A Response: “A Biblical Guide to Revelation” — Part 8

This is the last post in our series titled, “A Response: A Biblical Guide to Revelation.” Part 1 was the Introduction. Part 2 was about the Seven Churches in Revelation. In Part 3 we looked at the “Rapture.” Part 4 was about the Mark of the Beast. Part 5 was about the Tribulation. Part 6 was all about the Millennium (it actually covers two chapters from the Guide). And in Part 7 looked at the “Great White Throne Judgment.” Let’s now turn to the final chapter in this Guide — the New Heaven and New Earth!

Chapter 8: What Is the New Heaven and New Earth?

We’ve come to the last chapter of the Guide and I have to say that I’m really surprised with this part. At least the Guide seems to be about the restoration of all creation when it asks, “[Why] should we believe that God would purpose to restore only [people], while relinquishing the physical realm …to destruction?” (pg. 24; adapted). Later, the Guide is insistent, “There will come a day when God will do for all of creation what [God] did for Jesus on that first Easter morning” (ibid.; adapted). This is certainly a nice departure from the standard futurist position. It’s a view with which I certainly agree. The Guide even states, “When the last day finally comes, we will not fly away to him, but Christ will return to us as indicated in Revelation 21.” But this admission — with which I completely agree — begs the question from the perspective of the view put forth by the Guide: If Jesus will be physically reigning on the earth, why would “Christ … return to us” when he’s already here? I guess with this view, the events will be something like:

1. Jesus “raptures” the church (up)

2. The “antichrist” will reign on earth for 7 years

3. Christ returns with the saints, binds and imprisons the devil, destroys the “antichrist” and reigns physically on earth for a “thousand years” (down)

4. After which time, the devil is released and there’s a great war when the devil is finally defeated and everyone is taken to “heaven” for the “Great White Throne Judgement” (up)

5. Then, after that, Jesus and the saints — along with the New Jerusalem — return to the New Earth to live forever (down)

So, if you’ll permit me, the timeline for the Guide is more of an “up” then “down” then “up” and finally “down” instead of the more traditional “up” and then “down.” I guess it doesn’t really matter, though, as the Guide ends where God ends — ruling from the New Jerusalem on the New Earth:

Revelation 21.1-7 (CEB; adapted):[1] Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3I heard a loud voice from the throne say, “Look! God’s dwelling is here with humankind. [God] will dwell with them, and they will be [God’s] peoples. God … will be with them as their God. 4[God] will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more. There will be no mourning, crying, or pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” 5Then the one seated on the throne said, “Look! I’m making all things new.” He also said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6Then he said to me, “All is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty, I will freely give water from the life-giving spring. 7Those who emerge victorious will inherit these things. I will be their God, and they will be my [children].

The Guide speculates what this “new world” will be like which will “no longer be marred and twisted by sin” (pp. 24-25) — 

The new world to come is far more glorious than the one we presently know. However, there are great continuities between this one and the one we long for. It will be a world that we recognize and one in which all the things that we love will be present but no longer marred and twisted by sin. … 

Can you imagine the sports, the arts, the music that no human ear has ever heard, the construction, the technologies, the research, the teachings which will be possible in the new world without the power or presence of sin?

This is reminiscent of what Paul wrote to the followers of Jesus in Corinth — 

1 Corinthians 15.58 (NTE):[2] So, my dear family, be firmly fixed, unshakeable, always full to overflowing with the Lord’s work. In the Lord, as you know, the work you’re doing will not be worthless (emphasis added).

This statement can only make sense if the world in which we currently live is not destroyed but “made new” (Revelation 21.5). That is, the work that we are currently doing “in the Lord” (i.e., justice work, reconciliation work, ecological work, inclusivity work, etc.) will remain in the “new world.” 

The Guide ends this section by stating —

And best of all, Christ will be at the center of it all. This is a world I can get excited about and for good reason. It is the one I was intended to occupy from the very beginning. And so, it will be.

And I couldn’t agree more.

I wish the Guide would have ended it there but it didn’t. The Guide ends by stating:

There is obviously so much to unpack in Revelation. We have not even begun to scratch the surface. But we hope this guide was helpful when it comes to discovering more about the Tribulation, about the Beasts, and about the events, we have to look forward to coming to pass as we approach the End Days. Remember to stay vigilant and watchful, for none of us knows the hour in which the Son of Man will return.

As I’ve hopefully shown throughout this series, we are not “approach[ing] the End Days.” As we’ve seen, the New Testament time went from the “last days” to the “end of the age” to the “last hour” to the “time is near” and “must soon take place” to “the end of everything has come” (see Matthew 16.27-28; Matthew 23.35-36; Matthew 24.34; 1 Corinthians 10.11; 1 John 2.18; Revelation 1.1-3; Revelation 22.6, 12). The New Testament writers were very clear — the “end times” were being fulfilled during their generation. Indeed, it was coming upon them, just as Jesus and the apostles predicted.

The last thing I want to point out is the Guide’s final statement, “Remember to stay vigilant and watchful, for none of us knows the hour in which the Son of Man will return.” This is an allusion to Matthew 24.36, “But nobody knows when that day or hour will come, not the heavenly angels and not the Son. Only the Father knows” (CEB). This is bothersome for many reasons, not least of which is that this verse is used as some sort of catch-all to “prove” that Christ’s coming in the first century “can’t” be the fulfillment of Jesus’ predictions (similar to the way 2 Peter 3.8 is used when talking about “time statements”). But there’s a difference here. If something was in the past, we’d be able to point to it on a calendar and say, “That was it.”

For example, we can without any doubt point to 14 August 1945, and say that was the day Japan surrendered and effectively ended World War II. But, what about the months leading up to that day? We wouldn’t be able to know the “day or hour” when the war would end. Oh sure, there might be things that made us think the “end” was near, but none of us could predict the exact moment it would be over.

That’s Jesus’ only point here. He is not saying that, after the fact, we wouldn’t know when it happened. Jesus told the disciples — i.e., the first century audience — to be on the lookout for certain signs pointing to the “end,” but no one could know the exact moment or even the day. Jesus said right before this, “I assure you (i.e., the disciples who asked Jesus when these things would happen) that this generation (i.e., the disciples’ generation; the then-existing first-century generation of Jews) won’t pass away until all these things happen” (Matthew 24.34; CEB). Therefore, they might not have known the “day or hour” but they knew that some of them wouldn’t die before they witnessed it (Matthew 16.27-28) or that their generation wouldn’t end before it occurred (Matthew 24.34; cf., Matthew 12.38-45; 23.36).

Furthermore, why would Jesus give the disciples a bunch of signs to be on the lookout for if it wasn’t even for them but for people thousands of years in their future? Jesus listed thirteen signs for them to watch for, thirteen. But, Paul wrote in roughly 50/51 CE (approximately 20 years later) that there were only two things remaining before “the end” — the rebellion and the revelation of the lawless person (2 Thessalonians 2.1-12). That means during that time period, about eleven of the things Jesus told the disciples to watch out for had already occurred or were actively happening when Paul wrote his letter. Again, we see that the “end” Jesus and the writers of the New Testament warned about was being fulfilled during the first century. 

The only way Matthew 24.36 can be for us today is if the things Jesus told his first century followers did not take place. That would mean that Jesus and the rest of the New Testament writers were wrong about their predictions. Let me repeat that. If the position of this Guide is true then — 

Jesus was wrong.

I don’t know about you, but that’s something I can’t abide by and I’m quite confident in stating that the editors of the Guide would agree with me.

On paper, anyway.

They would have no problem espousing the “inerrancy” of the Bible but, practically, this Guide calls into question that very position. To maintain a very literal interpretation of so many passages (and have that as one’s primary interpretive framework), but then imply (or state plainly) that the passages speaking about the coming of Christ within the first century didn’t happen and shouldn’t be taken literally is the very definition of a contradiction. 

Therefore, to extrapolate Matthew 24.36 out of its context and force it into some sort of “proof text” for today is unconscionable, especially if one knows of the other views of eschatology (as the editors of this Guide clearly do) but refuses to tell other people about them and continues to teach their own twisted view (and this is certainly that as the Guide takes scripture and twists it to mean something it was never intended to mean). The only reason such a position would be held is that it’s being forced onto the text. That is, the Guide comes to these passages with the view that Jesus failed to return in the first century (though, it would never say it like that). It then imposes onto them the view that they’re for our time, that the urgencies and warnings and signs are for us and not for their original audiences. I find such a view unacceptable.[3]

Well, that’s it for my response to A Biblical Guide to Revelation. I hope you’ve enjoyed this series and that it’s been helpful to you. If you’d like to know more about the view I’ve espoused here, please see my series, New Testament Eschatology. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to send me an email or leave a comment.

~~~

In the Love of the Three in One,

Br. Jack+, LC

_________

[1] Scripture quotations marked (CEB) are taken from The Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible. Used by permission.

[2] Scripture quotations marked (NTE) are taken from The New Testament for Everyone. Copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011. SPCK Publishing.

[3] As I stated before, this isn’t to say that I haven’t made the same mistake. We all have. We all come to the Bible with our own “glasses,” if you will, and read it through our own worldview. The difference is that I recognize that and try my best to remove myself from the story and ask, “How would the people listening to this for the first time have understood it?” We get a pretty clear answer to that question in Matthew 24. The disciples point out the Temple, Jesus tells them it’s going to be destroyed. We get from the text that the disciples understood that to mean the same Temple they were just talking about. So they asked, “When will this happen?” Their question implies they understood Jesus was talking about their Temple. At no time did Jesus say something like, “Oh! Not this Temple! No. I’m talking about another one thousands of years in the future. All these warnings are for that generation of people.”