Featured Let Jesus be Jesus and Preterism Rings and Reigns all through the Bible

I love it—your post was a real hoot Sovereign

Thanks for the laughs brother. I love it when I get a futurist on the hook who likes to take all these apocalyptic verses rich with symbolism and literalize them.

So friend by what rule of interpretation pray tell are you able to take these verses and literalize them other than some spaced-out, moonbeam commentary?

There is plenty of precedence to see similar language as symbolic, but where was such language ever, ever literal?

Since we have already established that Christ had to come back soon after the writings of the New Testament if the bible is inerrant then it only forces this language to be symbolic as well since the world didn’t pass away and people didn’t get the mark of the beastie on their foreheads and so on and so on.

The new heaven and new earth is clearly a reference to the new covenant or Christianity. That interpretation is consistent with the bible and clearly can be a literal interpretation whereas the destruction of the earth and the creation of a new one can’t be literal and consistent with the bible.

You make this too easy for me Sovereign. You actually help me out if this is the best you can do it simply exposes the bankrupt, hallowed out, empty interpretation of futurism.

C’mon man—make an argument for your case instead of making a laughing stock out of it if you can.

I think we have here another example of what a joke futurism is—I laugh at myself to think I ever believed in futurism.

Sovereign do you realize that there is not one single verse in the bible that addresses the timing of the coming of Christ being anything but soon or near? You can’t worm around the fact that the inspired word of God demands a soon coming of Christ.

"No Dispy will claim that it is not, in fact, the case that an (even cursory) perusal of the New Testament doesn't often convey something of a "soon-ness" or "emminent-ness" to Christ's return. We already know that.....We don't debate it"…….Heir of Salvation

Well said Heir. Preach on brother.

 

His Witness,

Just wanted to say that I dropped by to check on the post tonight before turning to other work and saw your questions. All excellent questions that fit together well.

I promise to address all of them—but it may not be tonight—it depends on how my time runs. But I will respond as soon as I am able.

Regards,

Logos1

 

Ok sorry for the delay. Let me try this very succinctly. I’m sure a much longer treatment is needed, but I need to move quickly tonight. To keep the post short I’ll answer each of your questions in a different post.

This is not a literal sound of a trumpet. We see the pattern established in the Old Testament. It signaled a gathering of God’s people. In Jewish thought when they were dispersed outside of Judea as in exile they were said to be dead—not because they were physically dead, but because they were cut off from the presence of God in Jerusalem where he dwelt in the Temple. Separation was a type of death. See Isaiah 27:12-13 where those in Assyria and Egypt are gathered back to Jerusalem. The trumpet heralded their return—their restoration.

In the New Testament the trump signifies Christ’s atoning work when the dead in Christ are gathered from Sheol (or where ever they are) and allowed into the presence of God in heaven. This is the restoration of Israel (spiritual Israel which of course included gentiles) The last trump is the end of the Old Covenant and when the New Covenant comes fully into its own. Those who are dead in Christ are gathered into heaven. Their restoration. For us this means when we die we no longer are stuck waiting in Sheol for Christ’s atoning work, but go straight to heaven upon death. Hence, at the last trump we are all changed—the dead restored to God’s presence in heaven and those alive then go straight to heaven upon their death.

If I had more time tonight I could probably explain that better—but in the interest of not so long a post and time let me leave it there for tonight.

 

There seems to be some confusion here—The bible doesn’t say they ascended with him as in the description of the ascension in Acts 1. Let’s look at the verses in question.

Matthew 27:51-53
(ESV)
51 And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split. 52 The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, 53 and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many.

Maybe you confused resurrection with ascension. We know for sure that they could not have gone to heaven at the time of the ascension because John 3:13 tells us so:

No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.

Until 70 AD when the Old Covenant comes to a complete end and the New Covenant comes into its own Christ has not yet prepared the place for us and only then when his atoning work is finished and the place prepared can we go into heaven.

 

The greek word for air in Thessalonians (aer) has a connotation of spiritual air not the sky or physical air. If it meant the sky it would have said ouranos.

Those who are dead come into God’s presence in the spiritual realm they don’t fly up into the sky. This only makes sense—the bible is about spiritual matters not matters of the atmosphere. Don’t be confused by those who read that term in English instead of the Jewish (with greek dressing on it) as it should be read and understood.

We are all changed at the last trump in 70 AD—those who are dead go in to God’s presence in heaven and the rest of us who know Christ upon death go immediately into his presence at our death instead of going into Sheol.

I hope this answered your questions. They could be better answered with much longer and detailed answers that would be too long for a forum post, but I hope this at least gets to the heart of the matter.

 

The only thing that we really know about them is that they came out of the graves when Christ was crucified. We do know that they didn’t go to heaven before 70AD since the bible tells us in John that no one has gone to heaven except the one who came from heaven, the Son of Man.

We can only speculate—maybe they were just around for a period around the crucifixion/resurrection.

Maybe they lived for a while and died again of other causes.

The bible doesn’t go into that so I would only caution about someone trying to tell you what became of them.

 

The Christians who were alive in 70 AD didn’t go to heaven until they died later whenever their time came whether it was one day or 50 years or more. But when they did die they went straight to heaven and not to Sheol as those who died in Christ did before 70 AD.

Where does it leave us today—it means when Christians die they go straight to heaven and not Sheol.

 

In search of a good argument from a futurist

 

I'm accepting laurels tonight HoS, LOL