Big Tent Evangelist on the Millennium: To Be Desolation

Newark, Ohio, 1916

MILLENNIUM

WILL BE PERIOD OF DESOLATION PRECEDING REIGN OF CHRIST ON EARTH

Commences With Second Coming of Christ and Continues While Earth Is Being Cleansed

"The Millennium, But No Second Chance," was the subject of Evangelist W. W. Miller's address last night, at the Big Tent, corner West Main and Eleventh streets. An interested audience listened attentively throughout. He claimed that the millennium, so far as this earth concerned, is to be a time of desolation and chaos, not a time of peace, happiness and bliss when all who have not accepted the gospel will given a second chance to be saved.

"The term 'millennium'," he said, "is a term not found in the Bible, as many suppose, but is a Latin phrase of two words, 'Mille,' meaning thousand, and 'Annum,' meaning year. These two words combined and anglicized form the word 'Millennium.' While the word itself is not found in the Bible, its equivalent is used therein a few times. It is a period bounded by two resurrections. It commences at the second coming of Christ. The events during the period show that God's people of all ages will be with him in heaven, while all the wicked of all ages will be in their graves or lying dead upon the surface of the earth. The earth itself will be a vast charnel house of desolation, ruin and wreckage. Satan and his angels will be left to behold what their rebellion against God has wrought.

"Then at the end of the millennium there will be a resurrection of the wicked in which they live a 'little season,' to be entirely annihilated in the lake of fire. Then the earth, purified and cleansed will be renewed by the creative power of God. The new Jerusalem will become the capital of the new earth, and the Lord's people will be given the earth in its Edenic restoration for their inheritance, thus fulfilling the promise made by the Saviour in Matthew, 5:5.

"Revelation 20:1-3 says that Satan is to be bound and cast into the bottomless pit for a thousand years, and after that be loosed a little season, It is not to be understood that Satan is to be bound with a literal chain, for the language employed is symbolic. He is to be bound by a chain of circumstances, the links of which are first, the second coming of Christ; second, the resurrection of the righteous dead; third, translation of the righteous dead and living, and fourth, the destruction of all the wicked inhabitants of earth. These links form a chain which removes from him the power to deceive, for it takes from him all his subjects upon which he could possibly practice his deception. The bottomless pit is simply this world in its wild and desolated condition. Indeed, the term 'pit', as here used, is translated from the same original word which appears in Genesis 1:2, and is there called deep,' thus 'darkness was upon the face of the deep.' It refers throughout the Bible to any barren, desolate and uninhabited region. A word picture of the earth during the millennium is given by the prophet in Jeremiah, 4:23-27.

"If the binding of Satan is the taking away from him his subjects, then the loosing of Satan is the giving back into his hands of at least a portion of them. And this is precisely what is to take place, for Revelation 20:5 says, 'But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished ... and when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the nations.' This shows that the wicked will be given a resurrection, and that as soon as they are raised to life, Satan goes forth to his old work of deceiving them, and is thus loosed from his prison.

"Meanwhile the Holy City has descended from heaven, as stated in Revelation 21:2, and in it are the saved of all ages, who were translated to heaven at the first resurrection at the beginning of the millennium. Then Satan and his deceived followers attempt to capture the city. At that time fire from heaven descends upon them and devours them all. Satan with the rest. The same fire that destroys the wicked in that lake of fire also purifies the earth of all sin and traces of the curse as seen now in the decay of nature. Then are fulfilled the words of Malachi 4:1-3. The Lord will then and there, before the admiring gaze of his people, speak the words, 'Behold. I make all things new." And from out the chaos and ashes will spring a new earth, 'and the former shall not be remembered nor come into mind.' All tears will be forever wiped away. God's throne will be removed from its present location and set upon the earth, and here will be the center of the universe forever. Christ will come forth and say, 'Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.' Eden will become the new Jerusalem, and the plan of Salvation through Christ will be accomplished in the "resurrection of all things."

The subject announced for tonight is "The Christian's Future Home."

-The Newark Advocate, Newark, Ohio, September 13, 1916, page 8.