I like the way Tait Zimmerman put it:
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Can some of you stop making up off-the-wall American centered interpretations of Bible prophesies that are doomed to failure?
America and the modern nation/state of Israel have nothing to do with biblical prophecy.
𝐈𝐭 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐞, 𝐚𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮’𝐫𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐮𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐨𝐥𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐞𝐲𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐚 𝐰𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝.
Signed, your brother in Christ.
]
Completely wrong. Israel itself is a prophecy fulfilled. Isreal? As we know it today? The exact location and construction sequence of Jerusalem’s nine suburbs were predicted by Jeremiah about 2600 years ago. Jeremiah 31:38-40, Ezekiel 37:21-22. Isaiah 66:7-8 describes this taking place in one day. This rebirth became history in 1948, in one day, and the construction of the nine suburbs has gone forward precisely in the locations and in the sequence predicted.
In religious and theological contexts, predictions for Israel leading up to the “end times” usually follow a specific series of milestones.
Prophecy suggests that leading up to the end, Israel will find itself increasingly isolated on the world stage. The “Heavy Stone”: Zechariah 12:3 predicts that Jerusalem will become a “very heavy stone for all peoples,” and that all nations of the earth will gather against it.
Wars and Rumors of Wars: Jesus mentioned in Matthew 24 that conflict in the region would be a “birth pang” of the coming end.
One of the most famous predictions found in Ezekiel 38–39 describes a massive coalition of nations—traditionally identified with modern-day Russia, Iran, Turkey, and others—invading Israel “from the far north.” However, the prophecy states that God will supernaturally intervene to destroy these armies on the mountains of Israel, serving as a sign to the nations of His existence.
Also, many eschatological views believe a Third Temple must be built in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount. Then we have “The Abomination of Desolation.” This is tied to the belief that a figure known as the Antichrist will eventually enter this temple, break a peace covenant, and declare himself to be God. 2 Thessalonians 2:4
Of course, we then have the final seven-year period of extreme hardship (the Tribulation). For Israel, this is seen as a refining process. Zechariah 12:10 suggests that during this time of crisis, the Jewish people will experience a spiritual awakening. This is the moment they recognize Jesus (Yeshua) as the Messiah.
Now America? Not sure if it is mentioned, however, just because we exist, we will all be playing a part.
Peter
Well hast thou mastered thy Scofield, O “Scholar.”
Be very careful not to confuse the charismatic gift of prophecy, a wholesome gift from God with preaching – which is another gift from God – or with “prophecy TEACHING” – which is 𝗮 𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗰 𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗯𝗼𝘁𝗵 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗰𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴.
Imagine a perspective on Bible reading which pounds on the inevitability of the global triumph of evil, and our hapless incompetence in this “church” age. And does this so convincingly that the consistent dispensationalist denies the central, earliest, creed of the church: Ιησους Κυριος.
C I Scofield served his anti-Christian paymasters well. 100+ years later, his devotees, proselytes, and acolytes can no longer utter the classic statement of faith (“Jesus is Lord”) in good faith.
When a well-schooled dispensational saint is backed into a corner and finds himself saying this, the Mormon practice of “mental reservation” clicks in. The aware dispie will cross his fingers behind his back and mutter under his breath “Well, not really. Not here. Not yet.”
The unaware/naive dispie has already in his mind redefined the word “Lord” to mean “Guru.” Personal Spiritual Adviser, on a par with Madame Rose the palm reader. At least that’s the role Jesus is relegated to, in the years and decades following the moment of conversion.
Paul told the saints to “despise not prophecies.” 𝗢𝗧𝗢𝗛, 𝘄𝗲 𝗱𝗼 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝗚𝗼𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗶𝘀𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗰𝘆 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀, 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗹𝗺𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝗹𝘄𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗹𝘀𝗲 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀. 𝗪𝗵𝗼 𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗼𝘆 𝗹𝗶𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘃𝗼𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝘀𝗮𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆’𝗿𝗲 𝘀𝗼𝗿𝗿𝘆.
So? What did I get wrong? Jesus said the end would come. A new Heaven and a New Earth will come. I pointed out the places in the Bible where it discusses such things. It is pretty clear that Israel, God’s chosen land and people, will most definitely play a crucial role in the End Times.
Sorry if you become offended at this. Be offended at God. He says so. plain as day.
Oh, I do not believe I have the gift of prophecy. I do not think anyone does today. Why? We have this.
We need nothing else. We definitely do not need someone claiming to see the future and what God showed them. We already do. His name is John. He wrote Revelations. However, you seem to think I got something wrong? Let’s talk about it.
Peter
This what you had in “mind?”
The spiritual gift of prophecy is listed among the gifts of the Spirit in 1 Corinthians 12:10 and Romans 12:6. The Greek word translated “prophesying” or “prophecy” in both passages properly means to “speak forth” or declare the divine will, to interpret the purposes of God, or to make known in any way the truth of God which is designed to influence people. Many people misunderstand the gift of prophecy to be the ability to predict the future. While knowing something about the future may sometimes have been an aspect of the gift of prophecy, it was primarily a gift of proclamation (“forth-telling”), not prediction (“fore-telling”).
A pastor/preacher who declares the Bible can be considered a “prophesier” in that he is speaking forth the counsel of God. With the completion of the New Testament canon, prophesying changed from declaring new revelation to declaring the completed revelation God has already given. Jude 3 speaks of “the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (emphasis added). In other words, the faith to which we hold has been settled forever, and it does not need the addition or refinement that comes from extra-biblical revelations.
Also, note the transition from prophet to teacher in 2 Peter 2:1: “There were false prophets among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you” (emphasis added). Peter indicates that the Old Testament age had prophets, whereas the church will have teachers. The spiritual gift of prophecy, in the sense of receiving new revelations from God to be proclaimed to others, ceased with the completion of the Bible. During the time that prophecy was a revelatory gift, it was to be used for the edification, exhortation, and comfort of men (1 Corinthians 14:3). The modern gift of prophecy, which is really more akin to teaching, still declares the truth of God. What has changed is that the truth of God today has already been fully revealed in His Word, while, in the early church, it had not yet been fully revealed.
Christians are to be very wary of those who claim to have a “new” message from God. It is one thing to say, “I had an interesting dream last night.” However, it is quite another matter to say, “God gave me a dream last night, and you must obey it.”
No utterance of man should be considered equal to or above the written Word.
We must hold to the Word that God has already given and commit ourselves to sola scriptura—Scripture alone.
Zes me, Scofield in hand.
J.
Excellent and thoughtful response!
People who actually practice the charismatic gift of prophecy describe it as an anointing of the poetic faculty, the ability to create a SPONTANEOUS word picture that communicates a specific facet of God’s APPLIED truth for the day.The supernatural element is how precisely the prophetic “word” meshes with everything else going on at that moment.
It’s sort of like the right-brain counterpart to formal teaching. Very effective when properly and humbly done. God is not writing a new Bible any more (sorry, Joe Smith!). But we are ALWAYS challenged to APPLY His Word to new situations. It’s like the difference between physics and engineering.
Revelation can be described as the right brain (visual language) retelling of the Olivet Discourse. This last book of the Bible is almost an index to the rest of the Bible, with each verse hyperlinking to an average of 2.4 verses found elsewhere in the Bible. Revelation is also an incredibly sophisticated piece of literature, a step by step riff on the lectionary version of Ezekiel. Full of chiasms and nested chiasms.
Also a lot of fun to read in Greek. There’s a pounding, pulsing, rhythm to the prose. A lot of noise. Music. Chants. Poems.
Getting back to our original conversation, though – sermons are usually forgotten within days. But a well-crafted word picture can linger in memory and shape your thoughts and actions for decades. Both are needed. Both are beneficial.
But "prophecy teaching" is a cancer on the Body of Christ, designed to engender passivity and fatalism. To sideline us. Exactly as those who hired C I Scofield hoped it would do.
Get the time frame right, and the whole New Testament pops into vivid focus and makes sense. Get the time frame wrong, and you might well spiral into immediate irrelevance, and a much lower quality of life. Life is GREAT! God’s plans are AMAZING! Let’s go move some mountains for His glory!
The state-of-the-art best eschatology, postmillennialism, usually includes some form of preterism. Most of the prophecies in the Olivet Discourse, and John’s more detailed retelling of that discourse in prophetic (visual, right-brain) imagery, refers to the Jewish War, which lasted 7 years, started on schedule 40 years after Jesus pronounced God’s pending judgment upon “this generation,” and kicked the feet out from under the Kingdom of God’s two chief enemies – Rome, and apostate Israel.
Get the time frame right, and you can even explain Apocalypse to Turkish Muslims in a way that makes sense.
Sorry. I forgot you do not believe in the end times. Even though Jesus talked about it, John saw it, and God wants us watching and waiting for it.
Peter
Is he a Preterist?
J.
We don’t need to label people.
I am not here to label anyone. He is a preterist. Do you even understand what a preterist is? Please stay off my back, @Bestill, unless you want to get bitten.
Get it?
J.
Do you understand what it means to label someone?
Are you bored or something?
J.
Actually, I believe the end times ended exactly when Jesus said that they would – within the lifetime of the this generation that was hearing Him. It takes a special kind of contortionism to reverse the meaning of this generation to mean that generation, thousands of years from now!
I really enjoy reading God’s New Testament word in the words He used to first give it to us. Koine Greek isn’t that hard to learn, and amply repays the effort invested. For example, look at the first three verses of Revelation:
Some folks would say that Jesus was lying in Rev. 1:1-3. Well, the atheist who runs the religion department at UNC-CH came up through the Wheaton mill, and came to that conclusion.
Rev 1:1 ᾿Αποκάλυψις ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἣν ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ Θεός, δεῖξαι τοῖς δούλοις αὐτοῦ ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι ἐν τάχει, καὶ ἐσήμανεν ἀποστείλας διὰ τοῦ ἀγγέλου αὐτοῦ τῷ δούλῳ αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιωάννῃ,
Rev 1:2 ὃς ἐμαρτύρησε τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ τὴν μαρτυρίαν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὅσα εἶδε.
Rev 1:3 μακάριος ὁ ἀναγινώσκων καὶ οἱ ἀκούοντες τοὺς λόγους τῆς προφητείας καὶ τηροῦντες τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ γεγραμμένα· ὁ γὰρ καιρὸς ἐγγύς.
If by ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι ἐν τάχει (that which must happen quickly) and ὁ γὰρ καιρὸς ἐγγύς (for the time is near) means around 2,000 years later, I’d not send Jesus out for pizza!
If you’re going to insult me, try being a little more creative.
Root canal problems? Headache? You want to debate the Scriptures? Or rather, “be still”
Selah.
As for labelling…
First, if a person self identifies as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, then calling them a Mormon is not an insult but a factual designation. Likewise, if someone adheres to the theology of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, identifying them as a Jehovah’s Witness is simply naming their ecclesial affiliation. These are confessional identities, not slurs. The same applies to preterism. If someone affirms that most or all eschatological prophecies were fulfilled in the first century, then preterist is a technical theological descriptor.
Second, the ethical question is motive and precision. Labels can clarify or they can caricature. If you use the term to summarize a person’s stated doctrinal commitments in order to analyze them accurately, that is legitimate theological categorization. Theology has always required taxonomy. The early church labeled Arianism, Sabellianism, and Nestorianism not to insult but to distinguish doctrinal claims.
Third, it becomes problematic when the label substitutes for argument. If one says “You are a Mormon” as a way of ending discussion rather than engaging the doctrinal substance, then the label functions rhetorically as dismissal rather than clarification. That is when it becomes unhelpful.
Fourth, precision matters. Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witness theology both deny the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity and the full deity of Christ as confessed in historic creedal Christianity. Preterism, by contrast, is an eschatological framework within Christianity, though some forms such as full preterism are widely regarded as heterodox because of their implications for the bodily resurrection. Conflating categories can distort the discussion.
So for me, it is correct to identify someone according to their actual theological position, provided the description is accurate and used to advance clarity rather than to inflame. The key question is not whether labels exist, but whether they are used responsibly and truthfully.
You are way out of your depth here, so rather “be still” especially when you are on attack mode.
J.
Yes, I do. Referring to @Dr_S as a preterist in his eschatology is not a caricature of his character but a clarification of his interpretive framework. It allows me and other members to understand the lens through which he reads prophetic texts. Scripture itself recognizes the necessity of identifying doctrinal positions so that teaching may be evaluated.
Paul writes in Romans 16:17[1] that believers are to mark those whose teaching diverges from received doctrine. The verb σκοπέω carries the sense of carefully observing or identifying. That presupposes doctrinal discernment and naming positions accurately.
Similarly, in 1 Thessalonians 5:21[2] believers are commanded to test and evaluate teachings. One cannot test what one refuses to define.
Even Titus 1:9[3] assumes that theological distinctions will be drawn in order to exhort and refute where necessary.
Therefore, identifying someone’s eschatological position is not an attack on personal integrity but a categorization of doctrinal perspective. If the description is inaccurate, it should be corrected. If it is accurate, then it simply aids clarity. The issue is truthfulness, not sensitivity. Do you object to doctrinal clarity, or to the label itself?
J.
Grace and precision. God has an amazing family.
Amen, @Dr_S, did I attack you by stating that you are a preterist? I was simply seeking doctrinal clarity, not by snapping like a small, yapping chihuahua.
J.
Wow. That was clever.
