The Nature of the Second Coming
Since you are considering the view that Christ's Second Coming will
be "through us", I have a few questions for you:
1. Do you believe in a literal return of the Lord Jesus?
2. What do you believe about what Jesus called "the last day"?
3. Are you anticipating a resurrection of the body?
4. Do the New Testament writings anticipate that the message of the
Gospel should change after AD70, or after the Apostles?
I feel ok with what you said about Christians enjoying a Gospel
message on Sunday and then serving in the secular arena all week.
Because not everyone is called to be separated unto a full-time
career in the work of the Gospel.
And I have no problem when Christians who are passionate about the
Gospel aim to become world leaders in technology, science, business,
economics, the arts etc, if that is their calling.
But I think that what I was beginning to detect about Preterism was
something quite different: it was a tendency towards a subtle change
in the ACTUAL MESSAGE OF THE GOSPEL itself.
If someone like you who loves Jesus and BELIEVES THE GOSPEL feels
called to a career in movies or politics or preaching - either way,
he is contributing in some way to helping others get saved and to
come to the knowledge of the truth. In that case he hasn't gotten
"beyond preaching the Gospel" - he is not wanting to EVOLVE the
Gospel MESSAGE in anyway - he accepts it as it stands. It's just
that with the Gospel as the foundation of his life, he now enjoys his
life and expresses his salvation in accordance with his unique call
and personality. That's fine.
But what I detected about some Preterist literature is that it seems
to starts you slipping a little bit too close towards a change in the
actual foundational Gospel message itself.
It leans towards becoming a message that I feel is weakened in its
power to bring men to salvation.
It almost purports that the great hope of the Church is not the
coming Great Day of Redemption, but something that already happened
in AD70, and that our message should now be adjusted to something
slightly different.
When I applied the same logic across the entire New Testament which
gave rise to Part-Preterism, it soon forces you to consider
Full-Preterism, which denies the doctrine of a future Second Coming
of Christ, and of the Resurrection of the Dead and of the Final
Judgment, treating them as events which were fulfilled symbolically
in AD70.
The question is - were the Apostles gearing-up for a major
cataclysmic event (which happened in AD70), which was meant to begin
a change in what Christians would preach from that point onwards?
Did they expect us to stop preaching about coming judgment, the
resurrection and the Second Coming, after AD70?
If all the eventus like the Second Coming and Resurrection etc, were
fulfilled in AD70, then much of what John, Jesus and the Apostles
preached can no longer remain part of our message, post AD70. That's
what I have a problem with.
If we are living in a completely different dispensation to the early
Church, then I would think there should be a Third Testament to tell
us what now applies to us and to tell us what we should now be
preaching.
I can accept that some of the incidentary, location-specific aspects
of the Apostles' message - such as the prediction about the
destruction of the Temple - will not form part of our message today.
But we are not disputing about some geography-specific detail here.
We are talking about deleting entire, major foundational doctrines -
such as the Resurrection of the Dead and the Second Coming of Christ
- from our message!
(A 21st-Century Eskimo Evangelist can preach about salvation, coming
judgment and eternal life - without needing to mention the siege of
Jerusalem by Titus in AD70.)
The question is - did AD70 really mark the beginning of a new
dispensation? Was it really the big event that John, Jesus and the
Apostles spent so much time preaching about?
Or were they talking about something which even we in the 21st
Century are still looking forward to (minus a couple of details like
the then imminent siege of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple)?
Were they preaching about things which we should still be preaching
about (i.e. future judgment and the Second Coming as the hope of the
Church, etc)?
Sure, some things that Jesus predicted appear to have had a
fulfilment around AD70, and Jerusalem has remained in that state for
many centuries. But was that EVERYTHING that the New Testament was
pointing towards? Hardly.
I don't think that AD70 was the event that marked a change in
Covenants or a change of Dispensation. I think the Cross marked the
change.
Jesus sent the Apostles out to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom to
all nations. Is there any evidence in the New Testament that tells
us that message should change, after AD70? I don't think so.
Since the Old Testament prophets saw that a New Covenant was coming -
and they wrote about it; then surely if the Apostles saw that a third
Dispensation with a unique message of its own was coming, then God
would have used them to write about this coming change of message in
their Epistles. But they didn't. They clearly expected the same
Gospel message to continue being preached until the end. Amen.
This has relevance to the prosperity message and Dominion-now message too.
(I believe in prosperity so much that I believe we haven't even begun
to see how good it's going to get, in Australia).
However, I couldn't make some of the statements that American
prosperity preachers on TV are making, without qualifying them.
I was listening to one preacher say that it is God's will to prosper
you and all you have to do is claim it. Now that is true. But Jesus
also told us to expect persecution. So I couldn't help wondering how
this teaching applies to people like my parents' missionary-friend in
India who was burnt to death with his two sons. Did he lack faith?
"Show me the prosperity message in the Gospels and in the Epistles,"
I've asked a couple of people. I reminded them how much the Apostles
suffered. The early church even had a doctrine of suffering. They
said, "We must through much tribulation enter the Kingdom of God".
I asked, "Why didn't Paul become a Real Estate magnate in the Roman Empire?"
One preacher on TV looked into the camera and said without
qualification of any sort, "You should start a Corporation". This
was aired all over the world.
So I wrote to him and asked him if he truly thinks that everyone in
his audience no matter who they are or where they are in the world
should start a Corporation; or whether he thinks it could depend on
their calling; or whether he thinks it's ok for someone to feel
called to be separated from the commercial world to devote himself
entirely to missionary work; and I asked him to give me his most
convincing basis in the New Testament for the prosperity message.
He wrote back and told me that the mistake I am making is that I
believe the lie that Jesus was poor. He said that we now know that
the gold that the wise men brought Jesus was worth US$400million.
I later checked his website, and there it says US$300 million - not
US$400 million worth of gold. But I chose to overlook that
discrepancy. Then I calculated using today's values that this would
have been almost one cubic metre of solid pure gold, weighing many
tonnes, and requiring nearly one hundred camels to carry. The
preacher didn't quote any authority. And even if it was true, I
would have to say that someone must have invested it incredibly
poorly because this amount of gold should have funded Jesus' future
ministry - but instead Jesus depended on some folk who helped him.
Some of it could even have been invested until the Apostles later
started their missionary work - but instead they suffered hunger,
nakedness and cold. I was amazed that this was the best answer the
preacher could give to someone who was asking for a New Testament
basis for prosperity.
I believe in prosperity but I also believe that suffering and
persecution are our lot in this life. Not everyone of us has the
same cross to bear. I couldn't preach on worldwide TV that was being
broadcast into countries like India and China and promise a wide
audience, "Come to Christ, and I guarantee everyone of you that you
will be better-off financially." I couldn't deny the certainty that
some of the converts may face persecution or death. But I could
comfort them with the promise of the Second Coming of Christ. And I
could possibly comfort them with the hope that over a period of time
as more people believe through their testimony, their region could
become a more peaceful place to live, and then more Christians will
have the opportunity to live in peace and prosper instead of being
thrown in prison. In other words, some of them may prosper, whilst
others may be persecuted, and in the future it could get better. But
what I can promise all of them without qualification is salvation
through Jesus, and the hope of the Second Coming of Christ.
The church is built upon the blood of the martyrs. To me, that is
Paul's Gospel.
As a more modern-day example: England eventually became a free
country where Christians have the opportunity to live in peace and
prosper. But this freedom was paid-for by centuries of the blood of
martyrs and reformers. William Tyndale was burned at the stake by
King Henry VIII for translating the Bible into English. As he was
dying he prayed, "Lord, change the King". 100 years later his prayer
was answered when King James authorized the English translation which
remains the world's number-one best seller of all-time. William
Tyndale's lot in life was not to prosper. It was to die. But his
death was a seed that enabled a future generation to have an English
Bible. Faith led one person to death. Faith may cause other men to
prosper. Faith doesn't automatically mean prosperity for everyone.
But if we are now living in the fulfilment of Paradise Restored or a
Millennium, then every Christian should expect to prosper now,
shouldn't they?
Great revivalists during the Reformation held a similar view to
Paul's of suffering in this life to enter the Kingdom.
Now are we going to claim that Paul lived devoted to preaching the
Gospel even when it meant suffering - only because he lived pre-AD70?
And that Paul would expect our message - post AD70 and into the
21st Century - to be radically different to his? I don't think so.
I think Paul expected us to have the same emphasis on the Second
Coming, the Resurrection, the Cross, the future Hope of the Church,
and the same willingness to undergo suffering in this life, that he
had.
Even though Paul may have only barely understood that the Church age
could last this long; even though Paul may have only barely seen the
freedom that has emerged in some countries; even though Paul may have
only barely seen the prosperity and dominion that Christians enjoy
today in some countries - I still think he would expect the message
of the Church to be the same in every age:
Jesus saves, Jesus heals, Jesus baptizes with the Holy Ghost, and
Jesus is the soon coming King.
Even though I think Paul would delight in the freedom and prosperity
and influence of the United States of America, I don't think he would
see it as the fulfilment of the Hope promised to his forefathers.
He would enjoy it - he would consider it to be the fruit of the work
of the Gospel - but he would still expect us to preach that we are
still looking forward to the coming Kingdom of our Lord, the Saviour,
the Judge, the great hope of the Gospel.
Whether we are in America or in a persecuted country like Nepal;
whether in the 21st Century or pre-AD70 - I think the Gospel message
should still be the same Gospel message that it always was, no matter
where, no matter when - until Jesus comes.
No matter how great the reforms are that the Gospel may achieve in
history, these are still not to be the fulfilment of the great hope
of the Church that Paul preached. That hope is that Jesus is coming
again to save us, redeem us, resurrect our bodies, release the earth
from decay, and give us eternal life. The dead can't rise until they
hear the voice of Jesus in their graves on the last day.
One day I decided to search an answer to the question, "What was the
message that Paul preached?" It took me a day-and-half to finish.
I found that it was very similar to what Aimee Simple-McPherson
preached. She called it the Foursquare Gospel: 1) Jesus saves; 2)
Jesus heals; 3) Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit; and 4) Jesus
the soon coming King. I like that. That's what Paul preached too.
Dr Paul Yongghi Cho believes in all four and inserts a fifth: 1)
Jesus saves; 2) Jesus heals; 3) Jesus baptizes with the Holy
Spirit; 4) Blessing; and 5) Jesus the soon coming King.
I agree that the "Foursquare Gospel" could rightly be extended to the
five-point "Pentagonal Gospel". But I would have to include a
qualifier with the "blessing" point. Because the other four are
universal, but prosperity is dependant on variables. Jesus can be
Saviour, healer, baptizer with the Holy Spirit, and coming King - to
every believer regardless of any circumstances. But "blessing" or
"prosperity" is conditional upon each individual believers' calling,
or the persecution level in his country at the time of his life.
Isn't it?
So it really isn't as universally a part of the Gospel as the other four.
I found that Paul's message lined up exactly with what John the
Baptist, and Jesus preached.
Some preachers say that the Apostles' message was different to
Jesus'. Now they are saying that our's should be different to the
Apostles'.
But the Bible says that John preached the "Gospel". It says that
Jesus preached the "Gospel". It says that the Apostles preached the
"Gospel". And nowhere have we been told to preach anything
different. If we have, where?
I agree that the Cross of Jesus restores everything that Adam lost.
But I believe the Gospel teaches that some aspects of that redemption
will not be experienced in this life but we look forward to
experiencing them on the last day.
In this life (through the new birth) we can recover righteousness,
sonship, spiritual life, peace, acceptance, physical health,
deliverance, and prosperity.
But only at the last day will we experience the resurrection of the body.
Human endeavour, philanthropy and science may produce better living
conditions, increased prosperity, and even new nations may be
created. Christian ministry will produce salvation, healing and
church growth - but none of these endeavours will achieve overcoming
death itself during this life - even though death was abolished on
Calvary. That will only happen on the day that God has appointed.
The work of redemption is perfect in every respect, perfect in every
aspect. After Jesus finished the work on Calvary, He sat down at the
right hand of God, and is henceforth expecting til His enemies be
made His footstool. The last enemy to be placed under His feet is
death. This was the great hope that the Apostles proclaimed.
The Apostles called this coming event, this great day, by the words
"salvation" and "redemption".
They taught that although we have been saved already, we are saved
"in hope". Hope looks forward to the unseen, something future.
We who are saved look forward to the day of salvation, the great day
of redemption, when Christ shall come, and the dead shall be raised,
and death shall put on incorruption.
Paul said that even the natural creation groans - the physical world
which is in bondage to decay - groans, waiting for the manifestation
of the sons of God on that day.
I think its possible that on that day, even the natural world will be
released from decay and made anew - just like our physical bodies
will be.
In the meantime, many great blessings can be experienced on earth
through the Gospel. Even the desert can bloom; the wilderness can
become a fruitful field. God told me that we haven't even begun to
see the prosperity that God has for His servants in this country!
Prosperity deserves to be proclaimed. But the world will still be
subject to decay and death until the last day which God has appointed
in which He will judge the world through Jesus Christ.
Then we will be completely restored to lost paradise. God shall wipe
away all tears from their eyes. Then death shall be swallowed up in
victory. Redemption's work will be fully and finally and eternally
experienced.
Our great hope is that on that last day, God shall raise us up just
like He raised Jesus up - and we shall be saved from wrath through
Him.
No matter how rich we become in this world through the Gospel - that
is still not the great hope of the Church. Our focus is on what we
shall receive on that Day.
John the Baptist, the Lord and the Apostles preached one and the same
message, and nowhere have we been asked to change the message.
The message is that Jesus died, He was buried, on the third day He
rose again - now we look forward to that blessed hope, the appearing
of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ.