During the Great Tribulation, Satan will be given unrestrained control over unbelievers, and the world will experience an age of demonic humanity. This will demonstrate what this world would have been like if God had not intervened with a plan of redemption. This terrible period of human history comes to an end at the climactic battle of Armageddon. John has a vision of the celestial realm when he sees heaven opened and Christ riding on a white horse. This is similar to the visions of the celestial realm that Elisha had of the sky filled with chariots of fire. From the celestial realm, Christ merely says the word and the Antichrist and the armies following him are destroyed. Christ then sends an angel to bind Satan for a thousand years so his reign over this world can begin.
Premillennialists claim that this is the second coming of Christ in the clouds, but Christ is never depicted as descending to this earth on his white horse during or after this battle. And he is never described as being on one of the thrones set up on this earth at the first resurrection. He simply rules this world during the millennium from his throne in heaven. His second coming occurs after the millennium on Judgment Day, at the end of this Genesis creation.
