As we examine various points of view on Revelation, we must take into the question of the conflicts and troubles coming at the “end of the age“. No matter how one defines this phrase, there is an approaching day of judgment, bloodshed, and woe.
I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be taken and the other left.
Luke 17:34
As we looked at elsewhere, there are reasons why the current dispensational paradigm is so widely adopted. This view looks at a great conflict between an anti-christ empire and a coming Kingdom of God. Of course, looking at the statements in Daniel and the Gospels, it becomes apparent that the Kingdom of God has already come, it has destroyed the statue that Nebuchadnezzar saw (because it no longer exists in any form today), and this fact leaves the any view of a mostly-fulfilled book of Revelation (often referred to as “preterism”) in direct odds with Dispensationalism on several fundamental points.
Because Daniel 2:44’s setting up of the Kingdom (see more here) is understood to be Christ’s first coming, we see what has come about causing such a division between the two understandings. Daniel’s visions in Daniel 2 and Daniel 7 both point to a great conflict between a world-wide, one-world government and the in-breaking of the Kingdom of God to overthrow this. This is clearly the depiction of nearly all of Daniel’s visions, and it is no wonder that when you take the prophecies of Daniel 2 to be not fully completed you would look forward to the future for such a conflict to occur, whatever it might be. By claiming that the Kingdom must refer to a future installment of the Kingdom (a premise that is never really supported in the New Testament, as further study indicates), it is no wonder that this conclusion is reached.
Looking at the statue of Daniel 2 as already having been broken (see here), however, one must come to realize that the specific conflict talked about in Daniel 2 and Daniel 7 has already taken place, in history, with the ending of Rome. Remember, too, this fact has not stopped the persecution and the work of the spirit of anti-christ from being active in the world, as is directly evidenced by the rise of demonic world rulers, murderers, such as Stalin, Hitler, and other infamous leaders in history.
The issue with the conflict in Daniel 2 is that we were not there to see the fall of the statue, and so, not having been a witness, and not having been taught its significance, when we understand that Daniel’s statue must fall down, we do not appreciate that it already has. Fancy stories and fables, and a stringing together of current events in supposition that they are supposedly in line to fulfill all of end times prophecy makes interesting dialogue, but it certainly doesn’t change mere inference that the events might take that course to them actually fulfilling them, especially not in the preconceived and imagined fashion that an interpreter might insist they have to be. God is the real judge when it comes down to interpreting His own Word, and everything beyond the text itself is no longer inspired.
Studying the statue of Daniel 2, we see war and conflict between the various kingdoms and materials that comprise the statue. Between each of the four successive kingdoms, we saw natural armaments and physical overthrow. Yet, even the most basic analysis of this statue and the vision from Daniel 7 indicates that while a new empire took over, the old one, in some fundamental form or way, remained. Hence, when the statue was completely destroyed, all four materials were destroyed together, the gold, the silver, and bronze, and the iron and iron mixed with clay. So, while physical war did not remove the previous element, the coming of the statue did. Why then, must we assume that the overthrow of the statue in all its parts by the rock cut out without hands must be of the same nature and character as the intermediate wars? If physical conflict could have removed them, then certainly it would have in the centuries prior, but instead, it only continued their legacy according to the dream. Instead, the superior Kingdom came, and without direct military overthrow, the kingdom, Babylon in all its four forms, that reigned over the entire Earth, was defeated spiritually as Daniel 7 indicates, and when it was, it was broken small together (Daniel 2:35 YLT), and no place was found for them, and the wind, often a type of the Spirit, scattered and blew them across the Earth. When the Spiritual power, or ruling and reigning principality of Babylon, hence Rome, was broken, the natural kingdom was scattered, being unable to be maintained without the spiritual force at work that was coordinating to hold it together.
Thus, we see a spiritual establishment of the Kingdom of God in the Earth, as typified by the church and its growth throughout history, remembering of course that as there are tares in amongst the wheat, that not that is or has been done in the name of the church is actually the church, it is not necessarily the Kingdom. Never to be abandoned or spoken ill of, the true church, the one the Lord Jesus is building (Matthew 16:18), is completely true (the wheat is always wheat and the tares are always tares) and will stand forever.
So, while conflict and upheavals have come since the dawning of the church, and will continue to come so long as evil is in the world, the great conflict prophesied by Daniel has come and gone in some of the most recorded events in history. It is no wonder that the time after the fall of Rome was called the “Dark Ages”, dark with regards to the light of the beast called Rome, and that modern, secular history laments the fall of such a demonic culture. But, he who is blinded by such pagan interpretations of history or believes the rebellious arguments blasted against God’s church and Kingdom, will fail to see that this was the work of the church.
When one side of the situation is visible, the Kingdom of Rome and the physical church, and the other is invisible, the spiritual realm, and the powers, throne, dominions, authorities, principalities, and rulers of wickedness in the heavenly places as compared to Christ seated on the throne far above them in all authority and dominion (Ephesians 1:19-20), the obvious “cause and effect” is missed. Worse yet, when unbelief dominates the theological landscape, so that these forces and minions under the command of satan, the dragon, are disbelieved, doubted, or relegated to anything other than the world-rulers that they have been historically, we fail to recognize that much of what the modern world considers to be true is a paper thin veneer cast over the reality of God’s Spiritual Kingdom of the Heavens, in which He has always ruled over the affairs of men. Indeed, as Jesus Christ Himself said, that which is highly valued among men is detestable unto God (Luke 16:15).
If one does not appreciate the demonic heavenly powers associated with the Kingdom, and that there was nothing godly thing in Rome, but rather that it was an untoward beast that Daniel didn’t even describe as an animal (Daniel 7:7), but only its terrifying, frightening, and very powerful aspects, we can only look at the decline of that empire as heaven breaking in. Never again has there been a beast like it, for when it was defeated, its body was immediately cast into fire, despite the other three beasts being allowed to continue to live for a “season and a time” without authority (Daniel 7:12).
This defeat of this demonic kingdom was not a necessary sequence of events of the decline of a Republic in a slow but necessary progression of degeneration of society, but was the deliberate hand of God, worked against a nation, because of its indecency.
Understanding then, that conflicts are yet prophecied, including the Gog Magog war at the end of the Millennium in Revelation 20, we see that there are wars coming for which we must be prepared. Even seemingly unprophesied ones, by the Scriptures themselves that is, such as World War I and World War II, must leave us in a state of preparedness and watchfullness, even as Christ said to all, to “Watch” (Mark 13:37).
The question is not whether they will come, it is what the text is saying about a particular event. If the plain case that Daniel and Revelation point to the events surrounding the first century and following, we must accept that case, all the while being ever more vigilant and prepared for what is to come in our day.