1070AD-REFORMATION: Gog & Magog

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1070-REFORMATION: : Assyrians | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: Surrounded | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: Threat of Extinction | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: Kingdom Besieged | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: Surrounded | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: The Kingdom Besieged | Gog & Magog
1070-REFORMATION: Besieged | Gog & Magog
1070AD-REFORMATION: Kingdom Under Siege | Gog & Magog
1070AD-REFORMATION: Besieged by Satan's armies
1070-Reformation: Satan Released
REFORMATION: "Fire from Heaven" compared with divine deliverance of old Jerusalem by angel from Heaven during Hezekiah
1070AD-REFORMATION: Saints tested by Satan's release, Rev 20:7-10: Saints under seige like ancient Israel.

Revelation 20:7-9 ~foreseen around 63AD
Now when the thousand years have expired, Satan will be released from his prison 8 and will go out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea. 9 They went up on the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them. ...
NASB

Saint Augustine explains early orthodox view of verses 20:7-9 of Revelation
The words, “And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and encompassed the camp of the saints and the beloved city,” do not mean that they have come, or shall come, to one place, as if the camp of the saints and the beloved city should be in some one place; for this camp is nothing else than the Church of Christ extending over the whole world. And consequently wherever the Church shall be,—and it shall be in all nations, as is signified by “the breadth of the earth,”—there also shall be the camp of the saints and the beloved city, and there it shall be encompassed by the savage persecution of all its enemies; for they too shall exist along with it in all nations,—that is, it shall be straitened, and hard pressed, and shut up in the straits of tribulation, but shall not desert its military duty, which is signified by the word “camp.”

The words, “And fire came down out of heaven and devoured them,” are not to be understood of the final punishment which shall be inflicted when it is said, “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire;” (Matt 25:41), for then they shall be cast into the fire, not fire come down out of heaven upon them. In this place “fire out of heaven” is well understood of the firmness of the saints, wherewith they refuse to yield obedience to those who rage against them. For the firmament is “heaven,” by whose firmness these assailants shall be pained with blazing zeal, for they shall be impotent to draw away the saints to the party of Antichrist. This is the fire which shall devour them, and this is “from God;” for it is by God’s grace the saints become unconquerable, and so torment their enemies. For as in a good sense it is said, “The zeal of Thine house hath consumed me,” Ps. 119:9, so in a bad sense it is said, “Zeal hath possessed the uninstructed people, and now fire shall consume the enemies,” Isaiah 26:11. Saint Augustine's City of God and Christian Doctrine, pages 692-3

This period immediately following the 1000 Years Millennium answers to the Old Testament period of the scattering of the 10 Northern tribes and the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians during the reign of Hezekiah as reported by Isaiah. In analogous Christian history, Satan was released for a while to test and prove the New Jerusalem (Rev 20:7-9) in like manner as was the old Jerusalem. Historical accounts are given to reveal "the spirit of the age," that is, its telling marks & character, or "zeitgeist" of this period in Christian history reminiscent of that of ancient Israel under seige. On both occasions, heaven came to the rescue of the holy remnant of the Israel of God: the true believers, the saints.

It should be noted, however, that the king of Christians, the immortal King Jesus, will never err like King Hezekiah who later invited in the Babylonian spies, bequeathing His reign to heirs like Manasseh and Amon, and thereby losing the kingdom and Jerusalem to destruction again and again. So the analogy between Old Testament history and Christian history ends with the miraculous deliverance from seige under the reign of good King Hezekiah. Henceforth, Christian history is a blank page ready to be co-authored between God and Man: our Tomorrows are determined by what we do with Jesus Today and not by prophetic judgments upon generations long passed. There will never be a destruction of the Heavenly Jerusalem of which Christians are citizens; not by the Babylonians nor again and again by the Romans. The reign of Christ and His Kingdom, Christendom itself, endures forever and ever. Amen.

The events of World History are listed in this section to illustrate the "spirit of the age" that characterised this dark period between the "Thousand Years" (Millennium) and modern times. This dark period from 1070AD to the Reformation is characterized as follows:

  • The New Jerusalem, (ie, the global community of the true Christians), was subjected to same test of Isaiah's day that took away all of Israel & Judah leaving the mother-city Jerusalem alone and surrounded by the horde of enemies on every side.  Under siege and threat of extinction, both old and new Jerusalem, (the camp of the saints, the beloved city), were rescued suddenly with divine deliverance that consumed all enemies:  old Jerusalem by an angel from heaven, new Jerusalem by fire from heaven.
  • God's People under siege on every side, Turks & Wars & Black Death Plagues without and heretics running rampant within, True Faithful Christians face the greatest challenge to their survival since the Roman Empire was overcome for Christ.
  • From early Reformers like John Wycliffe to later Reformers like Martin Luther, the period following 1070AD is considered a Dark Age, a challenging season in Christian history. And secular historians have similar words for the period of World history. [It should be mentioned here that I regard the Reformation fires to have begun with the likes of John Wycliffe and ending with the likes of Martin Luther & Jean Calvin. Thus, the Reformation beginning with Wycliffe gave rise to the Renaissance, "the rebirth" that followed. Progress is preceeded by preaching]. Relative to the 1000 year Millennium just finished and Eternity just ahead, this period of Satan's Release is a "short while."
  • World History is cited to demonstrate the "zeitgheist" or "spirit of the age" of this dark period before the Reformation fire came like "fire from Heaven" to rescue the faithful from enemies on every side. 

"Having given my Conjecture, that the Jewish Church, with their rulers, were the Antichrist mentioned by St. Paul; I proceed to shew, how their Apostasy, when they were thus deserted by God, resembled, and ran Parallel to the Apostasy of the Roman Church." (Additional comments on II Thess. 2). ~ Daniel Whitby (1710)

Assyrians | Gog & Magog

Divine deliverance of old Jerusalem by an "Angel from Heaven"
compared to
Divine deliverand of new Jerusalem by "Fire from Heaven"

OLD TESTAMENT SAINTS
Old Jerusalem receives sudden, divine deliverance from existence-threatening siege by an angel from Heaven.
NEW TESTAMENT SAINTS
"The Camp of the Saints, the Beloved City" receives sudden, divine deliverance from existence-threatening siege by "fire from Heaven."

2 Kings 18:9-19:37

17 And the king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rabsaris and Rab-shakeh from Lachish to king Hezekiah with a great host against Jerusalem. And they went up and came to Jerusalem.

32 Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it.
33 By the way that he came, by the same shall he return, and shall not come into this city, saith the Lord.
34 For I will defend this city, to save it, for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake.
35 And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.
36 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.
37 And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him
with the sword: and they escaped into the land of Armenia. And Esar-haddon his son reigned in his stead.

 Revelation 20:7-10
And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,
8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.
9 And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed
the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.
10 And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

Commentary
This passage begins by stating that the Assyrians already took away the cities of Israel & Judah before approaching Jerusalem.  Those taken away were hardly heard from ever again, even considered "the lost tribes of Israel."  Even when some were allowed to return to the land of Israel much later, they were ever after referred to as "Samaritans," never quite "God's People " ever again.  This was, then, a circumstance in which the very existence of God's Covenant People, Jerusalem was threatened with extinction more than any time since the Exodus which preceded the conquest of the promised land and the establishment of the kingdom.
Commentary
LIkewise, this siege by Gog & Magog was envisioned as a circumstance in which the very existence of "the Camp of the Saints, the beloved City" was threatened with extinction more than any time since the Tribulation which preceded the 1000-years Millennium.  Such were the circumstances of true Christian believers everywhere when the fire of the Reformation suddenly came as a deliverance from Heaven.
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