Answering the "Replacement Theology" Critics (Part 1)

American Vision ^ | 10/7/2005 | Gary DeMar

[topcat54]

Replacement theology has become dispensationalism's latest prophetic boogeyman. If you want to end a debate over eschatology, just charge your opponent with holding to replacement theology. What is “replacement theology,” sometimes called “supersessionism,” and why do dispensationalists accuse non-dispensationalists of holding it? Here’s a typical dispensational definition:

Replacement Theology: a theological perspective that teaches that the Jews have been rejected by God and are no longer God’s Chosen People. Those who hold to this view disavow any ethnic future for the Jewish people in connection with the biblical covenants, believing that their spiritual destiny is either to perish or become a part of the new religion that superseded Judaism (whether Christianity or Islam).¹

“Replacement theology” is dispensationalism’s trump card in any debate over eschatology because it implies anti-semitism. Hal Lindsey attempted to use this card in his poorly researched and argued The Road to Holocaust.² He wove an innovative tale implying that anyone who is not a dispensationalist carries the seeds of anti-semitism within his or her prophetic system. This would mean that every Christian prior to 1830 would have been theologically anti-semitic although not personally anti-semtic.

As Peter Leithart and I point out in The Legacy of Hatred Continues,³ it’s dispensationalists who hold to a form of replacement theology since they believe that Israel does not have any prophetic significance this side of the rapture! Prior to the rapture, in terms of dispensational logic, the Church has replaced Israel. This is unquestionably true since God’s prophetic plan for Israel has been postponed until the prophetic time clock starts ticking again at the beginning of Daniel’s 70th week which starts only after the Church is taken to heaven in the so-called rapture. Until then, God is dealing redemptively with the Church. Am I making this up? Consider the following by dispensationalist E. Schuyler English:

An intercalary⁴ period of history, after Christ’s death and resurrection and the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, has intervened. This is the present age, the Church age. . . . During this time God has not been dealing with Israel nationally, for they have been blinded concerning God’s mercy in Christ. . . . However, God will again deal with Israel as a nation. This will be in Daniel’s seventieth week, a seven-year period yet to come.⁵

According to English and every other dispensationalist, the Church has replaced Israel until the rapture. The unfulfilled promises made to Israel are not fulfilled until after the Church is taken off the earth. Thomas Ice, one of dispensationalism’s rising stars, admits that the Church replaces Israel this side of the rapture: “We dispensationalists believe that the church has superseded Israel during the current church age, but God has a future time in which He will restore national Israel ‘as the institution for the administration of divine blessings to the world.’”⁶

Dispensationalists claim that their particular brand of eschatology is the only prophetic system that gives Israel her proper place in redemptive history. This is an odd thing to argue since two-thirds of the Jews will be slaughtered during the post-rapture tribulation, and the world will be nearly destroyed. Charles Ryrie writes in his book The Best is Yet to Come that during this post-rapture period Israel will undergo “the worst bloodbath in Jewish history.”⁷ The book’s title doesn’t seem to very appropriate considering that during this period of time most of the Jews will die! John Walvoord follows a similar line of argument: “Israel is destined to have a particular time of suffering which will eclipse any thing that it has known in the past. . . . [T]he people of Israel . . . are placing themselves within the vortex of this future whirlwind which will destroy the majority of those living in the land of Palestine.”⁸ Arnold Fruchtenbaum states that during the Great Tribulation “Israel will suffer tremendous persecution (Matthew 24:15–28; Revelation 12:1–17). As a result of this persecution of the Jewish people, two-thirds are going to be killed.”⁹

During the time when Israel seems to be at peace with the world, she is really under the domination of the antichrist who will turn on her at the mid-point in the seven-year period. Israel waits more than 2000 years for the promises finally to be fulfilled, and before it happens, two-thirds of them are wiped out. Those who are charged with holding a “replacement theology viewpoint” believe in no inevitable future Jewish bloodbath. In fact, we believe that the Jews will inevitably embrace Jesus as the Messiah this side of the Second Coming. The fulfillment of Zechariah 13:8 is a past event. It may have had its fulfillment in the events leading up to and including the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. Contrary to dispensationalism’s interpretation of the Olivet Discourse, Jesus' disciples warned the Jewish nation for nearly forty years about the impending judgment (Matt. 3:7; 21:42–46; 22:1–14; 24:15–22). Those who believed Jesus’ words of warning were delivered “from the wrath to come” (1 Thess. 1:10). Those who continued to reject Jesus as the promised Messiah, even though they had been warned for a generation (Matt. 24:34), “wrath has come upon them to the utmost” (1 Thess. 2:16; cf. 1 Thess. 5:1–11; 2 Pet. 3:10–13).

Before critics of replacement theology throw stones, they need to take a look at their own prophetic system and see its many lapses in theology and logic.

Read Part Two of this article...

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1. Randall Price, Unholy War: America, Israel and Radical Islam (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 2001), 412.

2. Hal Lindsey, The Road to Holocaust (New York: Bantam Books, 1989). The address for Bantam Books is 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York.

3. Gary DeMar and Peter J. Leithart, The Legacy of Hatred Continues: A Response to Hal Lindsey’s The Road to Holocaust (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 1989).

4. Inserted into the calendar.

5. E. Schuyler English, A Companion to the New Scofield Reference Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 1972), 135.

6. Thomas Ice, “The Israel of God,” The Thomas Ice Collection: www.raptureready.com/featured/TheIsraelOfGod.html#_edn3

7. Charles C. Ryrie, The Best is Yet to Come (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1981), 86.

8. John F. Walvoord, Israel in Prophecy (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1962), 107, 113. Emphasis added.

9. Arnold G. Fruchtenbaum, “The Little Apocalypse of Zechariah,” The End Times Controversy: The Second Coming Under Attack, eds. Tim LaHaye and Thomas Ice (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 2003), 262.

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Gary DeMar is president of American Vision and the author of more than 20 books. His latest is Myths, Lies, and Half Truths.

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Permission to reprint granted by American Vision P.O. Box 220, Powder Springs, GA 30127, 800-628-9460.

[Quix]

Very excellent valid, very Biblical points.

Should be sadly amusing to see the contortions replies to that take.

Thanks.

[Quix]

So the angels advising the Disciples on the nature of Christ’s return being in like manner to His Ascension were lying????

More rubber Bibling, sounds like.

[Quix]

Excellent point.

Clearly not yet occurred.

. . . except in the Alice in Wonderland School of Theology.

[Blogger]

wmfights,
Dispensationalism does not teach two paths to salvation. there has only been one path of salvation all along. Salvation by grace through faith in the Messiah, Jesus Christ. The Old Testament saints did not have every piece of the puzzle as it was progressively revealed; yet, they still looked for a Savior to come. When the fulness of time had come, God sent His Son, born of a virgin for the forgiveness of sins. Those who trust in Him in this generation are saved just as those who trusted in Him alone (not works) in prior dispensations. In the future, a large remnant out of national Israel will be saved. They aren’t saved at this moment. But their names were written in the Lamb’s book of life before the foundation of the world. They too will be saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ as their Savior and Messiah. They will have understanding as to what He has done for them when they look upon Him whom they pierced and they will mourn.

I know of no mainstream dispensationalist that teaches two ways of salvation. Even Hagee, whom I disagree with on certain important things, still says that the Jews are only saved by explicit faith in Jesus Christ as their Savior. Even he says that there aren’t two ways for salvation, one for the Gentiles and one for the Jews.

Where the charge gets laid at our feet is in some of the sloppily written comments by early dispensationalists. When we pull out quotes that seem to teach that this wasn’t want they meant, the quotes are ignored because the straw man is just too attractive to give up. If these men truly taught two ways (And I don’t believe that’s what they really meant having read more than just cherry-picked quotes from them), then they were wrong; and most folks would say they were wrong.

Dispensationalism is a biblical doctrine that shows how God dealt with people (not salvifically, but revelationally) through the ages. During this dispensation, He is primarily revealing Himself to gentiles. There will be a time where this revelatory period is over and then He will pour out His Spirit on the Jews, whom He has drawn from the 4 corners of the earth. And “all Israel” will be saved.

You note that people shouldn’t get bent out of shape about looking at history through periods. But they do. And their attitude towards it is just as was stated above. They believe that it is EVIL and treat us as if we are evil for believing it. It is very sad.

[Blogger]

Lee,
I was very disturbed by what Hagee said. I also did additional research and understand what he meant. I still disagree with him, but it isn’t the heresy that it sounds like. He claims that explicit faith in Christ’s atoning sacrifice is how Jew or Gentile are saved. His latest kick about how Jesus didn’t come to be the Messiah and how we can’t blame the Jews for rejecting what He never claimed to be is nowhere near what dispensationalism teaches. It is out in left field somewhere, and it is biblically false. It isn’t dispensationalism that is fueling this. It is itching ears syndrome. And the itching ears he is trying to appease are his Jewish friends. He is biblically, provably wrong.

[P-Marlowe]

However, if it is a belief that during these different periods different criteria for salvation were applied, I do see the threat. If the latter is the case, what stops the anti-christ from convincing people a new dispensation has begun and in it salvation is found in a new world religion where we worship the beast (we just don't realize it's the beast).

LOL! Are you suggesting that it is "possible" for the Anti-Christ to deceive the Elect?

Let me ask you, is it possible for anyone to mislead one of God's elect (through some faulty biblical interpretive method or otherwise) to the point where they can lose their salvation?

The Anti-Christ may deceive many. He won't deceive the elect. The sheep will follow Jesus. The goats and pigs and dogs will follow the Anti-Christ. No matter what kind of nonsense the Anti-Christ preaches people will follow him for no other reason than that they hate the real Christ.

[Quix]

Well that sure explains why they don't know which way is "up", and why they think that this fallen world is "heaven on earth".

So, when the satan driven and led globalists begin in earnest to reduce the global population to 200,000,000 . . .

The Contrarian Preterists/ Replacementarians/ Amils/ Postmils

. . . ??? i.e. those who's hearts have been so askew as to not really worship Christ etc. and get left behind???

Will pretend that the Anti-Christ is just doing some minor house cleaning?

And when the chip implant ID is required for all economic transactions, they'll just call it a necessary convenience?

And when Bibles are confiscated, outlawed, burned wholesale and the Name of Jesus outlawed in public . . . they'll just think of it as minor temporary secularizing on the way to social Nirvana?

And when Birth Pangs pograms or after the Great Tribulation begins formally . . . roundups of Jews and Evangelical Christians becomes routine, they'll just consider it a necessary tidying up of society???

And when the globalist gestapo comes for the Pentecostal straglers and backsliders who wake up and get right in the Great Tribulation, the Replacementarian backsliders/pseudo-Christians will feel find because they aren't Pentecostals.

And when the globalist gestapo come for the Dispy Baptist backsliders, the Replacementarians will feel fine because they aren't Dispy Baptists.

And when the globalist gestapo come for the Replacementarians, they'll insist there's been some mistake because their rubber Bibles are not really Bibles at all and they support the Anti-Christ in his efforts to bring a lasting world peace.

Gag me with a shoehorn.

,

[Quix]

APOCALYPTIC HYPERBOLE

is used where the Replacementarians Rubber Bibles don't quite stretch far enough to cover their deceptions and they have to bring out the big brass bands, dancing monkeys, fireworks shows and platoons of used car salesmen to hide the fact that their papal magicsterical encyclicals not only have no clothes . . . they have no reliable dictionaries; no reliable histories and no reliable consistent logic, phrasing or thought processes.

It takes apocalyptic hyperbole to cover that pile of compost.

[Quix]

INDEED.

Apocalyptic hyperbole . . .

EQUAL

—stretching their rubber Bibles to fit yet more outrageousness;

—stretching their rubber histories to try and fit their fantasies around things that never happened but are written up in the JOURNAL OF THE ALICE IN WONDERLAND SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY AS THOUGH they happened;

—stretching their rubber logic books to vainly try and insist that up is down; down is up; black is white; coming is going; increasing war; evil; crime and demonized behavior is a sure sign of Christ’s growing millenial peace . . . etc.

[Quix]

I do appreciate that some of you have more integrity in thought and Biblical faithfulness than some of the others of such theological camps.

I still feel that even your moderated position is greatly flawed and a spiritual hazard, danger, destructive force.

Like you, I will still feel duty bound to share what I construe to be a much more Biblical, Holy Spirit affirmed perspective.

HAVE A BLESSED THANKSGIVING WITH DEEPENED RELATIONSHIPS IN GOD’S LOVE, PURPOSES, WILL.

Blessings,

Thanks for your kind words, BTW.

[Quix]

AGREED.

Thanks.

Blessed Thanksgiving to you and yours.

[Quix]

I think The Cross

was the fulcrum of history and all Creation—certainly in terms of Salvation.

I do believe the Jews are still blinded, essentially, by God until the point when their awareness tweaks their Jealousy and their blindness is lifted and they WHOLESALE sse Him whom they have pierced and accept Him as their true Messiah.

Id o not see that happening before the Abomination of Desolation.

I think that much is fairly Biblically clear in the non rubberized Bibles.

[Quix]

Well put.

Thx.

[Quix]

What I basically construed Hagee to be saying is that Christ came as suffering servant not the conquering Messiah the Jews expected.

BUT HE WILL COME AS CONQUERING MESSIAH.

IF that’s what he meant, he was not far off.

[Quix]

Words worth pondering.

Thanks.

[Blogger]

That’s basically what he said. However, to say that He wasn’t the conquering Messiah at the time ignores verses such as His interaction with the woman at the well and leaves the door open for unbelieving Jews to proclaim that there is another Messiah.

What he said wasn’t biblical. However, it wasn’t the heresy that it sounded like it was at first.

He does skirt fairly close to allowing another way of salvation for the Jews, but I’ve heard him explicitly deny this is what he is saying.

As to Jesus not being conquering Messiah, He was, even at His first coming. He conquered sin, hell and the grave. Satan is living on borrowed time and one day soon will experience the physical banishment that he so deserves. True, “soon” in this case is at least 1,007 years away. But, in the economy of eternity, that is soon.

Theoretically, if the Jews had accepted Jesus as Messiah, He would have set up a physical kingdom right then and there. But, that is only in theory. God knew what would happen and had already ordained salvation for the Gentiles as well.

[Quix]

I wholesale agree.

Thanks.

[Blogger]

Have a happy Thanksgiving friend.

[Quix]

Mega dittos to you and yours.

Thx.

[Uncle Chip]

Well Said —