Why I reject the doctrine of a literal "Millennium." Pt. I
Premillennial Dispensationalism, the Theology many see as the spark behind the current cause of untold slaughter in the Israeli occupied territory of Gaza - has a lot to answer for. A lot.
Part I: The text in Biblical context [Revelation Ch. 20]
NOTE: As always, if you are reading this and you are not a Christian, consider the value of sharing this with someone you know who is a Christian and holds to the beliefs I describe in this essay.
While I was writing out my thoughts on the Evangelical Christian doctrine of the Millennium, the following World events took place: In May representatives of Russia, Ukraine & the US met in Istanbul for peace talks concerning the Russo-Ukrainian war. On June 1st 2025, a major drone strike, Operation Spider’s Web was launched one day in advance of what would be a new round of the talks. Russia has responded with a currently ongoing retaliation against Ukraine, showing the attacks by their ex-Soviet state neighbor didn’t seem to hobble their ability to fight a war at all!
Déjà vu occurred with a similar strike in in the Middle East on 09/13/2025. Israel began attacking Iran at more than a dozen locations throughout Iranian soil. Dubbed Operation Rising Lion, the stated reason was to prevent Iran from getting Nuclear weapons. But Ironically, these attacks took place during the 6th round of US-Iran talks to negotiate the parameters by which Iran might agree to limit themselves to peaceful use of Uranium enrichment only. In further aspects of Déjà vu, Iran is currently retaliating against Israel with attacks of it’s own.
In times like these, I’ve come to less and less expect wisdom to come out of the mouths of my fellow Evangelical Christians. Knowing that many of them voted to return to the white house a man who’s “Pastor” is a Word of Faith/prosperity doctrine nutcase, I can’t see how the believers I used to regularly associate with understand the complexities of much of anything.
It can be quite unsettling to realize that there are those who turn to the Bible for life guidance… You know, the Bible that reveals Jesus the Prince of Peace & advocate for the poor & downtrodden? And yet these same people are often found in constant search of verses that justify the slaughter of untold thousands of children going on right now in Gaza. All because of how they interpret the place of Israel in the plan of God.
Furthermore, I’m sure they see the 2 events in the Russia/Ukraine conflict as well as the Israeli/Iranian conflict as “foretold in Scripture.” Just like they saw the last major conflict as predicted by the Bible… And the one before that… And the one before that.
It would appear that the associated doctrine or way of reading Scripture known as Premillennial Dispensationalism has become so ubiquitous in Christendom that people automatically associate it with just being a “Bible-believing Christian.”
Thus, believing that Christ will be returning not once but twice - and one of those times will be to establish a “temporary” 1,000 year kingdom? Why that’s up there with just the basics of being Christian. Or so they seem to be saying.
But is it?
The relevant text that defines what this “Millennium” is all about is found in the Book of Revelation:
Rev 20:4 I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God, and such as didn’t worship the beast nor his image, and didn’t receive the mark on their forehead and on their hand. They lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years [Millennium.]
Wikipedia defines Dispensationalism in this way:
Dispensationalists use a literal interpretation of the Bible and believe that divine revelation unfolds throughout the Bible. They believe that there is a distinction between Israel and the Church, and that Christians are not bound by Mosaic law. They maintain beliefs in premillennialism, Christian Zionism, and a rapture of the Church that will happen before the Second Coming of Christ, generally seen as happening before a period of tribulation [Emphasis mine.]
But another belief system “Amillennialism” which historically is older than Dispensationalism, has begun to regain hold among Christians, as people have been searching their Bibles more carefully as the Bereans did in the Book of Acts.
“Amillennialism” is defined as:
Amilennialists reject the view that Jesus Christ will physically reign on the Earth for exactly one thousand years. Rather, they interpret the "thousand years" mentioned in Revelation 20 as a symbolic number, not as a literal duration of time. Amillennialists hold that the millennium has already begun and is simultaneous with the current church age. Amillennialism holds that while Christ's reign during the millennium is spiritual in nature, at the end of the church age, Christ will return in final judgment and establish a permanent reign in the "new heaven and new Earth" [Emphasis mine.]
As one who currently identifies as Amillennial [although I’m also exploring a similar view being promulgated more recently by NT Wright,] this summation of Amillennialism from the Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms by Stanley Grenz, etc. reflect most how I prefer to think of the Thousand years of Rev Ch. 20:
So rather than the more common association with the millennium as the “Church Age,” I prefer to read the text for what it says: Christ reigning in Heaven with the departed Saints.
So in assessing what’s actually being said and not being said in the 20th chapter of Revelation, we can make the following observations:
I. The Text of Rev. Ch. 20":
The mention of "thrones" here vs. other uses in Revelation indicates that the setting we’re being presented with is a Spiritual, not Earthly realm:
As near as I’ve been able to ascertain, the “throne” and/or “thrones” fall into the following 6 categories, depending on who’s sitting on which throne in context:
God
Jesus
The 24 Elders
“Creatures”
Satan
“The Beast”
No mention of an “Earthly” throne appears to exist anywhere in most of John’s Revelation. If what was meant by the 1,000 years in Rev 20:4 was meant to convey [for the sake of argument] an Earthly Kingdom, it is surely striking that almost every reference says nothing about a throne on the present-day Earth. Not until we get to Rev 21:5 do we encounter a Throne on “Earth.” But it’s not present-day Earth. It’s a future prophesy of the New Earth mentioned in v.1 of the same chapter. A re-made, re-founded Earth. And it comes with God’s announcement of making everything new, to top it all off. Those who expect Jesus to inhabit a throne on the Earthly Jerusalem [see Gal 4:21-31] simply do not have a leg to stand on:
Rev 21:1-5 I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth have passed away, and the sea is no more. (2) I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband. (3) I heard a loud voice out of heaven saying, “Behold, God’s dwelling is with people, and he will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. (4) He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more. The first things have passed away.” (5) He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” He said, “Write, for these words of God are faithful and true.”
Getting back to Rev Chapter 20:4, the beings reigning with Christ are described as "Souls," indicating they have not been Resurrected as of yet. The mention of “soul” or “souls” appears 3 times - depending on the translation. But here we’re concerned with verses where it refers to martyrdom: Rev 6:9, 12:11, 20:4. In these examples, John is made to be able to “see” the souls of those who had been murdered for the Gospel. Once again, the present-day Earth is eliminated as the location.
Some translations state "They lived and reigned with Christ," while others render it as "They came to life and lived with Christ." The Gk here is "ζάω" ["Zao"] which simply means "to live." Among the various translations that use this wording are: WEB, KJV, NKJV, your so-called “Literal” versions [Young’s Literal Translation, Concordant Literal Version, etc] But "Came to life" would appear to be a bit of editorializing. In any case, there's no indication that the Resurrection of the Dead happens here, and verse 5 clearly describes events that takes place "when the thousand years were finished" as "the First resurrection."
"Chilioi" ["thousand"] is a poetic term that should signal to us not to take it literally. It’s slang for a "long time." the root word is χίλια, seen as "a feminine* plural form of an indefinite amount." In fact, since it's plural perhaps the correct translation might be "They lived and reigned with Christ for thousands of years," putting it completely out of reach of the PreMil mindset:
Revelation Chapter 20 is the only place in the Bible where we see the Thousand years is mentioned. That puts the onus on the Premillennialists to verify that the remainder of the NT authors held to such a belief as a literal 1,000 year reign of Christ. It's doubtful that they can. The Prophets, the Priests, the Apostles and Jesus would seem strangely negligent if a literal 1,000 year reign, so important to Pre-Millennial Dispensationalist ideology, had been left out of discussion after discussion, teaching after teaching, prophetic utterance after prophetic utterance. But it would appear it indeed has been left out of all the above, with the one exception being Revelation Chapter 20.
There is not one word of the text that states a Temporal Earthly Kingdom is being set up at this time. Let me repeats that: Not. One. Word. The vision is of the persecuted Saints in heaven enjoying eternity in the presence of Christ.
The Earthly Jerusalem is not where Christ is reigning from, and it does not take place in this chapter. It is finished as a Spiritual entity because it is associated with Hagar and the Old Covenant [Gal 4] and Sodom & Egypt [Rev 11.]
The Jerusalem in which Christ will be reigning from is described in Rev 21:2 as "The holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband." Note that this takes place after what Rev 20:5 clearly tells is is the end of the 1,000 years. Note that the passages in Isaiah which foretell of an Earthly reign actually correspond not to Ch. 20 of Revelation, but to Ch. 21, which also tells us of the coming of a New Heaven & New Earth. Jesus' remedy for apostate Earthly Jerusalem articulated in Mat 23:27-29 was ironically fulfilled in Mat 21:9. Finally, note that Hebrews 12:22 tells us Christians that we've already come to the New Jerusalem, rendering any such connections to Zechariah 12-14 as highly unlikely.
Finally, the over-done objection of the Binding of Satan described in Rev 20:2-3 is clearly met in the same chapter vv. 7-10. What does Satan do as soon as he's loosed from being bound? Verse 8. He goes on a campaign to recruit armies for his war efforts against Yahweh! How does the text choose to describes this? As "deceiving the nations!" The armies of the earth are united against the Lord, but it will do them no good, because "Fire came down out of heaven from God and devoured them."
While it may seem logical to see Satan as bound in order that he may “Deceive the nations no more,” as referring to all kinds of evil shenanigans being carried out by the Nations, it’s important that we allow “Scripture to interpret scripture.” The meaning of a Biblical text is not what I logically assume it must mean, but what the context itself tells us it means. In this case, Satan in the past had the power to unite armies in opposition to God and his people. Now he can do this no longer. When he is released from bondage, he will be able to once again. And if you see the whole prophesy given by Jesus in Lk 21:20-24ff as something previously fulfilled in ancient times, the picture becomes even fuller!
Coming up: The concept of the “Two Jerusalems” and the place of the Children of Abraham in God’s grand scheme of things will be discussed in relation to how we see the Millennium. You can read further on my thoughts about this entire topic of the Millennium and Christian Zionism here and here. Please enjoy this video by Bible teacher Steve Gregg: