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Two Layers of Meaning (Acts of the Apostles #4)

Joshua Edgren on

INTRODUCTION

In the second chapter of Acts, we have the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, resulting in the gift of tongues, a powerful sermon, and a massive ingathering of new believers. As we read about this stupendous gift of tongues, we might have the same reaction that the initial hearers did. What on earth does this mean (v. 12)?

THE TEXT

“And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language  . . . And they were all amazed, and were in doubt, saying one to another, What meaneth this? Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine” (Acts 2:1–13).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The day of Pentecost was one of the feasts of the Lord appointed in the Old Testament Mosaic calendar (Lev. 23:15). The Feast of Firstfruits was celebrated the day after the Sabbath of Passover week, and the Israelites were instructed to count fifty days after that day, which would end on the day of Pentecost (from the Greek word for fifty). This festival is also called the Feast of Weeks, or the Feast of Ingathering. It was a harvest festival. When that day arrived, the followers of Christ were all in one place, and were all in one accord (v. 1). And suddenly the room where they were all sitting was filled with a sound from heaven—like a rushing mighty wind (v. 2). Cloven tongues like fire appeared, and rested on each of them (v. 3). They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began speaking in other languages (glossa) as the Spirit enabled them (v. 4). Devout Jews were there in Jerusalem, coming from every nation under heaven (v. 5). We are not told directly, but the disciples apparently spilled out into the street because a multitude gathered as the report spread. All of them were confounded because they all heard their own languages (dialektos) being spoken (v. 6). They began to speak to one another about it because they could tell that all the speakers were Galilaeans (v. 7). How is it we are hearing our native tongues (v. 8)? The word again is dialektos. All the nations are then listed, 17 in all (vv. 9-11). The wonderful works of God are being declared in all these different tongues (glossa). They were astonished, but still in doubt about what it could all mean (v. 12). There were also some wiseacres, of course, who accused them of being drunk (v. 13).

TONGUES ARE LANGUAGES

The tongues here are not to be understood as mystical jabbering. These are languages, with grammar, vocabulary, and syntax. We can assert this confidently for various reasons. First, the people listening identified what was being spoken with the languages of their home countries (vv. 6, 8). Second, glossa and dialektos are words that refer to languages. We get our word dialect from the second one. Third, elsewhere the apostle Paul requires any such expressions in church to be translated (1 Cor. 14:13).

153 AND THE FEAST OF INGATHERING

There are 17 nations mentioned here, and 17 is the triangular of 153. This means that 17 plus 16 plus 15 down to 1 all adds up to 153. And that is the number of fish that were caught in John 21:11, when Peter was restored to ministry. And what was that ministry? He had been called to become a fisher of men (Mark 1:17). When Jesus had done a similar miracle for Peter, this overwhelmed him with his own sinfulness (Luke 5:8). So the fish were clearly emblematic of the coming haul at Pentecost. We also have the fact that throughout Scripture, the sea represents the Gentiles and the land the Jews. No one in the Old Testament is shown eating fish, but in the New Testament fishing (and the eating of fish) comes to the front and center.

The practice of encoding numbers in names (called gematria) was common in the ancient world. They could do this in a way that we cannot because they used the same symbols for letters and for numbers. We have Roman letters and Arabic numbers. But in Hebrew, the first nine letters corresponded to 1-9, the next nine were 10-90, and the last five were100-400. So?

Well, the prophet Ezekiel promised that the time of the New Covenant would be a time of glorious fishing. “And it shall come to pass, that the fishers shall stand upon it from Engedi even unto Eneglaim; they shall be a place to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many” (Ez. 47:10). The prefix En simply means spring, and so if we look at the numerical value of Gedi in Hebrew, we find that it is 17, and the value of Eglaim is 153. Ezekiel is talking about the salvation of the Gentiles under the figure of fish, swimming in living waters from the Temple, and he uses these two numbers. This means that we are justified in taking 153 as a symbolic number for the Gentile nations who will be brought into the kingdom of God—fulfilled here at Pentecost.

TWO LAYERS OF MEANING

Because these tongues were actual languages, one of the things meant would be the things that were being said. What the disciples were declaring were “the wonderful works of God” (v. 11). The languages meant what the languages were saying.

But what did the mere fact of this miracle mean?

“Brethren, be not children in understanding: howbeit in malice be ye children, but in understanding be men. In the law it is written, with men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear me, saith the Lord [Is. 28:11-12 (see also Dt. 28:49)]. Wherefore tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe, but to them that believe not: but prophesying serveth not for them that believe not, but for them which believe. If therefore the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will they not say that ye are mad? [or drunk]” (1 Cor. 14:20–23).

For the unbelieving Jews, the sign of foreign languages in the streets of Jerusalem was a sign of pending judgment. You would not listen to the prophets who continually warned you in your own language (Is. 28:9-10), so maybe you will understand when you hear the languages of foreign soldiers in your streets. But for the foreigners who heard the wonderful works of God in their own language, this was the equivalent of prophecy, which was for those who believe.

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To Glorify Christ (Pentecost 2024)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

The Holy Spirit has been active in the world since the creation of the world. He appears in the second verse of the Bible, for example, hovering over the face of the waters (Gen. 1:2). In every era, God is always God. The Son of God is always the visible image of the invisible Father, and the Spirit is always the one who empowers and equips. Nevertheless, we do see a difference between the Old Testament and the New in this regard. The Spirit has always been the one ministering forgiveness, and cleansing, and power. This has always been his work. But in the Old Testament, His operations were much more surgical and precise. In the New Testament era, His operations are much more torrential. Water is always water, and while it would rain in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, the dam has burst. 

THE TEXT 

“And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2:1–4). 

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Pentecost is a Christian holiday, but it was also an Israelite holiday also, called by the same name. The word means fifty, and it occurs fifty days after the sabbath of Passover week (Lev. 23:16). It is also called the Feast of Weeks. In the English-speaking world, it has also been called Whitsun. It was a harvest festival, and so God waited to pour out the Spirit until it was time to harvest the first great crop of Christian converts. 

The Christians were already of “one accord” and waiting for power and authority, just as Jesus had instructed (Acts 2:1; Luke 24:49). There was a powerful sound, like a mighty rushing wind, but the sound was inside the house where they were (v. 2). Cloven tongues of fire appeared above each of them, and sat upon them (v. 3). These fire tongues (glossa) are described with the same word that is used in the next verse for the different languages. They were all filled with the Spirit, and began to speak in other languages (glossa here, and dialektos in v. 6). This is not so much a reversal of Babel, because they are still speaking numerous languages (Gen. 11:7), but it certainly is a reversal of the curse of Babel.

THE SPIRIT IN OUR MIDST

Theologians make a distinction between the ontological Trinity, the triune God as He is in Himself, and fully known only to Himself, on the one hand, and then the economical Trinity, God as He manifests Himself to us in this world. This of course is not a claim that there are two Trinities, but rather is a distinction between the Trinity as God knows Himself, and the Trinity as He reveals Himself to us. 

We know that Almighty God is one (Dt. 6:4). Christians are monotheists. Within the Godhead, there are three eternal Persons, all equal in power and deity. The Father is revealed to us as the source and origin. He is the Father. The Son is begotten by the Father, and is the only begotten Son of the Father (John 3:16). The Holy Spirit is called both the Spirit of God (Matt. 12:28) and Spirit of Christ (Phil. 1:19), and so we confess that He proceeds from both the Father and the Son. All together are the one true God.

All of this is of great practical importance. We pray to the Father, in the name of Jesus His Son, and we do so in the power of the Holy Spirit. All of our prayers function within the triune goodness of God. “For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father” (Ephesians 2:18). For through Jesus we have access to the Father by one Spirit. If I may use a homely illustration, the Father is the city we are driving to, the Son is the road we are driving on, and the Spirit is the car we are riding in. And all of it is happening within the one God, in whom we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28).

But none of this is a pedestrian matter of getting us from “here” to “there.” The tongues are all from different places, true enough, but they are also all on fire. The thing that moves us is a Spirit of glory. 

“But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me” (John 15:26). “He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you” (John 16:14). 

MAKING MUCH OF JESUS

My father liked to tell a story that illustrated how the Spirit works to glorify Jesus Christ. The testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy (Rev. 19:10). My parents were friends with Corrie ten Boom, and one time they brought her to Annapolis to speak. My father had given one of Corrie’s books (A Prisoner and Yet) to a Jewish neighbor, who then got really excited when she found out that Corrie was coming. She asked if it could be arranged for Corrie to speak at her synagogue. That was worked out, and my father took her there and sat listening to her talk. One of his thoughts was that “if she says ‘the Lord Jesus Christ’ one more time, we are not going to make it out of here.” And his point in telling the story was that when people are filled with the Spirit, they cannot help making much of Christ.

So we are not to come to the Spirit as though He were the destination. That is not what He wants. That is not His work. His work is to glorify the Son. We do not come to the Son as though He were the destination. That is not what He came to be. He said that He is the way (the road), the truth and the life (John 14:6). His work is to bring us to the Father. We honor the Spirit best by working with what He came to do. And so lift up the name of Christ, and our triune God will sort out everything else.

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Blasphemous and Absurd (Ascension Sunday 2024)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

We must learn how to stop doing is the bad habit of dividing the world up into separate compartments. Every aspect of our being—emotional, spiritual, psychological, mental—is occurring in the same created order. All truths that we affirm, whether biological, or theological, or anthropological, are true or false in the same created order. Christ remains your high priest, which means that He still has His resurrected and glorified body. That body is still within this created order, but because He has ascended, He is no longer under the sun. His authority is greater than that.

One of the great problems that secularists have is that they pay no attention to the things they are saying. But this problem is matched and compounded by the fact that we Christians too often pay cursory attention to the implications of the truths we confess. Remember that word implication. 

THE TEXT

“The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool” (Psalm 110:1). 

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The introduction to this psalm is quoted numerous times in the New Testament, and in ways that are not in any way ambiguous about what it means.  In the gospel accounts, Jesus stumps His adversaries with the question of how David, ancestor of the Messiah, could possibly call his descendant Lord (Matt. 22:44; Mark 12:36; Luke 20:42-43). This verse is quoted to show the greatness of the Christ over all the angels (Heb. 1:13). And the whole glorious consummation is summed up in Acts 2:32-36. God raised Jesus up, with eyewitnesses (v. 32). He was exalted to the right hand of the Father, where He received the Holy Spirit, which He then poured out (v. 33). David didn’t ascend into the heavens, but he did prophesy it—with our text (v. 34). Christ will remain there until His enemies are made His footstool (v. 35). Let all Israel know that this “same Jesus,” the crucified one, has been made both Lord and Christ (v. 36).  

THE CENTRAL IMPLICATION

One of our central duties in this wicked generation is to set out various doctrines which we confess, lining them up on the table before us. Having done so, we need to stare straight at the central implication. 

Jesus of Nazareth is fully God and fully man, a fact we celebrate at Christmas. The hypostatic union of God and man was miraculously accomplished in Him. In this incarnate body, He lived a perfect and sinless life, which He then offered up on the cross as a perfect sacrifice. God showed that the sacrifice was accepted when He raised Jesus from the dead, a fact we celebrate at Easter. Christ ascended into the heavenly places, and in doing this, He did not leave the Incarnation behind—He is still our high priest. “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us” (Rom. 8:34). He was there given universal dominion (Dan. 7:13-14). A human being, our elder brother, is seated at the right hand of the Father, and will remain there until all His enemies are subdued through the gospel, a fact we celebrate on Ascension Sunday. And last, He poured out His Spirit on Pentecost, which is what enables us to celebrate anything about any of this at all (Acts 2:3-4).

Now I have mentioned that word implications a few times. What are the implications of this? The implication is that the only principle of unity available to man is a unity that is outside the world. This, and only this, is the death knell of anarchy, for tyranny, and for anarcho-tyranny.  

SECULAR FUTILITY

Just as the secular mind oscillates between rationalism and irrationalism, so they also veer back and forth between radical individualism and total statism. Not only so, but each bounce on their teeter-totter gives energy to the opposite reaction. When they discover that they cannot hold everything together, they give up and it all disintegrates. But then they discover that they cannot live in such a chaotic world, and so they begin to flail, looking for a principle of unity that is immanent, under the sun, under the control of man. It might be the church, it might be the state, it might be the tribe, it might be some ideology. Whatever they settle on, it is down here, within their reach.

Tyrants want the locus of unity to be within the world, where they can control it. This pipe dream—seen clearly at Babel—was forever destroyed by the Ascension of the Lord Jesus into Heaven. What do we confess? We confess that there is only one possible locus of true unity, and that arche of unity is outside the world, at the right hand of the Father.  

“That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him” (Ephesians 1:10). 

He ascended into Heaven, and the yearning lusts of all despots (libido dominandi) were thwarted in principle.

The Lord told us plainly that His kingdom is not from this world (John 18:36). If it were, we would be trying to seize power the same way that the worldlings do. But the fact that the Lord’s authority is not from here does not mean that it is somehow impotent here. No, our weapons are mighty for pulling down strongholds (2 Cor. 10:3-5). 

THE DECLARED WORD

The fact that they are defeated does not mean that the secularist lords cannot still be conceited in their humiliation. They still sneer at us. How many regiments do we have? How many nukes? How many flotillas can we assemble?

Our weapons look paltry to them, but that does not distress us at all. It should not even slow us down. The Word of God is not bound (2 Tim. 2:9), and goes forth conquering and to conquer (Rev. 6:2). What do we have? We have word and water, bread and wine, and that is more than sufficient.

What do we have? Christ died and rose, and He reigns from Heaven. Just as they taunted Him to come down from the cross, in the same way they taunt Him to come down from Heaven in order to prove He rose from the dead. But the place where His proofs were ultimately received was the throne room of the Ancient of Days, and that proof was declared sufficient. The risen Christ is Lord.

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Real Roman Trouble (The Continuing Adventures of Jesus #28) (KC)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

In 42 B.C. in the fields of Philippi in Macedonia, Greece, the armies of Brutus and Cassius collided with the armies of Mark Anthony and Octavian, and the latter soundly defeated the former. Octavian would become the emperor of the Roman Empire, taking the name Caesar Augustus and eventually lavish a great deal of prominence on the colony of Philippi as the site of that historic battle. 

Around 80 years later, in that same city, Paul and Silas began proclaiming the reign of another King, the Lord Jesus Christ, and a new way of being Roman. And as is the case wherever this gospel goes, it caused trouble – trouble that sets prisoners free. 

The Text: “And it came to pass, as we went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which brough her masters much gain by soothsaying…” (Acts 16:16-40

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

After a possessed slave girl followed Paul around in Philippi for many days, crying out that they were servants of the Most High God, Paul commanded the demon to leave her, and when it did, this ruined her soothsaying abilities, and Paul and Silas were brought up on charges to the magistrates (Acts 16:16-21). With some mob pressure in the background, the magistrates stripped and beat Paul and Silas and imprisoned them (Acts 16:22-24). At midnight, while Paul and Silas were singing praises to God, a great earthquake broke open the prison, but the prisoners remained and Paul saved the jailer’s life, preached the gospel to him, and he and his whole family were baptized immediately (Acts 16:25-34). The next day, the magistrates asked Paul and Silas to leave town quietly, but appealing to their Roman citizenship, they requested an official release and visited Lydia and the fledgling church before leaving (Acts 16:35-40). 

PRINCIPALITIES & POWERS

Literally, it says that the girl had the “spirit of a python,” which refers to the Greek god Apollo and his shrine at Delphi. This may be a general description of the kind of soothsaying she was doing, or it may mean that she was from that shrine or received her power from there. Regardless, she made her masters money and after Paul commanded the demon to leave her, she no longer could (Acts 16:19). What do we make of this? 

In 1 Corinthians 8, Paul says that idols are nothing and there is only one God, but then he goes on to say that pagan sacrifices are offered to devils and we must not have any fellowship with them (1 Cor. 10:20-21). Likewise, the phrase “principalities and powers” sometimes refers to human authorities (Tit. 3:1) and clearly at other times refers to spiritual beings (Eph. 6:12). And Daniel referred to spiritual beings ruling Persia and Greece (Dan. 10:13, 20). Putting this together, we should say that there are more material explanations for some things than we realize, but there are also sometimes spiritual forces at work. Superstition, illusions, science, and fear can do a lot, and sometimes the spirit of Samuel gets called up from the dead (1 Sam. 28). But in the resurrection and ascension, Christ has triumphed over all principalities and powers in heaven and on earth (Eph. 1:20-21, Col. 2:15). 

EARTHQUAKES & BAPTISMS

While Luke seems to describe the earthquake as a simple providence, worship is described in the Bible as an earth-shaking reality (e.g. Ps. 29). Regardless, Paul and Silas singing followed by an earthquake is a fitting picture of what the gospel is doing in Philippi: ‘exceedingly troubling the city’ (Acts 16:20). This is what the gospel does: it shakes heaven and earth, so that “those things which cannot be shaken may remain” (Heb. 12:27). It is shaking Philippi so that only the true Philippi may remain. The gospel addresses the spiritual realities at the core of human life and society, and in so doing, transforms all of human life (business and commerce, entertainment and arts, politics and law, education and recreation) into what it was created to be. We a see microcosm of this principle in the salvation offer Paul gives the jailer in the middle of the night: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house” (Acts 16:31). We might add: and thy business, thy neighborhood, thy hobbies, thy city, and thy nation. 

CITIZENS OF ROME & HEAVEN

This episode contrasts rival visions of what it means to be “Roman.” The masters of the slave girl protest Paul’s disruption of their customary way of “being Romans” (Acts 16:21), but Paul is actually embodying a new way of “being Roman” in Jesus Christ and requires the Philippian magistrates to at least partially acknowledge that (Acts 16:37-39). Later, when Paul writes the Philippians, he exhorts them to reckon their citizenship according to the gospel of Christ (Phil. 1:27) and as primarily rooted in heaven (Phil. 3:20). Being an imperial colony, they would have understood that this didn’t mean they were not loyal or patriotic citizens of Rome, but rather the true form of that citizenship was being impressed upon them from Heaven. By preaching and casting out demons and baptizing, Paul was teaching the citizens of Philippi how to be true Romans. 

APPLICATIONS

This is Ascension Sunday, and so we celebrate Christ seated at the right hand of the Father, far above all principalities and powers, and we set our affections on Him there so that we will be truly affective here in this world, in our city and nation (Col. 3:1-4). This is how we learn to be true Americans, true men, true women, true husbands and wives, businessmen and members of our various tribes. Christ restores our humanity.

We ought to fight the temptation to see demons behind every tree, and this includes the need for governing our thoughts to think about those things that are good, true, noble, and lovely (Phil. 4:8). But we should also pay close attention to the warnings in Scripture about where the Devil likes to creep in: do not let the sun go down on your wrath (Eph. 4:26-27); spouses, do not deprive one another sexually (1 Cor. 7:5); women, watch out for idle chatter (1 Tim. 5:13-15), and men, watch out for pride (1 Tim. 3:6). 

In a world gone mad, sanity is trouble. We are gospel-trouble makers, not out of spite or a desire for chaos. We are here to establish the worship of the Triune God, set prisoners free, teach true justice, and establish the customs of Christ in the marketplace, home, and governments for human flourishing.

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The Resurrection of the World

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

Two thousand years ago, a man who had been wickedly betrayed by the religious authorities, murderously crucified by the Roman civil authorities, did the unthinkable by rising from the dead. This was God’s plan from the beginning, and the Lord Jesus knew that this was the plan.

“Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:17–18).

And when Jesus took up His life again, He was taking up absolute dominion. A man who dies and comes back to life again in history is the Lord of history. And this has enormous ramifications.  

THE TEXT

“But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you” (Romans 8:11). 

“For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:18-23). 

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Not only did Jesus take up His life again, but He did this in the power of the Spirit. The Spirit raised up Jesus from the dead (Rom. 8:11). Paul’s point here is that the Spirit who accomplished this extraordinary thing is the same Spirit who dwells within Christians. The Spirit who did it once indwells the believer now, and that indwelling is itself a promise and commitment. That Spirit will quicken “your mortal bodies.” Note that the Spirit is going to do something to the mortal bodies of these Roman believers. These are the bodies that they had then, but which are now dead and gone. The Spirit is going to raise those mortal bodies. It does not say He will give them different bodies up in Heaven.  

And a few verses down from this, Paul teaches us to compare our present state with our future state. Take our current trials, afflictions, suffering, and woes, and they are not even worth comparing to the glory that is coming, and that will be revealed in us (v. 18). This present time is being compared to a future time. All creation has an earnest expectation that it longs for, and that longing is for the manifestation of the sons of God (v. 19). What does that mean? It refers to the general resurrection of the dead. The created order was subjected to vanity, not because that was desired by the creation, but rather because of God’s reasons—He is the one who bound up the creation “to vanity” so that this created order would learn to long in hope (v. 20). When the sons of God are manifested fully at their final adoption (e.g. the general resurrection), then the creation itself will be delivered into the glorious liberty of the children of God (v. 21). The creation is pregnant with resurrection, and groans and travails in its labor (v. 22). She groans and travails in pain [synodino, birth pangs], longing for the delivery of a new order. There are three that groan all together—the Spirit does (v. 26), the creation does (v. 22), and we who have the first fruits of the Spirit groan (v. 23). All the groans are teleological—they are aimed at one thing, which is our final adoption in the resurrection. We groan toward that final adoption (Eph. 1:5), which is to say, the redemption of our bodies (v. 23). 

HYPER-PARTIAL PRETERISM?

You have been taught by us that many of the prophecies in the Bible that are popularly assigned to the end of the world are actually prophecies about the end of Jerusalem and the Judaic aeon. This is true regarding many such prophecies (e.g. Matt. 24:29), but there are some who have fallen into the trap of thinking that “if one’s good, then two’s better.” They move all biblical prophecies into that category, a position which is variously called hyper-preterism, or full preterism. The perspective we teach is called partial preterism, although I must confess that I was recently called a hyper-partial preterist, which is what might be noted to be an oxymoronic and meaningless taunt. 

Now the full preterist position does not just alter the timing of a few things, but rather alters the entire architecture of biblical faith, to such an extent that it has to be called a different faith altogether. For example: physical death is not a result of the fall, Christ’s bodily resurrection was the only one (the sole exception), sin remains an eternal feature of time, history has no telos point, we don’t go forward, but rather we just go “upstairs,” and many other distinctives. These are two completely distinct systems of thought, which is why full preterism is rejected as heretical. But the systems are so different that this actually needs to be acknowledged in both directions—the rejection ought to be mutual. If full preterism were correct, all orthodox theology would need to be written off. The only reason they don’t do this is because that would be off-putting to potential recruits, and they need to fish in orthodox waters (Acts 20:29-31).  

THE HOPE OF THIS WORLD

Faithful Jews knew that there was going to be a resurrection of the dead at the end of the world. The Pharisees held to this belief, while the Sadducees denied it (Acts 23:8). Martha was a good representative of this faith, when she confessed to the Lord that she knew that Lazarus was going to be raised eventually, at the last day (John 11:24). This is the basic structure of faith—this decrepit world is nevertheless pregnant with glory, and the day of delivery will eventually come. God in His mercy determined to give us a foretaste of this final glory by raising up Christ, the first fruits of that final consummation, and to do this in the middle of human history. This testifies to us that what happened to Him will happen to us, and what will happen to us will happen to the entire created order. The Spirit has been given to us, and He was given to us as an earnest payment (1 Cor. 1:22; 5:5). “Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory” (Eph. 1:14). The redemption of the purchased possession is the general resurrection of the dead.

So as we commemorate the resurrection hope of Easter to the end of the world one of the corollaries is that there will be an end of the world.

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