A NOTE ON THE INTERPRETATION PRESENTED ON THIS CHART

While  the interpretive position as shown on this chart is amillennial, it differs somewhat from other standard amillennial interpretations.  There are several reasons for this.

First, it is our position that in the prophecies of Revelation, the Great Dragon is emblematic of pagan, idolatrous kingdoms in opposition to the kingdom of God.  Therefore, it is to the binding of these pagan powers that we look in interpreting these symbols.

Second, it is also our position that the Bible is clear about the death-state; that man has no inherent immortal soul, and that mankind in general must sleep until the times of resurrection in the last trumpet.  It is our position that the first resurrection does indicate a hope of rising to life prior to that time, but only for those who by a life of intense self-sacrifice or martyrdom attain to it.

Third, with regard to the timing of the 1000 years, we have attempted to synchronize the visions of the dragon as seen in Revelation 12-13, and Revelation 20.  It is our belief that the dragon cannot go into the abyss until the last of its pagan ten horns is crowned upon the beast to whom it gives its power and authority.  The ten pagan kingdoms which destroyed the western Roman Empire are those which are symbolized on the seventh head of the beast, and the last of these kingdoms, being overthrown and submitted to the beast represents the time when the dragon becomes bound.  All of the periods in which this take place fall under the period of the fifth trumpet when the abyss is opened.  Hence, as the beast rises from the abyss, the dragon is cast into the abyss.

It should not be thought that the binding up of the dragon represents the absence  of wickedness in the world.  While the beast represents a wicked apostate form of 'Christianity', the atheistic, idolatrous paganism would not rise again until the time of the French Revolution, and has progressed with increasing intensity until this day.  After Revelation 13, it is only until a time within that of the seventh trumpet that we again hear of the dragon.

Finally, we must concede that the phrase '1000 years' in our interpretation cannot be taken on the prophetic day / year scale and may be largely symbolic as it represents the heavenly  reign of those who 'loved not their lives unto death'.  It is however interesting that in the scheme as we have presented it, the period from which the dragon is bound to the period in which it is released, when the atheistic, paganistic spirit which gave rise to the French Revolution first appeared, is in fact roughly 1000 years.