Jesus' Promise of a First Century 'Parousia' -- Not Clear?

By Walt Hibbard 11/26/4

Preterist Rapture

During a recent dialogue with a respected friend and theologian, I attempted to present a more or less standard preterist interpretation of a number of the time statements that Matthew records in his Gospel. They consist of passages such as Mt 10:23; 16:27-28; 24:34 and 26:64. Most readers of this paper are quite familiar with these often quoted verses, so I will not take the time nor space to print them out at this time. Suffice it to say, these are the words of Jesus Christ speaking to His disciples and, in the case of the latter verse, to Caiphas and likely the Sanhedrin council as well. However these verses may be interpreted, it is generally understood that Jesus was informing his first century audience something about the time of His future parousia. This word in the Greek means “coming” “arrival” or “presence” as it relates to that great eschatological climax associated with Jesus’ discourse on the Mount of Olives.

It surprised me, however, to receive the following response from my theologian friend:

“It is far from ‘clear’ that Jesus promised that His parousia would be in the first century. That is the point of disagreement. If it was clear, then the Christian church would have believed it and so would I.”

He goes on to add the following: “Much of what you say here is based on the belief that there can be no doubt on this matter. However, for myself and the historic Christian church these claims are not clear and so your conclusions do not follow.”

These comments that dispute the clarity issue lead me to ask several related questions. Questions such as, (1) Is my friend actually suggesting that Jesus’ words are obscure or ambiguous or defy understanding? or (2) Is it my interpretation of these verses, as witnessed by how I understand what Jesus is actually saying, that is unclear? or (3) By casting doubt on what I consider to be crystal clear, is he suggesting that a normal reading of these inspired words actually carry a hidden meaning, something that a straight forward reading would not reveal? or (4) How does my friend’s attempted debunking of the imminency idea relate to these words not being clear? or (5) Does his identification of his own views with those of the Christian church suggest that there has been a monolithic, even unanimous, understanding and interpretation of Jesus’ words throughout church history? or (6) Is this a not-so-veiled attempt to distance himself from what he considers a “lone individual” viewpoint in contrast to the weighty mass of contrasting interpretations? or (7) Could this clouding of the issue by casting doubt or uncertainty actually be an effort to avoid a thorough exegetical study of the several verses in question? and finally, (8) Is the clarity issue simply a smokescreen calculated to cover up his unhealthy veneration of the historic creeds of the Christian church?

And to add a 9th question, would a full-blown answer involve perhaps elements of all of the above?

From the wording of my Reformed scholar’s comments, it would not seem to be all that easy to determine precisely what the word “clear” actually means to his mind. On the one hand, if we examine his first statement that “It is far from ‘clear’ that Jesus promised that His parousia would be in the first century,” we might conclude that he considers Jesus’ words themselves to be unclear. Since the words in all of these verses are free of symbolic, metaphoric, hyperbolic or parabolic connotations, but instead are straightforward promises of future events that will happen soon, which of Jesus’ words does he consider to be unclear? The unclear element somehow must relate to his view that nowhere in these imminency statements is he willing to admit that Jesus is promising His second coming to happen within the timeframe of that first century. Being a futurist he most certainly believes that the focal point of all of the prophecised events will be at the supposed end of the material world, when time shall be no more.

Yet how could he ever derive that conclusion from reading these words of Jesus where He speaks of “this generation,” or within the lifetime of some of the people He was talking to? Somehow these statements of Jesus must be to him at least unclear enough to rule out the certainty of a first century parousia. Could it be that his own long-held theological system prevents him from accurately grasping what Jesus is saying? Perhaps our scholarly friend is unable to consistently apply his own hermeneutical principle of audience relevance to these verses because he believes that every portion of Scripture relating to the Kingdom must be taken together in arriving at a correct understanding of difficult or unclear portions. Indeed the scholarly interpreter must faithfully compare one Scripture portion with other related portions in order to arrive at the right meaning, but where, may I ask, are the verses that clearly teach a 2000 year or more delay or postponement from the first century setting, which would cause the reader to modify (or even contradict!) the plain and simple words of these four time statements above?

Relating to my Question (2) above, my friend especially has trouble understanding how I can interpret these four verses in a way that calls for their fulfillment within the bounds of the first century. This seems to be nonsense and rubbish to him in view of the twenty previous centuries where Jesus’ parousia was understood to have been delayed until the end of the material world. He is unwilling to admit that the time statements really do depict a first century fulfillment. His whole life has centered around theological studies where he has been taught over and over that the parousia is yet future to us today and this has rendered him blind to what seems to me to be statements of fact that contradict his lifetime studies. He has repeatedly contrasted my first century fulfillment idea with the whole Christian church down through the ages which has held to an end of history fulfillment. This seems to be one of the main reasons why he believes it is insane and unreasonable to adopt such an extreme minority position on these verses. He has suggested that my adherence to “sola scriptura” is distorted and resembles the methodology of Jehovah’s Witnesses or other cults who also claim to rely on the Bible alone in their studies. My friend simply can not bring himself to differ from the view held by the Christian church for 2000 years. There is absolutely no possibility that the church could be wrong!

Addressing Question (3) makes one wonder why it is not sufficient for my scholarly friend to take plain and simple language at face value, but rather a need to incorporate a wide range of historical, ecclesiastical, and cultural data into the determination of the meaning, that would be unavailable to most Bible students. Is there a hidden meaning in these straightforward imminency verses that plain language is unable to communicate and which only the elite scholars can really understand? Or is it necessary to import complicated theological concepts into the discussion so that these ideas prevail over the teachings of plain and simple words? It is interesting to observe that the Bereans of Acts 17 did not rely on anything of this kind but devoted themselves to comparing the apostolic message to that of the Old Testament Scriptures. To me this sounds like a much more acceptable way in which to study the Scriptures. What Jesus Christ said was what Jesus Christ really meant! Is that unreasonable?

Question (4) deals with our friend’s eagerness to debunk the imminency statements, at least in the way that my explanation of them leads to some amazing conclusions. If it can be successfully maintained that these time statements are unclear, then an interpreter like my friend would be able to empty the basic content out of the verses, especially the part that speaks of a time frame within which these events are to take place. If the Greek word “mello” in Mt 16:27 can be translated apart from the normal meaning of “about to be,” then a certain vagueness might enter in. Yet the verse following would seem to remove all doubt about the imminency factor by citing the persons standing there who would not die until they saw the Son of Man coming in His kingdom. In spite of the obvious fact (to most scholars) that verses 27 and 28 are in the same context, our friend maintains that vs. 27 refers to “His parousia and the final judgment, as the Son of Man in fulfillment of Dan. 7:14. However, in 16:28 He speaks of His coming in His kingdom. The transfiguration, resurrection, parousia and comings in judgment on his church are all aspects of the manifestation and realization of His kingdom, as is the everyday life of the church – and world – today.” By taking this position my friend attempts to separate the common timeframe of the two verses from the contextual setting and then confuses the issue with time elements taken from widely differentiated sources spread over 2000 years. His line of argument introduces confusion into what was apparently two very closely related aspects of end time events, in an effort to cast doubt upon our Lord’s teaching that both verses are speaking of a timeframe joined together by two closely knit events, namely the judgment in vs 27 and the parousia in vs 28. There is no hint in the text of Scripture that the intended time span is to encompass over 2000 years, but this does not deter this distinguished scholar from taking these liberties.

As my Question (5) would suggest, it is popularly assumed that there was a completely united and monolithic view in the early church, at least as far as the doctrine of futurism was concerned. The impact of this argument is to pit the thousands of spiritual giants of the Christian church down through the centuries of history against a lone preterist interpreter in the 21st century, filled with arrogance and pride. But this is nothing more than a feeble attempt to picture the preterist as an out-of-control, deceived, stupid, and stubborn Bible student – literally, a blind and naïve fool. Yet was it not the Apostle Paul in Romans 3:4 “Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar…” An argument from numbers can never take the place of an honest and thorough exegetical study of the Holy Scriptures themselves in determining the truth that God wants His people to understand.

A close study of the writings of the early church fathers detects that there were numerous elements of preterism in existence at that time. Admittedly, no systematic formulation of preterist eschatology was brought together as far as is known, nevertheless, this method of interpreting Bible prophecy was not unknown to some in the early church. The apparently unfilled promises of Jesus in the above cited passages did present some keen writers with a problem, and the “the delay factor,” originally thought to be only a short delay, as time passed, became stretched out longer and longer as the centuries passed. My counter argument, however, is to merely point out that the preterist system of interpretation, far from being original to J. Stuart Russell near the end of the 19th century, or held by some obscure 18th century writers, was actually a very early view. A minority view, of course, but something quite different from the caricature of a 21st century bookworm, alone with his Bible, coming up with cockeyed ideas off the wall. The preterist view is a very ancient view, not as a system, but in terms of portions of Scripture being understood within the bounds of a first century fulfillment.

I have covered Question (6) and the lone individual with his Bible in my comments in (5) above. So let’s move on into other somewhat different areas, yet which are closely related to this one.

Question (7) relates to what seemed to be an attempt to raise doubt on the imminency idea so as to diminish the preterist’s “big gun” argument. Again and again, in the course of our discussion, I challenged my friend to engage in the kind of commendable exegesis that he is capable of doing. But not this time on those great soteriological passages, but instead directing his efforts toward a thorough and intense study of those four timeframe passages cited above, directly from the lips of our Lord Jesus Christ. But again and again, he expressed a lack of interest in doing this, insisting that his main concern was in seeing where my preterist view would lead to concerning such weighty doctrines as the incarnation and the resurrection. I assured him of the importance of these imminency statements and if the Lord Jesus had not taught them to His disciples, there would be no such thing as a preterist today!

But this would not sway him in the least, thus placing himself in the same boat with many other futurists who are simply incapable of, or at least unwilling, to exegete these extremely important verses. This has become common practice in Reformed circles today when facing preterism.

I am reminded of a recent debate between a well-known postmillennial futurist scholar and a preterist pastor which dealt in part with these verses. The postmil gentleman made a most remarkable statement, which gets to the root of this whole problem. He admitted to his preterist opponent that even if he were to concede all of the imminency passages in the New Testament as relating to the AD 70 timeframe, he would still cleave to the futurist position! And then added that an exegetical study of these verses would not be particularly helpful to the debate at hand. So there you have it! The unwillingness to honestly and openly exegete those words of the Lord Jesus which is what preterism is all about. The postmil scholar apparently found a source of authority higher than the Bible as his final conclusion on whether to be a futurist or a preterist. Once again, this gifted and brilliant Christian man has chosen to follow “mother church” down through the centuries, believing that the church fathers simply could not have misunderstood the teachings of Jesus. A sad conclusion indeed!

And now to Question (8): Is the clarity issue simply a smokescreen calculated to cover up his unhealthy veneration of the historic creeds of the Christian church? This can be a grave issue in the Reformed churches where the creeds and confessions, valuable as they are, and accurate as they are on most doctrines, simply are not reliable as a help in correctly understanding the prophetic Scriptures. The condition that I am referring to in the creedal churches is a serious one. On the one hand there is absolutely unified and unanimous agreement that only the Holy Scriptures, the Bible, is the ultimate and final court of appeal in all matters dealing with the doctrines of the Faith. All pastors and elders would, with one voice, admit that the creeds, even and earliest creeds, as well as the confessions, are not infallible. It is possible, they say, that there could be some slight error in the creeds, but nothing of any significance that could alter any major doctrine, and certainly the Second Coming is a major doctrine. Therefore, while theoretically the creeds may have some slight error contained therein, nothing of real importance would be involved. It is therefore considered out of bounds to even study, or question, anything taught in the creeds since they faithfully reflect the infallible Holy Scriptures.

That implies that the creeds are sufficiently accurate to allow them to be used as a standard in determining what is orthodox and what is not. Somehow there must be a loophole in this argument and we shall continue to try to track it down because this entire discussion is so crucial to the preservation and survival of the Christian faith.

From this discussion with my friend, and from other statements dealing with the same basic idea, there seems to be at least three ways of expressing the limitations to normal biblical studies that the creedalists would like to impose on all Christians. They would have us believe that these limitations to the way we study and interpret the Bible are prerequisite to the survival of the historic Christian faith as we know it. Any departure from observing these guidelines would place a person in real danger.

What are these guidelines without which the study of our Bibles becomes a dangerous project?

As most of you who have read thus far in my article will have guessed, it is the one ecumenical creed, namely, the Nicene/Constantinople or C that sets the boundries or limitations for our Bible study. Our scholar admits that “C contains more than the words of Scripture. However , the fathers (and the church since then) were conscious that they were putting into language the faith handed down from the apostles, and were countering heresy that would destroy the Gospel.” Well and good, as long as there is found to be no conflict between the words in the creed and that of Holy Scripture. As the WCF in Chap. I, Sec. IV states: “The authority of the Holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed, and obeyed, dependeth not upon the testimony of any man, or Church; but wholly upon God (who is truth itself) the author thereof: and there it is to be received, because it is the Word of God.”

But the problem arises when church officials, sessions or councils regard the creeds in an unlawful manner by using them to define the limits of acceptable Bible study. The Lord Jesus recognized the danger in doing this when He spoke the words of Mt 15:6 “Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.” We need to be vigilant to never place the creeds in judgment over the Scriptures!

My sparring partner in this debate wrote as follows: “C is, as has been pointed out, ‘a fence around the mystery,’ setting the boundaries within which Christian reflection can occur, and beyond which is not Christian teaching at all. A family relaxing on the beach is not hindered from its enjoyment by clear signs warning of quicksand in certain areas. Those signs show that danger lurks and indicate that, away from the danger area, people can safely play or swim. Those signs bring reassurance. C, and such things as the Definition of Chalcedon, tell us (like small children) where we may play and from what we must stay away. They help us to study the Bible constructively, not dangerously (cf 2 Pet. 3:16).” The passage referred to here reads in part: “…in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.”

So my friend would have us believe that there can be great danger in studying the Bible. He apparently equates an honest inquiry into the meaning or interpretation of certain passages with the kind of “Scripture twisting” that untaught and unstable people engage in. It has been wisely said that a person can prove just about anything from the Scriptures if they twist it and take it out of context. But this is a far cry from earnestly seeking the guidance of the Holy Spirit to determine the meaning of the prophetic passages in the Bible. Most of the Reformed preterists that I know are dedicated students of the Scripture and place the Scriptures much higher than they do the creeds and confessions, and rightly so.

So he pictures the creeds as a “fence” warning us to go no farther in our investigative Bible studies, lest we get swallowed up by the “quicksand” that awaits us if we dare stray beyond the limitations established by these creeds. A question needs to be asked! On the basis of these established guidelines, which authority source is the higher – the creeds or the Scripture? The obvious answer is the creeds, since they establish our limitations in which Scriptures we are to study and determine for us the doctrinal conclusions that we are bound to arrive at. Here we have the creeds trumping Scripture!

But my friend, writing in another context, admits that historical events should not trump Scripture. “But in this case,” he writes, “it is a matter not of historical events trumping Scripture but their trumping a particular interpretation of Scripture. It seems you are identifying your interpretation of Scripture with Scripture itself!” He would say the same thing regarding the creeds and would suggest that the problem is with my interpretation of Scripture. Of course, this is a problem to him since I do not arrive at the same doctrinal conclusion as the creed demands. It is not easy to make any progress against this line of thinking. He continues to warn Bible students against any kind of Bible study where the creeds are not open before them, as well as the Bible text itself. The creeds are a “fence” and warn about the “quicksand” that is ever lurking nearby, least we depart from the creed.

I would suggest that his line of thinking is diametrically opposed to the methodology of the Berean Christians in Acts 17: 11 where we read “These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.” These Christians earned the commendation of the author of Acts, the Apostle Luke, even though they consulted no creeds or human authorities to find out if what Paul and the other preachers were teaching was actually true – just the Old Testament portion of the Bible alone.

My response to his arguments has driven my friend to suggest that I “show a deep hostility to the teaching of the historic Christian church.” Actually, nothing could be farther from the truth. I have always respected and admired the great leaders of the Faith down through the centuries. But by saying this, I am in no way ascribing infallibility to any of these great men and women of past or present. It is possible (and even highly probable) that they, being human and subject to error, have made some very serious and longstanding errors, especially in the area of understanding Christ’s Kingdom. And even ideas, if they are repeated over and over enough times, will cause error to be compounded with error. The fact that most believers for over 2000 years have been taught eschatology from a futuristic viewpoint and in turn taught it to others, in no way guarantees the correctness of that view. A majority opinion is never the method to employ in determining what the Bible says. It is rather the ministry of the Holy Spirit, together with the Scriptures themselves, that enables us to arrive at full truth.

I began this article in answer to my friends suggestion that the imminency statements were unclear, especially my interpretation of the meaning of the central passages in each verse. In turn, I would suggest that this whole issue is unclear to the futurist for several reasons:

First, the futurist is the one who injects confusion and doubt into the discussion, not the preterist.

Second, by refusing to recognize the first century disciples as the people to whom the Bible was written, futurists end up with many confusing and illogical ideas that complicate Christ’s entire teaching on the nature and timing of the Kingdom and its consummative events.

Third, by following their own distorted views on the place of the creeds in Bible interpretation, holding to the “fence” and “quicksand” ideas, they by necessity render a clear understanding of the message that Jesus spoke virtually impossible.

Fourth, by refusing to exegete these imminency passages with the same hermeneutical skills that they employ in interpreting the rest of the Bible, they are exposing a soft underbelly that bright theological students of the Scripture can easily detect and may soon afterwards move into the preterist camp.

Fifth, those futurists who confuse the authority issue, maintaining that the creeds in every single instance accurately reflect the true meaning of Scripture, in a practical sense actually equate both Scripture and creeds with the same authority, even in the face of attempting to deny this.

Sixth, by warning Christian interpreters about the dangers of “treading the high seas of Scriptural investigation” without one eye being open to the creedal position, futurists are encouraging students and laypeople alike to forsake Bible study entirely, since the danger of following alternative lines of inquiry leading to non-creedal conclusions, could indeed be fatal to their souls.

In closing, it is my prayer that this article may be read by many Bible students who may have never previously explored some of the areas covered in this paper. My purpose is to defend the clarity of plain statements in the Scripture, which strange and contrived interpretations can distort and confuse, and thereby help us all to believe and apply them to our daily lives. May God alone be glorified!