Apocalypse - End of The Age

End of The Age

In the Revelation of John, John writes about the "revelation" of Jesus Christ as Messiah, and about present tribulations leading to the ending of this age and the coming of God's Kingdom. Hence the term 'apocalypse' has come to be used, very loosely, for the end of the world.

In the Hebrew Old Testament some pictures of the end of the age were images of the judgment of the wicked and the glorification of those who were given righteousness before God. In the Book of Job and in some Psalms the dead are described as being in Sheol, awaiting the final judgment. The wicked will then be consigned to eternal trolling in the fires of Gehinnom, or the Lake of Fire mentioned in the Revelation of John.

In his New Testament letters the Apostle Paul also has written about the judgment of the wicked and the glorification of those who belong to Christ or Messiah. In letters to the Corinthians and the Thessalonians Paul expounds further the destiny of the righteous. He speaks of the simultaneous resurrection and rapture of those who are in Christ (or Messiah).

Some Christians had a Millennial expectation of glorification of the righteous, from the time when they emerged from Judaism and spread out into the world in the first century. The poetic and prophetic literature of the Hebrew Bible, particularly in Isaiah, were rich in millennial imagery, and New Testament writers after Pentecost carried on with this theme. During his imprisonment by the Romans on the Island of Patmos, John in the Revelation of John, chapter 20, receives a vision of a thousand-year reign of Christ/Messiah upon the earth.

Some Christian movements in the 18th and 19th centuries were characterized by a rise of Millennialism. All Christian apocalyptic eschatology has been concerned with the two themes referred to through the Bible as "this age" and "the age coming". Evangelical Christians have been in the forefront popularizing the biblical prophecy of a major confrontation between good and evil at the end of this age, a coming Millennium to follow, and a final confrontation whereby the wicked are judged, the righteous are rewarded and the beginning of Eternity is viewed.

Some evangelical Christians have taught a form of millennialism known as Dispensationalism, which arose in the 19th century. Dispensationalists see separate destinies for the Christian Church and Israel. Their concept of a pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church has become better known, thanks in part to the Left Behind series of books and films. Dispensationalists find in Biblical prophecy predictions of future events: periods of the Church, for example, shown through the letters to the seven churches in the Revelation of John; the throne of God in heaven and his glory; specific judgments that will occur on the earth; the final form of Gentile power; God' re-dealing with Israel based upon covenants mentioned in the Hebrew Old Testament; the second coming proper; a one-thousand year reign of Messiah; a last test of mankind's sinful nature under ideal conditions by the loosing of Satan, with a judgment of fire coming down from Heaven that follows; the Great White Throne judgment, and the re-creation of the current heavens and the earth as a "New Heaven and New Earth" ushering in the beginning of Eternity. A differing interpretation is found in the Post Tribulation Rapture.

One of the most extensive modern works on the meaning of the Revelation of John was written by Emanuel Swedenborg called the Apocalypse Revealed, first published in two volumes in Amsterdam in 1766. Another book, utilizing the literal method of interpretation, was The Revelation Record by Henry M. Morris (1983).