Does your view of creation affect your eschatology?

[AnswersInHovind]

A group at my church is doing a Bible study on N.T. Wright's "Surprised by Hope" DVD. I haven't been to the Bible study, but I watched the first couple sessions on my own time to see what he had to say. Wright seems to get a lot of criticism - conservatives seem to think he's too liberal, and liberals seem to find him too conserative, so it made me curious.

He explains that the traditional Christian view of heaven and earth is not that they are seperate. He says also that when we die, we are dead, and stay dead until the ressurection and the second coming, at which point heaven and earth will become one - the new creation.

I read up on this a little, and saw that this view has indeed existed throughout Christian history, and the view that seems to permeate a lot of Christian culture today (Left Behindesque eschatology) seems to be relatively new in the Christian history.

I'm not saying I agree or disagree with this. I'd never heard it before and don't know what to make of it yet, but I notice that this view works very well with a creationist worldview.

I know Wright himself is not a creationist, but I think of the nature defying feat of making heaven and earth one... some powerful event that would result in a new creation, and how that would completely go against all science and reason. It resonates with me the same notions of God forging the universe in 6 days, a notion that goes against our scientific understanding of the world, amplifying the power of God as we perceive it.

I don't really know where I am going with this thread, but I guess its interesting to compare your origins view with your eschatology view. Are they similar? compatible? Or complementary in their differences? Do we believe God made a perfect world that went wrong? Or that the world was never right and is building up to perfection?

Just some thoughts.

 

[juvenissun]

A group at my church is doing a Bible study on N.T. Wright's "Surprised by Hope" DVD. I haven't been to the Bible study, but I watched the first couple sessions on my own time to see what he had to say. Wright seems to get a lot of criticism - conservatives seem to think he's too liberal, and liberals seem to find him too conserative, so it made me curious.

He explains that the traditional Christian view of heaven and earth is not that they are seperate. He says also that when we die, we are dead, and stay dead until the ressurection and the second coming, at which point heaven and earth will become one - the new creation.

I read up on this a little, and saw that this view has indeed existed throughout Christian history, and the view that seems to permeate a lot of Christian culture today (Left Behindesque eschatology) seems to be relatively new in the Christian history.

I'm not saying I agree or disagree with this. I'd never heard it before and don't know what to make of it yet, but I notice that this view works very well with a creationist worldview.

I know Wright himself is not a creationist, but I think of the nature defying feat of making heaven and earth one... some powerful event that would result in a new creation, and how that would completely go against all science and reason. It resonates with me the same notions of God forging the universe in 6 days, a notion that goes against our scientific understanding of the world, amplifying the power of God as we perceive it.

I don't really know where I am going with this thread, but I guess its interesting to compare your origins view with your eschatology view. Are they similar? compatible? Or complementary in their differences? Do we believe God made a perfect world that went wrong? Or that the world was never right and is building up to perfection?

Just some thoughts.

Creationist would have the least problem with what would happen at the end time. The world we know started with miracles and will end with miracles. It is perfect.

 

[Assyrian]

I think TEs have a much longer view of the timescale our eternal God works on, they are also less likely to buy into the more literal interpretations of Revelation we see with the Left Behind series.

What is interesting is the link between end time movements and young earth creationism. Modern YEC actually grew out of the 19th century Millerite movement which fell apart after the Great Disappointment of 1844 when Jesus did not return as expected. One of the movements that emerged from the wreckage was Seven Day Adventism. It was Adventist George McCready Price's work on Flood Geology in the beginning of the 20th century the was the inspiration for Whitcomb and Morris's 1961 book The Genesis Flood. Until then American creationism was old earth creationism, whose quarrel was with evolution, not the age of the earth. The Adventist young earth view was very much a fringe view held by them a a few Lutheran groups. It was with Whitcomb and Morris's book that modern young earth creationism took off.

 

[AnswersInHovind]

I think TEs have a much longer view of the timescale our eternal God works on, they are also less likely to buy into the more literal interpretations of Revelation we see with the Left Behind series.

What is interesting is the link between end time movements and young earth creationism. Modern YEC actually grew out of the 19th century Millerite movement which fell apart after the Great Disappointment of 1844 when Jesus did not return as expected. One of the movements that emerged from the wreckage was Seven Day Adventism. It was Adventist George McCready Price's work on Flood Geology in the beginning of the 20th century the was the inspiration for Whitcomb and Morris's 1961 book The Genesis Flood. Until then American creationism was old earth creationism, whose quarrel was with evolution, not the age of the earth. The Adventist young earth view was very much a fringe view held by them a a few Lutheran groups. It was with Whitcomb and Morris's book that modern young earth creationism took off.

The rapture, what I would say was the start of modern evangelical eschatology, became popular initially in the late 1700's.

I would say the only difference between what you call "modern" YEC, and traditional YEC is depth to which science has been pulled into the discussion, which would make sense considering we are comparing pre and post enlightenment views.

But science can be found even in early creationism as an attempt to reconcile it. In the 4th century, Basil wrote against the symbolic view of Genesis held by Augustine (not directly against Augustine, but toward that camp) by trying to show how rain worked, and thus, the clouds are the waters that Genesis is talking about (not saying modern YEC agrees with this, but it is an example of "science")

It seems both views (literal/symbolic Genesis 1) can be shown to exist throughout history, and both views can be shown to have resurgance in the modern era. I think because until the modern era, it was mainly a side issue in the church, and the enlightenment forced people to finally pick sides and "prove" them.

I don't think that eschatology and creation views are linked in their development.

 

[crawfish]

I don't think that eschatology and creation views are linked in their development.

I would agree here, except to agree with Assyrian that TE is far less likely to be Dispensationalist. In fact, I don't think I know a single TE Dispensationalist, and would be shocked if I ever met one.

Many of the stronger YEC's I know personally are also Dispensationalists. Both are pretty verse-literal and appeal to a certain mindset.

 

[AnswersInHovind]

I would agree here, except to agree with Assyrian that TE is far less likely to be Dispensationalist. In fact, I don't think I know a single TE Dispensationalist, and would be shocked if I ever met one.

Many of the stronger YEC's I know personally are also Dispensationalists. Both are pretty verse-literal and appeal to a certain mindset.

Just because, I have abandoned YEC and taken up dispensationalism and TE for the rest of the day!

That just happened.

 

[Knee V]

I tend to be mostly agnostic on both beginning and end. I guess my origins and eschatology have that in common.

 

[dies-l]

It's been a while since I read Surprised by Hope, but from what I remember, Wright's position is not that we are dead and stay dead until the resurrection. Rather, I believe his position is that we exist in a place called "Paradise", about which he asserts that the Bible does not tell us much.

My personal view is largely in agreement with Wright. I don't know what his origins theology is, but I will say that I accept the possibility of both evolution and universe that is billions of years old. I find both to be more plausible than the YEC alternative. But, as I am not a scientist, I admit that I do not know for sure.

But, I think that Wright's eschatology works the same, if not better, within a literalist creation (e.g., YEC or OEC) framework. Wright appears to view the Gospel narrative as a restoration of the perfect creation that existed before it was corrupted by sin. I believe that he sees the final chapters of Revelation as reflecting the opening chapters of Genesis. In this view, God created Eden, as a perfect garden for his people to dwell in. Their sinfulness caused them to be banished from it, and since then God has been seeking to restore it. In the end, the garden of Eden is replaced with the New City of Jerusalem. And, the essential difference is that, what was once a perfect dwelling place for a single family is now a perfect vibrant city for all of humanity.

Understanding it this way, I believe that this eschatological view is most consistent with entirety of Scripture. And, I believe that a literal interpretation of Genesis 1-2 would call for a very literal interpretation of Revelation 21-22. A more figurative interpretation of the former might call for a more figurative interpretation of the latter. However, I think, in either event, our hope is that God did create us to live in perfection and ultimately will restore that perfection.

 

[Assyrian]

The rapture, what I would say was the start of modern evangelical eschatology, became popular initially in the late 1700's.

I would say the only difference between what you call "modern" YEC, and traditional YEC is depth to which science has been pulled into the discussion, which would make sense considering we are comparing pre and post enlightenment views.

But science can be found even in early creationism as an attempt to reconcile it. In the 4th century, Basil wrote against the symbolic view of Genesis held by Augustine (not directly against Augustine, but toward that camp) by trying to show how rain worked, and thus, the clouds are the waters that Genesis is talking about (not saying modern YEC agrees with this, but it is an example of "science")

It seems both views (literal/symbolic Genesis 1) can be shown to exist throughout history, and both views can be shown to have resurgance in the modern era. I think because until the modern era, it was mainly a side issue in the church, and the enlightenment forced people to finally pick sides and "prove" them.

I don't think that eschatology and creation views are linked in their development.

It does in that modern creationism has its direct historical roots in a particularly wild 'sell your farms and houses because Jesus is about to come back' movement from the 1840s. Of course futurist eschatology is much wider and was around longer than the Millerites, but it was the Millerites and its disasterous Great Disappointment that Adventism and modern YEC came from. There are similarities, a family resemblance in the hermeneutics too, a tendency towards literalism of course, but also the conviction you have got scripture figured out, and that you can tie God down to a specific timetable. The difference is one is working out Revelation and Daniel, the other Genesis.

In terms of science, of course throughout church history you are going to get people talking about the bible in terms of their understanding of science when it comes up. More important was the idea that it is possible to have different interpretations, that are perfectly reasonable ways to approach scripture, and there may be no way to tell which, if any is the right meaning. But if some new scientific discovery comes along and shows one of the interpretation was wrong, then that never was the real meaning of scripture. And we have people throughout church history as you say, interpreting Genesis literally or figuratively, and it simply wasn't a problem. Either approach was valid. We see this with the Copernican controversy, even though everyone interpreted scripture as teaching the sun went round the earth, once heliocentrism began to become established, the church went back to the drawing board and found new ways to interpret the geocentric passages. That is what happened too as modern geology began to show us the age of the earth, apart from the odd fringe group, the church found new ways to read Genesis, like Gap Theory and Day Age, which were the positions of all of the founders of the Fundamentalist movement. The difference between modern creationists and historical six day interpretations is that modern creationism is insisting on an interpretation that has been shown to be wrong, something their literal six day predecessors were not faced with, and from what we know of them, would have rejected.

 

[juvenissun]

I think TEs have a much longer view of the timescale our eternal God works on, they are also less likely to buy into the more literal interpretations of Revelation we see with the Left Behind series.

What is interesting is the link between end time movements and young earth creationism. Modern YEC actually grew out of the 19th century Millerite movement which fell apart after the Great Disappointment of 1844 when Jesus did not return as expected. One of the movements that emerged from the wreckage was Seven Day Adventism. It was Adventist George McCready Price's work on Flood Geology in the beginning of the 20th century the was the inspiration for Whitcomb and Morris's 1961 book The Genesis Flood. Until then American creationism was old earth creationism, whose quarrel was with evolution, not the age of the earth. The Adventist young earth view was very much a fringe view held by them a a few Lutheran groups. It was with Whitcomb and Morris's book that modern young earth creationism took off.

I think you are looking too much into the history. I believe that the stand which a Christian takes, whether YEC, OEC or TE, has little to do with what other people said. One developed a preferred view on his own, and looked around to see which group is the best to fit in. For example, I am actually neither YEC nor OEC. But without a clear category for me, I simply choose YEC. I don't really know what is the special doctrine of Baptist. I don't think I will agree with all they said. But I like baptism, so I call myself a Baptist. I like Whitcomb and Morris. But they are not the reason for me to be a YEC. The reason for the expansion of modern YEC is not Whitcomb and Morris. According to me, the real reason should be the fast advance of sciences.

History summarizes the behavior of people. History does not guide the behavior of people. In other words, something else is pushing church people to "modern" YEC.

 

[hamashiachagape]

A group at my church is doing a Bible study on N.T. Wright's "Surprised by Hope" DVD. I haven't been to the Bible study, but I watched the first couple sessions on my own time to see what he had to say. Wright seems to get a lot of criticism - conservatives seem to think he's too liberal, and liberals seem to find him too conserative, so it made me curious.

He explains that the traditional Christian view of heaven and earth is not that they are seperate. He says also that when we die, we are dead, and stay dead until the ressurection and the second coming, at which point heaven and earth will become one - the new creation.

I read up on this a little, and saw that this view has indeed existed throughout Christian history, and the view that seems to permeate a lot of Christian culture today (Left Behindesque eschatology) seems to be relatively new in the Christian history.

I'm not saying I agree or disagree with this. I'd never heard it before and don't know what to make of it yet, but I notice that this view works very well with a creationist worldview.

I know Wright himself is not a creationist, but I think of the nature defying feat of making heaven and earth one... some powerful event that would result in a new creation, and how that would completely go against all science and reason. It resonates with me the same notions of God forging the universe in 6 days, a notion that goes against our scientific understanding of the world, amplifying the power of God as we perceive it.

I don't really know where I am going with this thread, but I guess its interesting to compare your origins view with your eschatology view. Are they similar? compatible? Or complementary in their differences? Do we believe God made a perfect world that went wrong? Or that the world was never right and is building up to perfection?

Just some thoughts.

I think N.T. Wright has some good points there, especially given Ecclesiastes 1:4. If the Earth is to remain forever, then it needs to be rejoined to heaven. Left Behind Eschatology..is very poor Theology.

My origins Science view with my Eschatology? I honestly don't find them to be interrelated, though I have written about my Eschatology here -http://hamashiachagape.blogspot.com/2010/08/letter-to-brian-simmons-on-few.html which was a letter to Brian Simmons that got posted onto his website. I believe his Eschatology was Dispensational.

 

[DanuckInUSA]

Escha-wha?

 

[hamashiachagape]

I think TEs have a much longer view of the timescale our eternal God works on, they are also less likely to buy into the more literal interpretations of Revelation we see with the Left Behind series.

What is interesting is the link between end time movements and young earth creationism. Modern YEC actually grew out of the 19th century Millerite movement which fell apart after the Great Disappointment of 1844 when Jesus did not return as expected. One of the movements that emerged from the wreckage was Seven Day Adventism. It was Adventist George McCready Price's work on Flood Geology in the beginning of the 20th century the was the inspiration for Whitcomb and Morris's 1961 book The Genesis Flood. Until then American creationism was old earth creationism, whose quarrel was with evolution, not the age of the earth. The Adventist young earth view was very much a fringe view held by them a a few Lutheran groups. It was with Whitcomb and Morris's book that modern young earth creationism took off.

Given all of the young earth Creation views from the past from the early church fathers (except for perhaps your beloved Origen and a few other fringees)..and even from Jewish resources such as Josephus, I find the above comment quite hiliarious . Also..what to say of Isaac Newton? He was a Young Earther too.

 

[hamashiachagape]

Escha-wha?

Sorry. Eschatology is the study of end time prophecy.

 

[hamashiachagape]

I would agree here, except to agree with Assyrian that TE is far less likely to be Dispensationalist. In fact, I don't think I know a single TE Dispensationalist, and would be shocked if I ever met one.

Many of the stronger YEC's I know personally are also Dispensationalists. Both are pretty verse-literal and appeal to a certain mindset.

All I can say is that I stick with the Hebrew and Greek, and the societal context. If thats dispensational..okay . We go with a ministerial use of reasoning and not a magisterial, and that is a key dif between YEC and TE. This is evidently seen from Hugh Ross, who calls Science the 67th book of the Bible.

 

[Mick116]

I would agree here, except to agree with Assyrian that TE is far less likely to be Dispensationalist. In fact, I don't think I know a single TE Dispensationalist, and would be shocked if I ever met one.

Many of the stronger YEC's I know personally are also Dispensationalists. Both are pretty verse-literal and appeal to a certain mindset.

I wonder if such a combination (TE and dispensationalism) is more common amongst the descendents of the Irvingites/Catholic Apostolic Church?

According to their websites, such groups seem rather open to a (qualified) acceptance of evolution. I'm not sure if their creeds are strictly "dispensational", but there is certainly overlap, with beliefs such as an imminent rapture of the church to a heavenly "marriage union" with the Lamb, followed by the pre-millennial return of Christ with his saints; the millennium itself is viewed as a time of peace under the direct rulership of Christ, where Satan is bound, and is followed by a releasing of Satan, a "final struggle", and eventually a New Heaven and a New Earth.

 

[AnswersInHovind]

It does in that modern creationism has its direct historical roots in a particularly wild 'sell your farms and houses because Jesus is about to come back' movement from the 1840s. Of course futurist eschatology is much wider and was around longer than the Millerites, but it was the Millerites and its disasterous Great Disappointment that Adventism and modern YEC came from. There are similarities, a family resemblance in the hermeneutics too, a tendency towards literalism of course, but also the conviction you have got scripture figured out, and that you can tie God down to a specific timetable. The difference is one is working out Revelation and Daniel, the other Genesis.

In terms of science, of course throughout church history you are going to get people talking about the bible in terms of their understanding of science when it comes up. More important was the idea that it is possible to have different interpretations, that are perfectly reasonable ways to approach scripture, and there may be no way to tell which, if any is the right meaning. But if some new scientific discovery comes along and shows one of the interpretation was wrong, then that never was the real meaning of scripture. And we have people throughout church history as you say, interpreting Genesis literally or figuratively, and it simply wasn't a problem. Either approach was valid. We see this with the Copernican controversy, even though everyone interpreted scripture as teaching the sun went round the earth, once heliocentrism began to become established, the church went back to the drawing board and found new ways to interpret the geocentric passages. That is what happened too as modern geology began to show us the age of the earth, apart from the odd fringe group, the church found new ways to read Genesis, like Gap Theory and Day Age, which were the positions of all of the founders of the Fundamentalist movement. The difference between modern creationists and historical six day interpretations is that modern creationism is insisting on an interpretation that has been shown to be wrong, something their literal six day predecessors were not faced with, and from what we know of them, would have rejected.

edit:
I don't think I follow. The only difference between modern creationism and traditional creationism is that modern creationism denies evidence of an old earth, and because this evidence denial came at the same time as dispensationalism, they are connected?

 

[mark kennedy]

A group at my church is doing a Bible study on N.T. Wright's "Surprised by Hope" DVD. I haven't been to the Bible study, but I watched the first couple sessions on my own time to see what he had to say. Wright seems to get a lot of criticism - conservatives seem to think he's too liberal, and liberals seem to find him too conserative, so it made me curious.

He explains that the traditional Christian view of heaven and earth is not that they are seperate. He says also that when we die, we are dead, and stay dead until the ressurection and the second coming, at which point heaven and earth will become one - the new creation.

There is the concept of absent from the body, present with the Lord. Neither heaven nor earth are perfect, in fact, Revelations describes war in heaven and God burns both the heavens and the earth up. Some fundamental misconceptions there but it's not surprising since Bible literacy is at an all time low.

I read up on this a little, and saw that this view has indeed existed throughout Christian history, and the view that seems to permeate a lot of Christian culture today (Left Behindesque eschatology) seems to be relatively new in the Christian history.

A pretribulation rapture, in fact, speculation about when the rapture will occur seems to drive this sort of thing. The Left Behind series was woefully distant from the message of Revelations. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to be critical it's just impossible to reconcile the jet set Christian lifestyle of the Left Behind Series with the description of tribulation saints with John's Revelation.

I'm not saying I agree or disagree with this. I'd never heard it before and don't know what to make of it yet, but I notice that this view works very well with a creationist worldview.

In the sense that it's taken literally I think you might be right.

I know Wright himself is not a creationist, but I think of the nature defying feat of making heaven and earth one... some powerful event that would result in a new creation, and how that would completely go against all science and reason. It resonates with me the same notions of God forging the universe in 6 days, a notion that goes against our scientific understanding of the world, amplifying the power of God as we perceive it.

The same power at the creation and resurrection will again manifest itself at the second creation. None of this is complex, the relationship is pretty straight forward.

I don't really know where I am going with this thread, but I guess its interesting to compare your origins view with your eschatology view. Are they similar? compatible? Or complementary in their differences? Do we believe God made a perfect world that went wrong? Or that the world was never right and is building up to perfection?

Just some thoughts.

Consider this, Revelations is actually a fairly short book that comes in three parts. It has nowhere near the detailed expositions of Romans, Hebrews or Matthew. The first section Rev 1-7 are the Church and the 7 Seals, 8-14 are the 7 Trumpets and finally there are 7 vials of wrath. The 22nd chapter focuses on the eternal state.

There is a strong correlation between Revelations and Genesis and I've seen detailed expositions to that effect. To compare the two as literature makes a pretty interesting study. When people start getting into end time scenarios there is just too much speculation that goes on.

I loved Hal Lindsey's 'The Late Great Planet Earth' until I actually learned the text. I used to like the Romans Road approach to tracts until I actually started learning the book of Romans. The downside to learning the Bible is so much popular Christian press is rendered meaningless.

This is my point. If there is a coherent way of cross referencing the two I would suggest word searches. There is also something about how things are organized numerically. That might not sound like earthshaking breakthroughs
but a lot of what the Bible has to offer only really comes through in prayer and personal study.

I have one little tid bit that you might find helpful. There is an old rule of thumb that the significance of a word or image in Scripture goes back to the first mention of it in the Bible. So when looking at the seals, trumpets and vials the principle would be found in the days of creation. Try it sometime, it's more significant then you might realize at a glance.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[mark kennedy]

Given all of the young earth Creation views from the past from the early church fathers (except for perhaps your beloved Origen and a few other fringees)..and even from Jewish resources such as Josephus, I find the above comment quite hiliarious . Also..what to say of Isaac Newton? He was a Young Earther too.

Most people were young earthers in Newton's time, it wasn't an issue then like now.

Newton was into some kind of eschatology based on the architecture of the temple. Love the guys science but theologically he was a loon.

 

[Assyrian]

I think you are looking too much into the history. I believe that the stand which a Christian takes, whether YEC, OEC or TE, has little to do with what other people said. One developed a preferred view on his own, and looked around to see which group is the best to fit in. For example, I am actually neither YEC nor OEC. But without a clear category for me, I simply choose YEC. I don't really know what is the special doctrine of Baptist. I don't think I will agree with all they said. But I like baptism, so I call myself a Baptist. I like Whitcomb and Morris. But they are not the reason for me to be a YEC. The reason for the expansion of modern YEC is not Whitcomb and Morris. According to me, the real reason should be the fast advance of sciences.

History summarizes the behavior of people. History does not guide the behavior of people. In other words, something else is pushing church people to "modern" YEC.

Never understood how you can call yourself YEC when you are clearly OEC Still you are probably quite right that the sociological context played an important part, the rapid development of science, especially as Victorian optimism gave way to a fear of where science was leading, Whitcomb and Morris wrote under the (metaphorical) shadow of a mushroom cloud, in the middle of a Cold War threatening to go hot. But this context did not give us YEC what it did was provided fertile ground when the Adventist teaching Flood Geology found a more mainstream voice in Whitcomb and Morris.