Optimistic Amillennial: Oxymoron

When I was growing up in a Christian home, the topic of eschatology wasn't something that came up often. In fact, the word “eschatology” wasn't even known or used. Sure, there were always discussions about the “last days” and of course I was aware of the literature and speculation surrounding the debate, but they never became a topic of study. This is evidenced by the fact that the most controversial question you could ask was: “Are you pre-trib, or post-trib?” Everyone knew “mid-trib” existed, but it seemed ridiculous to include them in the discussion. You can then imagine my surprise when I was made aware of other eschatalogical views. Ones that had escaped my knowledge for my entire life. Not only were pre/post-trib far from the only options, but those were merely a subset of the greater perspective called “Premillennialism.” I also learned that there were other, entirely different views that were not pre-millennial at all. Amillennialism and Postmillennialism were also different perspectives on how the “last days” would look. To make a long story short, this began my study into eschatology. First, I had to understand what these long “theological” words meant. I learned that all positions have millennial in the name because they all relate to the 1,000 years spoken of in Revelation 20. All the major positions believe in a millennial reign, and all positions believe in a second, future, bodily return of Jesus Christ. Contrary to what might be immediately obvious, all the major positions have numerous things in agreement.  But, as the saying goes, the devil is in the details. While many areas of agreement can be found, the bulk of the disagreement comes in with the finer points. Indeed, the timing of the Final coming and Millennium is how each position gets its name: Premillennialism: The belief that Jesus will return before the millennium is established. Since Jesus comes before (or pre) the millennium, and since Jesus hasn't returned bodily to earth yet, it follows that the millennium is a future reality, one not yet experienced by believers today, Postmillennialism: The belief that Jesus comes after the millennium is complete (or nearly complete). The timing and mechanism of the millennium can vary under this system, but all who hold to it agree that the millennium precedes the bodily return of Jesus. Amillennialism: Here we run into a problem. The prefix “a” often means a negation or opposite. For example, a theist is someone who believes in God, but an atheist is someone who denies God's existence. Another example is the word muse, which means to contemplate or consider deeply, but amuse means to be entertained or to view things in a light manner. So, in the case of Amillennialism it would seem to be saying that it’s the belief of no millennium. However, that's not an accurate definition, Amils do believe in a Millennium, and several Amillennialists have tried to coin a more accurate term to represent this. The reason for this misunderstanding is because the term Amillennialism has less to do with timing (as in the case of Premil and Postmil), and more to do with the nature of the millennium. In terms of timing alone, the Amillennialist agrees with the Postmillennialist, that Christ returns after the millennium. However, the Postmil and the Amil disagree on the nature of the millennium. One prominent feature of Amillennialism is the belief that the “thousand years” of Revelation 20 is not a literal, but a symbolic amount of time. This is contrasted with almost all Premillennialists, who staunchly defend a literal 1,000 years for the millennial reign of Christ. The problem is that most (though not all) Postmillennialist also believe in a symbolic “thousand years”, rather than a literal 365,000 days period of time. So if the Amil and the Postmil agree that the millennium is a symbolic amount of time, and they both agree the millennium occurs before Christ returns, how are they different? Again, it has to do with the nature of the millennium. The Postmil understands the millennium as the period of time where the gospel grows in the world and within history. The expectation of the Postmil is one of enduring optimism. A postmillennialist expects the Kingdom of God to grow and be filled with true believers in Christ, and that the world will eventually be filled with Christians before Christ returns. The Postmil sees the millennial rule of Christ as both a spiritual and an earthly reality, with Gospel proclamation being an eminently successful endeavor.  On the other hand, the Amil understands the millennium in a much more spiritual light. This isn't to say that the Amil denies gospel success and growth, but the emphasis is more pointed at a “heavenly” kingdom, disconnected from earthly influences. To state it clearly, Amillennialism holds that there will be no millennial reign of the righteous on Earth. Websters defines Amillennialism as: The denial that an earthly millennium of universal righteousness and peace will either precede or follow the second advent of Jesus Christ. A definition provided by Christianity.com says this: Amillennialists believe in a literal reign of Christ, along with his resurrected saints. But we believe this reign is a heavenly one rather than on the earth. 

Crosswalk.com gives the definition of Amillennialism as such: Amillennialism is the view or system of eschatology that holds that there is no literal earthly millennium. Amillennialists believe that the millennium is spiritual. The New World Encyclopedia says: For amillennialists…the millennial kingdom only means the church as it exists on earth, somehow pointing to the kingdom of God in heaven. This kingdom of God in heaven does not involve a direct, personal reign of Christ on earth. Rather, this kingdom in heaven is manifested only in the hearts of believers as they receive the blessings of salvation in the church. Blue Letter Bible gives this definition for the Amillennial view of the Kingdom of God: a spiritual reality that all Christians partake in and that is seen presently by faith, but will be grasped by sight at the consummation.

Anthony Hoekema makes this comment on Revelation 20: Amillennialists interpret the millennium…as describing the present reign of the souls of deceased believers with Christ in heaven. The Official Website of the American Presbyterian Church (APC) says of Amillennialism: This position does not believe in any literal physical reign of Christ on this present earth, in any Messianic Age on this earth. The Biblical millennium is regarded as being fulfilled either by Christ’s reign in the heart, or by the saints in heaven in the intermediate state. Sam Storms Says this: this messianic reign is not necessarily for a literal 1,000 years and it is wholly spiritual (non-earthly, non-visible) in nature. Hopefully this is an ample list of examples to make my point, which is that the “A” in Amillennial, isn't a discussion on the timing of the millennium, as is the case with Premil and Postmil, but rather a statement of the belief that there is no earthly millennium. To the Amil, the millennium is a spiritual and heavenly reality, not to be seen on earth except in the lives of true believers, and by extension the church. Extreme forms of Amillennialism such as R2K (Radical 2 kingdoms), would go even further and state that the Christ’s millennial reign is exclusively spiritual over the church, and does not imply a program for the church to speak to the culture in general, and the state in particular. This topic is outside the scope of this critique, but it's worth mentioning. The end result of this spiritualizing of the millennium and by extension the Kingdom of God produces an inherently pessimistic expectation. Now, I realize that labeling the Amillennial view as "pessimistic" will ruffle feathers, but let me say this before moving on: All Christians are optimistic about the end of history and the final coming of Christ. In labeling the Amillennialist as pessimistic, I'm not disparaging their belief or emphasis on the victory of Christ in the hearts of believers or at the end of time. Eschatalogical optimism is something all Christians share; we all believe that Jesus is victorious and triumphant when all is said and done. That said, when the term “pessimism” is applied to an Amil or Premil, it's a statement on their historical pessimism. The Amillennialist, by default, does not expect or look for the gospel to be overwhelmingly successful in history. William Hendriksen comments that "the majority will ever be on the side of the evil one." Indeed, history "will finally result in the complete destruction of the church."

Philip E. Hughes comments on "the witness of the New Testament that the latter part of this age will see not a decrease but an intensification of the power of evil in the world." Herman Bavinck states that "Jesus only knows of two aeons: the present and the future aeons. In the present aeon his disciples cannot expect anything other than oppression and persecution and must forsake all things for his sake." So then, "nowhere in the New Testament is there a ray of hope that the church of Christ will again come to power and dominion " H. De Jongste and J.M. Van Krimpen declare: "There is no room for optimism: towards the end, in the camps of the satanic and the anti-Christ, culture will sicken, and the Church will yearn to be delivered from its distress." Anthony A. Hoekema expresses the characteristic position of amillennialism (the parallel development of good and evil): "Alongside of the growth and development of the kingdom of God in the history of the world since the coming of Christ we also see the growth and development of the kingdom of evil.' . . Evil and good continue to exist side by side. For every advance, it would seem, there is a corresponding retreat." Richard Gaffin states: "Over the interadvental period in its entirety, from beginning to end, a fundamental aspect of the church's existence is suffering with Christ'; nothing, the New Testament teaches, is more basic to its identity than that." In addition, "Until Jesus comes again, the church 'wins' by losing."

Optimistic Amillennialism All this groundwork brings me to a subset of Amillennialism, dubbed “optimistic Amillennialism.” For the purposes of this essay, I am going to argue for the case of dropping this label altogether. There are already adequate descriptors and terms that can be utilized, and clinging to the term “amil” is unhelpful and confusing in the greater discussion of eschatology. I am going to label Optimistic Amillennialism (O-Amil in abbreviation) as an oxymoron. Oxymoron: a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction So what does the O-Amil believe? If I understand the term and its advocates correctly, they are Amillennial in their eschatology, but they believe in large potential growth to the Kingdom of God within history. They see and affirm the validity of scriptures overwhelming optimism of the victory of Christ within recorded history, yet for some reason, they feel compelled to cling to the Amil label. So why would I call it an oxymoron? Because, as I hope I have demonstrated, the spiritual “non-earthly” nature of the Amil’s view of the Millennium, necessitates a contradiction with the Postmillennial view of historical optimism. To make this a little bit more clear, let me give more detail to the Postmil understanding of the Millennium. First, a Postmil would agree with an Amil that the Millennium is a present reality, and that we are currently in the Millennial reign. However, as already stated, the nature of the Millennium is different under the postmil view. A postmillennialist doesn't see the Millennium, nor the Kingdom of God as purely spiritual, seen only in heaven and by extension the church. Instead, Postmillennialism views the present reign of Christ as both heavenly and earthly. Postmil’s put great emphasis upon the heavenly reign of Christ as seated at the right hand of the Father. They also point to the Great Commision where Christ says “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth.” (Mat 28) In addition to this, Postmillennialists don’t see the Kingdom of God as only pertaining to the Elect, but actually extending over all creation. All men everywhere are now commanded to repent and believe the Gospel. (Acts 17:30) Contrary to common Premillennial understanding, the Postmillennialist sees the heavenly rule of Christ as greater than a purely physical rule (John 16:7). And contrary to the Amillennial, Postmil’s understand the earthly rule of Christ to be definite and yet still in progress. The Kingdom is being built, and it will be finally finished when Jesus comes again and “delivers the Kingdom to the father.” But he only does this after He “destroys every rule and authority and power.” (1 Cor 15:24) Contrary to common mischaracterizations, Postmillennialists don't believe that we “usher in” the final return of Christ by overtaking the government, by forcing conversions, or by dominating culture and society in order to “force” holiness. In fact, this is exactly backwards from Postmillennial teaching. Instead, the teaching is that world dominion was the original project given to Adam, in which he failed miserably. Christ, as the second Adam, has succeeded in all points, and now the dominion mandate can continue as originally tasked. Postmils don't see Christianization of the earth as the engine of Christs overcoming the world (John 16:33), but rather the result of the work already begun by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. We wholeheartedly admit that, sometimes, it doesn't look like Jesus has all authority, but we cannot form our faith or doctrine based on what our eyes see. “Now in putting everything in subjection to Him, He left nothing outside His control. At present, we do not see all things in subjection to Him” (Heb 2:8) The grand project is to “Make all things new,” and not just on a physical, and personal level, as if Jesus only came to save individual people (of course He does, and how glorious that fact is!). Rather, the undoing of Adam's sin is what's in scope, which means the salvation of the world, in a cosmic sense. That is the ultimate project. Thus, by clinging to the Amil label, the O-Amil hobble themselves. They affirm the global scale of Jesus and His redemptive power, yet they cling to a position that fundamentally opposes this idea. Either you are optimistic about the spread of the gospel in History, and affirm that the Kingdom will greatly affect mankind on a global scale, or you hold to a Millennium that is predominantly spiritual, and disconnected from the world at large. You can't have it both ways. The O-Amil is good natured, and hopeful, but (I believe) afraid to allow this optimism to really sink into their bones. My hope is that any O-Amil reading this will see that there is really no need to invent a new category of Amillennialism, when the Postmillennial option exists. I hope this explanation helps those who are torn between one position and another. I do want to make it clear, I appreciate my Amil brethren. The work done in defending the now-present rule of Christ, the reality that Satan is bound now, and the symbolic period of time of the “thousand years” is extremely helpful and well laid out. I really hope that the Amil and Postmil can unite on all that we have in common.  In the end, I think my point can be appreciated by Amils and Postmils alike: Optimistic Amillennialists….Pick a lane! A brief response to an objection: Some will say that the cornerstone of Amillennialism is the non-literal nature of the Millennium. Meaning that the “thousand years” of Revelation 20 isn’t a literal 1,000 years. The punchline of this argument is that the majority of Postmils are actually Amillennial, since the average postmil will agree that the Millennium isn't a specific period of time. However, not all Postmillennialists agree with the symbolic Millennium. Historic Postmils of the Puritan variety, affirm a yet-future, literal 1,000 year period of explosive gospel growth and success. I do not believe the Amillennial has a patent on the non-literal interpretation, any more than the Premillennialist has a patent on the literal interpretation. In theory, even a Premil could hold to a non-literal period of time for the Millennium, as long as Christ came back before that symbolic millennium began. Again, the term “Amillennial” has little to do with the timing of the Millennium, and pertains more to the nature or conditions of the Millennium. After all, if timing is the main issue, then technically all Amils are in fact PostMillennial. Thus, I do not accept the premise that all non-literal interpretations of the “thousand years” are inherently Amillennial.