Posted on 04/22/2008 6:15:22 AM PDT by xzins
However, this particular issue of eschatology always results in some losing patience.
Nonetheless, the early church was premillennial. It’s a good point to remember. That is good reason to keep it under consideration among the various perspectives one continues to look at.
This is Sign Language for “I love you.”
I will stand with you ZC.
In my studies, I have found that the first thing to throw away is the theory of replacementism, that the Church has replaced Israel. In order to remove Israel from the Prophecy the 'symbolic', 'spiritual' Israel had to be constructed. But the Prophecy is clear. Israel, in her two Great Houses, Judah and Ephraim, remains the instrument of Jehovah's work on this earth.
Without the construct of replacementism, the 'literal vs. spiritual' argument largely disappears, and the words of the OT and NT can be reconciled. That reconciliation does not allow for anything but a literal reign of Christ from the literal throne of David, in the literal Jerusalem, on the literal planet of Earth.
Thank you so much for the ping, dear brother in Christ!
lol
LOLOL!
I guess this means that Amillenialism is Origenal Sin :)
LOL!
My pastor is a firm panmillennialist.
He says it will all pan out in the end.
Is there any difference between the Am Sign Language “I LOVE YOU” and the satanic symbol? I don’t recall. I know they are at least very similar.
ABSOLUTELY AUTHENTICALLY TRUE:
Nonetheless, the early church was premillennial. It’s a good point to remember.
THX.
G-d created the world to be fulfilled. Our part is to hasten the kingdom by obeying G-d’s commandments. Absent this is only an other-worldly quietism or a militant crusading secularism.
==
GOOD POINTS, imho
The Satanic symbol has the thumb folded over the two middle fingers.
Thanks. I thought maybe that was the difference. But my memory was too fuzzy to assert so.
Thanks much, Dear Sister in Christ.
Your Philip Schaff quote does not say that.
Origen was, then and now, a material heretic.
I am serious about that. Don't like music? There are quite a few pre Nicene Fathers who viewed all music as the work of pagans (which at the time was probably true). Don't like the rich? There are a few who demanded you surrender literally everything to be a Christian.
So that there were a lot of premill Christians isn't surprising. St. Paul talks of them, and basically says for them to stop starring at the sky and get to work! See, there were a great many who thought Jesus was coming very soon, and didn't want to work in the mean time.
Of course not, as trinitarianism is taught in the New Testament.... but, the full-orbed formulary describing (or really apprehending) God as Trinity, 3 distinct Persons, with one essence, worked out from the scriptures, had to await for Athanasius and Nicea (AD 325)(something all cults always seem to condemn)...even though the prevailing view in the Church, arguably, throughout the 4th Century was Arianism...
Both the nature of the Trinity and the nature of Jesus, one Person with two full natures(divine & human), took until the 4th Century and beyond to be apprehended, described, and accepted. This is not to say that the saints listed were not incredible Christians, however, in the patristic period orthodoxy took some time to develop.
My main point was though, while the early Fathers got many things right, they got other things wrong--and proving they had an eschatology of literal Millenniumism doesn't prove at all that they were correct.
If I told you that you are existing in three states simultaneously, would you believe me? [You are, BTW.] ... How is the Trinity reality of God any more difficult to comprehend? A scientific explanation of thr three states of existence happening simultaneously would not have been possible until within the past fifty years! That early believers whom we late comer Christians will meet where/when lost no sleep over the nature of God in Three persons—Blessed Trinity seems to dismiss arguing over the issue as if salvation depended upon it.
Ummmm, yes, I do think that 3 Persons who are One is essence is very difficult if not impossible for the human mind to comprehend. We as Christians accept it by faith, and our descriptions at best can outline or summarize it; be it three states simultaneous in matter or three parts of an apple or 3 leaves of a clover, or the innumerable imperfect analogies people have looked to, to try to capture the nature of the infinite God in their minds, down through the centuries.
It is an historic fact though that before Nicea Christians wondered, argued, and searched the scriptures about the nature of God and the nature of Jesus Christ, among other things we take for granted today—and like I said in my original post, I’m not sure any of the Fathers before say AD 250 had worked out these important doctrines yet. Does that mean they were somehow intellectually or morally inferior, or not Christians? Of course not. Only that doctrine itself took some time to develop—as Church scholars better understood—and were better able to describe—the revelations of God in the bible.
My only point was that the author of the article was seeking support for pre-Millennial end-times view (which has only existed in modern days since about 1830) amidst very early church Fathers—who didn’t yet see things clearly on some very basic things like Trinity (or the Homoousious). Better to look to scripture itself (like Athanasius did when describing God as Trinity) NOT what the earliest Church Fathers—as blessed as they indeed were—thought and taught.
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