The
We are looking at the
spiritual life in the messianic kingdom or what we also refer to as the
Millennial kingdom, because Revelation chapter twenty tells us that it will be
one thousand years long—it is actually the prelude to eternity. Many things
that apply to the messianic kingdom, the Millennial kingdom described in
Revelation 20, continue that way beyond the end of the Millennium and on into
eternity.
The only place that we get an
understanding of the nature of the Millennial kingdom is in the Old Testament.
All we learn from Revelation is the length of the kingdom and that Satan will
be bound during that 100-year period, then released at the end of it when there
will be a rebellion against God even in perfect environment. We also learn that
during that time the saints will be reigning along with Christ.
Zechariah 8:3 NASB
“Thus says the LORD, ‘I will return to
These prophecies are given in
that context. Zechariah is after that deportation and so it is not the return
that comes in 538 that he is talking about. He was one of the two prophets
(with Haggai) who were responsible to challenge
Ezekiel has a number of
different visions and then in 40:1 we are told NASB “In the
twenty-fifth year of our exile, at the beginning of the year, on the tenth of
the month, in the fourteenth year after the city was taken, on that same day
the hand of the LORD was upon me and He brought me there.” He doesn’t have
an out-of-body experience, he is miraculously transported, and then he is going
to have a vision that God is going to give him of
In these chapters of Ezekiel
we get into the future blessings that God is going to give to Israel as He
finally fulfills those prophecies that He made, starting in passages like
Deuteronomy 30; Leviticus 27 & 27, that there would be a restoration to the
land and a complete renewal of the people, and that they will be restored to
the land from the four corners of the earth as a nation whose whole heart is
given to the service of God. The way that will be implemented after the horrors
of the wars described in Ezekiel chapters 38 & 39 is that there will be
this new temple that will be established on the “mountain of the Lord of
hosts.” This temple then becomes the center of the worship for all the nations
in the future kingdom. All of the Gentiles will come to
One of the interesting things
about this as we get into all of the descriptions is that there are certain
discrepancies between the description of the temple, the dimensions of the
temple, mentioned in Ezekiel 40ff and the dimensions of the previous temple and
the dimensions of the furniture in the tabernacle. There are also some
differences between the sacrifices. There are various differences that are
given and it was the rabbinical thought that these things couldn’t change. It created
a problem in the early period of Judaism when they were thinking through the
whole issue of what should be included and what books shouldn’t be in the
canon. Eventually they came up with a rationale for that, that within the
revelation that God gave to Moses there are a couple of phrases that allow for
things to change or develop with time.
The whole doctrine of a
future restored temple and future restored sacrifices isn’t distinct to
Ezekiel. Ezekiel expands it but there are numerous other prophets who also go
into detail. Part of the element of what lays the foundation for it is the
covenant that God will establish with the house of
The fact that there will be a
literal rebuilt temple is a part of orthodox Judaism. If God has all of the
numerous prophecies about the destruction of the temple then the same
prophecies that predict its restoration must also have a literal fulfillment.
We have seen that in the future when the Messianic kingdom is established it
will be a time of unprecedented positive volition on the earth, for all the
nations (Isaiah 2 and other passages) will come to
In Exodus 19:6 we see that
“During the Millennial reign of Christ
Another aspect of this
spiritual life in the Millennial kingdom is there are going to be some overt
and miraculous demonstrations of the Holy Spirit that are far beyond anything
that has been seen in the church age period or in the transition in the book of
Acts. The ministry of the Spirit in the Messianic kingdom is seen and often
linked with passages related to the New covenant in the Old Testament. Ezekiel
chapter thirty-seven reiterates in a little different language the same
elements that we see in Jeremiah 31 and other passages related to the New
covenant. Ezekiel 37:25 NASB “They will live on the land that I gave
to Jacob My servant, in which your fathers lived; and they will live on it,
they, and their sons and their sons’ sons, forever; and David My servant will
be their prince forever.
Jeremiah 31:33, 34 NASB
“But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after
those days,” declares the LORD, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I
will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
This is related to the
Holy Spirit, Isaiah 32:15 NASB “Until the Spirit is poured out upon
us from on high, And the wilderness becomes a fertile field, And the fertile
field is considered as a forest.” Isaiah 44:3 NASB “For I will pour
out water on the thirsty {land} And streams on the dry ground; I will pour out
My Spirit on your offspring And My blessing on your descendants.” That never
happened in the Old Testament, it is a prophecy of the future that has yet to
be fulfilled. Ezekiel 39:29 NASB “I will not hide My face from them
any longer, for I will have poured out My Spirit on the house of
Ezekiel 36:24-27 NASB
“For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring
you into your own land.
When we come to the temple
we will see that there is a connection now between the worship at the temple
and all the Millennial ritual associated with it but, unlike the Old Testament
period, the future temple worship is going to have this dimension that is
energized by God the Holy Spirit. So it can be seen that it is very different
from the Old Testament period or the present church age. In Judaism there is no
distinction seen between the Tribulation temple and the Millennial temple
although there is a clear understanding of the dimensions of Ezekiel’s temple.
They just think of that as the next temple. In Isaiah chapter two we have seen
that there is this earthquake that occurs to cause a mountain to rise in
Jerusalem and it is on that mountain that the house of the Lord “will be raised
above the hills; And all the nations will stream to it. And many peoples will
come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the
house of the God of Jacob; That He may teach us concerning His ways And that we
may walk in His paths…’” So the whole world is focused on the spiritual life
centering in
We learn also from Old
Testament passages that it will be the Messiah who builds the temple. Zechariah
In the new temple the
sacrifices on the altar will differ to some degree from the sacrifices carried
out in the Old Testament. Those who believe in a literal interpretation of
prophecy, a future literal interpretation, recognize that this has to be taken
literally. We have to understand that this isn’t conflict with the completed
work of Christ. In the first part of Leviticus there are five different
sacrifices identified—burnt offering, grain offering, peace offering, sin
offering, guilt offering. We have to remember that these are sacrifices that
the people in the nation are part of a redeemed nation, so naturally they are
viewed as being God’s firstborn already, and these sacrifices do not bring them
salvation. Nobody in the Old Testament was saved by bringing a sacrifice to the
temple; the sacrifices had to do with the ceremonial worship of God. All of the
things that went on from the feasts that were related to the temple to the
sacrifices themselves were designed to teach certain spiritual truths to the
Israelites—primarily that they were worshipping a holy God, a God who could not
have anything to do with sin, and that there was a penalty for sin and that
that penalty had to be applied/enacted so that His justice is not compromised.
The sacrifices had to do with satisfying His judicial demands. So there was a
limited or temporary effectiveness to these animal sacrifices. All of this was
designed to teach that sin was something that was horrible in the sight of God
and couldn’t be rationalized or glossed over but that God indeed had a
solution.
In the process of the sin
offering the priest would bring the animal (in this case the bull), Leviticus
So we look at the
sacrifices that are mentioned in Ezekiel. First the burnt offering. In the
burnt offering the animal was placed on the altar and burned. It depicted
complete devotion to God and that the worshipper was giving his whole life in
dedication to the service of God, and it depicts a complete ceremonial
cleansing of the worshipper. There is nothing in that would conflict with
Christ’s death on the cross, which isn’t for a ceremonial cleansing but for an
actual or real judicial cleansing. This was not in the Old Testament
sacrifices; they just gave ritual access to the temple. The grain offering is
also mentioned in Ezekiel 40-48 and it was a tribute offering given to God in gratitude
for His blessings in their life. The peace offering is the only offering of
that nature where the worshipper ate of the meal, because he is sharing that;
it is a picture of the fact that he already has peace with God. The peace
offering wasn’t to give peace with God, he already had it and so he is now
celebrating that he has peace and fellowship with God. Then the sin offering
was designed for ceremonially cleansing the worshipper from sins he didn’t know
were sins, inadvertent sins. The guilt offering provided ceremonial cleansing
for the worshipper where his sins involved some sort of monetary or physical
remuneration that could be accomplished.
In worship in the
Millennial temple the priests that are born in the Millennial period will still
be sinners and will still commit acts that will make them ritually and
ceremonially unclean. They are going to go into the temple and serve in the
temple and there has to be ritual/ceremonial cleansing for their service in the
temple. That is the purpose of those sacrifices for those who are going into
the temple to worship God. It is a physical representation to remind people of
the actual judicial payment that was taken care of by Christ on the cross. In
the Millennial kingdom we know from Ezekiel chapter forty that it is not all
the Levites because it is not all the sons of Aaron that can serve but only the
sons of Zadok because of their dedication and loyalty to David during the time
of Absolom’s rebellion.
Isaiah 56:7 NASB
“Even those I will bring to My holy mountain And make them joyful in My house
of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on My
altar; For My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples.”
[66:20] “Then they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as a
grain offering to the LORD, on horses, in chariots, in litters, on mules and on
camels, to My holy mountain Jerusalem,” says the LORD, “just as the sons of Israel
bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the LORD.’ Jeremiah
33:18 NASB “and the Levitical priests shall never lack a man before
Me to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings and to prepare sacrifices
continually.” Zechariah 14 mentions the various feasts observed during the
ritual calendar. Malachi 3:3, 4 NASB “He will sit as a smelter and
purifier of silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like
gold and silver, so that they may present to the LORD offerings in righteousness.