Undeception

As my regulars probably know, I like podcasts. One I listen to regularly (it comes out daily) is Renewing Your Mind with Dr. R.C. Sproul of Ligonier Ministries. He is well-known as a partial preterist, but, as you will see here soon, posits a future consummative coming of Christ. This is what he said in a recent podcast.

After the Resurrection [Jesus] sojourns on the earth for a few weeks with His disciples until that moment comes where He ascends into heaven. And what’s the point of the Ascension? . . . [The] “ascension” here takes on a technical meaning, where it means not simply to go up, but . . . to go up to a specific place for a specific purpose. And the place to which He goes is the right hand of God and the purpose for His ascent is to go to His coronation, to His investiture, as the fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant, where God now crowns Him not just one more king in the line of Davidic kings, but He crowns Him the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and to Whom all the nations of the world are given beneath His authority and under His dominion. And His reign is announced by God in the New Covenant not to last for four hundred years like the dynasty of David but “He shall reign for ever and ever” and ever and ever to which the Church cries, “Hallelujah!”

So far so good, but then he continues:

And that’s why it’s such a terrible thing when people think of the kingdom of God as exclusively something in the future. Yes, there’s still another chapter to be written; yes, there’s still a consummation; yes, the Kingdom is now visible and yes, there will be a time when our reigning King will make His Kingdom visible, we know that. But it’s not that it doesn’t exist now. It already has come in terms of its inauguration. It hasn’t been consummated in its full completion, but it’s real right now.

This is another reason I’m so confident in full preterism. The Millennium of Revelation 20 commenced with His ascension and consummated with the subjugation and elimination of all His enemies (1 Cor 15). This is exactly what happened with David: he was king for years before he subjugated all the inhabitants in his own land, but when he had accomplished this, his kingdom didn’t end — the golden age had only just begun and the expansion of Israel’s territory continued after this. In the same way that God owns the cattle “on a thousand hills”, the “thousand years”, as even Gary Demar points out, refers to the completeness and extent of His authority rather than a time limit - doesn’t He reign into eternity? The forty years after His ascension were spent demanding the obeisance of His people, proclaiming the naturalization of the aliens who claimed Him, and finally exacting vengeance upon His local enemies, the faithless and murderous shepherds with whom He had entrusted the care of His sheep. Now Christ is extending His borders, and “Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and for ever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this” (Isaiah 9:7). Amen!

As I pointed out in the comments of my post The Millennium and the Resurrection of the Dead, “We can’t forget that the purpose of Revelation was the encouragement of persecuted believers. With his discussion in Revelation 20 John reassures the weary, discouraged, and fearful believers already troubled by the delay of their ultimate victory that their deaths would result not in Sheol but in reigning with Christ . . . Revelation 14 pictures the first-century saints as first-fruits (which included the martyrs spotlighted in Rev 20:4-5), before the rest of the harvest is reaped (cf. the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares) at the time of God’s wrath. This is the event Paul describes in 1 Thessalonians 4, again paired with the Resurrection,” and interestingly this passage was also written to reassure the dying and the bereaved who had grown doubtful of the Resurrection (vv. 13-14). Recently Bryan also pointed out that the purpose of the passage was to reassure the persecuted that they would receive their reward.

The postmillennialist strains at the idea of a non-literal millennium of 40 earth years, but swallows a non-literal millennium that extends an unconsummated Kingdom at least two thousand years, and probably centuries more. Has He put an end to His people’s separation from Himself? If not, where does that put us? The full preterist looks at what God has done and sees “that it was good”, and does not insist upon anything else from God. Even Paul said that they, the firstfruits, had already received everything needed for life and godliness; what was lacking at the time was life after death for the departed, which was itself supplied accomplished at the Resurrection.

What are we waiting for? Our redemption has been accomplished and applied. We have been raised with the risen Christ and brought into the glorious, unshakable kingdom of His Father. Critics claim that preterists are preoccupied with AD 70, but we are so only as a child remembers the thrill of unwrapping the presents on Christmas morning; the real joy comes only after the beginning, and that’s where the full preterist lives.

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