Posted on 10/26/2007 9:00:59 PM PDT by 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covenants, believing that their spiritual destiny is either to perish or become a part of the new religion that superseded Judaism (whether Christianity or Islam).1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...
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.
Does that include the righteous?
Until John, the law and the prophets were preached.
Since that time (after John) the kingdom of God (Christ risen) is preached.
B.C./A.D.
“Doesn’t that look like a God-breathed exponential trend to you?”
Let’s see: many-few, many-few, many-few. Now, if we look at this exponentially, assuming that the many don’t all abort the unborn, it looks like the formula holds along with those who were “moths” to the light and fall away towards the latter days. There is no dismay or defeated attitude as we see things winding down but an expectancy and an urgency to be about our Father’s business as Jesus is coming to take His own. Fortunately for us the harvest is His responsibility and our report sheet will only list those we have witnessed to; not those who are in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
“Does that include the righteous?”
The righteous are no longer under the curse since Jesus came under the curse and bore the judgment for us. However, we labor in the results of the curse but not under it.
Rom. 8:22-23, “For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.”
So then according to Preterists the following was fulfilled in 70 AD???
"Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." [Mt 24:29-31]
And that's not the second coming to you???? Where did Jesus go when He came back then??? Are we looking now for a third coming or was that only a spiritual coming not a physical one???
B.C./A.D.
It's no coincidence that "be fruitful and multiply" is spoken of both men and the word of God. It's the same pattern. Where God dwells, there is light. Where He is not, there is darkness.
Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." -- Matthew 5:14-17"Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
And where the word of God is preached, light shines.
Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." -- Matthew 5:17
It doesn't say that. Jesus preached the prophets. So did Peter and Paul and the apostles. And Peter's last words admonished the church to remember the words of the prophets. It means that the age of the prophets and writings from them ended with John. It doesn't mean that all of what they said had been fulfilled with John.
So "the earth and all creation" are not presently under the curse.
The number of Christians is growing world-wide, so I don't see any trend downward. As more and more people become Christian, will that have any positive effect on the creation?
Good -- You're getting warmer. He said that He came in order to fulfill the law and the prophets. He fulfilled the law -- but did He fulfill the prophets??? Are there any prophecies in the prophets that have not yet been fulfilled??? He is not finished --
INDEED . . .
Pointed Head/Flat Earth Society
PHFES . . .
good analogy.
Replacementarians have to jump through sooooooo many convoluted worm holes in Scripture . . . dragging all manner of UNBIBLICAL, UNHISTORICAL, ILLOGICAL baggage with them to come up with anything remotely called their theological perspective.
But actually, it doesn’t hold together as a unified whole AT ALL.
Just doesn’t wash.
Mind boggling.
Even one of a FEW (much less the dozens and dozens available) basic Prophetic END TIMES SCRIPTURES completely NEGATE THE WHOLE STRUCTURE, SHATTER IT.
And they are oblivious.
Psychologically and sociologically as well as theologically . . .
fascinating . . . after one is done with the barf bag and grieving.
“will that have any positive effect on the creation?”
Not according to Al Gore.
"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." -- Matthew 5:17
“As more and more people become Christian, will that have any positive effect on the creation?”
Individually, maybe, but as a whole the trend in each of the following is downward.
Public Education
Law
Government
Public Safety
Religion
Communication
Family
The Arts
Entertainment
Health
Finance
National Security
Environment
Employment
Human Relations
Civility
1 Pet. 5:8-9, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.”
2Cr 4:3, “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”
Well, He said He it is finished and I believe Him. The offering for the sins of His flock has been accepted by God and the rest is just clean-up as Christ's sheep follow Him home.
EVERYTHING is fulfilled in Jesus Christ.
And he is before all things, and by him all things consist." -- Col. 1:16-17"For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:
And as if to underscore the point...
"For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell" -- Col. 1:19
Christ risen from the cross is the gauntlet thrown down to all creation. We are either with Him or against Him. Today.
As the word of God continues to be preached in truth and love, more and more of God's family will recognize their salvation by Jesus Christ alone. Then at some unknown time in the future all history will end and Christ will come in the blink of an eye to judge the world.
We will either be judged by our own righteousness (of which we have none) and thus condemned in our own sins; or we will be judged by the righteousness and obedience of Christ and therefore acquitted by Christ's one-time, perfect atonement of our sins.
All the rest of any unanswered prophecies comes under vanity. What does it matter?
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." -- Philippians 3:13-14"Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
Meant to ping you to 535.
YOU: Not according to Al Gore.
Thank you. I take most everything Gore says and believe the opposite.
***To believe both (the “Gospel transforms lives for the better” and the “world is waxing worse and worse”) you must conclude that either
A) Transformed lives don’t accomplish jack squat when working in groups, meaning groups can’t be transformed
B) God doesn’t plan on transforming lives in the future, or
C) The “transformed life” is but a temporary phenomena.
AMEN!
“So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed.” — Acts 19:20
Prevailed at what?***
To all my more thoughtful post leaning Preterists (more thoughtful than the Dispy’s), I think that it is a bit more complicated.
This is NOT our world and our gift. We are but strangers in it. An, even if we are suppose to work for the common good of all mankind because we ALL bear the image of our Maker, what makes us so sure that the spiritual transformation in the lives of believers is suppose to achieve some kind of Edenesque utopia here on this earth before the return of the Lord? This world belongs to the reprobates right now in the sense that this is their last gift from God. The fact that they are selfishly destroying it is simply evidence that they are indeed reprobate. Even Calvin himself noted that this is the ante-room of hell. I do agree with my post-mill brothers that part of our God given destiny is to subdue the world. I don’t think its accomplishment is going to be in a fallen sin filled one.
I also don’t see any logical requirement that a transformed life in a believer equates to this paradise I hear post-mills talking about. What I do see if there is some kind of super majority of believers which forces some kind of utopian rule, it is still a rule with a little leaven in its midst and we are promised by the Lord himself that it will leaven the whole lump. Perhaps someone might explain to me the Scriptural rationale for an entire world conquered when the Lord himself posits the question to his disciples that when he returns will he really find faith on the earth.
I also note that the Acts 19 verse you used, my good sister, still has a world in which the prevailing Word of God was accomplished over ground wet with the blood of the saints. Remember, one of the things upon which the Lord waits for accomplishment before his return is the number of the martuero (forgive my memory if it is wrong) to be completed.
Now you're really thinking like Gore. If the world at this minute is a little more secular than it was 20 minutes ago, should we all give up and assume 20 minutes from now it will be more secular?
ESPECIALLY given the long view which Al Gore and most dispensationalists seem incapable of taking.
Compare those categories to 2,000 years ago. To 1,000 years ago.
What is the actual downside to believing the Gospel and Christianity can change the world for the better?
No one believes in an earthly Eden or Utopia.
It is enough to say the hearing of the word will profit to whom it was sent.
And the more preaching of the word, the more grace; the more grace, the more Christians; the more Christians, the more good fruit. All according to the will and purpose of God.
Don't buy into the short view of history.
And
To keep the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good? Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD's thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is. Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day. Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked." -- Deuteronomy 10:12-16"And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul,
And Calvin is considered a postmil...
"There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in this world that is not intended to make us rejoice" -- John Calvin
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