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The following article is written by Paul M. League, a layperson and
self-employed business person of over thirty-five years and believer in
God and the Judeo-Christian tradition, a tradition that thousands of years
ago
prophesied
both a first and second incarnation of God as Messiah and then as Judge.
The first incarnation occurred in the first century with the Messiah and
Savior Jesus Christ and the second is yet future. The article is meant to
help fellow believers and others trying to increase their understanding of
God and Biblical truths, and is a work in progress. The attempt here is to
put in layperson language the essence of revealed truth as derived from
careful and thorough study of many of the world’s most respected
authorities of such matters. A listing of relevant resources follows this
article for those wishing to either personally verify or to more directly
study such matters for themselves. These are not given to direct the
reader one way over another, but as a helpful and sound way to move
towards a greater knowledge of God and His truth using the Bible and
credible, known and respected sources as appropriate guideposts along the
way. PML - March 2011 |
“What Is Truth?”
Practical Implications of Biblical Prophetic Truths
from the Orthodox/Partial Preterist Perspective
by Paul M. League
Mankind’s search for “the (absolute) truth” has been historically both
satisfied and proven through one, and only one book; namely, the “Old & New”
Testament Bible of the Judeo-Christian heritage.
The Bible is considered by many to be the best preserved body of work of
antiquity of any, and this is, in part, due to the strong tradition of the
most consistent and error free translations of it down through the ages by
scribes, scholars and others. This fact being irrefutably confirmed with the
finding of the Dead Sea Scrolls, where nearly whole books of the Bible proved
that current translations had every material point correctly recorded. The
most distinguishing aspect of this phenomena, however, is that it is the only
book with a hundred percent accuracy in predicting both near and far future
events, and in some cases, hundreds and thousands of years before their
occurrence.
The most historical account and example of Biblical inerrancy and fulfilled
prophetic pronouncements occurred with the incarnation of the prophesied
Biblical Messiah, Jesus Christ, when, in the first century AD, he was born of
a virgin mother, began preaching around the age of 13, and went onto to
perform many miracles culminating in His later crucifixion, around the age of
33, with historical evidence confirming His Resurrection back to life
three-days later. His tomb was heavily guarded, yet was found empty after His
fatal torment on the cross and 3-days having been entombed. After about 40
days, where over 500 persons of His time personally witnessed His death to
life triumph, He was seen to ascend to heaven, as attested to in the Bible,
where He now reigns, in His Millennial Kingdom, as King of Kings and Lord of
Lords, seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, the God of all
creation (“Millennial Reign” simply meaning a time period of long and
undetermined length, and an event that began around the time just following
His ascension in the 1st century AD). In theological circles, that
time period is referred to as the “end of the age”, the age of law being
thereafter replaced with the “age of grace” where salvation from evil and
separation from our Creator God is secured through justification by faith and
belief in the life and work of the incarnated Christ Jesus as Lord and
Savior.
A careful study of the Bible reveals that all prophecies of God have come true
exactly as they were made and documented in the Bible; however, often time
prophecies were not understood well by contemporaries of the time, or
subsequent generations, and so too is the case with the incarnation, death,
resurrection and subsequent ascension of Jesus Christ. Because His generation
did no better in understanding many of His prophetic pronouncements, such as
contained in His famed Olivet Discourse, there remains confusion about all of
what exactly He predicted and the time frame within which its components were
to be fulfilled.
To the rescue came various theological interpreters trying to make sense out
of it all from Gnosticism, Preterism and Dispensationalism, to present day
soothsayers like Tim LaHaye, who have invented such non-Scriptural imaginings
as a secret second coming, pre-millennial rapture of believers and the errant
end-times concept of two distinct dispensations, one having to do with the
Israelites and a separate other with the Gentiles. Unfortunately, for most of
these, only a form of Preterism, called orthodox or partial preterism, has
proven able to accurately interpret the Bible in light of the Bible. It is of
the utmost importance for mankind to understand the practical implications of
this form of Preterist view.
First, this Preterist viewpoint makes it clear that not all of
prophetic pronouncements contained within Christ’s Olivet Discourse and
Revelation have been fulfilled yet, although, most aspects were fulfilled in
the 1st Century AD following Christ’s victorious (He conquered over
death as witnessed by His historical and well documented Resurrection)
ascension to His Heavenly Throne. What remains then are only two things;
namely, the prophesied 2nd Coming (“bodily” return) of Jesus Christ
(this time as Judge of all mankind and creation) and the bodily resurrection
of believers – the one true “body of Christ”, who are those who believe in Him
and consists of persons from all nations and peoples of the world - to eternal
life with God.
What does all this mean for us today?
Primarily it means that we don’t have to be in the dark, confused or any
longer led astray about where we are in the time line of Prophecy and in the
Creator’s plans for mankind in general. And, it makes clear what we are to be
doing with our lives in the meantime.
Specifically, we can avoid and keep ourselves protected from the false musings
of modern day end-times prognosticators like: Tim LaHaye (“Left Behind”), John
Hagee, Joel C. Rosenberg[i],
as well as against Word of Faith & Prosperity misguided preachers like:
Kenneth Copeland, Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer[ii],
a cast of characters whose heretical teachings have been well exposed and
documented by Hank Hanegraaff in his award winning “Christianity in Crisis –
21st Century” (Thomas Nelson Publishing 2008. See
www.equip.org). Add to this the following:
1) You don't have to be constantly watching the news for signs of prophetic
fulfillment, or be suspicious of things like debit cards or microchips (at
least, not on spiritual grounds) being implanted on or in you by a so-called
modern day arch-Antichrist. All you need do is to prepare yourself for
Christ’s any moment return by living Godly lives in the here and now and doing
Godly works of love and caring towards your fellow man, all the while centered
on faith in Christ Jesus as Savior and Lord.
Orthodox Preterism, therefore, helps protect persons from errant teachings
that are doing more harm in fanning the flames of an Armageddon-like scenario
that, as Preterism makes very clear, was the subject of Christ’s prophetic
Words but applicable to the 1st century generation to who He spoke
His prophecy, and not to a 21st century generation. The Book of
Revelation employs highly embellished symbolic language that represents a
writing style genre that uses Old Testament imagery to communicate truths that
while beneficial to mankind of all generations, was meant to convey and usher
in the final phase of God’s redemptive plan for all humanity beginning in the
first century AD. It also shed additional light on how the rest of the Bibles
prophecies would be further fulfilled through God’s, yet future, prophesized 2nd
Coming. So, whatever holocaust-like horrors man conducts since the period
around 70 AD, they are not to be confused as the “Great Tribulation” of the 70
AD event predicted in the Bible that demonstrated God’s wrath on the sinners
and hypocrites of His first century advent.
Orthodox Preterism, therefore, short-circuits any attempts by cults or
heretical teachers, like those noted herein, to be successful in attempting to
use Biblical prophecy to persuade people to their non-Biblical viewpoints. For
example, the Jehovah’s Witnesses can't link themselves to the 144K saved
remnant referred to in the Book of Revelation, the final Book of the Bible, if
those people were the people Jesus referred to and who survived in the first
century AD, but who are certainly not 21st century believers. And,
Latter Day Saints (better known as Mormons), despite their acknowledged
substantive history of good works, can’t validate any original prophecies from
Joseph Smith’s the “Book of Mormon”, because that book is man-made and
therefore not the inerrant, inspired Word of God, and because Mormons do not
accept the deity of Christ, thereby contradicting the Bible itself.
Believers today will not endure a “Great Tribulation” because that tribulation
occurred in Jesus' generation, the ramifications of which included the deaths
of well over 1.3 million Israelites and the imprisonment of another 100,000 –
a tribulation greater than any before to those who had rejected their Messiah,
the very incarnate God Himself.
2) You don't have to worry about Satan, his group of fallen angels or evil
spirits influencing anything in your lives. Instead, you do have to be
concerned about your own sinful nature, and that of others, and its power to
lead you into total rebellion and ungodly actions, the outcome being death and
eternal separation from God.
Lucifer (also known as Satan or the Devil) has been bound since around the
time of the victorious ascension of Christ, such that the evil we see and
experience in this world is not from bad or evil spirits or the devil,
but generated from and by man’s own fallen sinful nature. What is evil, and
what is the cause or source of it? Since God created the world “good”, evil is
nothing more than good being corrupted and man, since Satan’s being bound, not
God, is the source of that corrupted good. God has set a moral standard,
embedded in every person’s conscience, and it is only by that absolute moral
standard that anything can be determined to be good or evil. Without God and
his goodness, mankind would have nothing but a relative basis on which to
judge or determine right and wrong, or morality in general (i.e. the modern
day philosophy of relativism), and such a Godless conscience leads to ruin,
corruption and ultimately to mass confusion and societal moral
disintegration.
3) Jesus will return, but it is yet future, a yet to be completed part of His
full prophecy.
Preterists make clear that Christ’s prophecy was directed to “this
generation”, the generation of His time on earth during the 1st
century AD, and the things that were “near” and “soon” to take place
immediately after, or following, His incarnation and subsequent ascension.
Everything He predicted would occur in that generation occurred, leaving only
future elements of His prophecy to be fulfilled.
So, what all this means is that we are, with every passing moment, actually
ever closer to the Lord’s 2nd return, His yet future prophetic 2nd
Coming, which is to include the resurrection of all, living and dead, to
eternal life with God or to eternal separation from God (a.k.a. “Hell”) in a
new earth and new heaven.
This also means that believers (those who believe in Christ Jesus’, His
incarnation to save them and who, with that belief and faith, have repented or
turned from their life of sin and placed their trust in Jesus Christ as Lord
and Savior) will one day soon see their trials, tribulations and the evil in
this present world, in an instant and like the blink of an eye, washed away
for evermore.
More to the point, understanding the Bible for all its worth, as
Orthodox/Partial Preterism helps us do, only affirms the veracity of the
inerrancy of the Bible as proven through the historically verifiable
fulfillment of each and every one of its prophecies in time.
“What is truth”, screeched Pontius Pilate to our Lord Jesus Christ before His
sentence of crucifixion (a clear part of prophetic Scripture itself), with the
Lord answering back and since, throughout the ages, I am that I am and My
Every Word is Absolute Truth!
We now not only have ample proof to believe, but we are promised, as
believers, the indwelling of His Holy Spirit to guide and comfort us.
We are called to test these truths of Scripture, and test we must, as this is,
literally, a life and death calling. Each one of us has a choice that will
lead us to a life of eternal communion or separation from our Father God. The
choice is rather simple when one considers the Truths and fulfilled prophecies
of the one and only Lord God Almighty and His Word Incarnate - Jesus Christ
our loving Messiah & Righteous Judge – and His Word, the one and only Holy
Bible.
PML – March 2011
Reference Resources:
21st Century - Orthodox/Partial Preterists:
Hank Hanegraaff (The Bible Answer Man) – “The Apocalypse Code”,
“Resurrection”, “The Complete Bible Answer Book”: see Christian Research
Institute (CRI) at:
www.equip.org
R. C. Sproul – “Now That’s A Good Question” & “The Last Days According to
Jesus” at:
http://www.ligonier.org/store/type/book/
Ken Gentry – “The Book of Revelation Made Easy” at:
http://www.kennethgentry.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=1&products_id=481
James Patrick Holding – “Defending the Resurrection” & “Trusting the New
Testament” at:
http://www.tektonics.org/esch/pretsum.html
Dee Dee Warren – “It’s Not the End of the World” at:
http://preteristsite.com/plain/warrenend.html
Gary DeMar (President, American Vision Org) - “Why the End of the World Is Not
In Your Future” & “Last Days Madness” at:
http://www.preteristarchive.com/Books/1999_demar_last-days-madness.html
Ralph Bass – “Christian Theology” at:
http://www.christian-resources-today.com/Christian-Websites-10.html
C. Jonathin Seraiah – “The End of All Things: A Defense of the Future” at:
http://answers.org/bookreviews/misstheend.html
Theology & Apologetic Resources:
The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) by the since disbanded
International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI) at:
http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/creeds/chicago.htm
C.S. Lewis – “Mere Christianity” at:
http://www.cslewis.org/
Dr. Gary Habermas, Ph.D. – “Why Believe? God Exists!” at:
http://www.garyhabermas.com
Michael J. Behe, Ph.D. – “Darwin’s Black Box” at:
http://www.arn.org/authors/behe.html
Dr. William Lane Craig – “Reasonable Faith” & “On Guard” at:
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/PageServer
J. P. Moreland – “The GOD Question” at:
http://www.jpmoreland.com/
Dr. Douglas R. Groothuis – “Confronting the New Age” at:
http://www.arn.org/authors/groothuis.html
Dr. Norman Geisler & Frank Turek– “I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist”
at:
http://www.internationallegacy.org/
Dr. Ravi Zacharias – “Walking from East to West: God in the Shadows” & “Can
Man Live Without God” at:
http://www.rzim.org/
Lee Strobel – “Case for Christ”, “Case for the Real Jesus” & “Case for the
Creator” at:
www.LeeStrobel.com
Ron Rhodes – “The Challenge of the Cults and New Religions” & “The Topical
Handbook of Bible Prophecy” at:
http://www.ronrhodes.org/
George Bryson – “The Five Points of Calvinism - Weighed and Found Wanting”,
“The Dark Side of Calvinism-the Calvinist Caste System” and “Grace-God’s
Riches at Christ’s Expense” at:
http://www.calvarychapeltheology.com/resources.html
Phillip Yancey – “What’s So Amazing About Grace” at:
http://www.philipyancey.com/
Dr. Walter Martin (deceased) – “Essential Christianity” at:
http://www.waltermartinjude3.com/wrmtribute.html
R.A. Torrey (deceased) – “How to Pray” & “How to Study the Bible” at:
http://www.freewebs.com/ratorrey/
Watchman Nee (deceased) – “The Normal Christian Life” at:
www.equip.org
Teachings / Persons to Avoid:
[i]
Avoid for eschatological teachings:
Tim LaHaye (Left Behind);
Hal Lindsey (Apocalypse Code); Rod Parsley; Perry Stone (Manna-fest); Dr.
David Jeremiah; Thomas Ice; Mark Hitchcock; Jay Adams; John Hagee
(Christian Zionist); Joel Rosenberg (The Last Days); Jack
Van Impe; L. Nelson Bell; Milton C. Fisher; Chuck Smith (Calvary Chapel
Movement); Dave Hunt; Robert Faid; Edgar
Whisenant; Jan
Markell; Terry James (Rapture Ready); Todd Strandberg (Rapture Ready);
Jeffrey Seif (Zola Levitt Ministries); Jim Fletcher; Noah Hutchings; Dr.
John Morris; and older interpreters regarding their eschatological views like: Dr.
James Vernon McGee; J.
Dwight Pentecost; Charles Ryrie, Dr. John F. Walvoord; C.I. Scofield; etc.
[ii]
Avoid for most all teachings:
Essek William Kenyon; Kenneth E. Hagin; Kenneth Copeland; Benny Hinn;
Creflo Dollar; T.D. Jakes; Frederick K. C. Price; John Avanzini; Robert
Tilton; Charles Capps; Jerry Savelle; Morris Cerullo; Paul Crouch; Juanita
Bynum; Paula White; Todd Bentley; etc.
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