Many
of you have read the various commentaries and newsletters I have put on the web
site over the past year. Yet there has been one area that I have not touched
upon, though there are a number of people that have accused me of being a
heretic because of it!
That
subject is Fulfilled Eschatology, or Preterism.
For most of you, the idea that all the prophecies in the
Bible being fulfilled is ludicrous. A good number of readers are comfortable with the other
topics I have covered. And still others have no problem with the idea that some
or most of the prophecies in the Bible are fulfilled.
But
not all of the prophecies!
Yet,
I feel that it is in the best interest of everyone that I completely "come
out of the closet" in this new area of the web site, and take you on a
journey. Because, as you shall see, Preterism is more than just accepting the
fulfilled nature of all the Bible, it is the heart of
what Kingdom Grace is all about.
About
six years ago I considered myself a confident pre-millennial, pre-tribulationist. My views leaned heavily toward the
historical rather than the dispensational, and I firmly believed that the reign
of Christ upon the earth, as well as the ultimate destruction of the world,
remained in our future. I had studied the many passages in Revelation, Daniel,
and the Gospels fervently. I knew all the reasons why I believed as I believed,
and could express them to anyone who would ask.
Yet,
as the days went by I found that there were many unanswered questions. It
seemed to me that the passages that I believed were in the future - like the
words spoken by Jesus on the Mount of Olives - seemed to be very out-of-place
in a modern context. Gradually I began to question my faith (see my Newsletter
titled "Am
I Saved?" for the details behind this event). After all, if I couldn't
trust Jesus in the arena of eschatology, I couldn't trust Him with my salvation
either.
I
started to accept the fact that some of these prophecies were fulfilled in the
first century. Jesus' words to me were very clear on that:
Matt.
24:29-34 "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be
darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from
heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 30Then the
sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the
earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of
heaven with power and great glory. 31And he will send out his angels
with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather together his elect from the four
winds, from one end of heaven to the other. 32Now learn this lesson
from the fig tree: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its
leaves, you know that summer is near. 33So also,
when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door.
34Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all
these things take place."
This
was foreign to me. It was like I was reading this passage for the very first
time, though I'd read it hundreds of times before. What Jesus was telling His
disciples is that all the events He spoke of would be fulfilled in their
lifetimes!
Many
liberal scholars believe that Jesus was actually saying that "this
generation" refers to a yet future generation that would witness the
actual coming of Christ. But is that what the passage actually says? NO!
Read it again and you will see that it is a plain and simple statement that
Christ would bring down judgment upon the people of the generation to whom He
spoke. Now the only thing wrong with this statement is that the event never
actually happened.
Or
did it?
History
records the complete destruction of
That
made me look at something else Jesus said:
John
21:20-24 "Peter turned and saw following them the disciple whom Jesus
loved, who had leaned on his breast at the supper and had said, 'Lord, who is
the one who is going to betray you?' 21 When Peter saw him, he said
to Jesus, 'Lord, what about this man?' 22 Jesus said to him, 'If I
want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me.' 23
Then the saying spread among the brethren that this disciple
would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, 'If I
want him to remain until I come, what is that to you?' 24 This is
the disciple who testifies to these things, and who wrote these things; and we
know that his testimony is true."
So
we have a problem! If Jesus said that "these things" would happed to
"this generation" and one of those present during the Olivet
discourse saw "these things" happen, then that leads me to believe
that the prophecy was fulfilled. There just is no "wiggle room" to
make it mean anything else.
But
I still had Daniel and Revelation to deal with. And I still had many other
passages to reconcile. This wasn't going to be an easy thing to accept. It
wasn't any wonder that I began to experience a crisis of faith! All that I had
accepted as true was turning into a lie before my very eyes.
I
decided that I would look into other eschatological beliefs. I researched
Amillennialism, Post-Millennial, and others. During this time I called myself a
"pan-tribulational, when-millennialist",
as it was the only label I could place upon my beliefs. During that time I met
someone who had gone through a similar transition. He told me about another
eschatology called "Preterism". I spent a lot of time researching
Preterism, and even had planned on debating this man on his radio show -
defending the belief that there were still unfulfilled prophecies in the Bible.
God
intervened, and saved me the embarrassment of taking that step. A few weeks before I was to debate this man I started realizing
that my ideology was seriously flawed. So I took a hard look at the
Bible again, spending over a year on reading and re-reading the entire Bible, and I made a discovery!
That
discovery forever changed my eschatology.