Paradise on Earth

4. Darkness to Light

The kingdoms of this world will have passed away and the Lord Christ is in undisputed control. This is the beginning of the Millennium and the time of final opportunity, for those who have hitherto rejected him, to accept and take their stand on the side of truth and justice, right doing and fair dealing. In a manner incomprehensible to men, Satan the Devil, who has been the "god of this world" (2 Cor.4:4) for so long, will have been restrained "that he should deceive the nations no more" (Rev.20:3) and with the end of his influence in the hearts of men there will be an immediate lessening of the power of evil in the world. People will not become righteous overnight; the lion will not lay down with the lamb at once, but there will be a considerable turning of men in the right direction and that of itself will generate a feeling of relief and confidence that the bad old days have passed away.

This Millennium, in which Christ reigns over the world in righteousness, and all sin and evil will be progressively eliminated, is not eternity, but it is the anteroom to eternity. Most Christian people are so accustomed to thinking of Heaven as immediately following death they do not stop to reflect that by far the greater number are by no means fit for Heaven when they die; there is still much more to be done in their hearts and lives before they can stand before God in the eternal state. There are those, so enmeshed by their own vices and shortcomings, that the pure and righteous society of Heaven would be so alien and distasteful to them that Heaven to them would become Hell, a condition of things not to be endured. A great many of the sons of Adam will need further training and experience before they are ready for admittance into the society of the blessed. Hence this intermediate period of evangelistic approach and full conversion and reconciliation with God for so many is vitally necessary before the Lord is able to say "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit (enter into) the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." (Matt.25:34). Whatever the ultimate destiny of this race of intelligent beings which had its origin in Adam so many years ago, there is yet to be a thousand years of earthly experience during which such familiar present things as injustice, cruelty, sorrow, grief, disease and death will be no more, and peace and happiness reign supreme. Only after the exhibition of what human society can be like will God, regretfully we may be sure, leave those who will not have him to the inevitable consequence of their rejection.

It follows then that the predominant characteristic of the coming Age is resurrection, the resurrection of all who have lived to renewed life on earth that they may receive what so many have never had in their former lives, a knowledge of the saving power of Jesus Christ and a full and final opportunity to turn to him and accept him as Saviour and Lord. There is much in the Scriptures to substantiate this.

A problem immediately presents itself. There are eight billion of men and women at present living on this planet, of whom 10 per cent do not get enough to eat. The reason for this is not, as some suppose, that the earth is incapable of producing enough food for so vast a multitude. The reason is that man has failed to devise a system whereby the food that is produced can be put into the hands of those who need it. So, we have famine conditions in Africa and in Europe food is wasted. The first consideration must be so to regularise the relation between the production and consumption of food that the living nations can be adequately fed, before there can be any question of raising the dead and adding to the problem. Even under the righteous rule of the Messianic kingdom the metabolism of the human organism must be kept going if life is to be maintained, and that requires an adequate supply of food. There is also the question of restoring the fertility of the earth, despoiled during these latter days by man‑induced pollution.

It is this consideration that has given rise to the oft‑quoted saying "Restitution begins with the living nations." The "restitution of all things" alluded to by St. Peter in his Pentecost Sermon (Acts 3:20‑21) "He shall send Jesus Christ…whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things," has its first impact upon those living at the time our Lord Jesus Christ asserts his authority and takes control of world affairs. From that moment matters will commence to improve, although there can be no question of raising the dead as yet. What must take place is a tremendous harnessing of human effort toward the rehabilitation and renovation of the earth. The Divine standards will come into their own; the balance of Nature will be restored.

Modern methods of farming aimed at extracting the last moiety (bit) of fertility from the soil by the use of chemicals with no heed given to the long term effect—will give place to Nature’s way, something like the example afforded by the system practised under the Mosaic Law in the early days of Israel when every piece of land had to lie fallow each seventh year to regain its potency. There will be a great planting of forests to replace those decimated by humans through the ages. The work will be intensive and strenuous, but men will realise that it cannot be other than good for them and their fellows, and the marvellous recuperative power of Nature will begin to produce increasingly beneficial results from the very start. Isaiah, the notable prophet of the Millennium, said of this time "Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters, that send forth thither the feet of the ox and the ass." "They shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them...they shall not plant, and another eat...they shall not labour in vain, nor bring forth for trouble." (Isa.32:20; 65:21‑23). When that day comes, says the prophet Joel (3:18) the mountains shall run with fresh wine and the hills flow with milk, the streams shall be full of water and springs break forth in the valleys exactly what Isaiah said a century or so later (Isa.35:1) that the wilderness and thirsty land be glad; let the desert rejoice and burst into flower. Joel’s brother prophet Amos caught the same inspiration; "a time is coming says the Lord, when the ploughman shall overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed they shall plant their vineyards and drink their wine, make gardens and eat the fruit." (Amos 9:13‑14 A[uthor’s own]). These visionaries of the Old Testament of necessity described the glories of the coming day in terms appropriate to their own contemporary agricultural economy, but the condition they describe is that of an earth rapidly achieving restoration to Edenic conditions by the willing labours of those who dwell therein. No longer will soulless vested interests dictate the use to which the land is put, careless of the effect upon its inhabitants. The new administration headed by the Lord Jesus Christ will see to a full implementation of the Divine principle enunciated so many centuries ago "the heavens, are the LORD’s: but the earth hath he given to the children of men." (Psa.115:16). That is the real meaning of our Lord’s saying "the meek…shall inherit the earth." (Matt.5:5).

How long will this initial phase of the Millennial Age last? Nature has immense recuperative powers. Just so soon as the polluting agents have been halted the atmosphere will begin to clear, the streams and rivers commence to be purified, the land rid itself of the toxic chemicals it has had to endure in modern times, the green grass and the trees begin to clothe the arid wastes, and Isaiah’s vision be fulfilled. Nevertheless, the transition will not be accomplished overnight. The change from an industrial to an agrarian (food‑growing) economy will involve a great deal. Something like a half of the present world population do rely on a predominantly agricultural and stock‑keeping life and for these it will be a question of profiting by the advice and help of the Lord’s workers who will be sent to them for that purpose; such will probably pass from their present semi‑starved condition by degrees to one which they have never known before. Concurrently with this they will hear the gospel of Christ presented to them from a standpoint they had not previously heard even if they had heard anything; many of them will thus hear it for the first time. Evangelism and physical rehabilitation can be expected to proceed concurrently, to the spiritual and material advantage of those who hear. The remaining third and industrialised so‑called "civilised" nations, will find the going harder. It is not easy properly to visualise the situation. Obviously, the great power stations with their gaseous acid wastes poisoning the atmosphere for miles around and blotting out the sun’s energy which alone can make the crops grow, the giant chemical works with their noxious effluents which pollute the sea, the nuclear plants with their radio‑active waste, must all go, but what is to replace them and how quickly can that be done? It is perhaps probable that the kind of lifestyle envisaged in the Scriptures as that which redeemed men will find entirely satisfactory in the distant future will be possible with a considerably reduced necessity for the amenities these things at present afford. The existing world economy is built upon energy produced from the consumption of fossil fuels—coal, oil, natural gas—and the supply of these in the earth has limits and must one day be exhausted. People have long ago realised that the source of all energy reaching the earth is the sun, and that all the earth’s needs could be met by solar energy if it can be satisfactorily tapped. Much of the technique is already known—Israel leads the world in the exploitation and use of such energy. Solar power generated 7% of global electricity in 2024. (Wikipedia) The principal reason why it is not more widely used is not because the technique is not known, but because if adopted on a wholesale scale the cost of the necessary equipment is so low that there would be little profit for manufacturing interests, whereas with nuclear plants and the like the profits are large. Under the kingship of Christ this kind of argument will have no validity, and the needs of humans will be met by the direct use of the powers of Nature in a manner which will be neither harmful to people or to the environment.

The ancients realised the vital part the sun plays in sustaining life on earth; that is why the worship of the sun occupied the central position in ancient paganism. Unlike earth’s store of coal, oil and natural gas, the sun’s energy is inexhaustible. So far as possibilities on earth are concerned the amount of solar energy falling on the land surface of the earth in one year is more than twice that obtainable from all the known uranium deposits, and many times that from all coal deposits. People are devoting more time to research and design means of taking energy direct from the sun and its concomitants, wind and water, as they still do to exploit nuclear energy, all problems will be solved and the uranium and coal and gas, and other minerals what remains of it, can be left where it is. Nature will provide energy, silently, cleanly, and efficiently. In the U.S.A.20% of electricity comes from renewables including 4% from solar and 41% in the U.K. (Wikipedia)

Another factor must be considered. Entry of the living nations into the Millennium involves another and vital matter, the abolition of death. "There shall be no more death" is the promise when the "new heaven" and "new earth" is established. (Rev.21:4 & 1). God "will destroy…the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from off all faces." (Isa.25:7‑8). He says, through the prophet Hosea "I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction." (Hos.13:14). When the peoples of the earth pass from this Age into the next, from this world into the next, they will find themselves unexpectedly and most inexplicably freed from the curse of death. A time in which some are being resurrected from the dead and others are still going into death would be illogical in the extreme. But how is this transition, from a life on earth in which death is a certainty to one on the same earth in which that certainty has been removed, to be accomplished? What will be the effect on world society?

We touch here upon a subject which is only casually alluded to in the Scriptures—a few words here and there but no detailed description of the process which must be involved in the immutable law laid down by St. Paul in 1 Cor.15:22. "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." The context up to verse 28 shows clearly that he is talking about the Millennial reign of Christ, its work with and effect upon man. A certain amount of basic theology must be brought into the argument here and a certain amount of reasoning based upon that theology. The whole fabric of Christian belief in the redemptive office and work of Christ is built upon the doctrine of the Fall. At the first, as Genesis tells us, man was created perfect and sinless, his life inbreathed by the Spirit of God, so capable of living for ever. Man sinned—the details of the sin are not relevant here—and in so doing severed the lifeline through which he drew his continuously sustained life from God. From that moment he was a dying creature, and in the course of time, when what might be termed his residue of physical life was exhausted, he died. "All the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years; AND HE DIED!" (Gen.5:5) All his posterity did the same, and the reason for that was his inability to transmit other than his sub‑normal, dying life to his offspring. Had he remained loyal to God, sinless, he would have transmitted the original God‑given life to them, but he missed the opportunity; "wherefore" says St. Paul in Rom.5:12 "as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:" all have been involved in the consequences of that sin. But Christ on the Cross redeemed man from those consequences, and as the "Second Adam" gives to all that life which they lost through Adam’s transgression. "If by one man’s offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace…shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ…As by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." (Rom.5:17‑18). This means that at the precise end of this present Age, called by Peter "this present evil world," and the precise moment at which our Lord takes over the active rulership of the world and so initiates the Millennium, the "world to come, wherein dwelleth righteousness," the Adamic death sentence resting on the human race is abrogated and reversed, and new life, life through Christ and not through Adam, begins to permeate the being of everyone living. From this moment the death processes inherent in the human frame comes to a stop, and life processes commence, processes which can culminate, if the subject so wills, in complete reconciliation to God and full entry into eternal life.

So, just as the death processes commenced immediately after the Fall, the flow of continuing life from God, the only source of true life, was cut off, only "animal life" remaining, so that man could only continue "under his own steam" so to speak, now, life processes commence immediately upon the Restoration, life from God mediated through Christ the channel of life, leading to reversal of death processes until the man stands in the same position as was the first man before the Fall. As Elihu the devout and far‑seeing man of God, of three thousand years ago said, looking forward to this momentous time "his flesh shall be fresher than a child’s: he shall return to the days of his youth." (Job 33:25). That will be the literal effect of the change which will take place in human physique and mentality as soon as the Kingdom of Christ is established. It will be a time of "reverse aging" in which old people, instead of degenerating further until they descend into the grave, will become progressively younger until they re‑attain normal human maturity.

It follows that at that same time babes and children will develop normally—much more so than at present—until maturity is reached and there they remain. The Divine ideal of a mature community of human creatures will, as far as the nations living at this time are concerned, be realised.

There must now be considered the parallel question; what about the continuing increase of the race? Are children still to be born, increasing world population perhaps to unmanageable proportions long before the end of the thousand years? Again, in the absence of anything more than the occasional casual allusion in Scripture, the problem must be viewed against the background of the overall Divine purpose. At the beginning, Adam was told to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish (make replete, fill) the earth." (Gen.1:28). This implies that had Adam not sinned, when the earth was adequately "filled" the powers of propagation inherent in man would lapse and no further births ensue. The Divine purpose so far as this planet is concerned would have been met. In ordinary human life today exactly the same position obtains. The powers of reproduction become operative as maturity approaches; then at a later time they lapse and disappear, although life goes on for an appreciable time thereafter. Quite often a family is considered complete when an agreed number of children have been born; what is thus true in the individual life may well be just as true in the Divine economy with respect to humanity as a community. It may well be that the foresight of God has ordained the time of the end of this Age and the commencement of the next to coincide with the attainment of a sufficient population adequately to people the earth when all the dead have been raised. Of that more will be said later.

Something like the first half century of the Millennium, perhaps, should be sufficient for this growing up of the children, and "growing down" of the aged, carried over from this present Age, and some decided progress made in the cleansing and renovation of the earth, preparatory to the next great step in the programme, the resurrection of the dead.

(To be continued)
AOH
updated 2025