Our Presuppositions Are What Makes The Difference

By Walt Hibbard

Traditional eschatological studies invariably begin with the assumption that the so-called "end time events" are all future to us today. This includes the Second Advent of Christ, the Resurrection of the Dead, the Final Judgment and the ushering in of the New Heavens and New Earth. One prophetic author, writing from the amillennial viewpoint, began his book, "Is This Really the End?," with the statement, "At least there is one thing that we all agree on and can be certain of: Jesus is coming again." No attempt was made to establish the validity of his thesis from the Bible. It was simply something that every Christian believes, regardless of their millennial viewpoint, because this is what all of us have been taught. Such an assumption, however, needs to be examined very carefully to see if it is true.

As an introduction to the Preterist or Past Fulfillment View, allow me to quote several Scripture verses that clearly teach that the Second Advent was imminent to the people who were contemporaries of Jesus, to the first century folks. It was to THEM that Jesus and His Apostles were speaking. An important principle of hermeneutics is to determine TO WHOM the writers of Scripture were addressing. This is called audience relevance. We must place these words in their proper context in order to determine the correct interpretation. Indeed, all Scripture was written FOR every forthcoming generation of Christians, but none of the Bible was actually written TO any of us. This is a vital distinction that we need to constantly keep in mind. So now let's consider the words of Jesus and His followers as recorded in our Bibles. (I am using the Literal Translation of the Holy Bible, Jay P. Green, Sr., editor, to insure accuracy of translation.)

THE SECOND ADVENT WAS IMMINENT

Matt. 10:23 But when they persecute you in this city, flee to another. For truly I say to you, In no way will you have finished (evangelizing -wh) the cities of Israel until the Son of man comes.

Matt. 16:28 Truly I say to you, There are some standing here who in no way will taste of death until they see the Son of man coming in His Kingdom.

Matt. 24:34 Truly I say to you, In no way will this generation pass away until all of these things have occurred.

Matt. 26:64 Jesus said to him (Caiaphas -wh), You said [it]. I tell you more. From this time you shall see the Son of man sitting off [the] right [hand] of power, and coming on the clouds of the heavens.

Rev. 1:7 Behold, He comes with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, and the ones who pierced Him, and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Yes, Amen.

Rev. 1:1,3 A Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to Him to show to His slaves things which must occur quickly....and keeping the things having been written; for the time [is] near.

Rev. 1:19 Write what things you saw, and what things are, and what things are about to (Gk. mello -wh) occur after these things.

Jesus tells his audience that His coming was imminent, within the life span of some, not all, of His listeners. It was to be in that generation of people who were His contemporaries. The commission to evangelize Israel would be cut short by His coming. He assured the high priest and others around him that it would be He Himself who would witness His coming in the clouds. The Revelation speaks in many places about Christ coming quickly, and that the time is near.

Since His Second Advent was clearly imminent to the first century folks, it could not possibly be imminent to people who lived beyond the first century, such as 21st century people. The Second Advent, as promised by Jesus, was a first century event. In light of the Olivet Discourse, it was to be an event associated with the Great Tribulation or judgment of the apostate Jewish leaders who had crucified the Christ, or as it happened, in A.D.70.

THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD WAS ALSO IMMINENT

I Cor. 15:23 But each in [his] own order: Christ, the firstfruit, afterward those of Christ at His coming.

Acts 24:15 Having hope toward God, which these themselves also admit, [of] a resurrection being about to be (Gk. mello -wh) of [the] dead, both of just and unjust ones.

The Resurrection of the Dead was spoken of as an event coinciding with the Second Coming. It was also spoken of as an event that was very shortly to happen. The Greek word, mello, will not allow us to ascribe this resurrection event to the 21st century or beyond.

THE JUDGMENT OF THE JUST AND THE UNJUST WAS ALSO IMMINENT

Matt. 16:27 For the Son of man is about to (Gk. mello -wh) come with His angels in the glory of His Father. And then He will give reward to each according to his action.

Rev. 22:12 And, behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward [is] with Me, to give to each as his work is.

Matt. 25:31-32 But when the Son of man comes in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory. And before Him shall be gathered all the nations; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

Jas. 5:9 Do not murmur against one another, brothers, that you not be condemned. Behold, [the] Judge stands before the door.

THE NEW HEAVEN AND NEW HEARTH WAS ALSO IMMINENT

II Pet. 3:11-12 Then all of these being [about] to be (Gk. mello -wh) dissolved, what sort ought you to be in holy behavior and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the Day of God, through which [the] heavens having been set afire will be dissolved, and burning, [the] elements will melt?

Read the Puritan theologian, John Owen's sermon on II Peter 3. It is found in Vol. 9 of his works, pg. 131ff. Owen, on this passage, takes a strong preterist interpretation. He does not believe that Peter is speaking of a destruction of our material planet, but rather is describing in highly symbolic and callapsing universe language, the changing of covenants from the Old Covenant [the Old Heaven and Earth] to the New Covenant [the New Heaven and Earth]. The word translated as "elements," in biblical language, is referring to the elements of the Old Testament Law and ceremonial rituals.

THE 'ONE DAY....IS AS A THOUSAND YEARS' ARGUMENT CAN NOT BE USED TO INVALIDATE THE IMMINENCY TIME STATEMENTS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT

II Pet. 3:8 But let not this one thing be hidden [from] you, beloved, that one day with [the] Lord [is] as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

In the context, Peter is assuring his listeners, who were getting impatient because the Lord had not (at that time, the A.D.60's) returned as He had promised to do, would surely come in due time to save His elect as He faithfully said He would. The verse has nothing to do with God reckoning time differently from what we do. This verse is probably the most misinterpreted and abused passage in all of Scripture.

THE SEALING OF DANIEL'S PROPHECIES WERE TO BE SEALED UNTIL THE TIME OF THE END, BUT THE PROPHECIES OF REVELATION WERE NOT TO BE SEALED

Dan. 12:4a But you, O Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, to the end time.

Dan. 12:9 And He said, Go, Daniel! For the words [are] closed up and sealed until the end time.

Rev. 22:10 And he said to me, Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this Book, because the time is near.

With over 600 years from Daniel's time until his prophecies would be fulfilled (as related in the Olivet Discourse by Jesus), God tells Daniel to seal the book. In marked contrast, John in Revelation is told NOT to seal the words of prophecy because the time of fulfillment is about to take place and is very near. This Scripture comparison will not allow for a postponement of the prophecies of Revelation beyond the first century, certainly not 1900 years hence into our day!

THE MATERIAL WORLD WILL CONTINUE ON FOREVER

Eccl. 1:4 A generation passes away, and [another] generation comes; but the earth stands forever.

Eph. 3:21 to Him [be] the glory in the church in Christ Jesus, to all generations of the age forever. Amen. (The King James Version translates this as "world without end. Amen.")

THE APOSTLE PAUL TELLS US THAT OUR BODIES WHEN WE DIE RETURN TO THE DUST AND BELIEVERS ARE GIVEN NEW RESURRECTION BODIES, LIKE UNTO CHRIST'S GLORIOUS, INCORRUPTIBLE, IMMORTAL, SPIRITUAL BODY

I Cor. 15:37-38 And what you sow, you do not sow the body that [is] going to be....and God gives it a body according as He willed, and to each of the seeds its own body.

God does not need the bones, flesh, skin and corruption of our dead physical bodies from which to give us a new body like unto Christ's glorious body. The "germ" or our personalities (spirit) are taken by God and united with the immortal spiritual bodies which are suitable for a heavenly existence, just as our earthly bodies were suitable for living on the earth during our lives.

Only Jesus Christ was resurrected in His sinless earthly body. Only to Jesus was it promised that His body would not suffer decay (Acts 2:31; 13:37). He was sinless and born of the Virgin Mary. He did not inherit Adam's sin unto Himself, but was sinless and undefiled.

So there is both continuity and discontinuity of the resurrection of the believer as compared to that of Christ. Be we receive a heavenly, glorified spirit body like Christ's when we die. This is immediate. There is no waiting in Sheol/Hades until a yet future physical resurrection of our decayed bodies in the ground where our spirits would be reunited with our reconstituted physical bodies. In other words, the Bible does not teach the doctrine of "disembodied spirits" from the time we die physically until the supposedly future resurrection day. The "seed analogy" of I Cor. 15:37-38 quoted above refutes this weird teaching.

AND FINALLY, SOME BRIEF THOUGHTS ON THE SUBJECT

1) The time statements of Scripture teach us the "time" when certain end of the age prophecies would be fulfilled. Believing the promises of Jesus and the inspired writings of the New Testament, we are forced to conclude that "something" happened within that first century, within the time frame of some of those still living, during that generation.

2) Rather than attempting to twist the Scripture so as to make it say something that it doesn't, how much more profitable it is to examine the "nature of fulfillment."

3) We are told that the "Kingdom of God does not come with observation" (Lk. 17:20) and "we are not considering the things seen, but the things not being seen; for the things being seen [are] not lasting, but the things not being seen [are] everlasting" (I Cor. 4:18). Also I Cor. 15:46 "But not the spiritual first, but the natural; afterward the spiritual." We should then expect that the "end time fulfillment events" would be of a spiritual nature rather than a material nature.

4) The term "last days" are the last days of the Old Covenant age which finally ended in judgment at A.D.70. We have been in the New Covenant age since A.D.70. The Jews in Old Covenant days spoke of two ages: this present age (meaning the Old Covenant age that they were living in), and the age to come (the age after the Messiah comes, namely the New Covenant age).

5) The writer to the Hebrews tells us that the last vestiges of the Old Covenant age did not come to a final completion until past the time of the writing of his Epistle. Heb. 8:13 reads: "In the saying, "New," He has made the first old. And the thing having been made old and growing aged [is] near disappearing." Notice that the Old Covenant did not finally end at the Cross, but rather at the consummation of A.D.70. Heb. 8:13 makes that very clear.

6) The skeptics teach that Jesus promised to return the second time during the first century, but that He did not really do so. Thus they discredit Christianity and Christ! Evangelicals have not been able to silence the skeptics since any form of "futurism" does not meet the requirements that Jesus and His inspired followers specified in setting forth the promises. Only Preterism is consistent with all the teachings of the Bible.

7) The Preterist view on the fulfillment of Bible prophecy does not relate to whether we are saved or not. Scripture plainly tells us that we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, and in Jesus alone. No other Scripture even hints otherwise. But for the sake of TRUTH, it is important that God's people come to understand that Jesus did indeed keep His promise to come again WHEN He said that He would do it. The credibility of the Gospel message that Jesus preached is dependent on His reliability as a Prophet. By faith, therefore, Preterists believe that Jesus fulfilled every promise that He made to the exact same people that He announced the promises to originally.

8) The Jews missed the First Advent of their Messiah because they were looking for a carnal and materialistic Kingdom that would subdue Rome and establish themselves in a position of supremacy. Most of the Church has missed the Second Advent for much the same reason. They have been looking for a visible, outward and materially glorious Second Advent, not the predominantly spiritual fulfillment that the New Testament gives us encouragement to seek after.

9) A first century fulfillment of all that Moses and the prophets foretold was clung to by the first century Christians, as Jesus said in Lk. 21:22 "For these are the days of vengeance [when] all things that have been written are to be fulfilled." It was not until the middle of the second century that the imminency idea began to be lost and postponement ideas began to replace them.

10) Could it be that the Second Coming event at A.D.70 "caught up" (I Thess. 4:17) all the true believers to Heaven with Christ, leaving unregenerate people to pass on the message that there had been no real Second Coming at all? With the absence of true believers, especially Christian leaders, would it not be quite natural to see an apostasizing from the imminency idea as taught by Jesus and His apostles? Yet the Scriptures remained and after A.D.70 many people became Christians and propagated the Gospel message to the lost around them. But the imminency hope of that first generation was largely replaced with a misguided "ongoing-imminency hope," an impossible concept that was to plague the Church for nearly 2000 years! Perhaps we need to consider this.

THE END

Date: 24 Sep 2006
Time: 14:59:35

Comments:

Point number 10 is stretching the problem of the "real message" too far. The reason that there was a lack of historical reporting on the theological component of the Parousia, was that the "winners" write the histories. Christianity was not the winner against Rome -- in fact, the record of what we call, "Christianity", today, begins AFTER the condemnation and deletion of the Pythagorean interpretations of the Gospel. Through the 3rd century, Christianity was built on LOGOS theology, such as that found in the works of Clement of Alexandria, and preserved its Hellenistic origins. "Against Heresies" was supposedly written to counter the Hermetic concepts of Jesus\Apollo.

Date: 28 Sep 2006
Time: 21:12:17

Comments:

God-Christ-HolySpirt do not go and come. God is. we live and move an have our being in Him - We are decreasing He is increaing- The final end to all of this is,"God becomes ALL AND IN ALL."