Friday 16 July 2010

Orthodox Eschatology

History's worst wars, pestilences, earthquakes, famines and apostasy all belong in former generations.

As for the rapid increase in technology - it occurred last century, not this century.

Plus any increase in technology can only be compared with the past, not with the future. Who can say whether a future generation won't see an even more rapid leap in technology such that the leap experienced last century will seem insignificant in comparison? A future generation may look back with amusement at how impressed our generation felt with its own technological advances - just like we look back with amusement at how impressed people felt when the first penny farthing was cycled through the streets of Paris!

Besides, Daniel 12:7 was not a prophecy about 'technology' and air travel - it was a prophecy about the knowledge of God and knowledge of the sealed prophecy increasing and many responding to that prophecy with appropriate action. That's how most standard Bible commentators throughout church history have understood that verse.

And as for Jesus coming back within the generation that saw the State of Israel rebirthed - it's already a generation too late for that - Israel was rebirthed last generation, not this generation. Unless you keep stretching the definition of 'generation'.

Besides, Jesus didn't say that the generation that saw the rebirth of Israel would see the fulfillment of all things - He meant that the destruction of the Temple would happen within the generation that saw the signs of which He had spoken. And all of those signs came to pass and the Temple was destroyed within that generation exactly as Jesus had foretold. The disciples hadn't asked only about His coming, but they'd asked also about signs when the Temple would be destroyed. Jesus answered that question - but of the timing of His coming He said no-one knows.

It has been the "last days" ever since the Day of Pentecost; it was already the "last hour" when John wrote in the first century. Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. Therefore watch!

This is not 'mockery' - it is a return to the type of good exegesis that long existed before the emergence of end-times hysteria and false prediction in 19th-century America.

Jesus is coming!

No comments:

Post a Comment