Drawn from a single chapter near the end of the book of Revelation, it is tempting to think that “the Millennium”—a term not even used in the text itself—is not a major biblical theme. Similarly, number 27 is a long way down the list of the 28 Seventh-day Adventist Fundamental Beliefs. And we have struggled to find a previous book-length study of this topic in the history of Adventist publishing.
Which makes The Cross and the Millennium a valuable book. Written by retired church administrator Peter Colquhoun and road-tested in preaching and teaching opportunities he has had in Adventist contexts around the world, his study makes the case for the importance of this doctrine and its value as a book, not by focusing on this argument but by demonstrating the importance of the final judgment as the closing act of the plan of salvation and the necessary culmination of the death of Jesus.
Revelation 20 describes a period of 1000 years after the Second Coming, at the end of which evil, the devil and all who follow them are finally destroyed and the world is made new. This sequence is important and The Cross and the Millennium points out some of the theological, practical and even political misdirection that can come with unbiblical understandings of the millennium. Adventists have long believed in a premillennial second coming of Jesus and Pastor Colquhoun urges that we maintain and deepen this belief.
If you have wondered about the significance of this sometimes-forgotten fundamental belief, The Cross and the Millennium will answer that question—in both time-honoured and new ways. And if you have previously spent time studying this promised sequence of rescue, judgment and re-creation, this book invites you to refocus this hope as a vital part of the Bible’s central story of Jesus, and the final act in the process of salvation that He initiated and continues to offer to us all. The story of the Bible—and of all who choose Jesus—ends well, and the millennium is a key to understanding how this will happen.
The Cross and the Millennium is available from Adventist bookshops in Australia and New Zealand, or online.
