His Perfect Love

Guest (Male): Next on His Perfect Love, we gain a greater understanding of the heart of man that, when given a choice, very often rebels against God. Jesus will one day rule and reign for a thousand years, and as believers, we will reign with Him. But at the end of the millennium, Satan will be released and lead a rebellion against God, which makes you wonder: why would people who are experiencing a beautiful, perfect reign of Christ choose to do that?

Well, for the same reason Adam and Eve did in the garden. It's the heart of mankind that rises to the surface today on His Perfect Love as Pastor Matt VanderVen returns to Revelation chapter 20.

Matt VanderVen: Well, we're going to pick up with verse 7 here. Again, when you think about the soberness of what we just read, I mean, we're coming to this place. If you look at this outline up here, we looked at the thousand-year millennial reign, a beautiful time that men, women, and even young children who are alive will spend a thousand years.

That's hard for us to believe because the average lifespan today is somewhere around 70 to 80 years. We had a dip a few years back when COVID came and we saw it go down a little bit, but it's going back up again. So we're seeing 70s and 80s, but it's just a reminder that if you think about it, back to the time that Jesus Christ walked the earth, the average lifespan was about 50 years of age. You can go back and look that up.

It's also interesting that really into the 1900s, that was the same lifespan. Now we are of a generation and we've been blessed to see a longer lifespan, and certainly that's wonderful. But we still haven't seen what we saw in the Old Testament where, before the antediluvian period—that means before the flood—you would see people living hundreds of years. Remember, 500, 600, and Methuselah, one of the oldest, 900 and something years.

To think that when we come back with Jesus in this millennial reign, people will be living a thousand years. You think about that because there could be somebody maybe on the earth at that time, maybe they get saved at the latter half of their life, maybe they're a hundred years old. They're going to be 1,100 years old. We're going to see that. Now, you and I will no longer age after that because we're in glorified bodies.

But think of the remnant, the people that got saved during the Great Tribulation. I call them a remnant because they got saved and they didn't get martyred. They're going to still have their bodies; they didn't get glorified bodies. You think about those that are unsaved, not saved, and have not received Jesus Christ. They're going to be alive on this earth, so things are going to be very different.

Also, in the millennial reign, as we read last week, we also read that they're going to have animals and all kinds of things. They're going to exist. Children are going to be able to play around snakes. It's going to be like at no other time on earth because Jesus is back in His perfect place on earth, reigning in a theocracy where there's no more unrighteousness, there's no more evil. We don't have even some of the diseases that we have now. He's even healed the waters from all of the Great Tribulation and the destruction.

It's going to be wonderful when we come back with Him to see this. But if you read the same thing I did in this chapter—and I know I went pretty quick and we'll talk about it—it's also humbling because we know that at the end of this thousand-year millennial reign, you think about it. You and I, do we really know who's saved today? Unless somebody tells us they're saved, but other than that, we can't judge the hearts.

The angels can't judge the hearts. Only God can judge the heart. I think the other thing that I learn from this chapter, and maybe you will see this morning as well, is that even in the end of the Great Tribulation, there's going to be one more rising. Satan's going to go and deceive like he's doing now and has been since the beginning of time, deceiving people and nations.

From the four corners of this earth, this great last army is going to come up. God doesn't choose to use the angels to deal with the army. He doesn't even call us, the bride of Christ, to take out swords and go handle these things. No, because we're serving the Lord and we're ministering to Jesus and to the people. No, He just calls fire down from heaven. It's not even really a battle. I mean, it's called a battle, but it's not even really a battle.

God just calls fire down. The entire satanic army is destroyed. All wickedness and evil is destroyed. But it's something to me because, like you, probably many of us thought that the reason that many people don't believe is because maybe they don't know or it's a misunderstanding. But then when I read passages like this that are describing even with environmental or circumstances, those are no excuses.

When Jesus Christ sits in Jerusalem and sits on the throne of thrones—He's God—and all the nations can see Him with their own eyes, and they're around long enough to see the miraculous that God is doing on this earth and how He's restored all these things for that thousand years, and there's still a hardness of heart that when Satan is released from that pit, he comes up and he speaks lies again.

How quickly humans are willing to jump on that deception train and believe those lies. Next thing you know, you have this final battle. It just tells us once again that even though outwardly it may look like for a thousand years everybody's together and believing the same thing, the reality is there's going to be several people that on the outside they look like they're following Jesus. They look like—I'm not talking about the saints that have come back—I'm talking about those alive during the Great Tribulation.

It looks like they're following God. They're obeying His rules, His theocracy. But when given the ultimate choice, they still choose to make themselves God, even when they experience the one true God. Which leads me to the conclusion ultimately that there is no misunderstanding. It leads me to the conclusion that my circumstances don't define me. My environment, while it may change me, doesn't define me or define my choices. I will never use that as an excuse.

It brings me to the point of realization that anyone who rejects Jesus, you could literally have Him standing next to you and you would do the same thing because ultimately you have chosen to make yourself God. "Thy will be done" instead of "His will be done." It's a constant reminder why He taught us to pray against that. Lord, may Your reign in heaven be that on earth. And then as we're taught to pray right after that, "not my will but Your will be done."

I believe that picture He gives us through that prayer, we see the ultimate fulfillment at the closing of this chapter. Why did He teach you and I, the bride of Christ, to pray that way? To protect us from falling into the delusion of self. As we're going to go through this here this morning, I think and believe you'll see these same things that are very apparent and can be temptations even for the Christian.

But we have to guard our hearts to protect and ask God to protect us from these things, that we don't fall into evil or temptation. If you look at verse 7, it says, "Now when a thousand years had expired"—and that is significant and should be underlined—"and Satan was released from his prison and will go out to deceive." That's exactly what he does. He has a mission of deception. It hasn't changed. It's the same way now as it was when he took a third of the angels with him.

Ezekiel 28, Isaiah 14, declaring, "I'm going to be like the Most High God," where he declared himself, "I will, I will, I will" five times. He's doing the same thing. He doesn't have a different playbook. He doesn't have a different agenda. He's going to go out and deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth. He says, "Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea." That's a lot of people that are going to rise up and turn on Jesus because they're not truly believers.

Now, a couple things I want you to look at is Gog and Magog. How many of you are familiar with the name Gog and the physical location Magog? It's talking about a name and a locale. Now, before I get too far, I just want you to underline those because we're going to come back to that. It's no coincidence that God has used that 12 times throughout all of scripture, the name and location.

It's also no coincidence that right here in Revelation, he is bringing that back up. Now, he's certainly not just talking about Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39, which we know that's the chapters that speak of Gog and Magog. But what was he speaking to Ezekiel when he said, "Son of man"? He talked about the rising up of the nations. Specifically, where were those nations? We're going to look at that here this morning as well because he's drawing our attention to that.

What was the fight, the battle? Who was it against? We're going to look at that. It was against Israel, the Jewish people, ultimately really God. And then what was the land? We talked about it. It was Jerusalem. That's nothing new. I just want us to see, as we're in the book of Isaiah midweek, God allowed the Assyrian army to come in, 185,000, and go as far as where? As far as Judah, but never to take Jerusalem.

He actually stops and protects the Assyrians through 185,000 that are wiped out by one angel who's not even named. Then Babylon comes in. They're allowed to take those captives in Jerusalem because of their idolatry. This is the key we need to take all of this in, what he's trying to teach us: because of the idolatry. Then he connects it with Ezekiel. Who are the nations that are going to come in and who are they attacking? Why is it Gog and Magog?

There's a lot more than I think when we read through this chapter that God is trying to teach us about our present day, what it's going to lead to ultimately, what it's going to be like in the millennium, and then why, what's really in the heart of man even at the end of the millennium. So I just don't want us to miss any of that.

Well, we just read in verse 7, it says Satan's going to be released. After a thousand years, he's going to be released and he's going to successfully organize many on the earth to form this rebellion against God ultimately. So I think we all need to see he's maniacal. It doesn't change. A thousand years of prison, if you will, doesn't change his heart. No, he's going to stop at nothing.

That's why none of us want to flirt with the devil, flirt with evil, or have anything to do with the occult. But the real question is, if Jesus has ruled and reigned for a thousand years, how is it possible that anybody on this earth would even want to rebel when they've had a perfect rule? Have you ever thought about that? And again, I believe it's just a final demonstration of man's rebellion and depravity. That's what we're really supposed to see here.

Again, no different than today. An outward conformity to Jesus' rule. Some people play church or play Christian. They're going to be required to do that during His millennial reign. But seemingly there is not an inward embrace of His lordship, and that's still going to be up to the individual. That doesn't change even in the millennial reign. He may control the outward conduct as far as rules and what can be done, but there will still be free will in the millennial reign that people will have the ultimate decision to choose to follow Jesus with all their heart, mind, soul, and strength.

That's a loving God that gives us that choice. So when you think about it, and again, throughout history, hasn't man blamed almost anything and everything other than taking personal responsibility for the sinful condition? Again, I believe that's why it's not about the environment, it's not about the circumstances, it's none of the things that we can grow up and say, "Well, because I grew up this way, because this has happened to me."

No, ultimately we still have to make a choice, and no choice is still a choice, but we are given free will. And again, I think with the millennial reign here or the millennium of Jesus, God is going to give man a thousand years to think about it, to actually see what it's going to be like to have a perfect rule on earth. Not compared to all the kings that have come before that, all the politicians, all of the governments that, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

We've all seen and experienced that. We've also seen good ones. We have. We've seen good ones, those that have taken and served the people. We've seen that in our lives. But we've seen far too many that haven't. Just like there in Israel, there were good kings and there were not good kings in the tribes. But they're going to see, and so are we for a thousand years, what it looks like to have a theocracy where a God who reigns is not a respecter of persons.

He doesn't tip the scale because of an economic state or how much finances somebody has, because they look or talk a certain way, or because they have this education or that education. None of that is going to matter. It's all going to be about the heartitude, a heart attitude. It's really important that we see that because there's no way to get one over on Jesus. There's no way to get one over, and to see perfect righteousness. I think many of us are going to probably weep in joy just to see this is what it was supposed to always be like.

Even if we should live a hundred years, the time we've had on earth, what we were supposed to, God's best for us, what we were supposed to have that began in a garden when there was no sin. Your life and my life to this very day, what it would be like if we believed God's best for us, obeyed God's best for us. I mean, just think about that for a minute. How different would everyone of our lives be? Think of all the pain and the heartache and the things that have come because, Frank Sinatra, "I did it my way."

You just think about that for a minute. I don't know, maybe you grew up in the church, maybe you've had a beautiful life, never done anything wrong. I don't have that testimony. I came the other way around, the hard way, the school of hard knocks. I think about all the time, "Lord, if I would have just obeyed and listened at a young age." All the heartache, all the stress, the anxiety, the sorrow. I mean, even the physiological things that we do to ourselves. You get yourself so worked up, your chest gets tight, you get overwhelmed, you carry these things around.

But we're going to see a beautiful, perfect reign where we're going to have glorified bodies and we're going to see what it was supposed to be like. And we're also going to see people on earth that are going to actually have lives that are not like us. We didn't have this, but they're going to have this where they have a holy king, a holy God on the throne. They're going to grow up and live a life. There's going to be babies that are born during that Great Tribulation. They're going to grow up and see what it's like to have a holy, perfect king.

It brings joy to my heart to think what it would have been like if I had a life or maybe you had a life like that. But it's still not an excuse, just like it won't be an excuse for them at the end of the thousand-year millennial reign. Now, you're not going to have any Satan because he's locked up, no crime, violence, or evil, no social pathology, nothing going on weird. But the devil is still going to promise everybody; he's still going to be lying when he gets released from that bottomless pit. He's going to come out.

To think about more than the sand of the sea—you think about the sand, you go to the beach, who can count all the grains of sand—it says that's how many people are going to come and rise up against Jesus from the four corners of the earth. I can't process that because I can't process what it's going to be like to have animals playing together, kids no more eating each other, nothing like that. It's going to be wonderful.

At the end of the thousand years, man given the first chance is going to do what he wants to do and he's going to rebel against God at the first opportunity. I think this powerfully demonstrates that the problem is in us; the problem is not our environment. That means that the decision and the change solely comes down to free will in us. I think that's important to teach because scripture teaches it. I think it's important to talk about.

During a time and a day of relativism where everybody wants to turn around and blame something, some other situation, some person, and all these other things, Jesus Christ square looks us right in the eye and says, "Nope, it's you, it's me." What I choose to believe, what I choose to do, what I choose to say, and what I choose to think, I solely control that. No one has no power over me. Satan doesn't have power over me. Principalities and powers don't have power over me.

This is just a wake-up call to the church. It's a wake-up call to the world that's been trying to find all of the other excuses to say, "Well God, that's why I'm not all in, one foot in the world and one foot in the kingdom." Friends, I'd be standing up here and lying to you if I said that was acceptable and that you would be without fault. That's not real love. Real love is to stand up here and say what Jesus Christ is telling us and what will be demonstrated before our very eyes during that thousand-year millennial reign: that even as good and perfect as it can get, it will never be enough for the carnal, wicked heart that wants to be God.

Does that make sense to everybody here this morning? It's important because it helps us guard and be on guard against that in developing in our own hearts and ourselves, lest we be like—because did it not happen to the apostles? Did they not struggle with who's going to be the greatest in the kingdom of God? Sometimes I think as Christians, we forget that we still are in that battle and that the enemy wants to sift us like wheat.

So we need to be on guard even though we're not in that thousand millennial reign. Guard our hearts against that kind of behavior that's going to happen from a Christ-rejecting world. We don't want nothing to do with that, friends. The next thing he says is that they're going to gather them together in the battle. Again, I think it's been pretty clear who these rebels are going to be.

These are going to be people who survive the Great Tribulation, enter the millennial kingdom, and even their descendants. Little children, it doesn't say anything that they won't be there. Infants born during the millennium will live to its conclusion and not be required to make a choice between the devil and Christ really until when? The end of the thousand-year reign. Do you realize that's different for you and I? We had to make that choice right from infancy when we're young, we're growing up.

They will never know that because the devil's been put in a bottomless pit. The principalities and powers, they will never know what it was like. I wonder, you know how we're going to ask some of the Old Testament prophets, "What was it like? What was it like when Jesus..." maybe the apostles, "John, what was it like?" Do you realize that I imagine a lot of the Great Tribulation saints that get saved afterward are going to turn and come to you and I and say, "What was it like when you knew because Satan was on the prowl like a lion seeking whom he could devour all the time, and you had to be on constant guard and guarding your heart, left and right and in front of you, behind you, because you knew he was just trying to consume you and steal your thoughts, take your joy, take your heart off of Jesus? What was it like to grow up with that?"

And you're going to sit there and go, "Oh, that's right. You're one from the tribulation. You don't know what it is because you've never had to battle with Satan or the fallen angels or the principalities and power. You're growing up in a totally different time where you didn't have to even make this choice until the end of the thousand-year reign." I don't know if you thought about that; it's very interesting to me.

Why I mentioned Gog and Magog, and I told you if you underline it or circle—I like to make notes in my Bible—12 times in the Bible these two names, the name and the location is listed. The only other place again we see Magog, Gog and Magog listed is Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39. Again, this should sound familiar if you've read those chapters. This is talking about Israel's prophetic enemies.

Who are these surrounding nations? First of all, three-quarters of them are Muslim. We know that they are believers of Islam currently as it presently is on the record. This Gog, for example, would be the president or leader of Magog. Magog is a physical place. According to the scripture, I'll use the modern locations for these areas. Magog would be today—anybody know? Russia. That's right. Russia.

Turkey is another nation if you're keeping a list. Iran is another one of the nations. Sudan is another one of the nations. Ethiopia is the last nation that we see. What they're going to do—and we're not told the specific time—is they're going to coalesce and form an army that are going to come against who again? Israel. I heard somebody say Israel. That's right. They're going to come against Israel.

Now, they're not going to just come against Israel, but specifically they're also going to come against Magog. What is Magog again? Russia. Russia's going to turn—I should say Magog is going to come against Israel. They're going to turn around and they're going to come from a physical locale and they're specifically going to attack the people that are living in Jerusalem. This is important because look in the scriptures how it's referred or how he references Jerusalem in this very passage.

You keep reading down, he's going to talk about it as that blessed place, the place where the Jews are going. Why would God draw our attention today or even those that are alive at that time back to Russia, Turkey, Iran, Sudan, and Ethiopia? Unless he's describing a battle that's going to occur, hasn't occurred with these limited nations. He can't be talking about the same battle that he's mentioning right now that are going to be more than the people, are going to be more than the sands, the grains of sand.

It can't be that because even with those four or five that are going to gather in that area, that's not from the four corners of the earth. So he's not telling us it's the same people that are going to come to battle. What he's talking about is the motive. Who are the most pursued people on the entire face of the earth since the beginning of creation? The Jewish people.

The Jewish people. And why? Was it because something they did of themselves? No, as a matter of fact, when God chose them, it says there's nothing quite frankly unique about you in that regard. You're not the grandest as far as location and stature. You don't have the most amount of number of people. There really is... but you know what? I love you and you're my chosen people, and I've made you my chosen people. I've loved you and I've called you my own. And the minute He did that, Satan heard that and he said, "I can't stand it. I'm going to destroy them all."

Guest (Male): That is Pastor Matt VanderVen on His Perfect Love. We're going through Revelation at the present time, and I'll remind you that you can hear the program again when you visit HisPerfectLove.org. That's HisPerfectLove.org. We're also at oneplace.com and look for us wherever you get your podcasts.

We also offer a mobile app. This is a great way to take Pastor Matt's teachings with you on the go. You can learn more about the mobile app and start your download when you visit our website, HisPerfectLove.org. We can't thank you enough for your prayers for this ministry. Please pray that as God's word goes forth, that lives will be greatly impacted for the glory of God and people would grow by His grace and love, or even enter into a relationship with Him.

And if you have a prayer request, please send that our way. You can email that to us through our website at HisPerfectLove.org. If you live in the Mechanicsburg, PA area, we hope you'll stop by for a visit. Just like you hear on the radio, Pastor Matt teaches verse-by-verse through the Bible here at Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore. Sunday morning services begin at 8:30 and 10:30. We have a midweek gathering on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM.

We're located at 28 North Locust Point Road in Mechanicsburg, PA. Go to CCHarrisburg.org for more information. And then join us next time when Pastor Matt will pick up where we left off in Revelation, here on His Perfect Love.

His Perfect Love is brought to you by Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore.