3. The Millennium: Now or Later (Remastered)

The Millennium - Now or Later?

R.J. Rushdoony

[Introduction] Rush’ is one of the few men that I’ve ever heard speak for an hour at a time, wishing that he would continue to speak. I never have tired of listening to him, he can’t speak too long so far as I’m concerned. He says more in the time that he has than anyone I’ve ever heard. I have the twenty-fifth anniversary issue of the Chalcedon Report. It came out in October of 1990, and was the flagship publication of the Chalcedon Foundation. The name ‘Chalcedon Report’ was first applied to Rev. Rushdoony’s newsletter April 2nd, 1969. With the issue number forty-four. It was two issues after that that for the very first time there was an article by a writer other than the Reverend Rushdoony. In his very first newsletter, Reverend Rushdoony set forth the essence of the work he had undertaken with the help of his supporters,and the vision he had for the church worldwide.

Chalcedon and its publications, with God’s help, have striven not to deviate from that premiere expression of purpose. And in his first newsletter he said that he wanted to discuss the significance of what you, my supporters, are doing. And he went on to explain in that what was going on at that particular time, and it is still appropriate for today. He pointed out that our age was seeing a similar development to what had happened during the Renaissance. Emperors and kings very early began to subsidize writers and artists to promote a statist perspective and to saturate contemporary thinking with that view. And there were clearly religious and philosophical trends pointing toward humanism and statism,but it was the heavy, steady, and long promotion of these things by subsidy that was responsible for the rapid spread and victory of these forces.

“Europe was steadily conquered by a rapacious and brutal statism,”

He wrote:

“The Renaissance was a period of showy art, but behind the facade it was an era of brutal terror.” 1

He said that, “Our age was seeing a similar development.” 2

“Our age is seeing a similar development. The major and minor foundations have been extensively captured by the forces of humanism and statism, and a new age of terror is developing all around us. Scholarship, arts, and literature are being subsidized to serve the purposes of humanism and statism, and our schools and colleges have been largely captured by these forces, as have been most publishers and periodicals. This movement has been a long time in developing…” 3

He continued to write:

“…it cannot be defeated overnight. It cannot be defeated by short-sighted people who want victory today or tomorrow, and are unwilling to support long-term battle. The future must be won, and shall be won, by a renewal and development of our historic Christian liberty, by an emphasis on the fact: the basic government is the self-government of the Christian man, and by a recognition that an informed faith is the mainspring of victory. History has never been dominated by majorities, but only by dedicated minorities who stand unconditionally on their faith.” 4

“What you are doing, in your support of me, (he wrote) is to sponsor a countermeasure to the prevailing trend, to promote by your support, interest, and study, a Christian renaissance, to declare by these measures your belief that the answer to humanism and its statism is Christian faith and liberty. Our choice today is between two claimants to the throne of godhood and universal government: the state, which claims to be our shepherd, keeper, and savior, and the Holy Trinity, our only God and Savior. You have made your choice by both faith and action.” 5

And then he signed his first newsletter.

Rush’ has never ceased to proclaim the truths of God’s Word, and today we’re looking forward to hearing ‘The millennium--Now or Later,’ by Doctor RJ Rushdoony, president of Chalcedon Foundation whom we welcome to this podium at this time.

[Rushdoony] The subject of this conference is an important one and a dangerous one. The books of Scripture that deal with prophecy, promise both a curse on those who add or subtract to the words of those books, or who in any way falsify their meaning. And implicitly call a blessing on all those who take heed to them. So the subject is, in effect, both a very promising one, and a dangerous one.

One of the problems is that people tend to concentrate on timetables, on how to escape tribulation like subjects, rather than on what God requires of us! What are the marching orders in these sections of Scripture that deal with our future under God? Christians are so used to talking of the millennium that they are unaware of, and do not appreciate the revolutionary character of this teaching. More than a few people in pagan antiquity believed in something comparable to a ‘millennium’ to a golden age. But in every case it existed for them in the past!

The Roman poet Ovid, in writing on the creation of the world in the Metamorphoses, sought as a development out of a time of primeval chaos. And man, as he developed and became man experienced in that early stage of history, when he was barely conscious of himself, a golden age. The Titans, Prometheus in particular, became an anime of the gods, and Prometheus was the one who created the golden age for mankind. In Ovid’s words:

Then sprang up first the golden age, which of itself maintained 

The truth and right of everything unforced and unconstrained. 

There was no fear of punishment, there was no threatening law 

In brazen tables nailed up, to keep the folk in awe. 

There was no man would crouch or creep to judge with with cap in hand, 

They lived safe without a judge, in every realm and land. 

The lofty pinetree was not hewn from mountains where it stood, 

In seeking strange and foreign lands, to rove upon the flood. 

Man knew not other countries yet then where themselves did keep; 

There was no town enclosed as yet, with walls and ditches deep. 

No horn nor trumpet was in use, nor sword nor helmet worn, 

The world was such that soldiers’ help might easily be for forborn. 

The fertile earth as yet was free, untouched of spade or plow, 

And yet it yielded of itself of everything enow. 

And men themselves contented well with plain and simple food 

That on the earth of nature’s gift without their travail stood, 

Did live by raspès, hips, and haws, by cornels, plums, and cherries, 

By sloes and apples, nuts and pears, and loathsome brambleberries, 

And by the acorns dropped on ground from Jove’s broad tree in field. 

The springtime lasted all the year, and Zephyr with his mild 

And gentle blast did cherish things that grew of own accord. 

The ground untilled, all kinds of fruit did plenteously afford.

No muck nor tillage was bestowed on lean and barren land,

To make the corn of better head and ranker for to spread.

Then streams ran milk, then streams ran wine, and yellow honey flowed 

From each green tree whereon the rays of fiery Phoebus glowed.” 6

Notice, that for Ovid all these blessings were the result of a world without law. 

“No brazen tables nailed up, no threatening law.

This is the dream of paganism, the dream of Jean-Jacque Crusoe, the dream of the environmentalists! Destroy the world of Christianity and its law, and the golden age will return again. It is not an accident that this resembles the ideas of our contemporary humanists and environmentalists. The natural order from Ovid and before Ovid to the present is seen as the ideal one not a fallen one. The golden age was that time when men lived without law, and therefore without problems. Food was not cultivated; it was there always. As one girl said at Berkeley in the sixties when questioned about the work-free world she wanted: “What about food production?” She looked at the reporter with contempt and said: “Food is!” This was the pagan view. And it is again the view of all too many around us.

Nature assured a perpetual spring, there was no armament, no national defense, only universal peace because there was no law. All men were equal and there were no judges of it. The environment went untouched, and streams ran with either milk or wine, if not with honey. Man did not by sin destroy this golden age, the gods did because they were jealous. The fault for all human ills thus rests with the gods! Man, not being a sinner, there was no need for him to be changed or to mend his life.

Now, of course, the complaint is against the God of scripture. As against this, biblical faith holds that the garden of Eden was a testing-place, and man failed the test! He sought to be himself a God, the determiner of good and evil, of morality and law. This means that humanity's basic battle is against its own nature. Man’s hope is not in himself, but in God his redeemer. Man must be recreated by his savior, only then can he move away from his sin and his death-sentence to serve the kingdom of God. His life must be God-centered, and God’s purpose is first and foremost, His kingdom and His righteousness or justice. In terms of this, the pagan myth of a golden age destroyed by the gods is a myth. Man, the sinner, wants to blame everything and everyone except himself.

Because of the myth of the Golden Age pagan antiquity was past-bound, its only hope for the future was a totalitarian kingdom of man, which Plato’s Republic is the classic statement. Wherein man, by totalitarian controls, builds an order against whatever gods may be. But that imagined order is a version of Hell.

On the other hand, Christian faith sees victory ahead. Nowhere in all of history, apart from biblical faith, have men seen victory in the future. Men have always, apart from God and His word, looked backward to a golden age when there was no law, and the gods were no problem. In the Great Commision we are given a governing task. In Campbell's words:

The task and goal is nothing less than a Christianized world.

This vision of victory marks all the Bible. For example, Psalm 47 declares: 

O clap your hands, all ye people [people being the Gentiles, the whole world, all the nations.]; shout unto God with the voice of triumph.

For the LORD most high is terrible; he is a great King over all the earth.

He shall subdue the people under us, and the nations under our feet.

He shall choose our inheritance for us, the excellency of Jacob whom he loved.

God is gone up with a shout, the LORD with the sound of a trumpet.

Sing praises to God, sing praises: sing praises unto our King, sing praises.

For God is the King of all the earth: sing ye praises with understanding.

God reigneth over the heathen: God sitteth upon the throne of his holiness.

The princes of the people are gathered together, even the people of the God of Abraham: for the shields of the earth belong unto God: he is greatly exalted.”

The psalmist celebrates God’s total victory before the event! We are also required, as part of our faith, to believe and to proclaim joyfully, that total victory in the face of all adversities and battles. Psalm 110:1 tells us that God has Christ sitting at his right hand until His enemies are removed.

The LORD said unto my Lord,

Sit thou at my right hand,

Until I make thine enemies thy footstool. 7

This triumphant statement is joyfully sighted in the New Testament over and over and over again! The expectation throughout the New Testament is of Christ’s total victory in time, in history. In Psalm 72 David declares:

In his days shall the righteous flourish;

And abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.

He shall have dominion also from sea to sea,

And from the river unto the ends of the earth.

They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow before him;

And his enemies shall lick the dust.

The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents:

The kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts.

Yea, all kings shall fall down before him:

All nations shall serve him.

For he shall deliver the needy when he crieth;

The poor also, and him that hath no helper.

He shall spare the poor and needy,

And shall save the souls of the needy.

He shall redeem their soul from deceit and violence:

And precious shall their blood be in his sight.

And he shall live, and to him shall be given of the gold of Sheba:

Prayer also shall be made for him continually;

And daily shall he be praised.

There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains;

The fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon:

And they of the city shall flourish like grass of the earth.

His name shall endure for ever:

His name shall be continued as long as the sun:

And men shall be blessed in him:

All nations shall call him blessed.

Blessed be the LORD God, the God of Israel,

Who only doeth wondrous things.

And blessed be his glorious name for ever:

And let the whole earth be filled with his glory; Amen, and Amen. 8

Many, many more verses can be sighted. But it is enough to say that the Bible does not look backward to the garden of Eden but forward to the promised land and beyond that to Messiah, to a worldwide triumph of the kingdom of God and then to Christ’s second coming. That the expectation of the Early Church was victory appears clearly in Revelation 6:9-10:

“And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?” 9

The saints expected judgment and victory very soon. They are told to wait, that it will come in God’s time, and the promised outcome is proclaimed in Revelation 11:15.

“And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.” 10

In 1 Corinthians 15:24-27 we are told of the sequence of the events.

“Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, all things are put under him.” 11

Paul here speaks of the end of the world. He makes no reference to any coming of Christ before the end. During almost all of church history and only recently has it been believed to be otherwise. In verses 20-23 Paul tells us that at the time the general resurrection will take place. Basic to this text is the kingdom of God. Charles Hodge clearly sets forth its meaning in his commentary on 1 Corinthians:

“...when the end comes, Christ is to deliver up the kingdom to his Father. What does this mean? The Scriptures constantly teach that Christ’s kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and of his dominion there is no end. In what sense, then, can he be said to deliver up his kingdom? It must be remembered, that the Scriptures speak of a threefold kingdom as belonging to Christ. 1. That which necessarily belongs to him as a divine person, extending over all creatures, and of which he can never divest himself. 2. That which belongs to him as the incarnate Son of God, extending over his own people. This also is everlasting. He will for ever remain the head and sovereign of the redeemed. 3. That dominion to which he was exalted after his resurrection, when all power in heaven and earth was committed to his hands. This kingdom, which he exercises as the Theanthropos, and which extends over all principalities and powers, he is to deliver up when the work of redemption is accomplished. He was invested with this dominion in his mediatorial character for the purpose of carrying on his work to its consummation. When that is done, i. e. when he has subdued all his enemies, then he will no longer reign over the universe as Mediator, but only as God; while his headship over his people is to continue for ever.” 12

Paul speaks here of an accomplished and triumphant kingdom, of the resurrection of the dead, the Second Coming of Christ, and the death of death. John Calvin understood verse twenty-four to mean, as have most commentators, that Jesus Christ at the end abrogates and abolishes all other authorities than His own. The Great Commission calls for precisely this, all rule, all authority, and all powers outside of Christ are to be put down. And all nations are to be disciplined under the kingship of Christ. In verse twenty-five we are plainly told that Jesus Christ retains this kingship over the post-fall, pre-second coming world until all His enemies are put under His feet.

The Second Coming does not at once follow this triumph. According to the prophets, an era of triumph known as the millennium, a myriad of years, precedes the end, and Christ reigns through His people. Then the last enemy, death, is destroyed. The destruction of death follows the destruction of the Fall’s first consequence as well as its cause, sin. The prophet Isaiah tells us that children will not die in infancy and anyone dying under a hundred years is seen as the cursed of God. The effect of sin is death, and as Christ’s kingdom triumphs in history, not only is sin replaced with righteousness or justice, but death itself is rolled back. Man’s life-expectancy lengthens. Death is Christ’s last enemy, and at His coming again it is destroyed. Sin was nullified in its power and claims by Christ’s atoning death. And as Christ’s kingdom grows, sin is pushed back and a new humanity in Christ, our new Adam, is established in all its power. According to verse twenty-seven, before the end God puts all things under Christ’s feet.

Hebrews 2:8 tells us this, this echoing Psalm 110:1 and 72:7-11 and 17-19. Of course, the words: “Thou hast put all things under His feet” come from Psalm 8:6. There is no limit to this dominion, the only exception is Jesus Christ Himself. All else is put under the Triune God. Calvin said of this verse:

“But Christ will then restore the kingdom which he has received, that we may cleave wholly to God. Nor will he in this way resign the kingdom, but will transfer it in a manner from his humanity to his glorious divinity, because a way of approach will then be opened up, from which our infirmity now keeps us back. Thus then Christ will be subjected to the Father, because the vail being then removed, we shall openly behold God reigning in his majesty, and Christ’s humanity will then no longer be interposed to keep us back from a closer view of God.” 13

We have referred to Isaiah 65:20-25, which speaks of the millennium peace, the longevity of life, prosperity, the end of sorrows, and much more, as marking the triumph of Christ in this world as men, women, and children, nations, gentiles, and all are made members of Christ’s new heaven and new earth, which began with His resurrection from the dead. 1 Corinthians 15:20-23 Paul speaks of Christ as: “the first fruits of the resurrection.”

Calvin, writing on the blessings of Christ’s triumphant history, in what is now called ‘the millennium,’ wrote in his comments on Isaiah 65:21-22:

“They shall build houses and inhabit them. In these verses he mentions what is written in the Law; for these are the blessings of the Law, that they who have obeyed God shall dwell in the houses which they have built, and shall gather fruit from the trees which they have planted. (Lev. 26:10.) On the other hand, the disobedient shall be expelled from the houses which they built, and shall give place to foreigners, and shall be deprived of the fruits of the trees which they planted. “The Lord,” saith Isaiah, “shall protect you from that curse, so as to enjoy your property.” 14

These texts make clear that the biblical mandate is a call to dominion, to knowledge, righteousness or justice, and holiness. Man was commanded in Eden to work under God to make the Earth God’s kingdom realm. And in the Great Commision man is reinstated in this dominion calling. Our federal covenant head in this calling is the Last Adam, Jesus Christ. We are the new humanity of the last Adam. The kingdom requires submission to Christ and faithful service to Him. A new creation, of which our Lord is the firstfruit, and of which we are all members, when fully instituted, is the eternal kingdom and the eternal victory of Christ. The millennium, coming as the climax of Christ’s historical victory through us, receives the new heavens and the new earth. For us it is now imperative to see the Promised Land for us in history as this world. The Holy Land is now the whole earth! We must repossess it for the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Amen, so be it.

1. Rousas John Rushdoony. Faith & Action: The Collected Articles of R.J. Rushdoony. Vallecito, California: Chalcedon/Ross House Books, 2019, 1201.

2. Rousas John Rushdoony. Faith & Action: The Collected Articles of R.J. Rushdoony. Vallecito, California: Chalcedon/Ross House Books, 2019, 1201.

3. Rushdoony, Rousas J. Faith & Action, The Collected Articles of R.J. Rushdoony from the Chalcedon Report, 1965 - 2004. Chalcedon/Ross House Books, 2019, 1201.

4. Rushdoony, Rousas J. Faith & Action, The Collected Articles of R.J. Rushdoony from the Chalcedon Report, 1965 - 2004. Chalcedon/Ross House Books, 2019, 1201, 1202.

5. Rushdoony, Rousas J. Faith & Action, The Collected Articles of R.J. Rushdoony from the Chalcedon Report, 1965 - 2004. Chalcedon/Ross House Books, 2019, 1201, 1202.

6. Golding, Arthur and Ovid. Shakespeare’s Ovid: Being Arthur Golding’s Translation of the Metamorphoses. Edited by Prof. Gallancz. London: Alexander Moring, 1904.

7. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Ps 110:1). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

8. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Ps 72:7–19). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

9. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Re 6:9–10). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

10. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Re 11:15). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

11. The Holy Bible: King James Version (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., 1 Co 15:24–27). (2009). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

12. Charles Hodge, D.D. An Epistle on the First Epistle to the Corinthians. New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1860, 330.

13. Calvin, J., & Pringle, J. (2010). Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians (Vol. 2, pp. 32–33). Logos Bible Software.

14. Calvin, J., & Pringle, W. (2010). Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Isaiah (Vol. 4, p. 401). Logos Bible Software.