Brian Mcnamee
Well-Known Member
The futurist are so because that position is taken from a literal understanding of the texts that are relevant for the end of the age and the onset of the 1000 year reign of Jesus on earth. This position can be easily established as Biblical by examining the passages and asking simply one question and that is did that already happen or is it future.Following the latter part of the twentieth century, when Hal Lindsey published his books The Late Great Planet Earth and The 1980’s: Countdown to Armageddon and Tim Lahaye and Jerry Jenkins began publishing their Left Behind series, the idea of a coming apocalypse captured the imaginations not only of Christians but of others as well. The idea of a future apocalypse predates these publications, of course, but these authors, among others, have managed to sensationalize a foreign theology.
One inspiration for Left Behind was a song by Larry Norman called I Wish We’d All been Ready, published in 1972 on the Only Visiting This Planet album. One of the verses reads thus:
A man and wife asleep in bed
She hears a noise and turns her head he's gone
I wish we’d all been ready
Two men walking up a hill
One disappears and one’s left standing still
I wish we’d all been ready
Larry Norman was a pioneer in contemporary Christian music. His lyrics reflected the human condition and his music both rocked and soothed. But as enjoyable as Norman’s music was to listen to, and still is, it may not be scripturally sound. Even the album’s title runs counter to the spirit of the Gospel. Certainly because our flesh dies, we’re only visiting this planet, but the Gospel message is not that we should despair of our lives on the planet. This particular song only reinforces this erroneous message. And when LaHaye and Jenkins capitalize on the lyric of this song, they, too, disseminate a false theology. Like this song, the Left Behind books say that the righteous are taken away, or raptured, as futurists like to say, and that the wicked are left behind, as if the earth is not a desirable place to be, even though David’s poetry says otherwise:
The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork;The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof,
the world and those who dwell therein,for he has founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the rivers. (Ps 19:1; 24:1-2)
Jesus often quoted the patriarchs, who never even hinted that man should endeavor to escape from the earth but rather that he should behold it and find pleasure in it even while he toils. A sample of passages to this effect includes Psalms 24:1 and 33:5 and Ecclesiastes 3:11-13.
Man may have a hope in the everlasting, but his place is on the earth. From scripture we glean that that is the very heart of creation—that man shall walk the earth with his Creator. Man’s place being on the earth is key to the disconnectedness of futurism, which in one sense is escapism. Futurists want to escape; they’re only visiting this planet, they insist. This world is not their home. The Bible, however, takes a rather dim view of that. As we see with Noah, the Beatitudes, and elsewhere, the earth is the Christian’s home. Not forever, of course, for though the earth may not be heaven, it is paradise when Creator and Creation reside there together. God’s dwelling place is with man (Rv 21:3).
The earth is good; God created a good thing, as Genesis tells us, and Jesus did not come to suggest otherwise:
I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. (Jn 17:15)The Lord is with us, now, on the earth.
here is a prophecy in Amos 9 that speaks of one people Israel who God will wipe out but yet promises a remnant will be placed back in that land and they will never be uprooted again.
O children of Israel?” says the LORD.
“Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt,
The Philistines from Caphtor,
And the Syrians from Kir?
8 “Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are on the sinful kingdom,
And I will destroy it from the face of the earth;
Yet I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,”
Says the LORD.
9 “For surely I will command,
And will sift the house of Israel among all nations,
As grain is sifted in a sieve;
Yet not the smallest grain shall fall to the ground.
10 All the sinners of My people shall die by the sword,
Who say, ‘The calamity shall not overtake nor confront us.
“On that day I will raise up
The tabernacle[fn] of David, which has fallen down,
And repair its damages;
I will raise up its ruins,
And rebuild it as in the days of old;
12 That they may possess the remnant of Edom,[fn]
And all the Gentiles who are called by My name,”
Says the LORD who does this thing.
13 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the LORD,
“When the plowman shall overtake the reaper,
And the treader of grapes him who sows seed;
The mountains shall drip with sweet wine,
And all the hills shall flow with it.
14 I will bring back the captives of My people Israel;
They shall build the waste cities and inhabit them;
They shall plant vineyards and drink wine from them;
They shall also make gardens and eat fruit from them.
15 I will plant them in their land,
And no longer shall they be pulled up
From the land I have given them,”
Says the LORD your God.
So when you look at passages like this there is a time when Israel is established and permanently that is not defeated again. This coincides with the LORD coming with His saints and being king over all the earth on the day the Mt of Olives splits in two the they proclaim the LORD is king over all the earth. This is the onset of the 1000 year kingdom on earth. The facts is for Daniel 9 to be a future prophecy as we expect Israel would have to be a nation and hated by all the other nations at the time world morality was upsidedown that is evil is good and good is evil and at a time when global government is being formed and a merger of religions is being accomplished. The return of the sacrifices in the temple after the nation of Israel is divided is another key central element for Daniels 70h week to be future for in the middle of the week the sacrifice is stopped. This is amazingly 42 months if you break 7 years into months and matches the time in Rev 13 the beast has control of the world. You make think we are nuts but every element of the literal view is lined up and shouts loudly that this view is tracking with current events. At any rate our hope is to be with Jesus and be prepared for eternity. We see the LORD is promised to do these things. So we expect them to happen just as the events in Jesus 1st advent happened literally.
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