My view is that we are currently living in the 'Millenium', which simply stands for the period of time between Christ's Ascension and his Return. What John means by 'reigning with Christ' is no different from Paul's understanding in Ephesians 1:20 - 2:10, and a thousand years simply means a long period of time, as elsewhere throughout scripture. The 'Tribulation' is another way of looking at the same period of time from a different perspective; it describes what Paul calls the "suffering of this present time" (Romans 8:18). Three-and-a-half years is another idiomatic expression not to be taken literally. I would understand the Book of Revelation to be a commentary on the spiritual state of the world, the same in John's day as in ours, not a sequential view of future history. I believe there is nothing new in Revelation which is not already expressed in different words in Jesus' and Paul's teaching. John is simply writing in code to evade the Roman censors, and uses metaphor, symbolism and a wealth of OT imagery to restate the Gospel. Many scholars currently take this view, with which I agree.
My view is that we are currently living in the 'Millenium', which simply stands for the period of time between Christ's Ascension and his Return. What John means by 'reigning with Christ' is no different from Paul's understanding in Ephesians 1:20 - 2:10, and a thousand years simply means a long period of time, as elsewhere throughout scripture. The 'Tribulation' is another way of looking at the same period of time from a different perspective; it describes what Paul calls the "suffering of this present time" (Romans 8:18). Three-and-a-half years is another idiomatic expression not to be taken literally. I would understand the Book of Revelation to be a commentary on the spiritual state of the world, the same in John's day as in ours, not a sequential view of future history. I believe there is nothing new in Revelation which is not already expressed in different words in Jesus' and Paul's teaching. John is simply writing in code to evade the Roman censors, and uses metaphor, symbolism and a wealth of OT imagery to restate the Gospel. Many scholars currently take this view, with which I agree.