THE VOICE OF PROPHECY

Due to differences in the principle of Biblical interpretation among Christians, there has arisen many differing views on the events of the end-time among Christians down through the ages. While some (THE AMILLENARIANS) find it difficult to accept a physical, visible millennial reign of Christ on earth, others who accept the millennial doctrine (THE MILLENARIANS) agree that the sequence of the end-time events shall be as follows:

TODAY (GOSPEL ERA) → TRIBULATION → MILLENIUM → ETERNITY.

However there is disagreement on when and how the resurrection (i.e. the parousial rapture) of the saints shall be and when the coming (i.e. the appearing or the revelation) of Christ shall be.

1. AMILLENNIALISM: This view assumes that the 1000 years of Revelation 20 is symbolic, referring to the Gospel era. The binding of Satan was at Calvary and the Magog battle is same as Armageddon. There shall be one general resurrection and judgment for both saints and sinners. The first resurrection is said to mean the new birth.

This view was shared by some Church Fathers of the 4^th century and the Reformers of the 16^th century. It is the view held by many Calvinist Evangelicals today.

1. POST-MILLENNIALISM: This view teaches that through preaching the Gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit to the entire world (Matt 24:14), the Millennium shall come as a result of mass conversion of the world. When the world is thus prepared, Christ shall then come for final general resurrection and judgment of both saints and sinners. This view motivated the missionary endeavours of the 19^th century. It is no longer popular today.

2. DISPENSATIONAL PRE-MILLENNIALISM: This view was primed by Miss Margaret McDonald’s vision in 1830, that the Church shall not go through the Tribulation. It was sustained by the Irvingites, developed and supported with the postulation of the Dispensational Theory by J.N. Darby, that the Church is only an interruption of God’s plan for Israel. The Church therefore has to be raptured away before God could finish up the last two stages of His plan (i.e. Tribulation and Millennium) for Israel.

This view was popularized through the Scofield Bible and is commonly held by Fundamentalists and Pentecostals mainly in America today.

DISPENSATIONALISM:- This is a new explanation of God’s dealing with man. It disagrees with the Apostolic view of the Church being the New or Spiritual Israel where both Gentiles and Jews become God’s elect people of one Church in Christ for ever. They do not accept that this one Church shall be gathered to Christ as one elect people at Christ’s coming after the Great Tribulation as Christ promised in Matt 24:29-31. The Dispensationalists do not agree that the Kingdom of God is the same as the kingdom of Heaven, nor do they hold that the Day of the Lord is same as the Day of Christ. They do not accept that Christ already reigns from His throne at God’s right hand: Christ shall only reign in the Millennium which shall be a kingdom for Israelites. Then David’s throne shall be restored and the Levitical priests shall resume their animal sacrifices in a rebuilt Jerusalem Temple. By then the Church must have been raptured to Heaven.

The Dispensationalists teach that the Old Testament Prophecies on the restoration of Israel are yet to be fulfilled literally, and that they have not been fulfilled in the Church as is usually understood. Does this mean that the whole ancient nations shall be literally restored also, including Moab, Ammon, Edom, Babylon, Assyria, Tubal, Mesheck, Put, etc?

The Dispensationalists do not seem to harmonize but divide Scriptures into a fragmented disharmony. To them the 0ld Testament is the book of the Kingdom and the New Testament (especially the Epistles) is the book of the Church, saying that there is no reference to the Church whatsoever in the Old Testament. God’s dealings with man is split into many covenants and “dispensations”. However in the Scriptures a dispensation is not God’s trial of man’s obedience but God’s intervention to redeem man: first without Christ and then in Christ.

To the Dispensationalists there will be two second comings of Christ (one secretly for rapture, the other openly for judgment). They say there shall be rapture before the first resurrection (i.e. resurrection of the just) takes place; that there shall be three end-time judgments (one in the air at rapture, the other before the millennium and the other after the millennium); that there shall be two peoples of God separated for ever (Israelites on earth and Christians in heaven).

PITFALLS OF DISPENSATIONALISM:

However this so called literalism of the Dispensational pre-millenarians is different from the apostolic method of Old Testament interpretation. For instance, the Apostles taught that the Old Testament believers (ie the Family church of the Patriarchs and the National church of Israel) belong to the same Olive Tree Church with the New Testament Universal Church (Rom 11). The Apostles believed that the Church is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies e.g Peter (Acts 2) and Paul (Acts 26:22 and Rom 9:24-26). The Apostles preached that the promises to patriarch Abraham (Rom 4 and Gal 3) and those to the Israelite King David (Acts 2:30-31; 2: Acts 15:13-18) are now all being fulfilled in the Church of the New Testament. Also in Hebrew 8 and 10, the New Testament Church is portrayed as a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies and a replacement for the Old Testament national church of Israel.

In fact according of St Paul, the true Israel is not the national Israel but the spiritual Israel (Rom 2:28-29; Rom 9:6) and Christians are the true seeds of the house of Abraham (Gal 3:29). He also taught that the Jews and the Gentiles are united in Christ (Gal 3:14-28) because Christ has removed the wall of partition and made the Gentiles fellow citizens and members of the commonwealth of the Spiritual and True Israel of God (Eph 2:11-22). No, the Church is not an unpredicted (parenthesis) interruption of God’s programme. It is the object of many prophecies.

Again, the pre-millennial doctrine of the Dispensationalists is different from that taught in the Early Church which we now turn to.

3. HISTORIC PRE-MILLENNIALISM: This view teaches that the rapture will take place at the time of the first resurrection, which is at the end of the tribulation (Matt 24:29-31; 2Tess 2:1-4) before the millennium (Rev 20:5-6). This also corresponds with the only second coming of Christ. There is no secret rapture. However, there is a time gap between the Resurrection of the Just Elect and that of the unjust (John 5:27-29; Dan 12:2; 1Cor 15:23-24). This time gap is symbolized by 1000 years in Revelation 20:6. Whether this shall be exactly 1000 years or one day, even a million years, cannot be certain because of 2Peter 3:8.

This view understands the millennium to serve as a further and victorious manifestation of the redemptive work of Christ for the Church. Not a time for a literal national Israel alone.

This was the Apostle’s traditional teaching and the earliest general eschatological view of the apostolic Fathers in the 1^st and 2^nd centuries. However, when some heretics began to concentrate on the millennial reign and subsequently tended to carnal extremes about material expectations, some Church Fathers began to teach the Amillennial doctrine as a less abusable interpretation. Others still retained the Old pre-millennial doctrine. Today many Evangelical circles still hold this age-old view.

This is the view most consistent with both Scripture and history. See Dan 7 and 8;l Matt 24 Mark 13; Lk 21 2Tes 2 and Rev 19 and 20. (Also see ESCHATOLOGY in New Bible Dictionary by IVP).

Historic Pre-millennialism is the view to be presented in this Advent Retreat.

THE GRACE OF GOD BE WITH YOU.

The Ven. Dr, I.U. Ibeme

Vicar, ACR Maiduguri.

Last Updated July 31, 2007

By The Revd Dr. I. U. Ibeme

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