going on and I need blows struck at the enemy.”

You see, Christian, God hasn’t left you here to do your own thing. Instead, He’s left you here to do your part in the fighting. You have assignments that only you can carry out and missions that only you can accomplish.

And so, I ask you, “How much soldiering are you doing these days?” If it isn’t much then I trust that this series will serve as your call to arms as you take your place in this worldwide battlefield that we call “life.” Am I asking you to enlist in God’s army? No, you’re already enlisted! I’m simply asking you to start acting like a soldier by striking some real blows at the enemy. Oh and by the way, when you do, be sure to duck. Remember, the enemy tends to strike back. That is, after all, how war works.