Post-mill, Pre-mill, A-mill

[tideh8rGator]

Originally Posted by Dreamliner

You left out: (D) obesity is killing us!

One can only type so much LOL

[Lawdog88]

Originally Posted by tideh8rGator

Regarding the thread title...

Remove the nametags from these views and tell me which one looks more like the History Of The World:

A. A period of universal peace began in the early 1st century and has heretofore gone unrecognized by virtually ALL the human race

B. The world will gradually improve through the centuries and get better and better and better until some fine, fair day far off when man shall eradicate ALL bad things and we shall all join hands in a utopia free of all blights of the human condition

C. The world will get gradually worse and worse and be at a breaking point at last when it simply can't keep going on any longer in its present state and MUST be remade by God's hand before it destroys itself by man's hand

One would be INSANE to believe EITHER "A" or "B".

Yes, make no mistake I am a PREMILLENIALIST. Primarily because I am a BIBLE BELIEVER. I see NO other coherent view of eschatology contained within its pages.

Tahdhater Gator, nice to see you on TH for a change, and totally agree with the portion of your post quoted above.

I got the part about you being a Bible believer, but I have to ask, how are the words of the Bible confirmed as being true in your life ? (I assume without knowing that you are convinced not only by the words themselves, but by something else).

With respect to the Holy Spirit, do the scriptures confirm the presence and working of the Holy Spirit, or does the Holy Spirit confirm the truth of the scriptures ? Is it through a one-time spiritual experience, or a continuing one (if it is at all) ?

If none of the above, let 'er rip.

Thanks.

[wargunfan]

The absence of the Holy Spirit in the life of a "Christian" should drive that person into a serious self examination of their spiritual condition. The Holy Spirit so permeates the New Testament and the daily lives of Christians that a denial of its existence calls into question the reality of that persons conversion. To be "agnostic" on the existence or role of the Holy Spirit and claim to be a Christian is a contradiction in terms. We do not get to choose which parts of the Godhead we will esteem and worship. This denial or even doubt must be put to rest for it reaches into the very core of ones conversion. Jesus esteemed the Holy Spirit above himself. To concur with Jesus that He and the Father are one and deny that the Holy Spirit is of a greater essence than Jesus as He inferred is to disagree with Christ. When Christ testified that "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. And so I tell you, people will be forgiven every sin and blasphemy. But the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come." He was not speaking of an angel or a spiritual messenger. He was speaking of the Godhead.
Here is a warning and a promise:
Galatians 6:6-8 Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things.

7 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

8 For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.

[reformedgator]

Spot on!

[Dreamliner]

Poppycock! The Holy Spirit was a downpayment.

You Stillwaitingists remind me of the CS Lewis quote on half-heartedness, "Like a child who makes mudpies, because she doesn't know what is meant by a holiday by the sea."

[reformedgator]

The indwelling Spirit is the holiday by the sea. Claiming it to be merely a down payment is like eating at McDonalds & believing you're dining at Ruth Cris.

[lacuna]

This debate is as useful as the one concerning how many angels can dance on the point of a pin.

[gatorplank]

Originally Posted by Lawdog88

Again . . . the alleged contemporaries (Disciples, certainly) never saw anything, and of course, never reported it, either in the Synoptic Gospels - all written well after 70 AD (possibly Mark, being excepted, which may have been written between 60-70 AD), or in the Revelation of St. John and his Gospel or in Acts, written in the 90's. And of course, none of these writings bother to amend any of the writings of Paul, already extant at the time, with the happy news that Jesus the Christ had returned, just as promised.

Again . . . there is no report that either the Disciples or any random person standing around when Jesus was alive, later witnessed the FULFILMENT of Jesus' PROMISE to return, i.e., his BODILY return in the form in which He ascended, from the sky, just as He left, with all men watching, in 70 A.D.

Again . . . there is not one jot, tittle, parchment fragment, side-book, ancillary writing, cross-reference, rumor, oral history, or wife's tale remotely suggesting that the Resurrected Christ returned to claim His church; issue judgment on all men and acts; separate the wheat from the chaff, the tares from the good plants, and sheep from the goats; and subjugate evil.

The last time I looked, the lion does not lay down with the sheep; mankind still makes rifles and not plows; there is still sadness, sickness, anger in the heart and tears in eyes of hurting people; and the source of evil has not been put under God's feet and eliminated forever.

The Holy Spirit has been given to comfort and seal the salvation of all men who would turn to Christ until that day. That is what we have now. Yes, we claim God's blessings now in our temporal lives, and those carry us on over to eternity . . . until He Comes Again.

In sum, there is no way whatsoever, that one of the essential promises of the Gospel - and arguably, the one on which the entire Gospel message hangs, i.e., Christ's return as the judge of mankind, all acts, and all evil - would have been left out of the Gospel story during the years when it was being written.

It is not a minor omission. It has not happened.

Ye err.

Nicely said LD. I can't stomach the idea that God would allow evil to exist forever. It just doesn't sit well with the soul. I seem to remember a passage about sin and death being thrown into the lake of fire. Our current reality does not seem to align with a world where that has happened.

I have refrained from saying too much in this thread, but I have to admit that Full Preterism has impressed me in one way. If fundamentalism is rigid and wooden, then Full Preterism is like reinforced steel when it comes to the 2 or 3 verses which it rests on.

[Dreamliner]

Originally Posted by reformedgator

The indwelling Spirit is the holiday by the sea. Claiming it to be merely a down payment is like eating at McDonalds & believing you're dining at Ruth Cris.

Ironically, that PRECISELY describes Stillwaitingists like yourself. You blithely lay claim to promises which are not in effect ... if we're still waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting ...

[Dreamliner]

Originally Posted by lacuna

This debate is as useful as the one concerning how many angels can dance on the point of a pin.

I'm going to dig in here if you don't mind. I can't stand the hypocrisy of Christians, who will not take Jesus at his word, then proceed to anathematize others.

[reformedgator]

Originally Posted by Dreamliner

Ironically, that PRECISELY describes Stillwaitingists like yourself. You blithely lay claim to promises which are not in effect ... if we're still waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting ...

They may not think they are in effect for you, but they are for me & all that are truly in Christ. I don't what you think it is I'm waiting for. It may now be "but a poor reflection as in a mirror" but there will come a time when "we shall see face to face".
The Christian will know the Lord(Christ) to the fullest extent possible for a finite being, similar to the way the Lord knows the Christian fully & indefinitely. But this will not be true until the Lord returns.

[gatorplank]

Originally Posted by lacuna

This debate is as useful as the one concerning how many angels can dance on the point of a pin.

The debate in and of itself probably isn't "useful" per say, but what side you end up on will be determined by whatever spirit dwells in you. The Spirit of God is a powerful powerful force in the life of a believer. If the Spirit is there the Spirit will make His presence known.

[Dreamliner]

Originally Posted by reformedgator

They may not think they are in effect for you, but they are for me & all that are truly in Christ. I don't what you think it is I'm waiting for. It may now be "but a poor reflection as in a mirror" but there will come a time when "we shall see face to face".
The Christian will know the Lord(Christ) to the fullest extent possible for a finite being, similar to the way the Lord knows the Christian fully & indefinitely. But this will not be true until the Lord returns.

Give me back my filet mignon and kindly stick to your burger. If you're still waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting ... (1) the law is still in force, every jot and tittle (2) you take a dirt nap when you die and (3) you are, in fact, STILL waiting for Jesus to return bringing salvation (Heb 9).

And this is on top of anathematizing people who do not line up with you, on disputable matters, while refusing to take Jesus at his own word.

[lacuna]

Rabbi Mendel Dubov is currently teaching a multi-part series on Jewish history on the Chabad.org website. The latest hour long episode is a detailed accounting of the first half of the first century CE up to the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE according to the historical records preserved in and with the Jerusalem Talmud.

Unfortunately Rabbi Mendel is not an especially gifted speaker, but his talk is filled with information from the Jewish perspective pertinent to the discussion on this thread. If you have interest in this subject you will probably find it worth your time to take the hour to listen to him.

Among other things he discusses the reasons the Jewish population doubled around the time of Paul's ministry. When he refers to Jesus, Rabbi Mendel calls him Yeshu. He also speaks of the great sages Hillel and Shammai who both headed their own schools of Jewish thought that were active at the time of Jesus. Students in the beit of Hillel or Shammai would have carried the yoke of their chosen teacher and assumed burdens of obligation assigned by his teacher. Those terms would have been very familiar to a first century yeshiva student listening to Jesus.

Rabbi Mendel also mentions the famous incident of the Gentile convert asking Hillel to teach him the Torah while he stood on one foot. He does not further the story to add that Hillel did exactly that when he told the convert the heart of the law was to 'love God with all your heart, strength and soul, and other people as yourself.' Hillel famously went on to add, "all the rest is commentary."

http://www.chabad.org/multimedia/liv...ond-Temple.htm

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