“Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue? What’s happened to the world?” “A great Shadow has departed,” said Gandalf, and then he laughed and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days upon days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known.
J. R. R. TOLKIEN, The Lord of the Rings
Once upon a time the earth was whole and beautiful, shimmering like an emerald, filled with glory, bursting with anticipation. Such wonders waiting to be unveiled, such adventures waiting to be ours. Creation was a fairy tale, a great legend—only true.
Once upon a time we were whole and beautiful too, glorious, striding through the Garden like the sons and daughters of God. A daughter of God is a goddess; a son of God is a god. “I said, ‘You are “gods”; you are all sons of the Most High’” (Psalm 82:6). We were holy and powerful; we ruled the earth and animal kingdom with loving-kindness.
But Eden was vulnerable; something dark slithered in the shadows. Something most foul and sinister. Banished from heaven, Satan and his fallen warriors came seeking revenge:
To waste his whole Creation, or possess
All as our own, and drive as we were driven,
The punie habitants, or if not drive,
Seduce them to our Party, that thir God
May prove thir foe, and with repenting hand
Abolish his own works. This would surpass
Common revenge, and interrupt his joy
. . . when his darling Sons
Hurl’d headlong to partake with us, shall curse
Thir frail Originals, and faded bliss,
Faded so soon.1
If the coming Restoration is to be fulfilled on the earth and in our lives, Satan and his armies must be destroyed. He must never be allowed in again.
We are letting the great stories awaken our imaginations to the coming kingdom, fill our hearts with brilliant images and hopeful expectation. Let us seize the moment crucial to the climax of every story and the redemption we long to see: that glorious moment when evil is defeated.
Whether as children or adults, many of us fell in love with Aslan, the noble Christ-lion of Narnia. We can’t forget that terrible scene when the White Witch drives the dagger into the Great Lion’s heart with such evil relish.
She stood by Aslan’s head. Her face was working and twitching with passion, but his looked up at the sky, still quiet, neither angry nor afraid, but a little sad. Then, just before she gave the blow, she stooped down and said in a quivering voice, “And now, who has won? Fool, did you think that by all this you would save the human traitor? Now I will kill you instead of him as our pact was and so the Deep Magic will be appeased. But when you are dead what will prevent me from killing him as well? And who will take him out of my hand then? Understand that you have given me Narnia forever, you have lost your own life and you have not saved his. In that knowledge, despair and die.” The children did not see the actual moment of the killing. They couldn’t bear to look and had covered their eyes.2
A heartbreaking scene for every child-heart, young and old. If we did not know the end of the story it would be unbearable. How much greater our joy, then, when the resurrected Aslan leads his army to victory and avenges himself upon the Witch:
There stood Peter and Edmund and all the rest of Aslan’s army fighting desperately against the crowd of horrible creatures whom [Lucy] had seen last night; only now, in the daylight, they looked even stranger and more evil and more deformed. There also seemed to be far more of them. Aslan’s army—which had their backs to her—looked terribly few. And there were statues dotted all over the battlefield, so apparently the Witch had been using her wand. But she did not seem to be using it now. She was fighting with her stone knife. It was Peter she was fighting—both of them going at it so hard that Lucy could hardly make out what was happening; she only saw the stone knife and Peter’s sword flashing so quickly that they looked like three knives and three swords. That pair were in the centre. On each side the line stretched out. Horrible things were happening wherever she looked.
“Off my back, children,” shouted Aslan. And they both tumbled off. Then with a roar that shook all Narnia from the Western lamp-post to the shores of the Eastern sea the great beast flung himself upon the White Witch. Lucy saw her face lifted towards him for one second with an expression of terror and amazement.3
At last. At last. Doesn’t something deep in your being resonate with this moment? Please, Lord, yes. Vanquish evil. Make it soon.
There are many moments of righteous justice in the long battle with darkness Tolkien so powerfully portrays in his Rings trilogy. One of my favorites (Hollywood seized on it too) takes place on the Pelennor Fields during the last great battle for Middle Earth, when brave Éowyn destroys the witch king of Angmar, terror of men, leader of the Nazgul. That foul prince of darkness is about to unmake her lord and king, who has fallen:
Out of the wreck rose the Black Rider, tall and threatening, towering above her. With a cry of hatred that stung the very ears like venom he let fall his mace. Her shield was shivered in many pieces, and her arm was broken; she stumbled to her knees. He bent over her like a cloud, and his eyes glittered; he raised his mace to kill.
But suddenly he too stumbled forward with a cry of bitter pain, and his stroke went wide, driving into the ground. Merry’s sword had stabbed him from behind, shearing through the black mantle, and passing up beneath the hauberk had pierced the sinew behind his mighty knee.
“Éowyn! Éowyn!” cried Merry. Then tottering, struggling up, with her last strength she drove her sword between crown and mantle, as the great shoulders bowed before her. The sword broke sparkling into many shards. The crown rolled away with a clang. Éowyn fell forward upon her fallen foe. But lo! the mantle and hauberk were empty. Shapeless they lay now on the ground, torn and tumbled; and a cry went up into the shuddering air, and faded to a shrill wailing, passing with the wind, a voice bodiless and thin that died, and was swallowed up, and was never heard again in that age of this world.4
You’ll find this moment in nearly every story you love. Sometimes at the movies I can’t help but yell out, “Yes!” when it happens. It’s a little embarrassing, but I can’t contain myself—not so much because of the story I’m watching, but because of the Day I am longing for with every fiber of my being.
OUR STORY
We love the fall of the Nazgul leader because it echoes this scene from our story:
Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—Gog and Magog—and to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever. (Revelation 20:7–10)
A moment of silence, please.
Pause and let this be true: evil is judged and utterly destroyed. Forever and ever. Not just in the fairy tale, but here in reality, in our Story. Satan, his armies, and every form of evil are destroyed with a punishment that never ends, under justice unrelenting.
It feels like a ten-ton weight being lifted off my being.
What will it be like to no longer be assaulted? To be utterly free from accusation; to look in the mirror and hear no accusing thoughts or voices. To be completely free of all temptation and the sabotage of your character—not because you are successfully resisting it in a moment of great resolve, but because it is no longer in existence, anywhere in the world. What will it be like to have the dark clouds lifted between us and our beloved Jesus, that veil that so often clouds our relationship with him? Imagine when all the physical affliction, emotional torment, abuse—all the evil in this world has vanished.
Think of it—what evils will you no longer have to live with personally?
Oh, the joy we will experience when we get to watch with our own eyes the Enemy brought down for good, cast into his eternal torment! Oh, the hope that begins to rise at the thought of a world where the Enemy no longer gets to do what he does. To see our loved ones released from their lifelong battles. To be released from our own lifelong battles, knowing with utter surety that the kingdom of death and darkness is forever destroyed.
This is my favorite scene in the film The Last of the Mohicans, a story set in the French and Indian War of the mid-1700s. It was a vicious war, with savagery practiced on both sides. In the film the archvillain is a very twisted character, the Huron Indian named Magua. His mind and heart are so tormented with bitterness and bloodlust, he gives himself over to become wickedness incarnate. Magua is a betrayer and murderer; he destroys the lives and happiness of many people.
The Mohawk warrior Chingachgook is the father figure in the film, like our heavenly Father. He has two sons—Uncas, his son by birth, and Nathanial, his adopted white son. Late in the film Magua has cut out the heart of an English captain and taken his two daughters as slaves; the daughters are each the love of one of Chingachgook’s sons. (The bride taken captive, just as in our story.) The three warriors, father and sons, race to rescue them. Uncas reaches Magua first, but Magua is powerful; he kills the beautiful young Indian warrior and throws him off a cliff. His love, Alice, throws herself off behind him rather than become Magua’s sexual slave. Then the father arrives and takes his revenge. Magua is brought down; Chingachgook kills him with his battle-ax.
The evil one finally gets what he deserves; he is stopped, judged, and destroyed. Every time I see a scene like that, I remind Satan that this is his end. This is coming, I think. This is your end.
You long for this day, and you long for it in very particular ways.
A HEART FOR REDEMPTION
Some stories and images stay in your mind for years; sadly, it is usually the darker ones. I remember leafing through a catalog of WWII photos when I came across one I could not stop looking at. At first all I saw was a large group of soldiers milling about; then I realized they were standing in a few long lines, smoking and chatting like soldiers waiting to get into the mess hall or use the latrine. I looked down at the inscription, which explained this mob of Japanese soldiers was waiting their turn with Korean “comfort girls,” young captive women forced to have sex with hundreds of enemies every day.
I nearly threw up; I could even now as I tell you this. I wanted to scream; I wanted to do something about it.
The human race has showed itself capable of unspeakable evils at war. But war is now at our doorstep, and this practice has become a major global industry. Millions of human beings—including children—are forced into sexual acts every day on this planet; $186 billion is spent on prostitution worldwide annually.5 Friends of mine who minister to the victims report that the stories they are hearing now are far more heinous than they were even ten years ago.
What does your heart do with that? What does your soul do hearing the stories of boys and girls trafficked into sexual torment? Just last week I heard another, from a Christian woman who confided she was sold by her mother to men starting at age six. She would hide under their kitchen table, but her mother would turn her over and leave the house while she was raped. What do we do with such evil that fills our world every single day? Do we not cry out for justice? Do you not feel more and more every day like poor Lot, who “was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard” (2 Peter 2:8)? You know the torment of living in an evil age; it is traumatizing to the soul. How long, O Lord, how long?
Now read this passage:
After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven. He had great authority, and the earth was illuminated by his splendor. With a mighty voice he shouted:
“‘Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great!’
She has become a dwelling for demons
and a haunt for every impure spirit,
a haunt for every unclean bird,
a haunt for every unclean and detestable animal.
For all the nations have drunk
the maddening wine of her adulteries.
The kings of the earth committed adultery with her,
and the merchants of the earth grew rich from her
excessive luxuries.” (Revelation 18:1–3)
Human sin is not sufficient to explain the rampaging, unspeakable evil of this age. There are powerful, ancient dark spirits—those same fallen angels who invaded Eden—who are now deeply involved ensnaring, entrapping, fueling evil people, making war on holiness and on the human heart. The Whore of Babylon is the one behind the sex trade in all its dark corruptions; Scripture says she has made the world “drunk [with] the maddening wine of her adulteries” (Revelation 18:3). Truly, an intoxicated sexual madness has come over the earth. And she is going to be severely judged by our righteous Lord:
“Give back to her as she has given;
pay her back double for what she has done.
Pour her a double portion from her own cup.
Give her as much torment and grief
as the glory and luxury she gave herself.
In her heart she boasts,
‘I sit enthroned as queen.
I am not a widow;
I will never mourn.’
Therefore in one day her plagues will overtake her:
death, mourning and famine.
She will be consumed by fire,
for mighty is the Lord God who judges her.”
“When the kings of the earth who committed adultery with her and shared her luxury see the smoke of her burning, they will weep and mourn over her. Terrified at her torment, they will stand far off and cry:
“‘Woe! Woe to you, great city,
you mighty city of Babylon!
In one hour your doom has come!’”
” (Revelation 18:6–10)
This passage fills me with such relief, anticipation, and something like holy revenge. Think of every little girl and boy forced to have sex with corrupt adults; think of every woman and man drugged and held captive as sexual slaves. Think of the shattering of those human hearts. Now think of the shout that will go up when the Whore is cast down forever:
After this I heard what sounded like the roar of a great multitude in heaven shouting:
“Hallelujah!
Salvation and glory and power belong to our God,
for true and just are his judgments.
He has condemned the great prostitute
who corrupted the earth by her adulteries.
He has avenged on her the blood of his servants.”
And again they shouted:
“Hallelujah!
The smoke from her goes up for ever and ever.”
The twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God, who was seated on the throne.
And they cried:
“Amen, Hallelujah!”
Then a voice came from the throne, saying:
“Praise our God,
all you his servants,
you who fear him,
both great and small!”
Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting:
“Hallelujah!
For our Lord God Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and be glad
and give him glory!
For the wedding of the Lamb has come,
and his bride has made herself ready.
Fine linen, bright and clean,
was given her to wear.” (Revelation 19:1–8)
Won’t it be marvelous to hear that roar of rushing waters, the triumphant shout like thunder from the hosts of the kingdom? You will hear that shout, friends; you will join it with all the power of your lungs.
And I have named only one evil. Think of all the justice that needs to be served. You have a heart for redemption. Your kingdom heart longs for restoration and reconciliation, for justice, for the recovery of all that has been lost. What is the redemption that your heart longs for on a global level? What passions arouse your heart? Is your heart for a people group? A community or nation? For the arts or sciences? You have very particular passions for justice and redemption, and they will be realized. Your heart needs to know this—they will be realized.
The children of Israel were seduced by many evil powers. That ancient spirit Molek somehow—how was it possible?—compelled them to sacrifice their own children:
“They built high places for Baal in the Valley of Ben Hinnom to sacrifice their sons and daughters to Molek, though I never commanded—nor did it enter my mind—that they should do such a detestable thing and so make Judah sin.” (Jeremiah 32:35)
This, too, has become a global industry. I can hardly bear to think of an entire industry devoted to killing children in the holy sanctuary of their mothers’ wombs. No doubt it is fueled by Molek still, and Molek will be judged, just like the Whore; this heinous crime will end.
And what is the redemption your heart aches for on a personal level—for your family, your friends? What cries fill your prayers in the night? Oh, to see the day that alcohol no longer holds a family line in its grips, when abuse no longer tears a family apart. Nor poverty, nor shame, nor mental illness. You have very special and particular longings for redemption for those you love. And, my dear friends—those longings were given to you by the God who shares them, and they, too, will be fulfilled.
Can plunder be taken from warriors,
or captives be rescued from the fierce?
But this is what the LORD says:
“Yes, captives will be taken from warriors,
and plunder retrieved from the fierce;
I will contend with those who contend with you,
and your children I will save.
I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh;
they will be drunk on their own blood, as with wine.
Then all mankind will know
that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.” (Isaiah 49:24–26)
The promise of justice fulfilled is one of the great hopes of the coming kingdom.
JUSTICE WILL BE SERVED
We preach a gospel of mercy. But it is mercy bought at a terrible price. We are saved from the judgment of God, not because he decided to toss justice in the gutter, but because he poured it out upon his own Son on the cross. That mercy is being extended to all mankind—so long as we are in this age. But when the Day of the Lord arrives, justice will be served. A day of reckoning is coming, and we need it to be so.
Few of us may have made it through the 618 pages of Alexandre Dumas’s The Count of Monte Cristo, but many of you have seen the movie. The story centers around the betrayal and injustice suffered by an innocent man, Edmond Dantès. Falsely accused of treason by a treasonous French official, Edmond flies to the home of his best friend, Fernand Mondego, who out of envy and jealousy betrays Dantès to the police. He is sentenced to the island prison Château d’If, where he is tortured for fourteen years. Edmond escapes, thanks to the priest, and thanks to the priest he recovers the fabulous treasure that allows him to become the Count of Monte Cristo.
Late in the story, at the climax of the film, Dantès confronts Mondego while Edmond’s lifetime love and their son stand by. Edmond has every reason to take Mondego’s life, but instead offers him a chance to repent. Mondego refuses. Edmond gives him a chance to flee. But when Mondego will not relent in doing evil, when he tries to take Edmond’s life, Edmond kills him in a sword fight, and rightly so. There is a time for justice to be served. Even mercy has its limits.
This is where Hinduism, Buddhism, and other religions that deny or ignore the actual, personal existence of evil fall so short. (Branches of Christianity have done the same.) Without naming evil for exactly what it is, and without a day of reckoning, there can be no justice.
Imagine, friends, a world without evil. Every demon has been swept away. I will say more about who shares in the Great Restoration in chapter 9, but for now simply imagine a world without evil people, where everyone loves God and overflows with his holy love. You look to your right and left, and you only see people you can trust completely. Lot’s torment will no longer be ours; holiness will permeate all things. No wonder joy is the constant mood of the kingdom! Not to mention massive relief and vindication too.
Our age cries out for justice, especially the younger generations. I believe in those justice movements; I support them. But I fear a great heartbreak is coming unless we understand the timing of things. Until the evil one is bound and cast into the lake of fire, our efforts here will be only partially successful. “The poor you will always have with you” (Matthew 26:11). A dear, dear man just e-mailed me; he and his wife run an orphanage for abused and trafficked girls in Guatemala. He aches because he has to turn away girls every week. They simply have no room to take them all in. This is a terrible reality: our best efforts must be carried on, but they will not achieve justice on the earth until our Lord’s return.
I can hardly bear it; how do we carry on?
Only with the anchor of the soul; only with the sure and firm hope that this Day is coming. Justice is coming. Those at the forefront of the justice movements must have the palingenesia before them daily.
OUR LONGING WILL BE FULFILLED
I have till this moment skipped over an important part of the passage where Jesus announces the palingenesia, the Great Restoration. Now is a good time to pick it up:
Jesus replied, “Yes, you have followed me. In the re-creation of the world, when the Son of Man will rule gloriously, you who have followed me will also rule.” (Matthew 19:28 THE MESSAGE)
“You who have followed me will also rule.” We rule with Jesus. In the next chapter we will be unpacking that extensively, for it has to do with our roles in the new creation. But here we are speaking of the administration of justice when the evil one and all in his service are sentenced; I believe we have a role to play in that. We will be there when our Lord judges the evil that has oppressed our family. We will be called forward as witnesses for the prosecution. We will preside with him when justice is carried out on the evil that has been behind those causes dear to us—poverty, abuse, racism, human trafficking, and the destruction of the earth itself.
Intimate and personal justice will be granted to us as well.
You have suffered very specific wrongs over the course of your life; God is fully aware of every one of them. Jesus your King will make sure they are addressed with very specific reparations. Far be it from God to make light of it. “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea” (Matthew 18:6). He is furious about what you have endured, and he will make it right.
I know that so much has been stolen in my life. So many blessings, so many gifts, so much taken from my relationships, opportunities, personal restoration that was diminished or thwarted. You have too, dear ones—so much has been stolen from you. And it will be repaid a hundredfold. This recompense, this restitution must be part of telling every story rightly, or justice will not be fulfilled. And it will be fulfilled:
“Then you will look and be radiant,
your heart will throb and swell with joy;
the wealth on the seas will be brought to you,
to you the riches of the nations will come.” (Isaiah 60:5)
Imagine—after your enemies are judged and banished, great treasure chests are then brought in and set before you. Huge oak chests; it requires two men or angels to bring each one in, and there are several. Jesus tells you to open them. You ask, “What are these, Lord?” and he replies, These are the gifts I meant for you in your former life but were stolen or prevented from making it to you. I return them now, with interest. Imagine all that fills those chests. You hear laughter coming from one, for so much of what has been lost are memories and joy. I am weeping as I write this.
Then you turn to your right and ask, “And what are these chests, Lord?” These are the rewards for your life’s choices, your victories, your perseverance, and your service. In addition to your estates, of course, he says with a smile.
Those treasure chests are yours, friends; their contents will thrill your heart and redeem so much of what you have endured here. Justice shall be yours, justice personal and particular. Wrongs will be avenged, hurts shall be healed, and all that was stolen from you in this life will be recompensed far beyond your wildest hopes. You will open those chests, look, and be radiant. Your heart will throb and swell with joy.