Why didn't the amillennialist cross the road?

When I was a guest on a show with Carl Trueman and others, I was favored with a list of reasons why the dispensationalist would not cross the road.

I thought it would be unkind not to offer back the same filial gesture, and so... ten reasons why the amillennialist would not cross the road:

1. The road is Jesus. Why would I want to cross Jesus?
2. This road is not mentioned in the Three Forms of Unity.
3. So many have already crossed it before me. Who am I to cross it for myself?
4. "Road" sounds so literal...which means it's carnal, which means No.
5. Two thousand years ago roadcrossing was inaugurated, so I'm already living in the Age of The Other Side of the Road.
6. Nobody said anything about this road before 1800.
7. Hal Lindsey crossed a road once. You'll never catch me doing it.
8. Crossing the road might be taken to mean two ways of salvation.
9. Pretty sure Calvin, Knox, Owen, Berkhof and Van Til never crossed this road, and they're my heroes.
10. People who cross roads are not real Calvinists.
11. "Road" might be used metaphorically. Therefore, there is no road to cross.

New, improved prophecy!

Perhaps the greatest single measure of how far well-meaning folks are willing to sell out every last cell of their brains to run cover for false teachers is this argument that now, in the glorious days of fulfillment under the New Covenant, the greater and more glorious version of the thoroughly-documented gift of prophecy has turned into a pathetic hit-and-miss irrelevancy.

Put another way:

Then: types, shadows, anticipations of Christ...and 100%-inerrrant morally-binding prophecy about the realities that move men and nations.

Now: fulfillment, reality, Christ Himself... and errant, safely-ignored, muzzy holy hunches about the most inconsequential trivia imaginable.

In even a marginally healthy church, this chimera would have disappeared under gales of derisive laughter within seconds of its invention.

But that's supposing a marginally healthy church. And there's my crucial miscalculation.

Harold Camping is not a false prophet

The tale of Harold Camping is that of a man who did not take sufficient heed to Romans 12:3 and James 3:1, propped up by people who haven't gotten the point of 1 Thessalonians 5:21 and Hebrews 10:19-25; 13:7 and 17.

Or, to turn our gaze downward to the secular wisdom of Harry Callahan, "A man's got to know his limitations."

Camping clearly doesn't.

You can read some of Camping's sad tale in the posts linked here, or see some of it in this piece:

See any Gospel in any of that? I don't.

One would think that Camping's put it all on the line in this, his latest shame. One would hope that he would be completely discredited after this coming Saturday.

But people are not machines, dispassionately processing data. After all, there are still Jehovah's Witnesses after their many false prophecies; there are still Roman Catholics after the Reformation. There will still be Campingites after Saturday. For "evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived" (2 Timothy 3:13), and "the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths" (2 Timothy 4:3-4). Ironically, those who refuse to yoke themselves to the fellowship and leadership of a local church will still subject themselves to a fool who makes fools of them (Proverbs 18:1; 2 Corinthians 11:20). Would that it weren't true, but it is.

So yeah, if Camping's followers had a fortieth of the wisdom God calls them to in books like Proverbs, they would demand that Camping prove his commitment by deeding all his assets to Phil Johnson or some sane person, effective May 22.

But then again, if they had a fortieth of that wisdom, they would have nothing to do with Harold Camping in the first place.

One more note: I know what people mean when they call Camping a "false prophet." He is not a false prophet, he is a false teacher. It may seem like an academic distinction, but it is an important one. Teaching falsities concerning prophecy does not make one a false prophet. Camping is not claiming to have direct personal revelation apart from Scripture, as far as I know. That is not what he does. Camping is not claiming to produce Scripture. What Camping does is to twist Scripture (2 Peter 3:16). There is a difference.

This, of course, is not a demotion. Being a false teacher is plenty bad enough. As Peter said, "false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction" (2 Peter 2:1). It is a matter of focus: were Camping a false prophet, we would need to train our guns on the notion of direct revelation and the sufficiency of Scripture.

As it is, we're faced with a matter of raging, irresponsible, unaccountable incompetence.

Two crucial hermeneutic principles

Carrying on from yesterday's meta:

1. "Jesus" is not God's way of saying "I can fudge on My promises and covenants" — to say the least.
2. "For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory" (2 Corinthians 1:20) is not a Biblely way of saying that "all the promises of God find their Fooled ya! in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Ah! ya got me! to God for his glory."

Sometimes a squirrel is a squirrel.

Discuss.

Walter Kaiser's take on Egypt

"World-class" (as they say) OT scholar Walter Kaiser is not known as a "newspaper-clipping exegesis" kind of guy. So it interests me to see him find a number of contemporary fulfillments of Biblical prophecy in Egypt, and he comments on the current situation.

I offer it for your edification, puzzlement, musing, discussion.

Some thoughts on Egypt in Biblical perspective

Our buddy Fred Butler offers some perspective on the situation in Egypt.

I would add two things.

First: Egypt is on firmer soil than we in America are.

How so? Try as they might, Biblical scholars have not found America in Biblical prophecy, with any confidence. However, Egypt is present, beyond doubt — and it ultimately has a bright future:

16 In that day the Egyptians will be like women, and tremble with fear before the hand that the LORD of hosts shakes over them. 17 And the land of Judah will become a terror to the Egyptians. Everyone to whom it is mentioned will fear because of the purpose that the LORD of hosts has purposed against them.

18 In that day there will be five cities in the land of Egypt that speak the language of Canaan and swear allegiance to the LORD of hosts. One of these will be called the City of Destruction.

19 In that day there will be an altar to the LORD  in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the LORD at its border. 20 It will be a sign and a witness to the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt. When they cry to the LORD because of oppressors, he will send them a savior and defender, and deliver them. 21 And the LORD will make himself known to the Egyptians, and the Egyptians will know the LORD in that day and worship with sacrifice and offering, and they will make vows to the LORD and perform them. 22 And the LORD will strike Egypt, striking and healing, and they will return to the LORD, and he will listen to their pleas for mercy and heal them.

23 In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and Assyria will come into Egypt, and Egypt into Assyria, and the Egyptians will worship with the Assyrians.

24 In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth, 25 whom the LORD  of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.” (Isaiah 19:16-25)

Second: do not think of these demonstrators as analogous to our Founding Fathers. Plug in the same reservations I had (and have) about young Iraq, and I think you'll have a good perspective on at least part of what's going on.

Maybe more to say in Friday's HT.

Mark Hitchcock?

I recently had a friend put me onto Mark Hitchcock. Well, the name, anyway. Reputed to be a pastor/PhD who's done some good work on prophecy, widely-read enough to have books in WalMart. (Cue the jealous elitists.)

Me, I haven't read or heard a word yet. So I ask:

1. Have you? And specifically:
2. Does anyone know where one can get mp3's of his debate with Haank Haanneeggrraaaaff? I hear he slapped the ol' seedpicker down something righteous on the latter's goofy preterism, but all I can find in Google is echoes, not the tapes themselves.

Forum on Matthew 24 — not such a big deal after all?

A friendly tussle broke out on yesterday's four-word post. The discussion was about Matthew 24, whether or not Jesus was just making a big deal out of nothing.

Of course, that isn't how it's phrased. The "preterist" position thinks itself very sophisticated and nuanced, as a rule. Its starting-point is the same one Albert Schweizer and scores of others have used to say that Jesus was a false prophet, namely Matthew 24:34 — "Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place." In fact, my father alluded to that as a reason not to believe the Bible.

Preterists (like Schweizer) insist that there is only one possible narrow interpretation of that verse. Jesus had to be saying that everything He foretold would happen within his hearers' lifetime. However, the way preterists (unlike Schweizer) continue to say Jesus is credible is by saying that nothing He said meant what it seemed to mean.

It wasn't going to be that big a deal.

Really, that's their position. Well, they labor hard to redefine everything. The bottom line was that nothing like what Jesus said was going to happen was really going to happen, but that's okay, He didn't really mean that all that would happen, and besides, it really did happen, but it just wasn't anything like what He said would happen. So it's really all okay.

Got it?

Of course, that has a withering effect on trying to take much of the rest of prophecy with any seriousness. That huge yacht you were told would come to pick you up? It isn't really a yacht, it isn't really coming, and it wasn't for you. But hey! Here's a picture of an island! Happy?

Here's why I'm in no way sanguine about this view.

Was a time in my life when I and all my fellows regularly said, about every Bible verse that was uncongenial to us, "Oh, it doesn't mean that. You're taking it too literally. There's a deeper meaning. Besides, look at this and this."

That was before I was a Christian. I was in a cult. I tell the story of my conversion from that to Christ at some length, starting here.

But in those days:

1. Hell? Oh, come on; surely not literal flames and the absence of God. How can God be absent? He's everywhere! You have to understand: it's a metaphor, a figure of speech. What it really means is the illusion of feeling separated from God. It's entirely in this life. You just have to affirm that you can never be separated from God, and your Hell ends.
2. Jesus the unique son of God? Oh come on. Didn't Jesus say, "Our Father, who art in heaven"? That means everybody is a son of God, just like Jesus. You're just not putting Scriptures together right.
3. "I am the way and the truth and the life"? Oh, come on. How can one man be the only way? Isn't God everywhere? Isn't He in all of us? What it really means is that the I AM within each of us is our own way to God.

And so on.

But God saved me from that, as I detail in the other post. As I explain there, what the Lord used in part to save me was grammatico-historical exegesis. It was dealing with the plain sense of the words of Scripture.

I explain and example that more fully in this article. Therein, I offer a brief, "golden rule" for interpretation:

When the plain sense of Scripture makes good sense, seek no other sense. Therefore, take every word in its primary, ordinary, usual, literal meaning, unless the facts of the immediate context, studied in the light of related passages and fundamental and axiomatic truths, clearly indicate otherwise.

Fast-forward. Imagine my dismay and my chagrin when I found that there were otherwise soundly orthodox Christians who were doing exactly what the folks in my cult did. They would find a verse that didn't fit their system and insist the words could not mean what they said. It wasn't that "related passages and fundamental and axiomatic truths clearly indicate otherwise." It was that their system demanded that it be otherwise.

So, Israel? Not Israel. Signs in the heavens? Not signs in the heavens. Global tribulation unrivaled in all history? Not so much. Jesus coming and establishing His kingdom on earth? Not exactly. God comes off as less of a great communicator, more like someone running a big shell game.

And on and on. It was (and remains) a sickening feeling of deja vu. I have both been there, and done that, and have no desire to go back.

Grace keeps these brothers — who (I mean with absolute sincerity) are my instructors and models in countless other areas — from "comparing Scripture to Scripture" as my cult did. When it comes to Romans 3-5, they're the very dictionary-definition of "solid." But prophecy? Bizarro-world. Not quite reformed; still one foot in Rome.

That's what this is about.

There, then, is my opening blast.

Something came up about Matthew 24. Al wanted to pursue Fred on it. Fred promised to see it through to the duration. Here's their meta, with me as the genial host.

Those irresponsible, nutty, sensationalistic, date-setting...

...amills.

Hey. Fair's fair.

The thing about 1 Corinthians 13:8-13

The passage:

8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.
9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part,
10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Paul's purpose is to show the superiority of love to prophecies, tongues, and knowledge; and even to faith and hope.

In the course of making this argument, the apostle states that tongues, knowledge, and prophecy are all temporary gifts. No Christian should argue this point; the apostle states it directly. And so, no Christian should deny that tongues, knowledge, and prophecy were deliberately temporary gifts, gifts of limited "shelf-life," if you will.

And I think you should grant that all these are revelatory gifts, according to the Bible. "Tongues" is the miraculously-given ability to speak in unlearned human languages. "Prophecy" is the reception and communication of direct, inerrrant, binding revelation from God (Exodus Exodus 4:14-16; 7:1; Deuteronomy 18:15-22). "Knowledge" is exegetically more problematic, but I take it to be revelatory understanding of theological truth (1 Corinthians 12:8).

Now, where Christians part company is the time by which those gifts will pass. The apostle clearly says that the contributions of knowledge and prophecy are piecemeal, they are bit-by-bit (ἐκ μέρους, v. 9); and he says that the piecemeal will be replaced by the complete or perfect (τὸ τέλειον, to teleion, v. 10). Now, I have argued that the best contextual counterpart to the bit-by-bit process of revelation is the completed product, which would be the completed Canon of Scripture. But that is definitely a minority-opinion today, and (like the other views, by the way) it has its problems.

Regardless, what you must agree is that these were designed to be temporary gifts. You cannot take the position that they are permanent. Whether you think they function with full canonical authority until Christ's return (which, I think, is the worst position), or cease at some time previous (better), you must admit that they are temporary. Paul says so.

And that is the thing about 1 Corinthians 13:8-13.

Babylon... rebuilt?

Joel Rosenberg reports that funds are being directed towards the rebuilding of Babylon. Yes, that Babylon, the actual city of Babylon.

Saddam Hussein had been very invested in resurrecting Babylon to power and glory, but he's very invested in something else at the present. Nonetheless, the dream hasn't died.

This won't be of any real interest to the I-know-it-looks-like-a-squirrel-but-I'm-going-to-say-"Jesus" crowd, but those of us who think that prophecies about Babylon are about, well, Babylon, find it of at least passing interest.