Posted on 06/21/2005 4:27:46 PM PDT by Buggman
When someone says to me, "think outside the box", what that usually means is that they are lacking any concrete scriptural support for their position and they want me to theorize.
When the church is raptured, and God deals with Israel according to promise, ...
Sorry, but this is precisely where you system breaks apart. It cannot be resolved into the teaching of the Bible.
The big problem is this unsupported notion that God begins dealing with Israel after the rapture of the Church. Apart from the fact that there is absolutely no Scripture to support that theory, it violates the entire message of the book of Hebrews and a number of other NT texts.
Lets go back to the beginning of your hypothesis.
Perhaps we are all looking at this wrong. Jesus is a priest after the order of Melchizedec, not of Levi.
Well, you can read the book of Hebrews just as well as I can. What does it say?
"But into the second part the high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance; the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing. It was symbolic for the present time in which both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make him who performed the service perfect in regard to the conscience-- concerned only with foods and drinks, various washings, and fleshly ordinances imposed until the time of reformation. But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation." (Heb. 9:7-11)
Note the words, the greater high priest and more perfect tabernacle. Why did we need a greater high priest?
"For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect." (Heb. 10:1)
"For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit." (Rom. 9:3,4)
The Mosaic law regarding the earthly tabernacle, earthly priesthood, and animal blood sacrifices, could never "make those who approach perfect." The Levitical system was imperfect in that it could not really deal with sin. It could only point us to the one who could deal with sin, that is, Jesus Christ the mediator of a new and better covenant. He stands to minister for us in a better tabernacles, as a better high priest, offering a perfect, once for all sacrifice.
The Levitical system was temporary. There is no getting around that from the NT. The older covenant was "decaying, and ready to pass away" even at the time Hebrews was written. There is no hint whatsoever from Jesus or any of the apostles that Levi would be restored. Why not? Because the greater than Levi had appeared to offer the perfect atonement for all who would trust in Him. There is no need to return to Levi. In fact those who do bring condemnation upon themselves.
who's gonna get 666 on a 666 thread?
I'll take it so you folks can be confirmed in your thinking that I am the antichrist.
Come on, we wouldn't be having this discussion if we weren't all part of the same family. Some of us may be like the eccentrics in the attic but what we are doing here beats mowing the lawn.
In the metaphor I've used before, a painting is not a masterpiece when the artist blends all the colors together into one on his palette. Our differences make for a beautiful work of art for the Lurkers (as long as we don't get irritable that is).
"Thus says the Lord: 'If My covenant is not with day and night, and if I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth, then I will cast away the descendants of Jacob and David My servant, so that I will not take any of his descendants to be rulers over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will cause their captives to return, and will have mercy on them.' " (vv. 25,26)
This was all fulfilled in Jesus Christ. He is the greater David. He is the son of David that God raised up to sit on His throne.
Now, was the throne on earth (like the tabernacle on earth) a pattern of the throne in heaven, or was it really intended to stand alone? Are we really supposed to take the fleshly view that God's ultimate purpose is to have Christ leave His heavenly throne and sit on a fleshly throne in Israel?
Not if you believe the NT, and you read the OT in light of the NT.
Speaking of these earthly types, the writer says, "He takes away the first that He may establish the second." (Heb. 10:9)
The types have been removed once for all that the true antitype, Jesus Christ, may show forth in all his glory.
If you decide to build a home, and someone brings you a model to represent how your home will look, it's folly to go and try to live in the model after the home is built. The only purpose for the model is to show how the real thing will look when it comes. The Levites, the sacrificial system, the tabernacle, were all models to point us to Christ. Once Christ appeared they served absolutely no useful purpose, period.
There are many passages in the OT that speak of "everlasting" this or that.
"he shall make atonement for the Holy Sanctuary, and he shall make atonement for the tabernacle of meeting and for the altar, and he shall make atonement for the priests and for all the people of the assembly. This shall be an everlasting statute for you, to make atonement for the children of Israel, for all their sins, once a year." And he did as the Lord commanded Moses."
But even while this speaks of an everlasting ordinance of the day of atonement, we know from Hebrews sand elsewhere that this was ll fulfilled in the sacrifice of Christ, once for all to take away the sins of His people. No one needs to annually have a pointer placed before them of how God will deal with sin, because Jesus Christ has come. Every Sabbath day we come together, on the first day of the week, to celebrate in what Christ has done. When we take the bread and the wine were are reminded in a more perfect way of the atonement Christ made for our sins.
You rely totally on the scripture concerning the sacrifice for sin to dismiss God's promises to Israel and to the Levites while ignoring all of the other worship sacrifices that were the duties of the Levites.
It's all tied together. The Levites, the tabernacle, the sacrifices where one big package. Jeremiah 33 speaks of it that way as does the rest of the Scriptures.
It is entirely arbitrary dividing of Scripture to try to separate Levites from the sacrifices. It cannot be done.
One thing that puzzles me with this futurist interpretation is exactly what will be the duties of the Levites in some future situation, and ho that all fits with what we know if Christ and His work. I sometimes get the impression that all these prophecy are read and interpreted as if Christ had never some, or as if He work on the cross with make no matter in the futurist scenario.
"And [the Levites] shall not come near Me to minister to Me as priest, nor come near any of My holy things, nor into the Most Holy Place; but they shall bear their shame and their abominations which they have committed." (Eze. 44:13)
What "tribulation period"? Are you asserting something, or can you demonstrate what you are saying?
He has not brought back scattered Israel from the nations with force and fury yet and He has not dealt with them "face-to-face" yet.
Where was Israel when Christ came to them and ministered "face to face"? Ezekiel was written before Christ came. No?
There will be no looking forward in the atoning sacrifice since it has been completed, but there will be a celebration of the sacrifice, just as we do in the church with communion.
Pure speculation on your part. The language does not permit you to add that sort of spin. The only reason you need to spin the words here is because you have taken other prophecies and missed their application and fulfillment in Christ and His church. In other words, you being selective in your literalism based on your preconception of how things ought to be in the future. But that is all built on the house of cards that all this is entirely in the future.
Every promise, whether blessing or judgment, made by God is irrevocable. It is true because He speaks it. Jeepers, He spoke creation into being.
If any promise could be undone, then why would Christ have to suffer? God could have simply forgiven Adam and restored him.
But the promises cannot be undone and instead, God pours mercy upon mercy on top of the promises. Therefore although man dies because of the law of sin and death, yet we who believe in Christ live as new creatures - not born of man, nor by our own will but by His Spirit. (John 1 and Romans 8)
Likewise every promise He made to Israel will be kept, indeed, is already kept in timelessness.
Who are we Christians, the ones who started working the fields in the middle of the day, to dispute the Master if He chooses to be equally generous to the ones who didn't begin their work until the very last hour?
The Jewish people are blind to the gift of Christ that we may receive it (Romans 11). But that blindness is not permanent, if it were then God's promises would mean nothing - to them and to us.
Do you believe there will be a time with God will be more "face to face" with Israel than when Jesus came to earth and ministered the gospel?
Jesus came and brought the message of the kingdom to Israel. Those who believed and followed Messiah were identified as the true children of Abraham. "Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. ... So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham."
Those who posit some future for national Israel make it appear as if nothing happened for the Jewish people when Jesus came to earth 2000 years ago. They seem to believe that the "real deal" is yet in the future. You can see how this attitude tends to minimize Jesus' death and resurrection, and the work He accomplished on behalf of His people.
"And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."
"From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.'"
For 2000 years Jews, along with gentiles, have recognized Jesus as the true Messiah of Israel. To demonstrate their realized faith in the promises of God through Abraham, they became baptized and members of Christ's body, the Church. There is no greater glory for any man, whether Jew or gentile, that to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved. This movement of the Holy Spirit will continue on until Christ returns to finalize all His work.
"Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet."
The section in question begins:
But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.'
So the context has to be the failed leadership of Israel that was leading the nation in apostasy against the Lord Jesus.
Later He's says to that generation of Jews:
"Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! See! Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!' " (Luke 13 has a similar but condensed version of this account.)
So, several questions need to be answered:
1) to whom is Jesus speaking? Directly? Indirectly?
2) is the a definite time indicator in the text that would require us to see this fulfilled at a single point in time?
3) what other texts help us to understand this text? "Then the multitudes who went before and those who followed cried out, saying: "Hosanna to the Son of David! 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!' Hosanna in the highest!" (Matt. 21:9)
It's also interesting that Jesus is quoting from a portion of Psalm 118, where also we read, "The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone." Jesus say the fulfillment of all these things in His coming. As Israel turned to Him, and recognized His messianic office, and became like those people shouting "Hosanna!" in Matt. 21, then the words of Jesus were fulfilled.
The herald has appeared (Mal. 3:1; Matt. 11:10). The Priest-King has entered His temples to the shouts of the people. Believing Israel has followed her King. The apostates have been cast into outer darkness, awaiting the final judgment.
"Hear another parable: There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a winepress in it and built a tower. And he leased it to vinedressers and went into a far country. ... But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said among themselves, 'This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance.' ... 'Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.'"
In order to shout "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!" the people needed to have their spiritual eyes opened. Then they could look on Him.
Do you agree that Jesus is speaking to Israel, not the church? Is He not saying that Israel, as a people, will see Him when they acknowledge Him for who He is?
"Israel as a people" as opposed to Israel as what? Believing Israel is part of the Church. Just ask Peter and Paul, the rest of the Twelve, and the 3000 baptized on Pentecost. All who were "saved from this perverse generation" (Acts 2:40). Those 3000 on Pentecost were in fulfillment of Zech. 12:10, "And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced." And Isaiah 44:3, "For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, And floods on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, And My blessing on your offspring;"
I won't get sucked into making a distinction that cannot be supported from the Bible.
Come on, look at the context of the passage and the subsequent history. Use your grammatical-historical tools and see that Jesus is not talking about the church nor is he looking at Pentecost. He says Israel will be desolate until they recognize who he is. You can't say that the church is desolate, especially at Pentecost, it is the people of Israel, not individuals, the nation as a whole who will be desolate and it still is and will be until it recognizes Jesus for who he is. He is not talking about scribes and Pharisees here for he has already mentioned them by name many times in the passage. He is speaking to the same people who just the day or days before were unknowingly blessing him, he now weeps over because he knows what is in store for them.
Where are we going?
Use your grammatical-historical tools and see that Jesus is not talking about the church nor is he looking at Pentecost.
Argument by assertion.
He says Israel will be desolate until they recognize who he is.
Is that really what it says?
"See! Your house is left to you desolate; and assuredly, I say to you, you shall not see Me until the time comes when you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!' " (Luke 13:35)
Let's use the proper rules of interpretation.
It says "your house is left to you desolate." Period. It says nothing about undoing any desolation. It says nothing about what will happen after the time of desolation, if there is any human time period. Does it?
Who is "your" in "your house" and what is it referring to? Verse 31 tells us that Jesus was speaking to the Pharisees. Same thing in the context of Matthew 23. "On that very day some Pharisees came, saying to Him, ..."
So the context says that Jesus was conversing with the Pharisees.
Jesus metaphorically uses the imagery of old Jerusalem, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!" Was it literally Jerusalem that stoned the prophets? Or was it unbelieving Israel as represented by her leadership, the scribes and Pharisees?
What do we know about old Jerusalem? "this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children--" Old Jerusalem is a picture of bondage. The one who kills the prophets.
Christ desires for His people to be identified with the new Jerusalem, which will one day come down from heaven in all her glory. There is no glory in earthly Jerusalem. It represents barrenness and futility.
But we, believing Jews and gentiles, the true sons of Abraham, have a real hope, "But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels,"
The bottom line is that when you read Luke 13 or Matthew 23 in context, it just does not say what you want it to say. The kingdom was "taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it."
he now weeps over because he knows what is in store for them.
"Now as He drew near, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, "If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close you in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation." (Luke 19)
AD70 was a brutal time for the apostate nation of Israel. God had withdraw His favor from thosde people because they killed the son of the landowner. The only consolation for Israel was that some of her childern would be blessed by being including in the righteous gathering of God's elect people, the Church. That is when the remnant would say, "Blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord."
"Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, The remnant will be saved."
Sorry about that, guys. What was originally just going to be an overnight at a friend's house to watch a few movies and then a quiet weekend at home turned into two overnights, two parties, helping my minister move stuff from one storage bin to another due to a leak in the first, and dinner with my parents for the 4th. My appreciation to everyone who has carried on the discussion in my absence.
In the interest of answering the posts made to me (directly or indirectly), I'm going to try to pull answers to posts #653, 654, 657, 660-663, and 669-676 together in one post. I'm quite sure that I won't address every point in as much detail as I would like, and it's possible that I'll accidentally miss some argument that the person who originally made it considers to be crucial. If so, I apologize in advance, and ask that you just restate the argument or point me back to it.
So, with no further ado:
Gram, post #653: As it was not pinged to me, and I don't scour the thread searching for things to read, I did not see it.
My apologies, you are correct that I forgot to ping you.
Jeremiah 33:20-21 clarifies that God's promise is conditional; "If you can break My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night so that day and night cease to come at their regular time . . . He then says that despite this condition--broken again and again by the Israelites . . ."
Right there you lost the argument. What is God's covenant with the day and the night? "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease" (Gen. 8:22). This was a universal, pre-Abrahamic covenant that God made which is linked to His promise never again to destroy the world by a flood.
Israel has no power to break God's covenant with the day and the night. It could never do so. Ergo, neither could it break God's promise that the Messiah would rule on David's throne forever, or that there would be Levi'im cohenim, Levite priests, to offer sacrifices. The only way that you can say that there will be no more Levites is to also say that the linked promise of the Messiah is also void.
Clarke's commentary is distinctly unconvincing on this point:
"The two families which God chose for the priesthood . . . are both extinct. Nor has the office of high priest, or priest of any kind offering sacrifice, been exercised among the Jews for nearly eighteen hundred years.
It seems to miss Clarke's attention, as well as your own, that the Davidic kings had ceased to be for over six hundred years before the birth of the Messiah. If God could restore the Kingship in the Messiah, He can and will also restore the Levitical priesthood to keep His promise to Aaron that the priesthood was his and his descendants:
And you shall put the holy garments on Aaron, and anoint him and sanctify him, so that he may minister to Me in the priest's office. And you shall bring his sons and clothe them with tunics. And you shall anoint them, even as you anointed their father, so that they may minister to Me in the priest's office. For their anointing shall surely be an everlasting priesthood for their generations. --Ex. 40:13-15Messiah Yeshua may certainly transform the Levite priesthood (and indeed He has, in that their sacrifices are no longer a covering for sin) and transfer the office of High Priest to Himself by His Sacrifice, but He could not utterly do away with it nor remove it from the family of Aaron without violating ADONAI's contract with them.
Consider this too: We are a holy priesthood. So was all Israel called to be "a kingdom of priests" (Ex. 19:6)--and yet, not all of Israel were called to be Levite priests serving in God's Tabernacle. Thus we see that even under the Mosaic covenant, there were different degrees of priesthood, each with their own purposes.
Actually, it does. Again, they are part of that "system which is ready to pass away" which Hebrews describes.
According to your reading, God lied to Aaron and He lied to Jeremiah--and you have yet to even attempt to reconcile the earlier promises with the elucidation of Hebrews. I don't think God lies.
I accept that there was a change--that is, a transformation or a transference, not a complete replacement--in the priesthood, as well as a change in the Torah. That's clearly Biblical, and even the rabbis expect as much of the Messiah. But a change does not mean a doing away with. Say that you've contracted to do a job, and at some point along the way, your boss changes your job responsibilities, or even puts another person over you. Clearly your job has changed and there has been a transference in your boss, but you would still have your job.
You assume something not in evidence. Where does God say to any Christian, "You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek"?
Where does He call us Levites? He doesn't. That's an assumption on your part that you cannot back up. Since He nowhere calls Christians "Levites," and the Levitical priesthood was very clearly given to the descendants of Aaron forever, then our priesthood must be of another order than that of the Levites. Since our Cohen HaGadol, our High Priest, is of the order of Melchizedek, I infer that the priesthood of those adopted as His children must be the same, just as the order of Aaron's sons was the order of which Aaron was the head.
We cannot infer from our adoption that we hold the same rank as Christ.
I never said we could. We are but the cohenim, but He alone is the Cohen HaGadol.
When God calls Christians "a royal priesthood" (1 Peter 2:9) he is quoting the Old Testament (Exodus 19:6) and applying it to Christians in general rather than Jews strictly.
Exactly. But as I've already pointed out, all Israel was called to be a kingdom of priests, but not all Israel were called out to be the Levite priests who served in God's Tabernacle. Neither are we Christians Levites, though we are a kingdom of priests, grafted into Israel.
n a spiritual sense, there is what Luther called "the priesthood of all believers," offering up spiritual sacrifices as 1 Peter 2:5 points out.
One of the great truths that Luther recovered.
But this does not mean that the title of priest in the order of Melchizedek is inherited.
Okay, if you see it so, fine. But you've still yet to show that we replace the order of Levi. What order, then, should we call ourselves? I'm fine with the Order of Yeshua, if that's all that's bugging you.
But again, the fact that all believers are called out as a kingdom of priests no more makes us a replacement for the Levitical priesthood than all of Israel being called out as such made them so.
Further, the reason that there were many Levite priests was because "they are prevented by death from remaining in office. 24 But because He remains forever, He holds His priesthood permanently."
According to that argument, neither are we priests, since Yeshua "holds the priesthood permanently." Yet this would violate 1 Peter, so we recognize that this is not what the passage is saying. Here, though "priest" is used, the High Priesthood is clearly the focus of the author's argument (v. 26).
So you think that the Levitical priesthood has a purpose beyond the Old Testament?
Absolutely. Back to Jer. 33, my friend--if the Levite priesthood is done away with, then Yeshua's kingship is in just as much trouble, as is the continued rotation of the earth.
The purpose of the Levite priesthood was indeed to act as intercessors before God for the people, and this purpose has now been given over to Yeshua. However, their sacrifices did not only atone for sin (which they no longer do, agreed), but served as a reminder of sin (Heb. 10:3), ceremonially purified the flesh (but not the concience, Heb. 9:13-14), and served as a prophetic type, a memorial-in-advance of the Messiah's ultimate and truly atoning sacrifice on the Cross.
Now we see a change, a transformation, in the priesthood: The High Priest is no longer a descendant of Aaron, but is the Messiah Himself. Sacrifices no longer atone for sins, for the perfect Sacrifice has atoned for all sins for all time. However, sacrifices as a memorial of that act and as a visual reminder of the price of sins would still have their place, and recognizing this means that one no longer has to simply ignore Jer. 33 (which I'm still waiting on a decent counter-exegesis for) or the latter chapters of Ezekiel or the Torah's promise that the Levitical priesthood belongs to the sons of Aaron forever.
And I'm sorry, but when God says "forever" and "to all their generations" and until "there should not be day and night in their season," I can't read that and interpolate "until the Messiah comes" when God has not said so. Forever means forever--and if it doesn't, those of us expecting "eternal life" are in for a rude surprise.
1) Our sacrifices are not superior. Jesus Christ's sacrifice is superior. Our sacrifices are sacrifices of praise; Jesus Christ's sacrifice was the sacrifice of His own life, once in atonement for all sin.
Yeshua's sacrifice is certainly superior to ours, but a spritual sacrifice of praise and obedience is also superior to the sacrifice of bulls and goats after an act of disobedience, wouldn't you agree?
2) You seem to think that when the author of Hebrews said that the Old Testament sacrifices "served as a reminder of sins," that this was a good thing.
Rather, a necessary thing. Frankly, as I look through what passes for Christendom and see how lightly the vast majority regard their sins or the Lord's sacrifice for them, I find myself more and more thinking that seeing the bloody mess of a true sacrifice might wake a few up.
How much more after the Messiah returns to sit on David's throne and the earth is restored to near-Edenic conditions, and the generation that saw God's wrath and what preceded it passes away, will people need a reminder of the true cost of sin?
3)The Levitical sacrifices never served as reminders to the world of sin "and its true cost," even less so now after the Levitical system has been extinct for almost 2000 years and the standards by which men know they have sinned is because their conscience speaks out against them.
You can go argue with whoever penned Hebrews 10:3 over that. If you won't believe the plain word of Scripture about one of the purposes of animal sacrifice (just as you don't believe the Scripture when it speaks of the eternality of the Levitical priesthood), then I'm not going to waste my time showing you that Scripture is true.
Isaiah 64:17-20 does not exist.
Sorry, typo. It's Isa. 65:17-20.
Further, assuming a premillenial interpretation of the Millenium, "reminders of sins" will be useless after the Second Coming.
Not at all. One thing almost every form of Premillennialism agrees on is that there will be a mortal remnant after the Day of the Lord that were not part of the Bride of the Messiah. Many of them (such as the 144,000) will be Jews, but as Isa. 66 points out (and this is why I cited it), not all will be--and the Gentiles "will bring all your brothers (the Jewish people) for an offering to ADONAI out of all nations" (v. 20).
The fact that Steele (at least as you've quoted him) doesn't seem to even be aware of this major point of premillennial eschatology renders him rather useless as a rebutting source.
Once again I point out that Jer. 33:17-20's promise of an eternal line of Levites is conditional . . .
On the continuation of day and night. And the continuation of the Messiah. Which makes it effectlvely unconditional. You've not even stepped into the vague realm of showing otherwise.
You assume a third physical temple because you think that when Ezekiel describes a temple in physically impossible terms, and in a vision to boot, it must mean that this third temple must be physical.
There's nothing the least bit "physically impossible" about Ezekiel's temple. It would require some changes in geography (or, as some would read it, that the Temple would be placed to the west of Jerusalem--that's not my take, however), but any reading of the Day of the Lord prophecies that doesn't simply allegorize them away tells us that there will be vast geological upheaval.
Frankly, I'm always amused when professing Christians trot out the "that's impossible" argument against theologies they don't like. Is there anything that is impossible for our God?
First off, employing a different hermeneutical approach hardly means that one is taking only selected portions of Scripture seriously.
No, but twisting a passage that links the eternality of the Messiah's Kingship to the eternality of the Levite priesthood into a conditional promise so as to protect the "traditions of men" does. You simply ignore or call "spiritual" (which the way you use it, may as well mean "fictional") whatever in the Tanakh you don't like. That's why I accuse you of being unserious in your study of the whole of the Scriptures.
When you are ready to deal with the Scriptures as they are instead of as your traditions say they should be, and when you are ready to stop simply dismissing 3/4ths of the Scriptures as "old" and "passed away," then you'll be a serious student. Until then, you are a serious student of Protestant theology of the New Testament, but not of the Bible itself as a whole.
Second, only by inserting a very strong pro-Torah bias . . .
I stand in good company, then:
Do not think that I have come to destroy the Torah or the Prophets. I have not come to destroy but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, Till the heaven and the earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle shall in any way pass from the Torah until all is fulfilled. Therefore whoever shall break one of these commandments, the least, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of Heaven. But whoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of Heaven. --Mt. 5:17-19Read that again. Yeshua HaMashiach Himself said that heaven and earth would pass away before the least letter of the Torah. He further said that those who taught others not to keep the least of its commandments would be the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. He most certainly had a "very strong pro-Torah bias," to use your phrase.
Therefore, even if Sha'ul or the nameless author of Hebrews said that the Torah is dead or done away with, Yeshua said it wasn't, so guess who wins? Hmm . . . the Messiah, the very Word of God, or a rabbi and an annonymous source . . . hard choice there.
Unlike some who have rejected Sha'ul or some of the other NT writings for this reason, I do believe that Sha'ul's writings should be regarded as sacred Scripture. However, I do not believe that Sha'ul rejected the Torah, despite the misinterpretations that would say otherwise. From his own pen:
Do we then make the Torah void through faith? Let it not be! But we establish (or keep) the Torah. . . So indeed the Torah is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good. --Rom. 3:31 and 7:12Sha'ul himself kept the Torah and even participated in Temple sacrificial worship some three decades after the Cross (Ac. 21:20-26). Given that both Yeshua and Sha'ul--and indeed, Ya'akov (James) and Kefa (Peter) and all the other first-generation of Yeshua's disciples--revered and kept the Torah and proclaimed it in the present tense to be in effect and holy, I am not ashamed to say that I do have a very strong pro-Torah bias!
Call me ambitious--I don't want to be the least in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Now, against such a host of men zealous for God's Torah, even if the annonymous author of Hebrews said that the Torah were done away with, he or she would be wrong and the book heresy rather than Scripture. But I don't believe that's the case. Hebrews describes the transformation of God's priesthood and its purposes in light of the revelation of the Messiah and the new understanding of Torah that He gave us--but it by no means says that the Torah is "old," nor does it lump together all of God's promises into the Tanakh as the "Old" Testament and simply dismiss them the way you have done.
Sha'ul himself pointed out that no prior covenant, or promise, from God could be aborogated by a later covenant (Gal. 3:17). Nor has God ever done so--what He has done is add His newer covenants to His old to provide for a greater blessing.
For example, does the covenant that God made with Abraham annul His promise to Noah never again to destroy the world by flood? Did the giving of the legal part of the Torah annul His unconditional promise to Abraham? Did His covenant with David to continue his line forever (in the Messiah) annul the blessings and the curses of the Torah?
No, no, and no.
Did the New (or Renewed) Covenant made through Yeshua's blood annul any of the promises that went before it?
No. Not even the promise that the Levites would have their position forever.
Your problem is that you are lumping all of God's pre-Messianic covenants into one category--the "Old" Covenant, which you claim has passed away--and are not doing careful exegesis of the many covenants that God made with His people. Of them all, there was only one that was conditional, and that is the covenant that Israel made with God through Moses, "Everything that ADONAI has spoken, we will do and obey" (Ex. 24:7), "the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day I took hold of their hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt" (Heb. 8:9, quoting Jer. 31:32).
That is the only covenant that Israel broke, to keep the Torah, because that is the only one they could break--everything else was solely on God. Therefore, God says, "I will cut a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah . . . I will put My Torah in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people" (Jer. 33:31, 33).
To write the Torah on His people's hearts does not make it any less the Torah. To write the Torah on His people's hearts does not aborogate the least of the Torah's commands or promises, save one: The Torah promises God's curse on those who do not keep every command, but "the Messiah redeemed us from the curse of the Torah, being made a curse for us (for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone having been hanged on a tree'); so that the blessing of Abraham might be to the nations in Yeshua Messiah, and that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3:13-14).
The Torah has not been done away with--it has been brought to its fulness by the saving grace of God in Yeshua HaMashiach. It has even been transformed in certain particulars. But it could not be transformed in a way that violates any of God's earlier promises, unless God is a liar.
I don't think so.
Alamo-Girl, post #654: I assert that this is not an “either/or”. We must accept that both statements are true as sworn by God in the full reading of Jeremiah 33 and as Christ said in the Sermon on the Mount:
Amen. I love how you can always sum up what I say in ten pages in a single sentence.
topcat54, post #660: God's plan, according to the prophets and the writer of Hebrews, was always to institute a greater covenant by the work of Messiah. The Levites, the physical tabernacle, the animal blood sacrifices were temporary.
The first part is correct, the second part is not. Certainly, God always intended to institute a greater priesthood than Aaron's--but nevertheless, He assured Aaron that the Levitical priesthood was his and his children's forever.
Now, obviously some need to twist the word of the prophecy to say that "never lack" doesn't really mean never. The need to account for the time in which we live. There are no Levites. There are no sacrifices and burnt offerings. So never has to be interpreted to mean.
No man sat on David's throne for six hundred years before Yeshua was born. Was God's promise made void by that fact, or did He preserve the line and provide the Eternal King at the time of His own choosing? And if the latter, why could He not preserve the line of Aaron to be restored to their service at the time of HIs choosing as well?
Nowhere in Hebrews or the rest of the NT is there even the slightest hint of a future, reconstituted earthly priesthood and animal sacrifices.
Mt. 24:15, 2 Th. 2:4, Rev. 11:1-4 all refer to the Temple, and the allusion in the Olivet Discourse to the Abomination of Desolation makes it clear that the sacrifices must be interrupted just as they were in the time of the Maccabees. Revelation 7 even makes it clear that God knows who belongs to what tribe, including the tribe of Levi.
But again, even if it were true that there is no NT teaching that the Temple would be restored, that wouldn't matter. More than 3/4ths of Scripture are contained in the Tanakh, not the NT, which was endorsed by Messiah Yeshua and all of His disciples and apostles. Ergo, an argument from silence in the NT doesn't prove anything, except that you have a bias against the Hebrew Scriptures.
blue-duncan, post #661: Now Jesus, as priest after the order of Melchizedec, has not done away with the covenant with Levi. When the church is raptured, and God deals with Israel according to promise, His witnesses will be Levites, pastors according to the religious sensitivities of the Jews, who will fill the same offices that Pastors did for the church, offering the sacrifices of praise, peace and thanksgiving and the prayers of the congregants which rises like the incense offering.
I'd leave the Rapture aside for the moment, since that's another whole ball of wax, but I'd like to quote my own book on this issue for a moment:
But to what purpose will the resumed sacrifices of an unsaved Israel just before the Second Coming serve? They will serve to once again remind Israel of the terrible price of sin and thus prepare the hearts of that nation to receive the Savior Messiah, the Lamb of God, as their King. Remember that for two millennia, the Jews have been, as Hosea predicted, “without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, without ephod or teraphim” (3:4). Talmudic Judaism has become a religion of works, of trying to make one’s good deeds outweigh the bad. The return of animal sacrifice will bring many to realize again the human need for salvation from their sins, to remember that all sin must be forgiven by the shedding of blood (Lev. 17:11), and therefore preparing the way for Yeshua in the hearts of many.topcat54, post #662: When someone says to me, "think outside the box", what that usually means is that they are lacking any concrete scriptural support for their position and they want me to theorize.
More likely they're trying to get you to look at what Scripture actually says, and not just what you've been told it says, as we are here.
The big problem is this unsupported notion that God begins dealing with Israel after the rapture of the Church. Apart from the fact that there is absolutely no Scripture to support that theory, it violates the entire message of the book of Hebrews and a number of other NT texts.
So you say with just as little support.
The Levitical system was temporary.
Jeremiah says otherwise, and all Hebrews says is that the priesthood has been changed, not that it has been done away with (see the top of this post). You're arguing without Scriptural support here.
blue-duncan, post 663: Hebrews speaks to only one aspect of the sacrificial worship required by the law, that was the annual and daily sin offerings that could not make the worshiper perfect and that was the prerogative of the high priest.
Exactly, though the daily sacrifice was not a sin-offering, but a burnt-offering, which represented complete dedication, not the removal of sins. Even the "sin-offering" might still be offered (and the prophets say will be), but it's character would have to be as transformed as the priesthood--no longer would it be considered to atone for sins, but simply to be a worshipful representation of the Messiah's ultimate sacrifice, and a reminder of sins.
(Indicentally, note that Heb. 10 says that the sacrifices are a "reminder of sins," present tense, in his or her own time, after the Messiah's sacrifice. Ergo, even after the Cross, I would argue that a sin-offering as a reminder of sins would still be acceptable by the writings of both the Tanakh and the NT).
You will permit gaps in time to cover the absence of David's throne but not the Levitical office and yet they are both contained in the same promise.
You noticed that too, huh?
topcat, post #669: This was all fulfilled in Jesus Christ. He is the greater David. He is the son of David that God raised up to sit on His throne.
Oh, com'on! You're not even trying to reconcile the two. Simply saying, "This was all fulfilled in Jesus Christ" isn't exegesis, it's isogesis at best, and simply ignoring the problem and hoping that it'll go away at the worst.
Now, was the throne on earth (like the tabernacle on earth) a pattern of the throne in heaven, or was it really intended to stand alone? Are we really supposed to take the fleshly view that God's ultimate purpose is to have Christ leave His heavenly throne and sit on a fleshly throne in Israel?
You've just got to love Augustinian neo-gnostic thought in the Church.
The answer is that the Messiah's throne on earth will be both a physical reality and a type of God's throne in heaven. "Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven."
If you disagree, feel free to show anywhere in the NT where it says specifically that the Messiah will not reign on the earth from Jerusalem. Bear in mind that I will happily correct you if you quote out of context--say, if you quote Mt. 23 and leave off the end: "You will not see Me again until you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of ADONAI."
Speaking of these earthly types, the writer says, "He takes away the first that He may establish the second." (Heb. 10:9)
If that meant what you're claiming it does, you would have a contradiction in Scripture--not just Buggman's interpretation of Scripture (as much as you'd love to claim that), but what it actually says in plain text. Me, I don't believe in contradictions in Scripture.
The reconcilliation is that God took away sacrifices as necessary for atonement for sins (see vv. 16-18) because of the perfect Sacrifice that paid for them all (v. 14), not that He took away all types.
In other words, you went well beyond the rules of gramatical-historical interpretation to justify your predetermined belief.
f you decide to build a home, and someone brings you a model to represent how your home will look, it's folly to go and try to live in the model after the home is built.
Granted, and that's a good illustration. However, you might still show the model of your house to those who have not yet seen it, since the model shows more than pages of description. "A picture is worth a thousand words."
The Levitical priesthood and all of the types of the Torah are a picture, a model. Even today, we can learn much about God's work in us by studying Leviticus--I'm planning to write a book on the subject, in fact--for we yet "see as through a glass darkly" not yet "face-to-face" (1 Cor. 13:12).
But even while this speaks of an everlasting ordinance of the day of atonement, we know from Hebrews sand elsewhere that this was ll fulfilled in the sacrifice of Christ, once for all to take away the sins of His people.
You realize that you're using your premise to prove your premise here. And again, having knowledge of the reality--and that but through a glass darkly--does not remove the command to keep the type. It makes the type all the more poignant and powerful, as any Christian who has celebrated a proper Seder can tell you. Why else do you think the first-century Messianics continued to worship in the Temple? Is your vision so much clearer than Ya'akov, Kefa, Yochanan, and Sha'ul, who actually saw the Lord face-to-face?
It is entirely arbitrary dividing of Scripture to try to separate Levites from the sacrifices. It cannot be done.
Nor do Jeremiah, Ezekiel, or Moses do so. Neither does Hebrews--again, all Hebrews does is explain the Temple service in light of the Messiah and describe His superior priesthood.
One thing that puzzles me with this futurist interpretation is exactly what will be the duties of the Levites in some future situation, and ho that all fits with what we know if Christ and His work.
I already went into that in a previous post, so if you're confused, go read that, read Ezekiel 40-48, and then we'll take that part of the conversation up again. But as I said in post #634,
Thus, in the Millennium, when there will be a mortal remnant (Isa. 64:17-20 [sic, should be Isa. 65:17-20] and 66:18-21) in addition to those who rose with Yeshua and have already been glorified in Him, there will still be a need for that reminder of sins--especially in a society and a world where the effect of sin won't be as obvious to those who did not grow up in this present age.I sometimes get the impression that all these prophecy are read and interpreted as if Christ had never some, or as if He work on the cross with make no matter in the futurist scenario.In the eternal age, I have no doubt that the role of the two priesthoods will again transform, but we simply don't have enough information to know for certain just how they will. God doesn't tell us much at all about that time. But what I do know is that the two priesthoods will continue. Why? Because the Messiah is a priest forever (Ps. 110:4), just as the Levitical line will have priests foever. If the end of sins meant the end of priests, of intercessors, then He would only be a preist for a short age, not forever. I don't have to have all the answers about what their role will be to trust Scripture when it says they will still have a role.
Obviously you need to read more on the futurist perspective if your understanding of our views is that poor.
From post #671: Where was Israel when Christ came to them and ministered "face to face"? Ezekiel was written before Christ came. No?
Yes, but unless you've completely left the bounds of orthodox Christianity, you still believe that there will be Two Comings, no?
The language does not permit you to add that sort of spin.
No, but the whole of Scripture does permit it. As Alamo-Girl pointed out, you're treating this as an either/or, we're dealing with it as a both/and. The Scriptures say plainly that the Messiah both provided the final atonement for all sins and that there will be continuing sacrifices in the Temple that Ezekiel describes. Therefore, instead of simply ignoring one of these two truths, we reconcile them by supposing that the sacrifices are memorials only, "a reminder of sins," as Hebrews says.
From post #674: Do you believe there will be a time with God will be more "face to face" with Israel than when Jesus came to earth and ministered the gospel?
Yes. Even you believe that God will be "face to face" with Israel and the rest of the world at the sheep and goat judgment--this time not veiled in the form of a servant, but as Yochanan saw Him on Patmos, the glorified King.
Jesus came and brought the message of the kingdom to Israel. Those who believed and followed Messiah were identified as the true children of Abraham. "Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. ... So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham."
And, if you'll stop reading selectively, you'll see that Sha'ul goes on to say that the natural branches that were broken off for disbelief will be restored, that the blindness of Israel will be removed "when the fulness of the Gentiles is come in," and that "all Israel will be saved, as it is written."
It is we who are saved by being grafted (adopted) into Israel, not Israel who will be saved by being grafted into us.
You can see how this attitude tends to minimize Jesus' death and resurrection, and the work He accomplished on behalf of His people.
Oh, baloney. Nothing we say minimizes Yeshua's sacrifice in the least--but we affirm what the Apostles affirmed, that He will return in power to judge the earth and keep God's covenants (all of them) with Israel by bringing the whole nation into the New Covenant.
In that sense, yes, the "real deal" is yet future:
Beloved, now we are children of God, but it has not yet been revealed what we shall be. But we know that when He shall be revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope on him purifies himself, even as that One is pure. --1 Jn. 3:2-3We seem to be in some pretty good company.For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that having denied ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live discreetly, righteously and godly, in this present world, looking for the blessed hope, and the glorious appearance of our great God and Savior Yeshua the Messiah, who gave Himself for us that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify to Himself a special people, zealous of good works. --Tit. 2:11-13
I say then, Did they not stumble that they fall? Let it not be! But by their slipping away came salvation to the nations, to provoke them to jealousy. But if their slipping away is the riches of the world, and their default is the riches of the nations, how much more their fullness? For I speak to you, the nations; since I am the apostle of the nations, I glorify my ministry; if by any means I may provoke those who are my flesh to jealousy, and might save some of them. For if their casting away is the reconciling of the world, what is the reception except life from the dead? --Rom. 11:11-15
For 2000 years Jews, along with gentiles, have recognized Jesus as the true Messiah of Israel.
Agreed. That would be the remnant Sha'ul speaks of in Romans 10. However, the remnant is not the whole of the promise, as Sha'ul himself explains in great detail in chapter 11 (see the above quote). God's promises were to the nation of Israel as a whole, not to just a remnant.
Post #676 (and I really hope that the conversation hasn't progressed by twenty posts while I've been writing this):
There's too much for me to want to quote point-for-point. Most of your questions/arguments have been long since answered anyway. I again refer you to Romans 11: Yes, the bulk of Israel was blinded and broken off for their failure to follow the Messiah when He came the first time; however, that does not annul the promises of God, and the day will come when the broken branches will be restored, and "all Israel (not just the remnant which was already in existence) will be saved."
You are again guilty of selective reading.
Whew. I'd come up with a final summary of the debate, but we've been all over the map and I'm frankly ready to just post this and be done with it. All I can say now is that it's a pity that in order to justify the traditions of men, you are willing to just toss away 3/4ths of Scripture as "old." When you learn to treat the Tanakh with the same reverence and seriousness that you do the NT, as Yeshua and His disciples did, your understanding of Scripture will greatly benefit.
Rev 19:10 And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.
I have noticed that in every passage of scripture, there is something concerning Christ. In all of the emblems, types, shadows, parables etc in scripture, you will find Christ somewhere. Of course this would make the entire Old Testament, to be prophecy and most of the New Testament.
As I said before, the metaphors are not generally explained in scripture. I will qualify and say they are explained, but only in part, perhaps even far more than we have understood, but scripture points us in the right direction, and it is only when we add the guidance of nature and the spirit, that we can search the deep meanings. It is good to remember that nature was given first, and God adds more light, as we are able to receive it.
It is my belief that scripture contains more treasure, undiscovered, than all that has been found. To use a metaphor, there is more gold in the world, not mined, than mined. I may not be able to prove this, but if true, how can we know if 90% of the metaphors are explained in scriptures?
Sorry to be off topic here. Just my thoughts.
Seven
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