Internal Dissonance
Posted on : 06-11-2009 | By : Dan | In : End Times, Living Your Faith, Theology
Tags: amillenialism, cognitive dissonance, eschatology, faith, questioning
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I’m having my own sort of cognitive dissonance right now with this blog. I’m re-evaluating some of my beliefs and viewpoints and am reading a lot from conflicting perspectives to help sort out my thinking. I apologize for the scarcity of posts during this time, I assure you I’ll make a strong comeback once I get my head together. For now I’m focusing on His Word and prayer and other resources to help me understand some positions and how they have come about historically. I’m also asking a lot of questions, and I’ll post one here for anyone who cares to try to answer it:
Revelation 20:1-3 (NIV) says: “And I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key to the Abyss and holding in his hand a great chain. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. He threw him into the Abyss, and locked and sealed it over him, to keep him from deceiving the nations anymore until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be set free for a short time.” I happen to be amillennial in my eschatological views, but this passage makes it clear that I must then believe that Satan is bound during the millennium and is thus being kept from deceiving the nations. This seems to be cognitively dissonant from what amillenials teach regarding Satan’s activity in the world today, even though this passage makes it clear that Satan is bound in the Abyss during the millennium. How do you reconcile these unscriptural teachings about Satan in light of Revelation 20 from an amillenialist perspective? (I’m not really interested in the premillenialist response, “because you’re end times view is wrong.” I’m just curious to see how someone might explain this from the amillenial perspective). I know it’s not a salvation issue, God will work out the end times in His own way, I’m just curious. . . .
No related posts.
It is obvious that Satan is not bound now Dan. So therefore we must not be in the 1,000 years reflected in your passage. So two possible explanations, either that 1,000 years already happened or it’s still to come. I think the Word is pretty clear that Satan has been prowling all during the walk of man on earth … so the 1,000 years is in the future.
When? It must be after Armageddon but before his eternal banishment … why the 1,000 years and the “short period” to come back and screw things up again? Why does God keep giving Satan a chance to take humans away?
Or more importantly, why does God keep giving us the chance to choose to walk with him, instead of going to the other side? We are pretty happy he waited for us, and at some time in the future he will wait a short period longer for a generation that will grapple with Satan one last time. And God will be glorified
eschatology has to be the most confusing thing to me in all of Scripture. I must admit I tend to ignore or forget about any kind of end times belief, because, frankly, I just don’t get it. I’ve read it, but I’m like the ethiopian, how can I understand?
fortunately, as you said, it’s not a matter of salvation. I honestly don’t even know what you mean by premillenialist, amillenial, etc. I feel like I should get more informed, but thus far the Spirit hasn’t seen fit to really open my eyes in these areas
so yeah, sorry this comment is pretty much useless as far as answering anything goes. I’d be interested in seeing any other questions you had to throw out there that I might actually have input on
this comment is so i get e-mail feedback… delete if you so desire. I forgot to check off the box
Not a useless comment, honesty is the best policy and I love any kind of interaction. I’ll post more questions soon, I’ll post one at a time in new articles. I’m reading “Case for Amillenialism” by Kim Riddlebarger right now, answering a lot of my questions.
Having read the book of Revelation again not too long ago, I, too, wondered, and still wonder, about this very same issue…. I will be interested to hear what others, and you, have to say as time goes on. Thanks for the discussion, Dan.
For a little more insight on my perspective on the end times and how the doctrines many churches today believe came about, check out my past post entitled, “The End is Near” at http://prayeramedic.com/2008/10/the-end-is-near/
I wondered about the whole millenium issue as well, as there are other places which definitely seem to teach that Jesus will simply return, judgement will happen right then and there, and then the new heaven and earth begin…
I’ve had to wonder if the “thousand years” is not even a literal thousand years, but maybe instead just a metaphorical way of saying something else. Which is weird, cuz I’m usually such a “literalist” when it comes to scripture…
The part where I do feel more “concrete” in my views on the end times is the issue of the Antichrist rising up to lead the whole world in rebellion against God. It’s hard not to look at what’s going on around the world today, and see the “buds appearing on the fig tree”…
Yes Daniel, my view on the millennium is that the 1,000 years refer to the church age, the interadvental period in between Christ’s first and second coming. So we are now in the millennium. This is called the amillennial view.
huh… I guess it does make sense, in a rather simplistic way, if we understand Satan being “re-released” after Christ’s death and resurrection on the cross, where He actually defeated death and Satan… (right?)