The coming is not AD70, however, but that in
the form of the Holy Spirit. Amazing to me is how this return of
the High Priest out of the Most Holy Place in the person of the
Holy Spirit is ignored by HyP... and even more remarkably how
the Holy Spirit is sometimes (perhaps rarely) said to no longer
have His ministry!
And so, with Warren in
mind, this reading sees the reference to
going through the cities as referring
thematically to the persecution that they
would face, and the seeing of the son of
man's power and glory as the resulting
reward for their obedience and endurance...
whether that be in life or in death (see
Matthew 16:27-28 and "shall not taste of
death"). Paul strikes a similar chord in
Second Corinthians:
2 Cor 6:1-10 We then, as
workers together with him, beseech you also
that ye receive not the grace of God in
vain. 2 (For he saith, I have heard thee in
a time accepted, and in the day of salvation
have I succoured thee: behold, now is the
accepted time; behold, now is the day of
salvation.) 4 But in all things approving
ourselves as the ministers of God, in much
patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in
distresses, 5 In stripes, in imprisonments,
in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in
fastings; 6 By pureness, by knowledge, by
longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy
Ghost, by love unfeigned, 7 By the word of
truth, by the power of God, by the armour of
righteousness on the right hand and on the
left, 8 By honour and dishonour, by evil
report and good report: as deceivers, and
yet true; 9 As unknown, and yet well known;
as dying, and, behold, we live; as
chastened, and not killed; 10 As sorrowful,
yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making
many rich; as having nothing, and yet
possessing all things.
This was standard
evangelical exhortation then, just as it is
today. (And note that even now, 2,000 years
later, TODAY is the DAY of salvation, etc.)
Paul is using the A) certainty of
persecution and the B) comforts and
blessing to follow as a means of
encouraging courage and endurance.. just as
our Lord is in Matt. 10... and just as your
pastor does every Sunday.
There are numerous
examples of this A/B type of reasoning in
the New Testament. (But a fuller examination
of these points will have to wait until
after the baseball season.)
To close out the advocacy
section of this post, I'd just like to make
another reference to the "end" that we are
all racing towards : the end of our soujourn
in this world. Like Paul noted ("the time of
my departure is at hand"), our own personal
race as a witness of the gospel has its end/telos
-- which we must all face in this age/world
-- and which is followed by the glory of the
just rewards and judgment that await in that
age/world to come (Heb. 9:26, cf. Luke
20:35). "Yea, and all that will live
godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer
persecution," but "the sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared
with the glory which shall be revealed in
us."
Jesus speaking in a "time
specific" way to his immediate audience
(extending chronologically as far as their
life spans), is a common rhetorical device
by which the Word speaks to all generations.
The church has been correct all these years
to read their lives in the context of the
New Testament.. because 'this is that'
today, just as it was then. Likewise,
legitimate time specific references to acts
of Providence (such as the falls of
Jerusalem in 586BC and AD70) operate in like
manner. And even today the Logos, though
collectively received in the form of the
written Word, speaks directly to the
individual as the Living Word.
Revelation 2:7 "He that hath an ear, let him
hear what the Spirit saith unto the
churches; To him that overcometh will I give
to eat of the tree of life, which is in the
midst of the paradise of God."
These New Testament themes should be
taken very personally regarding our walk
today, as we likewise bear our crosses and
face the need to endure persecution to the
end of our days. To take the HyP
position that the New Testament doesn't
speak to post-AD70 life has disastrous
consequences to how people approach their
Christian walk. If we do not share the
charge of the New Testament to be
transformed from old to new, but agree with
Hyper Preterism that our salvation as
something that was settled in AD70, then we
will live differently. The transformative
process of persecution/glorification (being
made new) in the work of the Holy Spirit is
accomplished through trial, tribulation and
other forms of fleshly necrosis... and the
shaking of the old is something that all
Christians must endure even now.
We, too, must "turn from darkness to light,
and from the power of Satan unto God, that
(we) may receive forgiveness of sins, and
inheritance among them which are sanctified
by faith that is in me." (Acts 26:18)
Forsaking Local for Global ; Personal
for Historical ; Judea for Empire
There are many, many
other points that can be brought out in the
opportunities this passage provides
(including those coming from the references
to speaking, acknowledging, witnessing,
teaching, greeting, hearing your words,
testimony, etc.). However, I would like to
give one final thought in this post before
closing for the sake of brevity. That
thought is regarding the paradox of the
followers of Christ having evangelized the
entire known world prior to AD70, yet not
having covered all the cities of Israel.
It is taught in all Hyper
Preterist literature that the gospel would
be preached to the entire Roman Empire
before AD70. A list of verses is usually
offered to prove that the gospel had been
preached to the whole world in
fulfillment of Jesus' declaration in Matthew
24: "this gospel of the kingdom shall be
preached in all the world (oikoumene) for a
witness unto all nations; and then shall the
end come."
So then, this model defies intuition by
suggesting that the disciples were A) able
to evangelise the entire known world before
AD70, yet B) were not able to the cover the
cities in their own back yard after 40 years
of evangelism!
Keep in mind that it was the cities
that supposedly would not yet be reached --
even forty years later [Note that the Greek
word for cities is from "polis" (as in
Metropolis), not "kome," which is used
dozens of times for "village"]. On top of
this, it is not even ALL the cities of
Israel under consideration, as Jesus had
just told them not to go into "the way of
the Gentiles" or the cities of the
Samaritans (10:5)! This greatly narrows the
scope of their commission.
This fact also provides a very
important chronological cue, because
after His resurrection, Jesus widened the
commission's scope to the entire world!
Therefore, this commission, and all of the
associated aspects, were bespeaking the
pre-resurrection time frame. In evidence of
the distinctly different nature of the
"great" commission after His resurrection,
Jesus assures his disciples that they would
not have to wait at all, but that He would
be "with them" at all times (28:20), as "all
authority" had already been given to Him (v.
18).
Matthew 10:23 is
constantly appealed in HyP literature as a
prime example of extreme chronological
nearness for the "coming of the son of man"
-- which is equated with the events of AD70.
Seemingly unaware of this paradox, HyP
scholarship embarrassingly stumbles around,
declaring on one hand that the gospel was
preached to "every creature" before AD70 --
and yet that not even all the cities of
Israel had heard the gospel. Here are a few
of the verses given to shore up the teaching
that the gospel was indeed preached
throughout the entire Roman Empire (at the
very least) prior to AD70 :
Colossians 1:5-6 "For the
hope which is laid up for you in heaven,
whereof ye heard before in the word of the
truth of the gospel; Which is come unto you,
as it is in all the world; and
bringeth forth fruit"
Colossians 1:23 "This is the gospel that you
heard and that has been proclaimed to
every creature under heaven, and of
which I, Paul, have become a servant."
Romans 1:8 "I thank my God through Jesus
Christ for you all, that your faith is
spoken of throughout the whole world. "
Romans 10:18 "Their sound went into all
the earth, and their words unto the
end of the world"
Romans 16:25 ..the preaching of Jesus
Christ.. which was kept secret since the
world began, 26 But now is made manifest,
and by the scriptures of the prophets,
according to the commandment of the
everlasting God, made known to all
nations for the obedience of faith:
1 Timothy 3:16 "He was manifested in the
flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by
angels, proclaimed among the nations,
believed on in the world, taken up in
glory."
And yet, in spite of this
(geniunely remarkable) world-wide explosion
of evangelism... somehow a few of the
(non-Gentile / non-Samaritan) cities in
Israel slipped through the cracks, and did
so according to the foreknowledge and
prophecy of Jesus Himself. To call that
feat quite unlikely is an understatement.
Rather, it is a manifest absurdity!
During the ministry of
Jesus alone, all of the cities were
likely covered (see map above). However,
those that may not have been at that time
would certainly have been covered shortly
thereafter.
And this paradox is even allowing that the
focal point of Jesus' declaration was the
cities and the evangelism of the collective
disciples, which I dispute (opposition).
Rather, I believe (advocacy) that the focus
here is the same as in Matthew 16:27-28 -
the individuals Jesus was sending out
to be persecuted right then and there..
maturely and warmly providing comfort in the
face of the coming sufferings. This was no
cold calculation regarding the amount of
time it would take to collectively
propagandize most of the cities prior to the
fall of Jerusalem. This was a show of Jesus
at His most humane and loving.
TIME TEXT TAP DANCE
I have heard that there is an alternative
take on this passage now circulating in HyP
circles. Recognizing that the "unfinished
evangelism" interpretation leads to
difficulties such as the paradox listed
above, the new interpretation focuses on the
"continuation" of the evangelism.
The reasoning goes like this: What Jesus
is actually saying is that the disciples
will continue evangelizing Israel until
Jesus comes in AD70. In no way will they
finish their evangelism until the Son of Man
comes in AD70. (an amusing interpretation,
seeing as how HyPs teach that every last
Christian fled to Pella, Jordan in AD66).
Here is Young's literal rendering of that
verse: "And whenever they may persecute you
in this city, flee to the other, for verily
I say to you, ye may not have completed the
cities of Israel till the Son of Man may
come."
For those who want to address this
alternative HyP argument, it will be helpful
to coordinate "flee" with "completed". If
the "not have completed" is tied to the
command to "flee" the cities, then
the utter nearness of the coming of the Son
of man is displayed... in other words,
something coming much sooner than 40 years
later when all the apostles were likely dead
except for John.
However, it is unneccesary to even
critically oppose this alternative
interpretation, as it proves the point of
this article without me having to write a
word. In this interpretation Matthew 10:23
ceases being a "time text" pointing to AD70
altogether! The only way to make this a time
text is by demanding a fine set of
assumptions - not least of which is that the
time when "the Son of Man may come" is
actually AD70! Obviously, this is assuming
the very point in question (which is
actually not uncommon). By reasoning thus,
however, and saying that the coming must be
AD70 and only AD70 (despite how this
language is used in Matt. 26:64), a nice
tidy bit of circular reasoning kool aid is
packaged and ready for delivery.
For HyP to present a corporate view of
AD70 in this passage, fulfillment would need
to be delayed well into the future, long
after the vast majority (if not near
totality) of the audience was already dead,
which undercuts the very comfort that this
saying of Jesus is intended to provide.
Accordingly, if this were His intent, it
might have made more sense for Jesus to have
stated, "if they persecute you don't worry,
you will soon be dead."
HyP must show how this very language in
Matthew 26:64 points to the future, when
Jesus plainly speaks of the immediate
present. This is no small hurdle, and the
only response I've received from a HyP
author is "it doesn't matter."
FORSAKING THE INDIVIDUAL FOR THE
COLLECTIVE
At a later date I will
tie the typical coldness of this misreading
of the Bible into how the individual
is consistently forsaken by Hyper Preterism
.. then and now .. for the sake of upholding
a method which is focused on the
corporate events of the distant past.
This is not to say that hyper preterists are
cold to people. There is a difference
between a system of theology and the people
who embrace it. Therefore, if one wants to
take it personally, then it would have to be
in context of the santifying or
de-sanctifying effects of the system itself.
So then, with the
complete lack of any references to AD70,
yet with abundant references to the personal
sufferings as evangelism meets bitter
rejection, Matthew 10:23 stands with Matthew
16:27-28 as another example of :
A) (Opposition) The eisegesis of the
Hyper Preterist "AD70 Coming of the Son"
and
B) (Advocacy) Jesus Christ warning and
then comforting those who live godly in Him
that they will be persecuted for providing
testimony of the gospel, but will be
glorified afterwards for their endurance to
the end.
A faithful committment to
"audience relevance" will reveal the
personal nature of Jesus' solemn warning to,
and gracious comforting of, the disciples He
was sending out as sheep to wolves:
Matthew 10:23 "Whenever
they persecute you in one town, (you)
escape to the next; for I solemnly tell
you that you will not have gone
the round of all the towns of Israel
before the Son of Man comes." (Weymouth)
Instead of insisting that
the Lord may only come once to the
collective world, we would do better to
accept that it is He who is, who was, and
who is always coming to each individual in
their times. For a broader examination of
this suffering/glorification archetype in
scripture, refer to the book of Job. It is
important for all Christians to become very
familiar with this motif because, whether we
realize or not, our transformation in Jesus
Christ is being managed according to the
very same operation of the Holy Spirit. We
are likewise being exhorted -- even now --
to "cast off the works of darkness, and put
on the armour of light" because "the day is
at hand."
John 12:25 He who holds his life dear, is
destroying it; and he who makes his life of
no account in this world shall keep it to
the Life of the Ages. (Weymouth)
blessings!
todd
