That is to say, while they understood that someone would come, they understood whatever it was that had been revealed to them, the timing was not clear, and the precise personages were not clear. It has to matter to us. Turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 9; 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 9: We have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, - that is, whether in heaven or here - to be pleasing to Him - to be pleasing to Him. Now, why am I making a case for this? You cannot fight the war on every front, and at the great time of the Reformation, they were fighting the war where the battle raged the hottest. I know where history is going. JOHN MACARTHUR is the pastor-teacher of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California; president of The Master's College and Seminary; and featured teacher for the Grace to You media ministry. There were 1600 pastors from central Asia - the first Central Asian pastors conference in history after the breakup of the Soviet Union. There is no doubt that he does hold to the fundamental distinction between the Church and Israel, though he does not always apply this distinction consistently. There was a clear majority position among the earliest church fathers on the relationship of Israel to the church. / ( .) And theres the main verb in the sentence are in varying degrees of disinterest in applying their skills to the end of the story, and rather, content to be in happy if not playful disagreement in regard to the vast biblical data on eschatology, as if the end doesnt matter much - period. Moreover, John, as again stated by Papias, ascribed the origin of millenarianism to Christ . Guest. But, in any case - and by the way, postmillennialists and amillennialists differ as to the details of these kinds of things. Only now has it happened, and so His promises may not be trustworthy, since they were given in the past, before so many things happened that He didnt know were coming to pass. My professors were a Who's Who of dispensational premillennialism: John Walvoord (then president of DTS), Charles Ryrie (author of Dispensationalism Today and The Ryrie Study Bible ), and J. Dwight Pentecost (author of perhaps the most influential text on the subject at that time, Things to Come ), just to mention the more well-known. Single. Now, I've been telling you for a number of months that we were going to get into the subject of eschatology, the doctrine of last things. Grace to You radio, video, audio, print, and website resources reach millions worldwide each day. No kingdom on earth ruled by Christ before He gets here, and no kingdom on earth ruled by Christ after He gets here. Whats that about? From this point on he dedicated much of his energy to ridding the church of this belief. And youve been great tonight; this is more like a theological lecture. [21] Eusebius also had low regard for the chiliast, Papias, and he let it be known that in his opinion Papias was "a man of small mental capacity" because he had taken the Apocalypse literally.[22]. a.Dispensationalist Premillennialism 1. Even His promises may not be valid, because He made them with inadequate information. Forfeited all its privileges, forfeited all those things that God declared in covenant that He would give to them in the future; and they forfeit it by their disobedience to the Mosaic Covenant, by their apostasy from true religion and by their rejection of their Messiah. If you look at Acts 3:19, Peter says, Repent therefore, and return, that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing - thats the millennium - may come from the presence of the Lord; that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you, whom heaven must receive till the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time. So, having your eschatology in place may lead you to repentance. He loved the church. Doctrinal Statement Student Testimonies TMS for your Family Academics Academics Overview Master of Divinity Master of Theology Doctor of Ministry Doctor of Philosophy Bachelor of Theology Diploma of Theology Center for Israeli Studies Distance Education Academic Calendar Faculty Admissions & Aid Those who most celebrate the sovereign grace of election regarding the church and its inviolable place in Gods purpose, from predestination before the foundation of the world to glorification in the future, those who most celebrate the sovereign grace of election, those who most aggressively, most militantly, and most capably defend the truth of Scripture regarding this election being divine, unilateral, unconditional, irrevocable by nature, for the church - thats for us . Origen was the first to challenge the doctrine openly. We can interpret it the way we interpret any other passage of Scripture, with the same use of the normal, natural means of interpreting language, and we should; and it will yield for us as clear an understanding of the future as the Lord wants us to have. Continue reading In similar language, Scripture affirms the perpetuity of ethnic Israel to a future salvation and a future kingdom as a race of people, and that in that salvation and in that kingdom will be the fulfillment of all divine promises given to them in the Old Testament, repeated in the New Testament, and through them to the world. In fact, the worst evil thats ever been done on the history of the world was the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and by that - the worst evil - He gained the greatest glory. Isaiah 65 - really, the whole chapter is about Israel, Gods elect - verse 22: My elect again shall enjoy long the work of their hands. Israel repeatedly called Gods elect; we know what that means. Why do we want to run from that? Register. The reason why it's called "historic premillennialism" is that, historically, this was the allegedly commonly-held view by many of the church fathers like Iraenus, Pappias, and Justin Martyr. Accordingly, it must be that Abraham, together with his seed (that is, those who fear God and believe in Him), will receive it at the resurrection of the just.[7] In another place Irenaeus also explained that the blessing to Jacob belongs unquestionably to the times of the kingdom when the righteous will bear rule, after their rising from the dead. . So, if were going to change the rules of interpretation to inject into Scripture a preconceived idea or to avoid what is obvious, we better be sure that we have a word from God. Please be aware that these items are sent out from our office in the UK. Did He do it and somehow muddle it so hopelessly that the high ground for Bible students and the high ground for theologians is to recognize the muddle and abandon the perspicuity or the clarity of Scripture on that subject? Scripture affirms the perpetuity of the elect church to salvation glory; that all whom the Lord has chosen He brings to glory. If you interpret Old Testament prophecies literally, they cannot be fulfilled in this present age. In the world, things will get better and better and better as the church becomes more powerful and more influential. Now, frankly, its too late for John Calvin to fix his work, although he is now a premillennialist in heaven. Weekly telecasts and daily radio broadcasts of "Grace to You" are seen and heard by millions worldwide. Now, against those two is the view called premillennialism; that means there will be a millennium and prior to that millennium, Jesus will come. We also applaud his insistence that the Bible must be interpreted literally, according to its normal sense. ; 2) Egypt in the following years; and 3) Judah in 605 B.C. So to interpret Matthew 24 the way John MacArthur does as all about the tribulation period, and then all of a sudden you get to verse thirteen and you read into that a whole soteriological concept that I've got to make it to the end of my life in good works to prove I'm a Christian so I can get to heaven. It is the single most inexplicable story in human history, that this small group of beleaguered people, attacked and assaulted by everybody around them for centuries, still exist as a pure ethnic race. Irenaeus and Justin represent two of the most outspoken premillennialists of the pre-Nicean church. Revelation 1:3: Blessed is he who reads, and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it: for the time is near.. I said, Sure - Ill take all day Friday, Ill tell you the future. So, I just marched them through the order of the chronology of eschatology as its laid out clearly, both in the Old and the New Testament, and I finished. Particular to this framework is the eschatological position known as "premillennial dispensationalism" which holds that Christ will return prior to a literal one-thousand-year reign on earth. So, you interpret it right, and that will allow you to understand the meaning of the Covenants and the future of Israel; and Gods integrity is at stake. 4. I think it matters. Daniel was one of the first groups of deportees, and Ezekiel followed in 597 B.C. When Assyrian power had ebbed by 625 B.C., the Neo-Babylonians conquered: 1) Assyria with its capital Nineveh in 612 B.C. In the US, the dispensational form of premillennialism was propagated on the popular level largely through the Scofield Reference Bible and on the academic level with Lewis Sperry Chafer's eight-volume Systematic Theology. MacArthur is a fifth-generation pastor, a popular author and conference speaker and has served as pastor-teacher of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California since 1969 . And he is suggesting, therefore, that we cant interpret them literally, because somehow, weve got to make them fulfilled in this age, because there is no future age. Now, if you want to get the future right, youve got to get Israel right, and youve got to get Gods sovereign electing purpose right. Why, then, if we are so committed to protecting the text of the beginning in its literal nature, are we so fast to give up the texts of the end and their literal nature? Who will establish it? Dispensationalism is perhaps a key reason why evangelicals have such a concern with what happens to the nation of Israel. Well see more about how that works. And by the way, if we change the rules, what are the new ones? But some are holding on to what they have taught in the past; I guess self-preservation dominates their theology at that point. We chart the course and God reacts. Popular proponents of dispensational premillennialism have been John F. MacArthur, Phil Johnson, Ray Comfort, Jerry Falwell, Todd Friel, Dwight Pentecost, John Walvoord (d. 2002), Tim Lahaye, Charles Caldwell Ryrie (in the notes for the Ryrie Study Bible), the theological-folk poetry of Jack Royerton, and Charles L. Feinberg. From the material available online today, many would conclude that "historic premillennialism" refers to the teaching of 20th century theologian George Elton Laddand no other view. [41] Although they were not premillennial, the English theologian Daniel Whitby (16881726), the German Johann Albrecht Bengel (16871752), and the American Jonathan Edwards (170358) "fueled millennial ideas with new influence in the nineteenth century. The reformers had it right on most issues. There are over two thousand references to Israel in Scripture; not one of them means anything but Israel. - comfort one another. The following resources pertain to eschatology the study of the end times. One says moving toward the coming of Christ there will be no kingdom. Whether you are a pessimistic amillennialist, or an optimistic amillennialist - thats a postmillennialist - you dont know what to do with prophetic truth, because if you interpret prophetic truth in the same normal, natural way you interpret all the rest of the passages of Scripture, youre going to end up a premillennialist; its inevitable. And I ask the question: are we supposed to be comfortable with the notion that the hard and fast and true principles of Bible interpretation have to be set aside in prophetic texts? I had, as theologians might call it, my own my own ordo eschaton; that would be the chronological sequence of the end times. The world, as they see it, is in an ongoing golden process of progress. 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