Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: dvnspc1!tom@tredysvr.tredydev.unisys.com (Tom Albrecht) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: The second coming (part 1) Message-ID: Date: 3 Apr 91 07:37:15 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Unisys Corporation, Devon Engineering Offices Lines: 80 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article gross@dg-rtp.dg.com (Gene Gross) writes: >In article smaanian@swift.cs.tcd.ie writes: >> >>The people believing in Moses they didn't accept Christ because He didn't >>come as Kings of Kings. But Jesus was a King in the Spiritual Realm. > >However, Jesus will return as King of kings and Lord of lords to >establish His earthly, visible reign. That is our Blessed Hope. Technically speaking, our "blessed hope" is in the fact of Christ's return; His "appearing" according to Titus 2:13. This "blessed hope" has nothing to do with an "earthly, visible reign," and I submit that such a concept is foreign to the New Testament teaching on the nature of Christ and His Church. It is an assumption of premillennialists, based on certain principles of biblical hermeneutics, that Christ's second coming will usher in an earthly reign, the so-called Millennium. One of the premillennialist's principles is that OT prophecies concerning the coming of Messsiah must be taken "literally." As a result, they project into the future certain prophecies which they say cannot have been fulfilled as part of Christ's first coming. The problem with this principle of hermeneutic is that it cannot be supported from Scripture. In other words, there is no Scriptural reason for positing such a principle. In fact, such a principle seems to go completely contrary to the way Jesus and His apostles interpreted the OT prophecies related to the Messiah. And I would submit that a better principle, more overriding, is that the New Testament is the interpreter of the Old Testament. One need only examine a few OT prophecies, and the interpretation given by the New Testament, to see the deficiencies of the premillennial principle. (I should point out that there are many premillennialists who recognize the problem with this approach, and seek other ways of justifying their position. There are also many former premillennialists, like myself, who attempted to do the same without success.) For example, take the way Jesus viewed the ministry of John the Baptist. There are those premillennialists who teach that the prophet Elijah will be resurrected and his prophetic office reestablished just prior to Christ's second coming. This is during the time that some folks call the "great tribulation," or the "time of Jacob's trouble." This resurrection is so that certain OT prophecies can be "literally" fulfilled, especially: Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of Yahweh: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse. (Mal. 4:5,6) According to another premillennial principle, the "the great and dreadful day of Yahweh" must refer to the events at the end of the "great tribulation." But the premillennialist has a problem, because Jesus clearly spoke of John the Baptist as the fulfillment of the OT prophecies concerning the coming of Elijah. About John He said, "If you will receive it, this is Elijah who was to come." (Matt. 11:14). Following the Transfiguration, at which Elijah actually appeared, He was much more direct: And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elijah must first come? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elijah truly shall first come, and restore all things. But I say unto you, That Elijah is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them. Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist. (Matt. 17:10-13) The only New Testament interpretation that we have of Elijah's coming was offered by Jesus. And He never gave us the impression that another "coming of Elijah" should be expected in the future. From the NT perspective, "Elijah has come." And if Elijah has come, then what does this tell us about "the coming of the great and dreadful day of Yahweh?" (cont'd) -- Tom Albrecht