City of God by Augustine (available from Amazon or free on the internet, here for example)
Firstly we see that he definitely takes an amillennial view: 'In the meantime, while the Devil is bound for a thousand years, the saints reign with Christ, also for a thousand years; which are without doubt to be taken in the same sense, and as denoting the same period, that is, the period beginning with Christ's first coming.'
Then he continues to unpack various parts of Revelation, including who Gog and Magog are; the meaning of the dead given by the sea and by Death and Hades; what are the new heavens and the new earth.
Then Augustine turns to Peter's eschatology in 2 Peter 3.
This is followed by a look at Paul's eschatology in 1 & 2 Thessalonians, particularly the Antichrist and the 'catching up in the air' of saints who are still alive.
What grabbed me
I must agree wholeheartedly with Augustine's statement about the book of Revelation: 'Now in this book called the Apocalypse there are, to be sure, many obscure statements, designed to exercise the mind of the reader; and there are few statements there whose clarity enables us to track down the meaning of the rest, at the price of some effort.'
I find Revelation very difficult and I'm not sure in my ministry that I will ever be confident enough to systematically preach or lead a Bible study through it.
Conclude Book 20 by reading Chapters 21 to 30.
Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.
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