“AND when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison.” Revelation 20:7. This, because, the thousand years being finished, “the rest of the dead lived,” and this releases him. It was the taking away of all people from the earth, by the resurrection and translation of the righteous, and the slaying of all the wicked, at the beginning of the thousand years, which put a bond upon Satan, in that he is left utterly without resource. There is thus none upon whom he can exercise any of his wiles or faculties in any way whatever. And being confined to this earth in its utterly wasted, desolate, broken-down, dark, and dismal condition, it is a horrible and gloomy prison, indeed.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 564.1

But when the thousand years are expired, and the rest of the dead all live, in the resurrection of the unjust,—the second resurrection,—then Satan is loosed. Now he has something to do: now he has subjects upon whom he can work: now he can be active once more in all his satanic ingenuity.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 564.2

GATHERING THE NATIONS TO BATTLE

Accordingly it is written of him that immediately when he is loosed, he goes “out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.” Revelation 20:8. And this battle, into which, by his deception, he leads this multitude to engage, is a battle against the camp of the saints and the beloved city, for “they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 564.3

They are enabled to do this because, in Zechariah 14., it is declared that when the Lord Jesus comes, at the end of the thousand years, “His feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley.... and the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.” Verses 4, 5. Thus the holy city, the heavenly Jerusalem, the camp of the saints, is brought down upon the earth at his coming to the judgment of the wicked. And this is how it is that Satan can gather all the nations of the wicked, who have then been raised from the dead, against this camp of the saints and the beloved city.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 564.4

And how easy it will be for him to deceive them all in this, however much he has deceived them before! What a vast multitudes of the wicked dead of the ages have died in battle! And even when Jesus comes to gather to Him His saints at the beginning of the thousand years, the kings of the earth and their armies are gathered together to make war against him that sits “upon the horse,” and his army, and, in this warlike mind and spirit, they are slain by the brightness of His coming. And when all these awake from the dead, it is to them just as if they had awaked in the midst of the battle and turmoil in which they went down. It will be indeed, in their minds, almost a continuation of the scenes in which they perished in the beginning. And now Satan and his armies are there, with his spirit reigning supreme, to seize their minds in this crisis and in this spirit of war, and to draw them up to battle against the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And so “they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 564.5

THE SHEEP DIVIDED FROM THE GOATS

And thus, and at that time, the Son of man sit upon the throne of his glory, and before Him are “gathered all nations,” and they are separated one from another, as a shepherd divideth His sheep from the goats: the sheep—the righteous—are at “His right hand,” in the city, and the goats—the wicked—are at “His left hand,” outside the city. Matthew 25:31-33.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.1

“And I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell [“the grave,” margin] delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.” Revelation 20:11-13.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.2

These are all the wicked dead; for the righteous dead all lived a thousand years before. And mark: these are judged out of the things “written in the books;” not out of the things written in the book. These books are the records of their lives. The book of life is there as the witness that they might have had their places in that book, and so might have had all the records in “the books” blotted out, and they have lived at the beginning of the thousand years, and be reigning now with Christ. But they would not have their place in “the book of life,” and so they must now meet the record in “the books,” exactly as that record is, “according to their works.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.3

And now all the books are opened; and every soul of that vast throne, as it stands compassed about “the camp of the saints and the beloved city,” sees his life exactly as it was lived. He sees all the blessedness and the joy that he might have had. He sees “the book of life,” in which he might have had his name. But, alas! it is too late. They are judged out of those things written in the books, “according to their works.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.4

“There all flesh is at once in the sight of the Lord, And the doom of eternity hangs on His word.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.5

And every soul of them, seeing all this, and, in the light of the judgment of the just Judge,—seeing that it is all just, every knee bows to Christ, and every tongue confesses to God that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Romans 14:11; Philippians 2:11. Thus, all they “that go down to the dust shall bow before Him;” yet, as each one has chosen his way in spite of all that the Lord could possibly do, now “none can keep alive his own soul.” Psalm 22:29. Then to those on His left hand the awful word goes forth, “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” “And these go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.” Matthew 25:41, 46.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.6

“It is the day of the Lord’s vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion. And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch.” “The breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it.” “And fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.7

“And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.” “And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire.” “And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.” And “the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.”PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.8

“O mercy! O mercy! look down from above,
Great Creator, on us, thy sad children, in love;
When beneath to their darkness the wicked are driven,
May we find a reward and a mansion in heaven.”
A. T. JONES.PTUK September 6, 1900, page 565.9

August 30, 1900

September 13, 1900