The eschatology of the devil’s desperation

By definition the devil’s desperation begins at this moment when he is expelled in heaven. This will be in the middle of the Tribulation. We will be in heaven. Once Satan is confined to earth he is desperate to avoid certain judgements. He realises that he has lost the battle and therefore in his desperation Satan attacks Israel in the greatest of all holocausts which is the seventh trumpet and the beginning of the third woe. The third woe is actually the entire course of the devil’s desperation. It is broken down into six parts:

Part 1, the beginning of Satan’s desperation, the great holocaust of Israel, the seventh trumpet which is the beginning of the third woe, Revelation 12:12-17.

Part 2, we meet the devil’s two witnesses, the two great dictators of the last half of the Tribulation. One is a Gentile dictator of the revived Roman empire; the other is a Jewish dictator of the state of Israel in the Tribulation. We meet them in Revelation 13.

Part 3, evangelism continues on the earth in spite of the fact that all of the demons are on the earth, both those who are disembodied spirits and those who have bodies, and it is the worst time of tribulation the world will ever know — Revelation 14.

Part 4, Revelation 15 & 16. While Satan is still ruler of the world in the last half of the Tribulation, and now confined to the world, his kingdom has become his temporary jail, divine judgment is administered through the seven last plagues or the seven goblet judgements.

Part 5, Satan’s last attack on the human race. The devil finally plays his ace trump just before the second advent. Religion has always been the devil’s ace trump and in the last half of the Tribulation he has organised the greatest system of ecumenical religion the world has ever known — Revelation chapters 17 & 18.

Part 6, The second advent of Christ where Satan and his whole system, both angelic and human, is defeated and destroyed. Satan is imprisoned for 1000 years.

Satan’s tyranny and frustration will be seen in the policies of his dictators in Revelation. The consequences of Satan’s desperation will be studied in the Armageddon campaign — Revelation chapter 16:12-16. The greatest attack of Satan’s desperation coming from religion will hit the entire human race, but especially Israel, the last half of chapter 13 as well as chapters 17 & 18. Satan’s human armies of the Armageddon campaign are destroyed; Satan’s two dictators are cast into the lake of fire; and in Revelation 20:1-3 Satan himself is dethroned and incarcerated in the abyss for 1000 years, his last 1000 before he is freed for a short time. His sentence was served in full during the Millennium and once he is let out the first thing he does is start the big revolution called the Gog revolution. From that point on it is all down hill into hell and the lake of fire forever.

Therefore, the eschatology of Satan’s desperation begins with the expulsion of Satan and all fallen angels from heaven in the middle of the Tribulation and concludes with the second advent of Christ three and a half years later. Essentially then, it is the last three and a half years of the Tribulation and the last half of the book of Revelation which is devoted primarily to the devil’s desperation — chapters 12-19.