Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #3 of Revelation chapter 20 and we are going to read Revelation 20:2-4:

And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season. And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.

I will stop reading there.  Last time we were looking at the “little season” that is spoken of at the end of verse 3 and we saw that those two Greek words are found four times together in the New Testament and we looked at John, chapter 7, where we saw that Christ indicated that He would be with them for a “little while.”  Let me read, again, John 7:33-34:

Then said Jesus unto them, Yet a little while am I with you, and then I go unto him that sent me. Ye shall seek me, and shall not find me: and where I am, thither ye cannot come.

It is very interesting how Christ said He will be with you for a “little while” or “little season” and then He would go to Him that sent Him.  Of course, historically, it fits that Jesus had entered into the world to demonstrate the things He had done in the atonement before the foundation of the world.  Then, after going to the cross and showing Himself alive for forty days, He went to be with His Father in Heaven.  But, again, this is the Bible and God hides spiritual truths in various ways.  In this case, we have hidden truth concerning the Feast of Tabernacles and that “last day,” the great day of the feast. 

Historically, you could say it was a feast that took place during Christ’s ministry.  That is accurate historically, but as we search the Bible, the reference to “the last day” ties into the last day of the world.  It ties in because Christ said, “And I will raise him up at the last day,” in referring to the time of the resurrection at the last day, even though it is cast in the historical setting of an actual Feast of Tabernacles that Jesus would attend.  We know that.  Likewise, the statement, “And yet a little season I am with you,” has an historical setting during Christ’s earthly ministry.  But, spiritually, we can look at that phrase “the last day” where it is used elsewhere in the Bible and we find it ties into statements like, “The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day,” or  “And I will raise him up at the last day.”  Again, and again, God relates this phrase to the end of time and, here in John 7, He connects it to the Feast of Tabernacles.

Now we follow the term “little season” from Revelation, chapter 20, which identifies with the short period of the Great Tribulation and it takes us to John 7 and it fits exactly with our understanding of what God did during the last part of the Great Tribulation.  Christ was in the world saving the great multitude for the “little season.”  He was with us doing the work of the Father in salvation and then He left the world following the “little season,” in order to begin bringing judgment upon the world.  Since He left on May 21, 2011, men seek Him but they cannot find Him.  People, in their various false religions and gospels, encourage others to seek the Lord and, yet, no one has found Him in regard to salvation since that date.  So we see these two words in John 7:33-34 fit very well with what happened during the Great Tribulation and thereafter.

Also, it says in John 12:35:

Then Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you…

Here again, the words translated as “little while” are the same words as translated as “little season.”  Just to remind us, it ties in to our verse regarding the loosing of Satan in Revelation 20:3:

… and after that he must be loosed a little season.

He must be loosed a “little while” or “little season,” the 23 years of the Great Tribulation that lasted from May 21, 1988 to May 21, 2011.  This period of time is the “little season,” and Jesus says in John 12:35:

Then Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you…

This was the case, was it not?  The light of the Gospel was shining brilliantly all over the earth outside of the churches and congregations for a “little while” or a “little season.”  Christ is making reference to the light of the Gospel and warning people: “Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you.”  The word “come upon” is Strong’s #2638 and it is the same word translated as “overtake” or “overtaken” in 1Thessalonians, chapter 5.  This is not accidental, as God says in 1Thessalonians 5:3-5:

For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape. But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.

The word “overtake” is the same word translated as “come upon” in John 12:35 and they are tied together, as it says, “Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light.”  The time you have the light is the “day of salvation,” and then darkness will “overtake” you.  Then it goes on to say in John 12:36:

While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light…

God indicates that His elect are saved and, therefore, they are “children of light” and that is the same thing it says in 1Thessalonians, chapter 5, when it says, “But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.”  God’s true people were saved during the day of salvation and they are not going to attempt to get themselves saved and they are not beseeching the Lord after the light of the Gospel has gone out and we are in the Day of Judgment.  God’s people recognize that the “night” has come.

Let us go back to John 9.  It is good to go over these Scriptures because they are very important and pertinent to our present time.  Again, it says in John 9:3:

Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.

Again, what are the works of God, according to John 6, verse 29?  “This is the work of God, that ye believe,” so the work of God is belief in granting saving faith (Christ) to sinners.  Then Jesus says in John 9:4:

I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.

Do you see how there is a contrast being made between “day” and “night” and “light” and “darkness”?  That is because the “day” is the “day of salvation” in which the work of saving was to be performed by Christ; He did the work of saving sinners and he could only do that work while it was day because “the night cometh, when no man can work.  As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”  It was the light of Christ or the light of the Gospel that accomplished the salvation of God’s elect and when He stopped saving people, it was as if the light left.  That is why God says, “Immediately after the tribulation, the sun shall be darkened.”  Who is typified by the sun?  It is Christ.  He is the bridegroom and Psalm 19 likens the bridegroom to a sun that comes out of His chamber.  In Psalm 84, God likens Himself to “a sun and shield.”  So the darkened sun happens immediately after the Tribulation and it is an indicator that the Light of the world is gone; He has departed and is no longer saving anyone and God’s Gospel program to find the lost sheep of the house of Israel is done.  It has been triumphant and Christ has been victorious in saving all those to become saved, all those named in the Lamb’s Book of Life.  The house of the strong man has been completely plundered and all the vessels unto honour have been gathered.

Let us remind ourselves of “the day.”  While it is day Christ works, but when the night comes, no man can work.  In John, chapter 11, God gives more details about “the day,” in John 11:9:

Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.

Again, there is an emphasis on walking in “the day,” during those twelve hours. But, it goes on to say in John 11:10:

But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.

That is because Jesus is not doing the work of granting faith.  No “man” can work in the night.  In the night, you are in darkness and you stumble.  In the night, no one is being saved.  Anyone seeking to “walk by faith” in obtaining salvation will, ultimately, fall.  They are going to stumble over the Word of God, the Lord Jesus Christ.  This is a key statement to help us understand exactly when it was that God did do His saving work and when He stopped doing that work: “I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day.”  In John 11, Christ notes that there are “twelve hours in a day.”  Now we have a definition for “the day.”  Does God tell us anything else about a twelve-hour period in the Bible?  The answer is, “Yes.”  In a parable in Matthew, chapter 20, we have the account of the householder who hired laborers to work in his vineyard; he hired them at various intervals.  It says in Matthew 20:5-6:

Again he went out about the sixth and ninth hour, and did likewise. And about the eleventh hour…

The day would start at 6AM and the sixth hour would 12PM and the ninth hour would be 3PM and the eleventh hour would be 5PM.  In our modern age between 5PM and 6PM is typically when our work day comes to an end.  So it says in Matthew 20:6-8:

And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard; and whatsoever is right, that shall ye receive. So when even was come…

The word “even” is a word for “night” and it would have been 6PM, after that “one hour.”  The work day was twelve hours long; they were hired at the eleventh hour, so they only worked an hour until 6PM.  Night has now come and the day of work in the vineyard of the householder is done.  It is finished and now they come to get paid their wages.  It says in Matthew 20:8:

So when even was come, the lord of the vineyard saith unto his steward, Call the labourers, and give them their hire, beginning from the last unto the first. And when they came that were hired about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first came, they supposed that they should have received more; and they likewise received every man a penny. And when they had received it, they murmured against the goodman of the house, Saying, These last have wrought but one hour, and thou hast made them equal unto us, which have borne the burden and heat of the day.

We are not going to get into other aspects of this parable regarding the “fairness” of the householder’s right to pay the wage he had determined, but we are looking at the length of the day.  Jesus said in John 11, “Are there not twelve hours in a day?”  Jesus said in John 9, “I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day.”  Here we find laborers that were hired at the eleventh hour for one hour.  All the other laborers were hired at even intervals spaced three hours apart, indicating God’s “purpose” for the time of gathering the fruit of His salvation program.  God operated in a very orderly and systematic way to gather in the firstfruits in the churches, but toward the end of “the day,” God changed the pattern.  He did not hire workers at even intervals, but he hired them at the last hour.

We still use that expression today, “the eleventh hour,” and it comes right from the Bible.  The householder (God) hired them and He was gracious.  He was generous and he paid them equally, just as he paid the other laborers.  That was his privilege and right to do, but the important thing is that the twelve-hour day is God’s illustration of the day of salvation.  This twelve-hour day outlined in this parable is an overall picture of God’s salvation program in which work was to be performed in salvation while it was day.  There was a change in the pattern from the eleventh to the twelfth hour as laborers were hired to work just “one hour” and it was the “last hour,” and God likens the Great Tribulation to “one hour.”    The “one hour” is the last hour of the work day and that is exactly how the Great Tribulation fit into God’s plan of times and seasons.  There was an expanded “day of salvation” when God was saving during the church age for 1,955 years and it was by far the biggest span of the “day of salvation.” 

Yet, there is a change in the program because for the final “hour” of the Great Tribulation (the “little season”) God did not use the churches.  He utilizes those that were not part of the churches or those that had been called out and He hires them to work in His vineyard for the “last hour.”  Although we do not see this in this particular parable, it was the greatest time of salvation in God’s program of salvation.  What happened at the end of the Great Tribulation and the “little season”?  Immediately the sun was darkened and God completed His salvation program and Christ ended His work of salvation.  We knew that and we had known that for years.  We knew the Great Tribulation would be 23 years and that God would complete His salvation program by the end of the Great Tribulation, followed by Judgment Day “in those days after that tribulation.”  Immediately, the sun was darkened because the twelve-hour day had come to a close.  The Great Tribulation ended because it was the “last hour.”  There is no more “day” following the Great Tribulation.  The twelfth hour is finished and then comes the “even” or the “night” when, as Jesus said, “no man can work.” 

There is no one working in God’s vineyard now.  Yes, there are churches that say they are still working and there are ministries that claim they are all about working in their Father’s vineyard, but God is the owner of the vineyard.  He is the Husbandman or householder.  He is the one that hired the laborers and sent them forth.  He is the one that completed His work within the churches as He used faithful laborers at that time.  He is the one that completed His work at the final “hour,” using those that had been standing idle all the day to minister the Gospel for the little period outside of the churches and congregations.  God is the one who closed the work day.  That is what He did.  He shut the door of heaven.  He put out the light of the Gospel because the twelve hours was complete and He brought spiritual “night” to the world in which “no man” can work, no matter what mankind may say.  They can say, “I am working.  I am busy in the vineyard.  God is saving.”  It is not true.  It does not fit any time period.  The great multitude came out of Great Tribulation.  Remember the question that was asked: “Whence came they?”  The response was, in Revelation 7:13: “These are they which came out of great tribulation.”  It says in Luke 13:24:

Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.

Jesus said in John 7:34, “Ye shall seek me, and shall not find me.”  When will this happen?  It says in Luke 13:25:

When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:

Again, read Revelation 7, where it says, “Whence came they?”  It is the same word.  They had to come from some “season” of fruitful time?  Did they come in as the firstfruits?  No, these are the final fruits that came out of Great Tribulation, but then the door was shut.  The Latter Rain ended and all the precious fruit of the earth had been produced and now here come others after God has ended His program of salvation in His times and seasons.  They come after the season and after the twelve-hour day.  They are trying to knock and, yet, it is dark and it is night.  When they say, “Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are.”  In other words, they are not His firstfruits and they are not His final fruits, so He is saying, “These are the fruits of my New Testament age and these are my final fruits of the Great Tribulation and from whence come you?  What other season is there?”  There is no other season and there is no extension to the twelve-hour day.  The close of the Great Tribulation was the end of the twelfth hour and then came the “even.”