On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 05:55:41 -0700, vince garcia
<vggarciaxx@ix.netcom.com> wrote:

Pastor Dave wrote:

The Error of the Greek Church, which persists today
in the Gentile Churches!

Timothy James

The belief in the failure of Christ’s prophecies stem from
the attempts of a Gentile-dominated church after A.D. 70
trying to understand Jewish concepts. This lack of
understanding should not amaze us, for most of the Jewish
world misunderstood the prophecies of His first coming,
so why should we expect any difference in recognition
of His second coming by Gentile interpreters?

If any literature was written by them after the fall of
Jerusalem that taught the return of Christ in that event,
there is good reason to believe that it was suppressed or
beyond the understanding of the dominant Gentile church.

Careful study of Rabbinic sources shows that the remnant
of the Jewish nation actively destroyed all apocalyptic
works speaking of an imminent end after A.D. 70 because
of its embarrassment to them. Hence, suppression of
Jewish/Christian material referring to fulfilled imminence
was a most likely target of this group also.

Another factor related to this is N. B. Stonehouse’s mention
of a definite division in the church after A.D. 70. Syrian
Christianity was isolated from the Greek world because of
its Aramaic language. This barrier caused a more pure line
of understanding and tradition. Therefore, the Greek church
considered the Syrian church "heretical" because they
rejected the Greek’s sensual chiliasm and held to a
spiritual/figurative understanding of Jewish/Christian
apocalyptic.

This distaste for sensual chiliasm was a major factor in
their total rejection of the Apocalypse in the early Syrian
texts and canon.

It wasn’t till later that Revelation was added, and then
with a heading that placed its date in reign of Nero,
before the A.D. 70 event.

Interpretation of Scripture by the Gentile-dominated church
was caught up in the idea of a physical return and a literal
interpretation of the very figurative Jewish apocalyptic
language found in the book of Revelation and other OT
& NT prophecies.

Yet, even in the early church, Christ’s return was seen
by the Jewish Christians to be a spiritual change in
the authority of the Kingdom. Such can be seen in
the "jumping the gun" of the early church in the teaching
that the Lord had come before A.D. 70, (II Thess. 2:1-2).

This premature teaching was dangerous to the early church
since it implied an acceptance of the Temple cultus, thus
putting Christianity in the category of just a new sect of
Judaism, rather than the fulfillment of the whole thing.
The fact that they believed the Lord had come before A.D. 70
shows that they interpreted His return as a spiritual coming
in the early church. Even though they were premature,
it only supports our early research that they expected
His return just as He said, in that generation.

There are only two main verses that have loosely been used
to assume a physical return of Christ by the Greek-dominated
church.

The first is Acts 1:9-11 (the Ascension), "he was taken up;
and a cloud received him out of their sight". After this
the two angels reassured the disciples saying, "this same
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so
come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven"
(emphasis mine, tj).

The emphasis here is not on the transfigured form, but on
the manner in which he ascended and would return, "in a
cloud". This event was a reaffirmation of Jesus’ being the
apocalyptic "Son of Man" spoken of in Daniel and the
Gospels. That he, "the Son of Man", came with the clouds
of heaven (Daniel 7:13), is later emphatically stated to be
fulfilled in His return, in numerous places (Matt.16:27f;
24:30; Mark 13:26; and Luke 21:27).

The second verse under consideration is Revelation 1:7.
"Behold, he cometh in the clouds and every eye shall see
him, every one which pierced him: and all the kindred
of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.".

Here one finds the same apocalyptic "Son of Man" imagery
regarding His "coming in the clouds". The language of
the text shows that literally, those that would see him
were even who had "pierced him", namely the Jews
(Acts 2:23,36; 5:30).

In His parousia in judgment on the Jewish theocracy,
those that had rejected Him would now "see" the truth
of Jesus’ claims and their error, i.e. a nationalistic
expectation of the Kingdom (Matthew 26:64).

Truly, upon a close investigation of the subject, there are
not any verses in the New Testament that point to any other
manner of coming other than a spiritual parousia of Christ
in a judgment of God’s enemies at the redemptive-historical
end-time of the Old Covenant system.

In fulfilling this event, the bondage of the non-occurence
theory is vanquished.

(Chapter 13 of his book, "THE MESSIAH’S RETURN, Delayed?
Fulfilled? Or Double-Fulfillment?)

http://www.preteristarchive.com/StudyArchive/t/theory_parousia-delay.html

Interesting. SO you consider yourself to be
more along the lines of the Messianics who
think a Judaism/Torah-based religion is
more accurate than Christianity of today?

I will say this without any ill will at all.

I have never said to follow the Torah. That would
be a legalistic approach to the Scriptures and to
Judaize it. The Law was nailed to the cross with
Christ. But there is a difference between trying
to Judaize Christianity and looking at the Scriptures
from a Jewish perspective, which would mean
the perspective of those Jews, in the time in
which they lived and how they viewed the
Old Testament Scriptures, which is what they
preached from. And even their New Testament
writings are based on those Old Testament
Scriptures and I don't think you realize just
how much of the New Testament is direct
quotes of the Old Testament and how much
more of it is alluding to various Old Testament
Scriptures.

And so, if what you got out of it is what you
responded with, then it is due to your ignorance.
That however can be cured. :)

And no, I am not saying you're stupid. Stupid
is far different from ignorant. Ignorant simply
means, "uninformed". And as I said, that can
be cured. :)

This is about looking at the Scriptures from
a Jewish perspective, not from a legalistic
perspective of how to worship Christ today.

The problem comes when trying to interpret Jewish
texts from a Gentile perspective. And that is how
Futurism started. You see, back then, with their
pagan religions that they were brought up with,
they worshipped what they could see. Jews were
considered foolish for worshipping an unseen God.
To Gentiles, it was about them and their time and
their physical world. Now read the texts without
any sense of how a Jew would interpret it, even
though it was a Jew that wrote it and it is easy
to see how the physical is what Futurists wait for
and is why they don't believe that Jesus kept His
promise to return within the same generation
and so, they try to reword any and all passages
which clearly teach a return within the same
generation and prove that the Apostles expected
His return within the same generation and they
try to perform all sorts of mental gymnastics
to get around these clear and simple passages.
They would rather try to say I don't believe in
what the Bible says, because I don't take as
physically literal Jesus flying through the sky
in a cloud and yet, they won't take literally
a simple statement of "this generation",
or "soon", or "quickly", etc.. (:

But the problem today, is pride, ego, arrogance
and vanity and it is rampant in the churches! (:
People today ACTUALLY BELIEVE that the
Apostles were wrong and that they are right
and that it's not a contradiction to say that
and to also say that they taught inerrantly.

Huh?

Allow me to give you an example.

Read the following verse as you would,
as a 21st century Gentile:

"The burden against Egypt. Behold, the Lord
rides on a swift cloud, and will come into Egypt;
The idols of Egypt will totter at His presence,
and the heart of Egypt will melt in its midst."
- Isaiah 19:1

This MUST be about Jesus' return one day, right?
I mean after all, it talks about the Lord riding a
cloud into Egypt. But wait, Jesus doesn't come
riding into Egypt, so how could this be?!?

The truth is, it is a FULFILLED prophecy and was
fulfilled in the 6th century BC. It has nothing to
do with the return of Jesus and was about when
God used the Assyrians to judge Egypt.

Now read the following verse as you normally do:

"...and they will see the Son of Man coming on
the clouds of heaven with power and great glory."
- Matthew 24:30b

Now you wait for this to happen physical and to
physically see Jesus in the sky and so, you utterly
reject the idea that He could have returned yet.

The reality is, no Jew would have interpreted it
that way and the Apostles were Jewish. And to
pretend that they taught like Gentiles, is to do a
disservice to the Holy Scriptures!

A Jew would have known that when this type of
statement is made, the Lord in the clouds simply
refers to His coming in judgment against someone.
Thus, when they heard/read Jesus' words, they
would not have expected Him to be physically
riding a cloud, any more than they thought that
God was actually seen riding a really fast cloud
over Egypt, back in the 6th century BC! :)

The fact is, that it is IMPOSSIBLE (and I do mean
IMPOSSIBLE) to understand the Scriptures and to
rightly divide the word of truth, if you do not know
these people, in that time and aren't intimately
familiar with the way that they thought, spoke,
wrote and lived.

The way you approach it now, is to say that it
doesn't matter. You're going to read them the
way that suits you and the Apostles be damned.
If you want it to be all physical, because you
want it to, then that's what it is, damn it! Right?

If you disagree with my assessment, then why
have you opposed everything I've said so far?

--

A liberal is someone who will give away everything
except his/her own possessions.