The Bible explains itself when we read it with spiritual eyes.
In this study, I would like to show you the meaning of the thousand years, the first resurrection and the second death through Bible stories that you may have read dozens of times, but never before in this way.
I encourage you to keep reading until the end, because the best is saved until last.
In Revelation 20 we read about judgment, a time of a thousand years, a first resurrection, a second death and a lake of fire. If we read this with the eyes of the flesh, we will only see death and destruction in it.
God, however, does not do death and destruction. God is life and love!
The inexhaustible love of God is therefore also wonderfully seen in Revelation 20.
This chapter shows the creation of the new heaven and the new earth.
This is why the next chapter begins with:
Revelation 21:1 (HSV)
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth….
How this new heaven and new earth come about is explained with natural images visible to the eye in Revelation 20, so that we can come to understand the spiritual, the invisible to the eye.
Therefore, everything described in this chapter is not happening somewhere in the world, but within you.
Christ in you, then, is the hope of glory.
Colossians 1:27b (NKJV)
Christ in you, the hope of glory
And as you learn to see Christ in you, you start to see more and more the glory of God, and you change more and more into the image and likeness of God.
Because….
2 Corinthians 3:18 (NKJV)
….we all, with unveiled face,
beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord,
are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory,
just as by the Spirit of the Lord.
Therefore, Jesus Christ must be revealed in us.
Thus, the book of Revelation begins:
Revelation 1:1 (NKJV)
Revelation of Jesus Christ….
Throughout the book of Revelation, Jesus Christ is revealed to us so that we are changed in the same image, from glory to greater and greater glory.
Therefore, even in Revelation 20, we must find Jesus in the text.
And when we have found Him, we can also find ourselves in it.
1 John 4:17 (NKJV)
For as He is, so are we in this world.
The verse in Revelation 20 that Jesus is easiest to find in is verse 6.
It says there:
Revelation 20:6 (NKJV)
Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection.
Over such the second death has no power,
but they shall be priests of God and of Christ,
and shall reign with Him a thousand years.
I would like to show you Jesus in this verse using a well-known story in the Old Testament.
For the story that shows this beautifully is the story of the Israelites’ journey from Egypt to the promised land.
Egypt is an image of the oppression of sin.
1 Corinthians 15:56 (NKJV)
….and the strength of sin is the law.
Everyone is born under that law.
And until we come to believe that Jesus Christ fulfilled that law for us and that we are therefore free from the law, we remain under the law and therefore remain in sin.
Galatians 3:23 (NIV)
Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law,
locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed.
…until Christ is revealed in us.
Galatians 3:10 (NIV)
For all who rely on the works of the law are under the curse.
But….
Galatians 3:13 (HSV)
Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law!
In Egypt, the people of God were used as slaves to build an earthly kingdom.
Everyone is born into this slavery.
Romans 6:22 (KJV)
But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God,
you have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.
Thát is the journey to the promised land, which leads to holiness, so that we can enter after Jesus into the promised land, where He defeats all enemies for us, if we continue to follow Him.
And….
1 Corinthians 15:26 (NKJV)
The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.
The end of the journey is everlasting life.
Over him who continues to follow Jesus to the end, the second death has no power.
When there is a second death, there must also be a first death.
This first death, is the death of Jesus Christ.
And therefore also the death of your old self, the old man.
Romans 6:6 (NKJV)
Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him,
that the body of sin might be done away with,
that we should no longer be slaves of sin.
In Egypt, we served sin as slaves.
But by counting yourself as dead to sin, by believing that your old self was crucified with Christ, you are led out of Egypt.
Our death in Christ Jesus is depicted in the passage through the Red Sea.
This passage is a picture of baptism.
1 Corinthians 10:1-4 (BSB)
I do not want you to be unaware, that our forefathers were all under the cloud,
and that they all passed through the sea.
They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.
They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink.
For they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them,
and that rock was Christ.
All these natural objects and events have deep spiritual meaning.
Romans 6:3 (NAS)
Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?
Now that our old man has been crucified with Christ, we can follow Him to the promised land, where we may have part in the first resurrection.
For….
Romans 6:8 (NKJV)
….if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,
When the Israelites arrive at the promised land, they realize that the land is inhabited by great and powerful nations.
God, however, had said to them:
Deuteronomium 7:22-23 (NAS)
The LORD your God will drive away these nations from you.
The LORD your God will turn them over to you,
and will throw them into great confusion until they are destroyed.
The old generation that had been brought out of Egypt under the leadership of Moses is a picture of the old man.
This generation did not believe what God had promised and died in the desert without ever having entered the promised land.
THIS is a picture of the second death.
They had already died with Christ through baptism into death, but they never rose with Him in a new life.
When you do not have part in the first resurrection, you have part in the second death.
By this you crucify Christ all over again, as it were.
Hebrews 6:4-6 (BSB)
For it is impossible for those who have once been enlightened,
and then have fallen away, to be restored to repentance,
because they themselves are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting Him to open shame.
When you read the next two verses of this chapter, you will find that the same thing is said in Revelation 20.
Look:
Hebrews 6:7-8 (BSB)
For land that drinks in the rain often falling on it
and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is tended receives the blessing of God.
But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless, and its curse is imminent.
In the end it will be burned.
The land is an image of your heart.
This land brings forth thorns and thistles when it has listened to earthly wisdom, the knowledge of good and evil.
God explains this to Adam in Genesis 3:17 and 18.
Adam is therefore a picture of the old man.
This old man must be burned up so that the new man can come into being.
In Revelation 20 you see this described as well.
Revelation 20:14-15 (NAS)
Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.
This is the second death, the lake of fire.
And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life,
he was thrown into the lake of fire.
If your name is not found written in the book of life, in the death AND resurrection of Christ, you have yet to be purified by fire.
This fire is the Word of God, which burns off Adam, the old man, from you.
So….
Revelation 21:8 (ESV)
….as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers,
the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars,
their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur,
which is the second death.
This coward, unbeliever, detestable, murderer, sexually immoral, sorcerer, idolater and liar is the old man.
It is everything the flesh produces.
So it is not from God.
The fire is the purifying word of God.
It burns up everything that is not from God and leaves only the pure.
So it is not a literal fire ➡ it is an image in the visible to explain to us the invisible.
You can read about this fire throughout the Bible.
This study would become much too extensive if we go further into this now.
I have previously posted a study on this subject.
You might find it interesting to check it out.
It will give you a deeper understanding of the meaning of the lake of fire.
To enter the promised land, according to Hebrews 3 and 4, is to enter the rest of God.
As we will see shortly, the first resurrection is depicted in entering the promised land.
At the first resurrection, the thousand years spoken of in Revelation 20 begin.
Therefore, the 1,000 years mentioned in Revelation 20 is not a literal 1,000 years.
It is a picture of the Sabbath, the seventh day of creation.
It is a picture of God’s rest.
Hebrews 4:8-10 (NAS)
For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that.
Consequently, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.
For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.
And from what works did God rest?
He rested on the seventh day when he had finished creating the heaven and the earth and everything in them.
Likewise, we enter the rest when the new heaven and the new earth are established.
This new heaven and new earth is you.
It is a picture of the new man risen with Christ in a new life.
If you want to learn more about this, please check out the study
“A New Heaven and a New Earth“.
2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV)
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation;
old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
We see exactly the same written in Revelation 20.
Revelation 20:11 (BSB)
Earth and heaven fled from His presence, and no place was found for them.
The old heaven and the old earth have passed away; they cannot exist in the presence of God.
No more place is found for them; they have made way for the new heaven and the new earth.
Therefore, in the first verse of the next chapter, you can read that the new creation has been established.
Revelation 21:1 (BSB)
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth,
for the first heaven and earth had passed away.
The thousand years mentioned in Revelation 20 is a picture of the rest of God.
It shows that the new man, the new creation, has been established.
The thousand years, in which we reign with Christ, is the day of the Lord.
It is the Sabbath rest we enter when we have part in the first resurrection.
The thousand years signifies the completion of the new heaven and the new earth; the new man, risen with Christ to walk in a new life!
But what exactly is the first resurrection?
The first resurrection is beautifully depicted in the entering of the promised land by Joshua and the new generation of Israelites.
In order to enter the promised land, Joshua and the people had to cross the river Jordan.
Joshua 3:14-16 (BSB)
So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan,
the priests carried the ark of the covenant ahead of them.
But as soon as the priests carrying the ark reached the Jordan
and their feet touched the water’s edge, the flowing water stood still.
It backed up as far upstream as Adam, a city in the area of Zarathan,
while the water flowing toward the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea was completely cut off.
So the people crossed over opposite Jericho.
The water through which they had to pass in order to enter the Promised Land was the Jordan River.
This river flows into the dead sea.
This sea is known as the dead sea for a reason.
The water of this sea is so salty that nothing can live in it.
So the water of the Jordan River feeds the sea of death!
Water is an image of the word.
In the case of the Jordan, the water is an image of the word of man; human, earthly wisdom.
This wisdom leads to death.
God had already explained this even to Adam and Eve through the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Genesis 3:6 (NIV)
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food
and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.
But this wisdom is earthly wisdom that comes from the flesh.
This is why God had said:
Genesis 2:17 (NIV)
you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
for when you eat from it you will certainly die.
The water of earthly wisdom, flowed from Adam to the dead sea.
When the people entered the Promised Land, this water stopped flowing.
The water that fed death stopped flowing.
THIS is the first resurrection.
Over them the second death has no power!
You have now entered the promised land and you no longer live by earthly wisdom that comes from the flesh and leads to death, but now you live by the wisdom of God that gives you eternal life.
Next to the city of Adam, where the water stopped flowing, is the city of Zarathan.
Zarathan means toiling.
Indeed, God had said to Adam:
Genesis 3:17 (BSB)
Because you have eaten from the tree
of which I commanded you not to eat,
cursed is the ground because of you;
through toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.
There the land was cursed and only by toiling would we be able to eat from it.
Galatians 3:10 (BSB)
All who rely on works of the law are under that curse.
Romans 6:23 (BSB)
…. but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:14 (BSB)
because you are not under law, but under grace.
When we believe that Jesus Christ has done everything for us and there is nothing we can add, we rise with Him in a new life.
Now we enter the land overflowing with milk and honey ➡ without toiling!
Upon entering the promised land,
the curse that began with Adam in Genesis 3 is broken.
THIS is the first resurrection.
Revelation 20:6 (NKJV)
Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection.
Over such the second death has no power,
but they shall be priests of God and of Christ,
and shall reign with Him a thousand years.
Revelation 1:5-6 (NKJV)
To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood,
and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father,
to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever.
Amen.
