Quick! What’s your end times view? Part I

Eschatology.  Last Days.  End times.  The subject is awfully confusing.  Orthodox Christians agree on one certainty: Jesus Christ is coming again!  The angels told the Apostles as Christ ascended into heaven,  “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.” (Acts 1:11)

No topic spurs such passionate and interesting discussion as the end times.  In theology the term for the end time is “eschatology”, the study of last things.  Most Christian bookstores have an end times or prophecy section.  A few years ago a best selling book series was published on this very topic, along with a movie.  Some people are looking forward to a rapture of the church, a seven year tribulation that God will use to pour out His wrath and judgment on sinful man, and a thousand year millennial reign by Christ Himself.  Others believe that the only thing left on the prophetic clock is the return of Christ followed by the eternal state.  Still others believe that all prophecy has been fulfilled, including the Lord’s return.  Who is right, and how can we make sense of eschatology?

The first thing we need to understand is the study of eschatology is secondary issue.  By that I mean that it does not effect the doctrine of salvation.  Good Christian people, including the church fathers and modern theologians, have differing views of when the Lord will return.  The important thing is that they believe the Lord will return!

There are four basic eschatological views.  They are:

1. Preterism
2. Historicism
3. Idealism
4. Futurism

Over the next few days will discuss each major view and how it fits into accepted Christian teaching.  We’ll start today with Preterism.

Preterism

Full Preterism teaches that all prophecy has been fulfilled, including the prophetic parts of Revelation.  The final prophecy to be fulfilled was the destruction of the Jerusalem temple in A.D. 70 by the Romans.  Full preterism denies a visible and bodily return of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Because of this denial the majority of the Christian church considers Full Preterism to be a dangerous and heretical belief.  It is the only one of the four major views that is acknowledged by almost all Christian theologians to be in error.  Paul’s first epistle to the Thessalonians clearly articulates the Christian hope of the return of Christ.

1 Thessalonians 4:15-17 15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, and remain until the coming of the Lord, shall not precede those who have fallen asleep.  16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first.  17 Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord.

There is a variant of Preterism that views much of prophecy as having already taken place, but not all.  This variant is called Partial Preterism.

Partial Preterism

Partial Preterism teaches that prophecies such as the destruction of the Jerusalem, the tribulation and the “coming of the Lord” occured no later than A.D. 70.  The “coming of the Lord” was a return of Christ in the clouds to pronounce judgment on the corrupt and obsolete Jewish religious system.  While Partial Preterists hold to the “coming of the Lord” in A.D. 70, they also believe in a visible return of the Lord at the end of this present age.  Partial Preterism was held by many of the early church fathers and is still popular with many Orthodox Christians in various denominations.  Because Partial Preterism believes in a visible return of the Lord Jesus Christ, it is considered to be an orthodox view.

Tomorrow, Historicism.