The Second Death (03/15/23)

Having looked at the life to be ours in light of the Last Day, it is only right that I should look as well at that death which is to occupy eternity for those who have not been saved.  And the first thing we shall have to recognize is that there will indeed be those who have not been saved.  And of this, we shall have to recognize that what Jesus has said in regard to salvation holds.  We looked at this yesterday.  “All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me, and of all He has given Me, by His will, I shall not lose a one, but raise all of them up on the last day.  For this is My Father’s will, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life.  I Myself will raise him up on the last day” (Jn 6:37-40).  The corollary to this is that “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (Jn 6:44).  There are those who are not drawn.  I have said it before and I say it again, if it were not so, the whole business of the gospel makes no sense whatsoever.  None.  If this were not so, then whole passages are at best pointless, at worst, lies; and lies, it should be noted, in regard to the very nature and purpose of God.  If, in fact, we have come to know Christ, if, in fact we have been given all knowledge for life and godliness as Peter insists, then looking at these things we must once again answer the question.  “Do you believe this?”  And if we have believed that Jesus is in fact Messiah, and in fact the Son of the living God, ergo, God live and in Person, surely, we must answer, “Yes, Lord, I believe.”

With that settled, we come to view the results of that final day, of the judgment meted out against the enemies of our God and King.  It comes, fittingly enough, quite near the end of the Scriptures, although there remains the joyous arrival of the New Jerusalem to follow and close out the textbook of God’s revealed word.  So, we come to Revelation 20.  An angel comes to the abyss and throws Satan in.  No more is he able to deceive the nations, not for a thousand years, although we have this note that after that period he must be released for a short time.  But here, we are in discussions of time while viewing a realm where time has little to no meaning, really.  What are a thousand years?  As with Daniel’s vision, we don’t really have a scale by which to determine what these units mean in terms recognizable to our present state.  But judgment is being set up, and interestingly, it’s not just our Lord seated there.  It is not one throne, but thrones, ‘and they sat upon them, and judgment was given them’ (Rev 20:4-5).  Given who?  I don’t know.  The most immediate referent is either the singular angel, or the singular devil, and neither of those properly fits the pronoun.  If we cast forward, instead, we have those who had been beheaded for their faith, and their refusal to worship the beast.  These, we are told, came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.  I suppose that note of reigning together with Him would account for the multiplicity of thrones.  And we have this note that the rest of the dead don’t experience resurrection until this thousand year period is complete, and Satan is released from prison to unleash Armageddon (Rev 20:6-8).  All of this, it seems, should have been examined back under the subject of sequence.

It does show us somewhat of the sequence, doesn’t it, although what it shows leads more to confusion than certainty.  Here is that millennial reign that takes hold of the church’s imagination, and it does seem rather clear that the resurrection we see in Paul’s excellent dissertation on that topic (1Co 15), comes subsequent to this setting up of the thrones, after that millennial reign, whatever it is, exactly that this represents.  And, if Armageddon remains ahead, we might incline to suppose we have just been informed that the redeemed shall indeed be taken up prior to that event.  But if that’s the case, what was with the notice of Matthew 24, that it was so needful for this time to be cut short for the sake of the elect?  Or is all of that which Jesus spoke of prior even to the millennial reign, and of the chaining of the devil?  That, it seems to me, makes rather more sense, doesn’t it?  The devil has had long ages in which to deceive the nations, and I should have to suppose, given recent history, that we are very much in the midst of those days, and I could certainly see how it might be needful for this period to be cut short for the sake of the elect.  I can also see how this period would indeed produce a body of martyrs such as we see here.

Does this change anything for me?  I don’t rightly know.  It does appear to me that we who are called of our Father, who have beheld and believed our Lord, do indeed get a skate save on the Last Battle, and if we account that the Tribulation, then I suppose we would say that this, too, has been given a miss.  But I am not convinced we can conjoin those two.  The tribulation, if not the Great Tribulation, is ongoing.  That seems clear from experience, and at least a probability from what Scripture has said, what we have been exploring.  The Last Battle, though, remains something a bit different.  We have encountered this before, in other texts, and I have to observe that what those prophetic texts observed in regard to that battle is found here as well.  That great army that Satan has summoned at the conclusion of this period, whatever it is that this period encompasses, comes up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounds the camp of the saints, and the beloved city (Rev 20:9).  Now, I don’t personally suppose that this is intended to put our attention on the specific, geographical location of Jerusalem, but rather ought to be viewed as having a much broader context, a much broader impact, as it encompasses the whole of Zion, God’s holy mountain, which, as I have observed along the way, is something more grand, something more permanent, than the hills around Jerusalem on the shores of the Mediterranean.  But hear the result of this vast army.  “And fire came down from heaven and devoured them.”  The battle still belongs to the Lord, and His power us such that, to borrow the imagery of Scripture, He destroys them with no more than the blast of His nostrils.

But we are here to look at the aftermath, the mop up, as it were, after our Victorious Lord has put paid to those who are bending the knee but unwillingly, who have opposed Him every step of the way, but are now most utterly and finally defeated.  “The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone; the beast and the false prophet, too, and there they will be tormented day and night forever and ever” (Rev 20:10).  And only now do we come to that scene depicted by our Lord in Matthew 24.  Only now is the great throne set up and the books opened.  “And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before that throne.  Books were opened, also the book of life, and the dead were judged by what was written of their deeds.  The sea gave up its dead, as did death itself, and Hades, and these, too, were judged.  Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire, and anyone whose name was not found in the book of life was also thrown into that lake of fire” (Rev 20:11-15).  And this, we are informed, is the second death.

See, we have learned along the way that the death which is the common experience of all who have been born is not the end.  For the believer, it is an entrance into rest, as the battle against sin is laid to rest along with that body of sin.  The spirit of man has been released, but not to wander the world, haunting old acquaintances.  No!  That soul has come to rest.  “Today, you shall be with Me in Paradise” (Lk 23:43)  And that today is spoken of in the physical realm, where today means today as we understand today.  We’re not looking at some eternity-warped perspective on time here.  Today.  Your struggles with sin have ceased.  Your judgment has been rendered already.  You may rest now, until the time has come for this moment we are now observing.  For the reprobate, I should have to think that rest is hardly restful, for as certain as is the believer’s knowledge that a resurrection unto life awaits him, just so certain is the dreadful knowledge that no hope of pardon exists, no more chances shall be given.  There is only the assured dispensing of that resurrected soul into the lake of fire where, like the devil they have served and now join, they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.  There shall be plentiful occasion to consider the error of their ways.  But there shall be no hope of reprieve, no cry of repentance loud enough to stir the mercy of our God.

This is the second death.  It is not a cessation of consciousness.  It is not the hoped-for nothingness of the nihilist.  It is an eternal anguish, and I think we shall have to recognize that this anguish is both physical and mental.  They have been given a body fit for eternity, even as we.  But that body, now effectively indestructible, has been cast into a place of fire that is not quenched, a place where ‘their worm does not die’.  There is no release.  There is no remission.  There is no relief.  “Between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, in order that those who wish to come over from here to you may not be able, and none can cross from there to us” (Lk 16:26).  The separation has been finalized.  The great divorce has been accorded.  The two cities are closed to one another once for all.  Those who have life may, it seems, perceive those who have this second death, and those experiencing the second death can presumably see the joyous living as well.   Add this to their torment.  But even should the living, in their compassion, think to relieve the suffering of the damned, there is no crossing over.  There shall be none of that stuff of Greek mythology, with folks rescued from this place of punishment.  Judgment has been rendered, and sentence passed, and there shall be no parole.

Okay, I had started this section saying that the arrival of the New Jerusalem awaited completion of the section I had in mind to consider on this subject of the second death, but in fact it is here at that opening of Revelation 21.  The first heaven and earth have passed away.  The sea, that most dreaded thing in Jewish conceptions, is no more.  A new heaven and new earth have come, and the new Jerusalem, the true holy city, comes down from heaven like a bride coming for her husband.  “Behold!  The tabernacle of God is among men, and He shall dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be among them.  He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes.  Death is no more, nor mourning, crying, or pain.  Those were symptoms of the first things, and the first things have passed away” (Rev 21:1-4). 

He is seated on His throne.  Here is the eternal kingdom of our Lord come to full fruition.  And He has a message for His faithful followers.  “I am making all things new.  Indeed, it is done!  I AM the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.  I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life at no cost.  He who overcomes shall inherit these things, and I will be His God and he will be My son”  (Rev 21:5-7).  This is clearly blurring the vision, isn’t it?  It is seeing both the now and the not yet, and all at once.  It is done, yet I will.  All is new, yet it remains to overcome.  Again, I would stress that we are viewing events from the perspective of eternal heaven, a realm in which time, if it has not lost all meaning, at the very least has limited and perhaps non-linear application.  In this realm, the now and the not yet are indeed one.  You have entered into the presence of Him for whom the end is known from the beginning, and I suggest that in large part that is because both are present to Him simultaneously, as are all the moments in between.

But I have one more verse here that needs our viewing.  “But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone.  Theirs is the second death” (Rev 21:8).  This is the removal of all evil from what is now, fully and finally, the perfected holiness of the eternal Zion of God, the kingdom which shall have no end.  “For a child will be born to us, a son given us, and the government will rest on His shoulders.  His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.  There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore.  The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this” (Isa 9:6-7).  This second death, this purging of every last remnant of evil has been the necessary precursor for the full and final establishing of this kingdom.

I suspect that for many of us that list of miscreants thrown into the lake of fire gives some cause for concern.  It is to be hoped that many of those criminal characteristics we see listed have been far from us.  But there have also been those who knew even such crimes as these in life and yet found pardon and forgiveness in our Lord, not least of them David, whose kingdom was a type for this realm over which and in which our Lord God reigns in immediacy of presence.  David was a murderer, certainly, and immoral.  And yet, he was also a man after God’s own heart.  I suspect we would be hard pressed to find so much as one among us who is not an idolater in one form or another.  Calvin famously observed that all mankind are, pretty much without exception, idol factories.  No sooner do we destroy one than we are busily setting up another.  And I suspect the vast majority of us would have to accept accusations of having lied, however benign we thought our particular case to be.  And we should have to note that there are those, even in the earthly lineage of our Lord, who found their place there by lying.  Rahab comes to mind, with her deception of the Jericho authorities which allowed Israel’s spies to escape unscathed.

We shall have to recognize, I think, that what we see in this final stage is a purging of those who had no least trace of godliness.  Oh, we might have looked at them and thought they were good men, that they had some redeeming qualities.  Even a murderer might well be a good husband to his wife and a good father to his children, at least as we tend to measure goodness.  But it matters not if there has been no heart for repentance, no seeking of forgiveness from the God Who Is, no trust in Him.  These are those who, asked, “Do you believe this?” have answered, “No, Lord.  I don’t believe in You.”  And for such rebels as these, what other result can there be when the King comes to establish His kingdom?  To leave such elements free is to invite insurrection and trouble.  Our Lord is no fool, and this victory is final.  Those who have insisted on being His enemies shall have their way.  They shall remain His enemies.  Forever.

And isn’t that a fun place to leave this study?  But I shall do so.  And tomorrow, perhaps, I can consider somewhat what this lengthy exercise has clarified and settled in my thinking, what I have seen (to the degree I see) as regards what Scripture has to say about this great and glorious Last Day.