The world seems to be getting worse. Things feel more tense, more dangerous and, in many ways, simply stranger. We have more information than at any other time in history, and much of it is unreliable. For a lot of Christians, that combination makes the end times a source of anxiety rather than hope.
It doesn’t have to be. The Bible’s picture of the end is a picture of hope: “Behold, I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5). Here is a framework for thinking about the end times that keeps Jesus at the center.
Three Questions for Building a Theology
When a topic is hard, three questions help:
1. What does the Bible say? Always the place to start. 2. What has the church said for 2,000 years? We are not the first believers to wrestle with these passages, and many wiser people have gone before us. 3. What fruit does it produce? Jesus said of false prophets, “You will recognize them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). What is true of teachers is true of teaching. A belief that leaves people anxious, obsessed or stuck deserves a second look.
Distraught or Distracted
People who become deeply invested in the end times often end up one of two ways. Some become distraught: every headline raises the question, “Is this it? Will I make it?” Others become distracted: they hunt for secret knowledge about dates, signs and symbols while the real issues in their lives go untouched.
In John 4, when Jesus gently brings up the Samaritan woman’s broken marriages, she quickly changes the subject to a theological debate: “Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship” (John 4:20). It is easy to mask real pain with deep-sounding theology. But details about the 144,000 will not heal a broken family or break an addiction. The cross of Jesus will.
The Four Pillars Every Christian Holds
Christians disagree about the timeline of the end times, but orthodox believers across the centuries agree on four pillars:
1. The second coming of Christ. It is bodily: “This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11). And it is imminent: nothing can stop it, and no one knows when. 2. The resurrection of the dead, both the righteous and the unrighteous. 3. The final judgment, when all evil is done away with and people are judged by whether their names are written in the Lamb’s book of life (Revelation 20:12-15). 4. The new heavens and the new earth, where God’s people will live with Him forever.
Every view below holds all four. The disagreement is about timing, and it centers on the thousand years described in Revelation 20, known as the millennium.
The Four Views of the Millennium
Premillennialism is the oldest view, going back to the early church. The church age moves into a time of tribulation. Believers are raised and caught up with the Lord (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17), and Christ returns at once to reign on earth for a literal thousand years. Then come the resurrection of the unrighteous, the final judgment and the new creation.
Amillennialism became widespread around AD 400 to 500. It reads the thousand years as symbolic of the present church age, in which Christ already reigns from heaven. At His return, the dead are raised, the judgment takes place, and the new creation begins.
Postmillennialism grew in the centuries after the Reformation. It holds that as the gospel spreads, the world will gradually grow better until it enters a millennial age, after which Christ returns.
Dispensational premillennialism is the newest and most detailed view, arising in the 1800s and spread widely through the Scofield Reference Bible and later the Ryrie Study Bible. It teaches a rapture of the church before a seven-year tribulation, the restoration of Israel, a rebuilt temple and the rise of the Antichrist, followed by Christ’s return and a literal thousand-year reign. It is the view held by the Assemblies of God, the fellowship Citylight Church belongs to.
A simple way to remember them: the premillennialist says things will get worse and worse, and then Jesus comes back. The postmillennialist says things will get better and better, and then Jesus comes back. The amillennialist says it doesn’t matter how things get, because Jesus is coming back.
Daniel’s Seventy Weeks
Much of the debate turns on Daniel 9:24-27, the prophecy of “seventy weeks,” literally “seventy sevens,” usually read as 490 years. After sixty-nine of those weeks, “an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing” (Daniel 9:26). Counted from the decrees to rebuild Jerusalem in Ezra 7 or Nehemiah 2, the timeline lands in the days of Jesus. Read this way, the prophecy points to the Messiah and His finished work.
Dispensational teaching reads the first sixty-nine weeks the same way, but places an indefinite gap before the seventieth week, sometimes called “the great parenthesis.” That gap is the church age, and the seventieth week becomes a future seven-year tribulation. The system is detailed and carefully built, but it is also a house of cards: every piece depends on every other piece. Its great risk is a high view of world events and a low view of the finished work of Jesus Christ. Whatever view we hold, no politician, policy, country or party should ever take the place of Jesus in our hope for the future.
Seeing in a Mirror Dimly
So which view is right? Paul gives the humblest and most honest answer: “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face” (1 Corinthians 13:12). On the details of the end times, we are looking through a dim mirror. When we see Jesus face to face, we will know fully. The second coming of Christ will be the great clarifier.
That means the goal is not certainty about every detail. It is being comfortable holding the tension of the mystery, while standing firm on the four pillars.
What Daniel Did When the Times Were Troubling
Daniel lived through upheaval: Babylon had fallen to the Medes and Persians. His response is a model. He “perceived in the books” what God had spoken through Jeremiah (Daniel 9:2), and then he turned to the Lord in prayer. While he was still praying, God sent understanding, and the word he received was a revelation of the coming Messiah.
The last book of the Bible opens the same way. Before any beasts or bowls or trumpets, its first words are “The revelation of Jesus Christ” (Revelation 1:1). The point of Bible prophecy is not a chart. It is a Person.
Hopeful About Tomorrow
You do not have to be distraught, and you do not have to be distracted. When the news is troubling, do what Daniel did: go to the Word, pray, and fix your eyes on Jesus. He reigns now, He is coming back, and He is making all things new.
That is why Christians can be hopeful about tomorrow. As Paul wrote, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).