Hi one and all. I don’t know how many new posts I will be able to produce in the next couple of weeks — though I will try to post at least one a week — because I’m planning on leaving for a visit to India Wednesday afternoon. I’ve started a new blog to journal my adventures. Here’s the link: http://marksindiajournal.wordpress.com
Posted by: markcarlton | July 19, 2010
India, Here I Come!
Posted in Uncategorized
Posted by: markcarlton | July 15, 2010
The End is Near….Or is It? (Part 7)
There is an ominous tone to the story of Jesus. It began with the ministry of John the Baptist. John’s message to Israel was that the Messiah was coming. But this good news came with a somber announcement, He was coming to judge: “His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.” So the story of Jesus is set against the backdrop of an approaching storm, and as the story of his coming unfolds we can see the thunderheads building.
The gospel narrative is summarized very concisely at the beginning of the fourth gospel: “He came unto His own and His own received Him not.” As we read the story, and as it becomes clear that Israel is going to reject the Messiah we can almost hear the sounds of distant thunder in the distance; and as we continue to read through the book of Acts one senses that the storm will soon be upon the nation.
It is interesting to fit Jesus’ prophetic ministry into all of this.* He began His ministry with the same message as John the Baptist, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2; c.f. 4:12). But as His ministry began to eclipse John’s, new themes were taken up and developed.
During the early stage of Him ministry Jesus confined Himself primarily to forth telling (see part 6), and the few predictions He made were primarily to individuals and in private conversations. It was only after it began to be apparent that He was going to be rejected that He began to talk in any detail about future events.
The Jesus’ foretelling aspect of Jesus’ prophetic ministry began very suddenly with the parables of the Kingdom, recorded in greatest detail in Matthew’s gospel. On other occasions Jesus used parables to help the multitudes understand spiritual truth, but these parables were told to prevent them from understanding it. On this occasion Jesus began to tell the crowds parables without context or explanations.
This caused His disciples to ask, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”
Jesus explained: “I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.” But lest any should think that their inability and unwillingness to understand was an unforeseen development, Jesus explained that it was actually the fulfillment of a prophecy made centuries before through Isaiah: “You will keep on hearing, but will not understand; you will keep on seeing but will not perceive; for the hearts of this people has become dull, with their ears they scarcely hear, and they have closed their eyes, otherwise they would see with their eyes, hear with their ears, and understand with the heart and return, and I would heal them.”
So, what was Jesus teaching through the enigmatic parables? Jesus gave us some important clues that will help us understand them. Note, for example, that He refers to these parables as “mysteries”. When this term is used in the New Testament it is referring to something that is now being revealed which has either not been revealed before, or if revealed, not completely understood. It is good to keep this principle in mind in seeking to understand these parables, particularly those which are not specifically interpreted for us by Jesus. I believe that the failure to do this has resulted in the misinterpretation of several of these parables.
Notice also that Jesus specifically states that these parables contain truths that have not been revealed or clearly understood in the past: “For truly I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.”
This statement is very significant. What Jesus seems to be saying, right before He went on to explain the meaning of the first parable, was that he is presenting new stuff, things that godly men before them had not seen or heard. Thus if we come up with an interpretation of these parables that is just a restatement of truth that had previously been seen and understood then we have erred in our understanding of them.
Thus we must reject some of the common interpretations of some of these parables. For example, the Parables of the Mustard Seed and the Hidden Leaven, have often been interpreted as predicting the exponential growth of the Kingdom. This interpretation must be rejected because the exponential growth of the Kingdom had already been revealed and was greatly anticipated.
Israel was looking forward to the coming of the kingdom, pictured by Daniel, as a stone falling from the sky and then growing into a mountain that filled the earth. Other prophets had predicted the same thing. So if these two well known parables are just Daniel’s vision with fresh imagery, they hardly qualify as exciting new truth which other generations had not foreseen or understood. On the contrary, the coming and the ultimate triumph of the Kingdom of God was something that even those who were refusing to accept Jesus understood, accepted and had longed for.
But if they do not picture the growth of the kingdom, what was Jesus predicting? I will be discussing the meaning of these and the other parables in the next post in this series.
*For placing the events of the ministry of Jesus in chronological order I am largely following the order presented by Dr. A.T. Robertson in his, “A Harmony of the Gospels for students of the Life of Christ”.
Posted in Apologetics, Bible, Theology
Posted by: markcarlton | July 6, 2010
The End is Near…Or is It? (Part 6)
The scriptures teach us that Jesus has three offices: Prophet, Priest and King. Evangelical Christians have tended to focus heavily on Christ’s high priestly work. We also talk about the fact that He is Messiah the King. We also sing at lot about it. But with the exception of those passages in which Jesus speaks of the end of the age, we don’t talk very much about His prophetic office. This oversight is unfortunate because Jesus was not just any prophet; He was “the prophet,” whose coming was foretold by Moses:
“The Lord will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen, you shall listen to Him. This is according to all that you asked of the Lord your God in Horeb on the day of the assembly saying, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, let me not see this great fire anymore lest I die.’ The Lord said to me, ‘They have spoken well.’ I will raise up a prophet from among their countrymen like you, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. It shall come to about that whoever will not listen to My words which he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him.” — Deuteronomy 18:15-18
In Jesus’ day the coming of this prophet was greatly anticipated (John 1:19-25), but there was some confusion as to who this prophet would be. The consensus was that he would be someone other than the Messiah.
We catch a glimpse of all of this in the first chapter of John’s gospel when the Pharisees in Jerusalem sent a delegation to talk with John the Baptist to find out just who he claimed to be.
They asked him if he was the Messiah. He denied it. So they went on to the next question, “are you Elijah?” Based on the last prophecy in Old Testament (Malachi 4:4-5), they were anticipating the return of Elijah almost as much as they were looking forward to the arrival of the Messiah. John denied this too, so they moved on to the next question, “Are you the prophet?” This was a direct reference to the prophet whose coming was foretold in the eighteenth chapter of Deuteronomy…but John denied that too.
Had they asked the same question of Jesus they might have solicited a different answer, because he was not only the Messiah, He was also the prophet like Moses who the Lord had promised to raise up from among them.
In the next several posts I am going to be discussing Jesus’ unique prophetic ministry. As we begin I think it would be good to define exactly what we are talking about when we speak about a prophet. Most of our dictionaries define a prophet as someone who foresees the future. But that is not an adequate definition. At least it is not an adequate definition of what a prophet of God was because they did far more than predict the future.
In one of its first uses of the term, the Bible provides us with picture of the prophetic office. In the Sixth chapter of Exodus God commissioned Moses, telling him that he was to go to Pharaoh and “speak to him all that I speak to you.”
“Behold, I am unskilled in speech; how then will Pharaoh listen to me?” Moses protested.
But God had an answer; “See, I make you as God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet. You shall speak all that I command you and your brother Aaron shall speak to Pharaoh” Exodus 6:28-7:2a
This passage teaches us that a prophet is a person who stands between God and the people he serves in the same way as Aaron stood between Moses and Pharaoh. Aaron heard the words of Moses and then conveyed them to Pharaoh. In the same way, the prophets of God heard the word of God and communicated it to the people.
A prophet, then, was a conduit of Divine revelation making known to men what God had revealed to him. Since Jesus was “the prophet who was to come” we would expect to see him doing this, and when we look at the gospels this is what we see him doing. This is how Jesus described His ministry, “For I did not speak on my own initiative, but the Father Himself who sent Me has given Me commandment, what to say, and what to speak. And I know that His Commandment is eternal life; therefore the things I speak I speak just as the Father told me.” – John 12:49-50
Prophets, then, speak for God. In doing this they sometimes spoke of things to come. It should also be noted that the prophets of God did more than just tell the future. But just as often — more often in some cases — they spoke concerning all sorts of moral issues and current events. For example, Moses gave Israel the Law, which revealed the moral will of God. He also gave the instructions for building the tabernacle in the wilderness, which made known how they were to worship Him.
Theologians, who love making distinctions, have distinguished between the prophets’ foretelling and fourth-telling ministries. When they were revealing things about the future they were foretelling. When they revealed God’s will concerning other matters they were fourth-telling. Fourth-telling looks a lot like preaching or teaching because, in fact, that’s what it is.
Jesus certainly spoke of things to come. However, when we look at the gospels we often find Him astounding His listeners by “teaching as one having authority.” This non-predictive aspect of Jesus’ prophetic ministry needs to be remembered when considering His predictive prophecies because they flow out of it. This is particularly true with respect to His predictions of a dark and foreboding future for the His own nation, Israel.
When we look at the great themes of Jesus’ ministry in chronological order we note that His foretelling began after He had ministered for some time. In fact,it began only after it became clear that Israel was not listening.
In light of Moses’ warning in Deuteronomy 18:18, this is instructive. You see, the prophet came just as Moses said He would, but the people did what Moses warned them not to do. They refused to “listen to the words which He spoke to them.” As a consequence, God, Who always does what He says He will do, “required it of them.” Beginning with the Parables of the Kingdom Jesus began to explain what the consequences would be.
Posted in Anti-Semitism, Apologetics, Bible, Theology
Posted by: markcarlton | June 29, 2010
The End is Near…Or is It? (Part 5)
Several years ago I decided to read R.C. Sproul’s book, “The Last Days According to Jesus”. Though I disagreed with much of it, I found it a fascinating and profitable read. I had been thinking about the prophetic teachings of Jesus for some time before reading Sproul’s book, but it helped me to clarify my thoughts. I found it particularly helpful in helping me resolve some of the questions I had about the Olivet Discourse.
Sproul defines himself as a Partial or Moderate Preterist.
For those not familiar with preterism Sproul provided this helpful chart:
| Preterism | The Kingdom is a present reality |
| Radical Preterism | All future prophecies in the NT have already been fulfilled. |
| Moderate Preterism | Many future prophecies in the NT have already been fulfilled. Some crucial prophecies have not yet been fulfilled. |
The reason Sproul wrote “The Gospel According to Jesus”, was to “examine and evaluate the various claims of Preterism, both full and partial.” He believes that Preterism has performed a great service by focusing our attention on two major issues. The first service is what he refers to as “the time frame references in the New Testament regarding eschatological prophecy.” He is referring to the various statements of Jesus that seem to indicate that His generation would witness certain of the events He prophesied. He believes this is useful because it “provides a sentinel standing guard against frivolous and superficial attempts to down play or explain away the force of these references. I would note the Preterist interpretation of these passages is primarily an attempt to explain away the charge that Jesus was a false prophet because he claimed he would return within the lifetime of some of His apostles and clearly that did not happen. Spiritualizing the prophecies of the second coming and saying that Jesus did return to judge Israel in 70 AD would seem to solve that problem. However, I do not agree that the other explanations that have been offered for Jesus’ use of the term, “generation,” are frivolous and superficial. For example, I note that the word translated “generation” can be also be translated, “race.” If read this way many of Jesus’ use of the term generation may be references to the Jewish people, and reading these texts in that sense makes sense, or at least as much sense as the radical preterists reading of the prophecies of the second coming.
The second service performed by preterism is that it forces us to focus our attention on the destruction of Jerusalem. Sproul points out that,”This event certainly spelled the end of a crucial redemptive-historical epoch. It must be viewed as the end of some age. It also represents a significant visitation of the Lord in judgment and a vitally important ‘day of the Lord.’ “
I have come to agree with Sproul on this point. The destruction of the temple in 70 AD was indeed an eschatological event, it was a significant divine visitation, and it was a vitally important “day of the Lord.” Any normal reading of Luke’s account of the Olivet Discourse would leave the honest reader with no other conclusion. However, the Preterist makes the common mistake of trying to prove too much with a good argument. Matthew’s account in particular, seems to focus, not on the eminent judgment of Jerusalem, but on the end of the age and the climactic event we generally refer to when we speak of the second coming of Christ. Sproul agrees that the Radical Preterist interpretation is inadequate.
As far as I am concerned, the most thought provoking statements in Sproul’s came after his discussion of the various schools of eschatological thought that have developed over the years: “The differences displayed among the various millennial schools go far beyond their understanding of the millennium itself. The differences are systemic and extend to every aspect of eschatology. Some form of preterism could conceivably be incorporated into all of them. One possible exception is Dispensationalism, although with certain modifications it could fit in even there.”
I am basically a traditional Dispensationalist. But I do not find any conflict between Dispensationalism and many aspects of Sproul’s partial preterism. In fact, I think Sproul is a Dispensationalist; he just does not want to admit it or call it by that much despised name. For evidence I would offer you his statement that the destruction of Jerusalem was, “the end of a crucial redemptive-historical epoch,” sounds pretty dispensational to me. The recognition that there are redemptive epochs in the outworking of God’s redemptive purposes in history is Dispensationalism. The only questions are, when do the epochs start and end, and what was or is God’s purpose in each particular epoch. But I digress.
Reading Sproul’s book led me to connect some dots I had been seeking to connect for some time. Without knowing much about Preterism, my own reading of the Olivet Discourse, particularly Luke’s account of it, had led me to conclude that the discourse has been greatly misinterpreted. So I set out to combine the New Thoughts I had been exposed to by Sproul with my previous understanding of the text, and some of the thoughts I had been kicking around in my mind. The result was a course I taught for the first time when I was invited to speak at Bible conference in Guyana. The name of the lecture series was, “Jesus the Prophet”. I will be presenting part of that series in the next several posts.
Posted in Anti-Semitism, Apologetics, Bible, Theology
Posted by: markcarlton | June 25, 2010
The End is Near…Or is It? (Part 4)
The fact that the early church maintained a consensus in the area of eschatology, and that its end times scenario remained faithful to the apostolic tradition is really quite remarkable. This is especially so given their inability to remain faithful to apostolic teaching in so many other important areas.
For example, Paul wrote, “It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to the yoke of slavery.” Yet within a few generations of the Apostles the church had placed itself under bondage. Not even the most legalistic Pharisee would have ever prescribed the asceticism of the early church.
By the fourth century the church had actually managed to acquire a level of legalistic bondage greater than anything that had ever existed in Judaism. Christianity had become so rigid that even the enjoyment of the most innocent pleasures of life where, if not outright forbidden, then certainly looked upon with suspicion.
The history of the early church evokes a range of emotions. The courage of the martyrs is inspiring. The rapid movement away from the New Testament is heartrending. But it is hardly a surprise when we consider the obstacles those early believers faced. J. Dwight Pentecost offers this brief summary: “They were without an established canon of either the Old or New Testaments. They were dependent upon a faulty translation of the Scriptures [The Septuagint]….They were surrounded by paganism, Judaism and heresy of every kind.”
In commenting on the Jewish influence Pentecost says, “They had known only the rules of interpretation laid down by the rabbinical schools and, thus, had to free themselves from erroneous application of the principle of interpretation.”
I disagree with this statement (Unless he is referring to the influence of the Jewish philosopher, Philo). After all, the authors of the New Testament with the possible exception of Luke, were Jews and they brought some of those Jewish rules of interpretation with them. This is apparent from their use of the Old Testament scriptures. Also, I believe that one of the tragedies of the early church is that it moved so quickly away from its Jewish roots.
Early in the second century of the Christian era, Christianity, which had originally been seen as just another Jewish sect, had come to be seen by the Romans and by the church itself as a distinct religious movement. According to historian, Leon Poliakov, This process accelerated after the Bar Kokba rebellion in 135 when “the first Christian apologists [attempted] to prove that Christians having no link with Israel and the land of Judea, were irreproachable subjects of the empire.”
It was during this period that the church, now a predominantly gentile institution, began to display a hatred of Judaism. Gary Vaterlaus describes this disturbing development: “The Church was born in a Jewish cradle, but it rapidly became de-Judaized. By the middle of the second century an anti-Jewish polemic arose within the Church as men like Marcion sought to rid Christianity of every trace of Judaism. Other Church fathers such as Justin Martyr, John Chrysostom and Ignatius spoke with great contempt against Jews and Judaism. With the eventual triumph of Christianity in the fourth century as a state religion, its indebtedness to Judaism had to a great extent been forgotten. Judaism was now thought to be obsolete. Because Jewish people had rejected Jesus as their Messiah, what need did believing Gentiles have to associate with or be indebted to those of a dead, legalistic religion? The Jewish roots of the church had thus virtually been severed. A Gentile Church, largely Grecianized through the influence of Platonic though, now stood in its place.”
All of this happened while the majority of the church still clung to the same basic end-times scenario they had received from the apostles, but there was something missing, the Jews. Sadly, some of the early church’s strongest voices for pre-millennialism were among those seeking to sever the church from its Jewish roots. But in doing this they were departing from the teaching of their Lord. I will be speaking more about this in my next post.
Posted in Anti-Semitism, Bible, Theology
Posted by: markcarlton | June 24, 2010
The End is Near…Or is It? (Part 3)
The Didache — also known as, The Teaching of the Lord to the Gentiles by the Twelve Apostles – is perhaps the earliest non-canonical Christian documents we have. The consensus is that it was produced in the late first or early second century of the Christian era, though there are portions of it that may have been produced even earlier. It is basically a moral tract, but it concludes with a call to vigilance in light of the imminent return of Christ, and the same basic narrative of end time events that we find in Mark 13, Matthew 25 and Luke 21:
“For in the last days the false prophets and corrupters shall be multiplied, and the sheep will be turned into wolves, and love will be turned into hate. For lawlessness will increase, they will hate one another and will persecute and betray. And then the world-deceiver will appear as a son of God; and will work signs and wonders, and the earth will be delivered into his hands; and he will do unholy things, which have never been since the world began. Then all created mankind will come to the fire of testing, and many will be offended and perish; but they that endure in their faith will be saved by the Curse Himself. And then will the s signs of truth appear; first a sign of a rift in the heaven, then a sign of a voice of a trumpet, and thirdly a resurrection of the dead; yet not of all, but as it was said; the Lord will come and all His saints with Him. Then the world will see the Lord coming in the heaven.”
At this point the Didache ends abruptly, leaving the question, what happens next, unanswered. But one does not have to delve to deeply into the post-apostolic literature to find the answer to this question. The Apostolic Fathers speak with one voice, the return of our Lord will be followed with a material millennium on the earth.
In his book, The Last Days are Here Again, Dr. Richard Kyle discusses the two views of Millennium that were popular during the first three years of the Christian era.
The first view seems to have originated in the area of Ephesus. This view taught that after Christ returned there will be a resurrection, followed by the millennial kingdom, an age of material blessing during which Christ will rule over a renewed earth.
The second view apparently originated in Antioch in Syria. It was based on Peter’s statement that a day with the Lord is as a thousand years. It posited the theory that God’s redemptive purposes would be accomplished in seven days, or seven thousand years. As with the Ephesian view, this view posited a literal, earthly, 1000 year reign of Christ.
Though there were differences in the eschatology of Ephesus and Antioch they were slight, and both agreed on what would happen after Christ returned. So when the men of Ephesus and Antioch prayed, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” they were all praying for the coming of a literal, material kingdom. There is not a hint in either tradition that they saw the kingdom promise of the Kingdom being fulfilled in a non-literal sense at the present hour. Such a view of the prophetic scriptures lay hundreds of years in the future.
The post apostolic fathers were pre-millennial. All of them were literalists. This leads to the question, where did they get the idea the book of Revelation was to be taken literally when it spoke of Jesus ruling with his saints upon the earth for a thousand years (Revelation 5:10; 20:4-6).
Eusibius (c. 263–339 AD) , who did not share their literal interpretation of the prophetic scriptures, blames it all on Papias (c. 60-130 AD). While acknowledging him as “a disciple of the Apostles, Eusebius would later dismiss him as “a man of very mean capacity,” because he promulgated “the Jewish tradition of a Millennium.”
Eusebisus declares that, “It was owing to him that so many church fathers after him adopted a like opinion, urging in their own support the antiquity of the man.” Eusebius is probably giving too much credit to one man, Papias, for the unanimity of the post-apostolic church on the question of the Millennium. But clearly Papias was an influential voice in the early church, as was his friend, Polycarp and his disciple, Irenaeus. Just as clearly, his contemporaries did not share Eusebius’ low opinions of Papias’ “capacity”. Nor did they share his eschatology.
But why was Papias so well respected and where did he get his millennial ideas ? According to his disciple, Irenaeus, Papias’ ideas were passed down to him by the elders who saw John the disciple of the Lord. According to Irenaeus, these elder related “they they had heard them from [John the apostle] how the Lord used to teach concerning those times.”
Irenaeus also exercised enormous influence in the early church. This was due in part to the fact that he could trace his credentials to the apostles through Papias. Listen to how he describes the millennium: “The blessing thus foretold belongs undoubtedly to the times of the Kingdom, when the righteous shall rise from the death and reign, when too creation renewed and freed from bondage shall produce a wealth of food of all kinds from the dew of heaven and from the fatness of the world.”
Note that Irenaeus does not picture the Kingdom as a present reality being spiritually realized at the present hour through the church. Rather, he sees the Kingdom as a coming golden age during which Christ will reign on the earth with His resurrected saints. Irenaeus was not alone in this opinion. His was the view of the post-apostolic church.
It is interesting that not a single voice can be found questioning the literal interpretation of the prophetic scriptures, the “Jewish traditions,” championed by men like Papais, Irenaeus and Justin Martyr. For the only time in the history of the church there was a consensus on the nature of the millennium. How did this happen? It happened because men like Papias had actually heard the apostles or those who knew them, and they were faithfully passing down that which they received. At the time their close proximity to the apostles carried enormous weight.
By the third century that was beginning to change. While still personally revered, the teaching of the apostolic fathers was be superseded by a new, non-literal interpretation, of the prophecy. Origen (c. 185–254), one of the great minds of the early church, was the father of this new school of thought. In time it gained ascendency, particularly when the even more influential Augustine of Hippo (c. 354 – 430) embraced it. But whatever the sources of knowledge and information they or their modern contemporaries claim to have, Papias’ sources were better. After all, it is entirely possible that he had direct access to the author of the Book of Revelation. At worst, he was just one degree of separation from the Lord Himself. Pardon me, then, if I prefer his perspective.
Posted in Anti-Semitism, Bible, Theology
Posted by: markcarlton | June 23, 2010
The End is Near…Or is It? (Part 2)
Some years ago I purchased a book by Professor Richard Kyle of Tabor College entitled; “The Last Days are Here Again: A History of the End times”. The back cover of Dr. Kyle’s book summarizes it well:
“Professor Richard Kyle has found that speculation on the last days is not a novel phenomenon. Having researched the history of end-times thought, Kyle describes various millennial positions from both Christian and secular circles. The Last Days are Here Again serves as a comprehensive source regarding movements related to the end times…”
Dr. Kyle is an evangelical believer, and he does believe in the second coming. However, like some of our contributors, he is turned off by the speculations of the likes of Tim LaHaye and John Hagee. He prefers that we “focus on Christ, not the signs of the times.” I think he is presenting a false dichotomy. It is possible to do both. In fact, I think Jesus expected us to do both. Thus in applying His own prophetic teaching Jesus exhorted His disciples to be alert and watchful , and if the Pharisees of Jesus’ day were worthy of rebuke because they did not know how to discern the signs of their times, so we will be if we fail to discern the signs of ours.
Nevertheless there is much in Dr. Kyle’s book that I agree with and I have found it to be an invaluable resource. I find his historical analysis extremely valuable, particularly his summary of the eschatological views of the early church. For example, He provides a very good job summary of Jesus’ eschatological teaching:
“Jesus’ most detailed eschatological words are in the so-called Little Apocalypse, found in Mark 13 and repeated in different forms in Matthew 24-25 and Luke 21. In these passages Jesus describes the last days and the sequence of events that lead up to the end. A series of disasters – wars, earthquakes, famines, and persecutions – will disrupt the political, religious and natural orders. And when the gospel is finally preached to all nations, the end will come.
“As the end draws closer, the great tribulation will come. Jesus refers to this event as ‘the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet. The affliction will be such ‘as was not from the beginning of creation…unto this time…and except that the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh should be saved. But this horrible tribulation will end suddenly in a great cosmic drama – the return of Christ in the clouds with great power and glory.
“In the parable of the fig tree Jesus gives another clue as to when the end will come. Christ will return in the generation after the fig tree gets its leaves. This parable along with Daniel’s prophecy of seventy weeks has tempted countless people to try to calculate the exact time when Christ will return. But what is meant by the parable of the fig tree? A contemporary popularizer, Hal Lindsey, claims that the fig tree put forth its leaves when Israel returned to Palestine in 1948. So in one generation from 1948 the end will come. However, in this very parable Christ condemns such speculation: ‘But of that day and that hour knoweth no man.”
I agree with most of Kyle’s summary of the teaching of the gospels and epistles. However, there are a couple of points I disagree with. First, Jesus did not say that the abomination of desolation was the great tribulation; he said that the “standing” or setting up of the abomination of desolation “where it should not be” will mark the beginning of the great tribulation. In Matthew Jesus identifies the place where the abomination of desolation will be set up as , “the holy place.” If Paul is speaking of the same event in I Thessalonians 2:4, that place is the Temple. Second, while I have doubts about Hal Lindsey’s interpretation of the parable of the fig tree, and while agree that some have attempted to set dates, there is a difference between discerning that the day and hour are close and date setting. As to the former, Jesus Himself in said that the generation which witnesses His coming should be able to recognize that His coming is getting close:
“But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your head for your redemption is drawing near (Luke 21:28).”
It is also interesting to note that in Luke’s account He says this just before referring to the Parable of the Fig Tree and I think it gives us a clue as to how we ought to interpret it (i.e. That as the leafing of the fig tree signals the soon approach of summer, so the beginning of signs Jesus mentions in Luke 21:24b-26 signal the approach of end of the age.).
So other than these two small areas of disagreement Kyle and I are pretty much on the same page in our understanding of the teaching of our Lord concerning the last days. The view he outlines was also the view of the early church in the post-apostolic era and during the first few centuries of the Christian era. I will discuss this in more in my next post.
Posted in Apologetics, Bible
Posted by: markcarlton | June 22, 2010
The End is Near…or is It? (Part 1)
Recently two of the contributors to this blog have taken shots at John Hagee for his interpretations of the prophetic scriptures. It is admitted that he takes the prophetic scriptures literally. This is part of the problem. They do not think the prophetic scriptures should be taken literally. The other part of their problem with Hagee and other Popularizers of end time prophecy is their speculation, their tendency to try to fit every current event into their end time scenario.
I have some sympathy with the latter criticism, though I must confess that I prefer even the most outlandish speculation of a Tim LaHaye or John Hagee to the alternative. You see, I am increasingly troubled by an evangelical culture in which so many are “building the Kingdom” but so few are longing or looking for the return of the King. You would think if we love Him as much as we say we do in our worship songs we would be more anxious to see Him.
I am also troubled that the church, like the Pharisees of old, seems to be unable to discern the signs of the time. Jesus told us that when certain events “begin to take place” we should “straighten up and lift up [our] heads because our redemption is drawing near.” But these days more and more are pooh-poohing such things. Increasingly we are being told that it is not possible to know that the day is approaching.
“Where is the promise of His coming?” We are asked, “For ever since the father’s fell asleep all continues just as it has from the beginning of creation.” It seems that I read a prophecy somewhere that said that this would happen in the last days. But surely these are not those times, are they?
There is some truth in the taunt. In his book, The Second Coming, John MacArthur writes, “From the very earliest days of the church, the apostles and first generation Christians nurtured an earnest expectation and fervent hope that Christ might suddenly return at any time and gather His church to heaven.” Indeed they did. But he did not come. They died looking.
My grandfather shared that hope and watched expectantly for the coming of Christ. He believed it would happen during his lifetime. My father, a pastor, believed the same thing. In his later years he preached on it nearly every Sunday. Both died looking. I share that same hope, and I look at the signs of the time as others look at the sky in the morning to see what the weather is going to be later in the day. And if I die looking, that’s fine with me. I will be in good company.
There is something else I share with my father, grandfather and those early believers, and that is a particular end times scenario. I will be discussing this commonality in my next post.
Posted in Apologetics, Bible
Posted by: markcarlton | June 17, 2010
Why Defend Israel?
Former New York mayor, Ed Koch, has written a tremendous opinion piece. I would urge everyone to read it. In this article he extensively quotes Pilar Rahola, “a Spanish politician, journalist and activist.” Rohola’s statements bear repeating:
“Why, of all the world’s conflicts, only this one interests them? Why a tiny country which struggles to survive is criminalized? Why does the manipulated information triumph so easily? Why are all the people of Israel, reduced to a simple mass of murderous imperialists? Why is there no Palestinian guilt? Why is Arafat a hero and Sharon a monster? Finally, why when it is the only country in the world which is threatened with destruction, it is the only one that nobody considers a victim?…”Today too, as yesterday, that left is hawking totalitarian ideologies, falls in love with dictators and, in its offensive against Israel, ignores the destruction of fundamental rights. It hates rabbis, but falls in love with imams; shouts against the Tsahal [Israeli Defense Forces], but applauds Hamas’ terrorists; weeps for the Palestinian victims, but scorns the Jewish victims, and when it is touched by Palestinian children, it does it only if it can blame the Israelis. It will never denounce the culture of hatred, or its preparation for murder. A year ago, at AIPAC’s conference in Washington, I asked the following questions: Why don’t we see demonstrations in Europe against the Islamic dictatorships? Why are there no demonstrations against the enslavement of millions of Muslim women? Why don’t they declare against the use of bomb-carrying children in the conflicts in which Islam is involved? Why is the left only obsessed with fighting against two of the most solid democracies of the planet, those which have suffered the bloodiest terrorist attacks, the United States and Israel?…Because the left no longer has any ideas, only slogans. It no longer defends rights, but prejudices. And the greatest prejudice of all, is the one it has against Israel. I accuse, then, in a formal manner: the main responsibility of the new anti-Semite hatred, disguised as anti-Zionism, comes from those who should have to defend freedom, solidarity and progress. Far from it, they defend despots, forget their victims and remain silent before medieval ideologies which aim at the destruction of free societies. The treason of the left is an authentic treason against modernity….”I am not Jewish. Ideologically, I am left and by profession a journalist. Why am I not as anti-Israel as my colleagues? Because as a non-Jew, I have the historical responsibility to fight against Jewish hatred and currently against the hatred for their historic homeland, Israel. To fight against anti-Semitism is not the duty of the Jews, it is the duty of the non-Jews. As a journalist, it is my duty to search for the truth beyond prejudice, lies and manipulations. The truth about Israel is not told. As a person from the left who loves progress, I am obligated to defend liberty, culture, civic education for children, coexistence and the laws that the Tablets of the Covenant made into universal principles. Principles that Islamic fundamentalism systematically destroys. That is to say that as a non-Jew, journalist and lefty, I have a triple moral duty with Israel, because if Israel is destroyed, liberty, modernity and culture will be destroyed too. The struggle of Israel, even if the world doesn’t want to accept it, is the struggle of the world.”
Amen.
Posted in Anti-Semitism
Posted by: markcarlton | June 16, 2010
Is President Obama a Muslim?
Egyptian Foreign Minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, says he is: “The American President told me in confidence that he is a Muslim.”
According to American Thinker columnist, Pamela Geller, “That was the claim of Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit…According to journalist Avi Lipkin, Gheit appeared on Nile TV’s ‘Round Table Show’ in January, on which he said that ‘he had had a one-on-one meeting with Obama who swore to him that he was a Moslem, the son of a Moslem father and step-son of Moslem step-father, that his half-brothers in Kenya were Moslems, and that he was loyal to the Moslem agenda.’”
Geller reports that during a private meeting with Gheit, Obama said he would soon deal with Israel: “He asked that the Moslem world show patience. Obama promised that once he overcame some domestic American problems (Healthcare) [sic], that he would show the Moslem world what he would do with Israel.”
I don’t know if Gheit is telling the truth or not, but shouldn’t the mainstream media be reporting on this? It would certainly explain a lot.
Posted in Anti-Semitism, Politics and Current Events
