will know us there-changed, glorified, the 'vile body fashioned like unto His glorious body,' yet the same. We shall see familiar faces in heaven, those with whom we are actually acquainted, whose memory and ours link us together-not entirely new individuals with whom we must become acquainted, but the same old friends. How many times in this life have we sighed that the old friends, yes, even those articles that have become dear to us by association, could be preserved and kept rather than replaced by those that were new and strange. Yes, the same old friends, renewed, glorified, shall meet us in the morning of the resurrection.

"Then, truly, shall we know even as we are known. As from the dark tomb Jesus arose triumphant, turning His back upon the darkness and the tomb, and His face toward the sunrise of eternal morning; so, when the trumpet sounds, we shall rise victorious over all the sorrows and failures of the past, leaving death a conquered enemy, while before us stretches out an eternal, glorious future. O, the glory, the joy, the triumph, the eternal blessedness of the resurrection of the dead!

"But we should remember that there are two resurrections. See I Thess. 4:16, 17; Rev. 20:5, 6. There is a resurrection to condemnation as well as one to eternal life. See Acts 24:15; John 5:28, 29. Between these two resurrections there is a period of a thousand years.

"The first resurrection is of the righteous when Jesus comes, in which they are changed to immortality. The second is of the wicked a thousand years later. But the wicked come forth with the same bodies, the

same weaknesses, the same passions with which they went into the grave. With the same malice and murder in their hearts as in the day when they breathed their last, do they rise to wage war against the people and the city of God. See Rev. 20:8.

"All might have risen blessed and holy. No one need to have risen in the second resurrection if the opportunities which God held out had been accepted. Yes, all must rise in the first resurrection to eternal life, or in the second to final destruction and eternal death. Shall we not choose our part in the firs: resurrection?"

HE word millennium is derived from the Latin words mille, a thousand, and annus, a year. It is a modern term used to represent the thousand years referred to in the following texts:

"And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. 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 [the holy martyrs and all the righteous who have part in the first resurrection; see last clause of verses 4, 6,] sat upon them,

and judgment [the power to sit as judges] 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 [the redeemed martyrs], and which had not worshiped 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.

"But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years.

"And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city; and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them." "This is the second death." Rev. 20: 1-9, 14.

As the millennium is so closely connected with our earth's history, and represents a definite period of time, it will be well to consider it under three heads: First, When will it begin, and what are the events which lead up to it? Secondly, What takes place during this period? Thirdly, What marks its close?

When Will the Millennium Begin?

The millennium begins with "the first resurrec

tion," when Jesus comes. This is made plain by the beloved John, who says, "Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years." Rev. 20:6.

Paul gives the details of this "first resurrection," which is to mark the beginning of the millennium, in the following words: "For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel [Jesus Christ], and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." I Thess. 4:16, 17.

Where will the saints go at this resurrection? Jesus said, "In My Father's house [His heavenly home] are many mansions. . . . I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." John 14:2, 3.

This home of mansions is the New Jerusalem, which will come down to earth at the end of the thousand years to be the capital city of the new earth. See Rev. 21:2.

When Jesus comes, all the righteous will be "caught up . . . in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air." I Thess. 4:17. And while destruction and desolation as a pall are spreading over the earth, the saints are borne upon the cloud to their New Jerusalem home, where "judgment is given unto them" over wicked men and fallen angels. Paul says, "Do ye not know