THE HERE I STAND THEOLOGY PODCAST Interview with Jeremiah Nortier The Dangers of Full Preterism

Here I Stand Theology

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May 10, 2023

THE HERE I STAND THEOLOGY PODCAST Interview with Jeremiah Nortier The Dangers of Full Preterism Recorded on May 9, 2023

00:00: All right, y 'all, so I want you to take a look at this. What we know is the
00:05: Great Commission. Has it been fulfilled? Yes, and it wasn't fulfilled in our lifetime. It was fulfilled in the first century.
00:12: The reason that the commission had to be fulfilled is because the gospel had to go to the
00:18: Gentiles and the kingdom, the new covenant kingdom, had to be built and expanded, and it was.
00:24: And that was the picture. And it was necessary that the gospel reach all of these inhabited people in the known world in order that the second coming might happen.
00:34: It had to happen then. And I believe with all my heart, according to the testimony of the scripture, that it did happen.
00:52: You need to hold on to your britches for this one. It's going to be a good one. We've got Jeremiah Nortier on with us, the apologetic dog.
01:01: Hang tight. We'll be right back. The Here I Stand Theology Podcast is a ministry of Reformation Baptist Church and a member of the
01:09: Truth In Love Network. Please consider heading over to YouTube, Spotify, or your podcatcher of choice, and subscribing to the
01:16: Here I Stand Theology Podcast today. Unless I am convinced by scripture and by plain reason, and not by popes and councils who have so often contradicted themselves, my conscience is captive to the word of God To go against conscience is neither right nor safe.
01:49: I cannot and I will not. I can't.
01:56: Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me.
02:10: And welcome to the Here I Stand Theology Podcast. Here I stand. I can do no other.
02:17: God help me. So the Here I Stand Theology Podcast is a ministry of Reformation Baptist Church, of which
02:24: I am an elder and a pastor alongside the two other elders that serve there.
02:29: So we are accountable for the things that we say, and we are accountable for the theology that we communicate.
02:36: Today, we're not going to waste any time. We're going to get right into the episode. We have with us
02:42: Jeremiah Nortier. If you want to sound fancy, it's Nortier. If you're just country, it's
02:48: Nortier, and we'll let him tell us what his wife calls him due to a traumatic scar that was left on him in his basketball days.
02:59: In any case, let's bring in Jeremiah. Jeremiah Nortier, the apologetic dog.
03:20: Hey, I appreciate that standing ovation. I felt that. So I got to tell people, so I used to play basketball.
03:27: I was point guard, and the announcers would announce my name, Jeremiah High Flying, and then they would always get my last name wrong.
03:35: And so my favorite mispronunciation was Nortier, and I'm like, that will always stick with me.
03:41: And so my wife reminds me of that. She calls me Jeremiah Nortier, and I'm like, thanks, babe. Well, let me,
03:49: I should have read this in the beginning, but I'm going to go ahead and read this now. Jeremiah's bio is as follows.
03:55: He was born and raised, according to his bio, right here in Jonesboro, Arkansas.
04:01: He is here in Jonesboro, Arkansas. I am not here in Jonesboro, Arkansas. I am in Knoxville, Tennessee.
04:08: So we're coming at you live from Ramsey Manor in the studio. Needless to say,
04:14: Jeremiah attended Westside High School, graduated from Arkansas State University. He's been in ministry now for seven years.
04:21: His love for God, theology, and apologetics and people are evident as he teaches the saints.
04:28: And I got to say amen to that from what I've seen online, brother. He and his wife, Allie, have been married since 2015, and she has been continually his number one supporter in the ministry, as should the case be, my brother.
04:43: A good wife is a hard thing to find. That is so true. I'm going to add one more thing in there. We have a six -month -old baby boy,
04:51: J .J. Nortier. We adopted the day he was born. It was the hand of God, and we refer to him as the apologetic puppy a lot of times.
05:00: Praise the Lord. And what's his name again? J .J. Jude Jeremiah. Awesome.
05:06: Fantastic. Well, congratulations on that, too. Thank you. So, Jeremiah, I know
05:14: I read your bio, but tell us a little bit about yourself. Where you got to be? How you got to be where you are?
05:20: Particularly, let's start with your testimony. Absolutely. Well, I grew up in church, and so I praise the
05:27: Lord for that. That guarded me from a lot of things that could have happened differently. I was raised in a
05:32: Christian home, and I believe the Lord saved me when I was 14 years old. I knew all the facts about the gospel, but I remember being 14.
05:41: I watched someone else's testimony. The pastor came over to the house that evening, and I was just clawed so convicted over my sin.
05:49: I was just weeping, and I knew I was simply a fan of Jesus, not a follower, and I just wanted to give it all to him.
05:56: I remember that so clearly when I was 14 years old. Back in 2006, I wrote the date down,
06:02: October 6th, 920 p .m. And I know not everybody has that, but I'll never forget.
06:08: That was recommended to do. And so from 14, I truly believe I was made right before God.
06:15: But Claude, I don't recall just a ton of sanctification in my life when
06:21: I was 14 until I was about 21 in college. And so that's where God just really grabbed a hold of my heart.
06:30: Massive sanctification. Realized, you know, what am I doing with my life? I need to be in the word.
06:35: I want to know my Lord and Savior more and more. And that is the sphere. Also, I began to have the call to ministry.
06:42: So that's just a quick flower version. Praise the Lord. That is great. That is great.
06:48: So you serve at 12 .5 Church. Tell us about the 12 .5 Church. Oh, so I tell you,
06:55: Claude, 12 .5 Church is an amazing place. We are a church plant coming up on three years.
07:03: And so I've been here from literally the very get -go serving with Pastor Nathan Hargrave, as well. We started out with just his family and my family.
07:12: Zero dollar budget. Zero other families. Three years later, we have close to 60 members.
07:18: Our budget, I would just say we are very blessed. We are looking to relocate with a bigger facility, all these things.
07:25: And it's just the hand of God. God has absolutely pressed upon my heart and Nathan's heart to facilitate a gospel culture.
07:33: One where true discipleship can happen to where not only hospitality and fellowship can happen, but also learning sound doctrine and learning theology.
07:43: And people understand how important that is. And that's how you flourish in the grace and knowledge of our
07:49: Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We are to grow into these things. So 12 .5 Church is in Jonesboro, Arkansas.
07:56: So if you're in Northeast Arkansas, please look us up. We would love for you to come and visit and check out our fellowship.
08:01: Claude, I'll tell you something very different that we do. After the sermon, usually that's the close of a service.
08:09: Our service keeps going. It goes straight into what we call Koinonia Feast. The early church had that love feast.
08:16: And so we have men, women every Sunday bring so much food. Bring enough for you and your family and then a little bit extra.
08:25: And you would be amazed with all the food that we have. But we get a time of sweet fellowship every week.
08:32: And I mean, we eat for a while and then afterwards we have sermon Q &A, sermon discussion to where almost everyone stays for that.
08:41: And then we do our benediction after the sermon Q &A. And so I just every week we get hours upon hours of sweet fellowship, not just minutes upon minutes where you turn around and greet your neighbor.
08:54: Anyway, that's a little bit about my church home. That's a blessing. So tell us how the name came about, 12 -5.
09:02: Oh, man. Well, that's fine. I give Pastor Nathan a hard time about this because he's the visionary there. Because I remember us talking about future church plant names, things that he was excited about.
09:14: And he wanted to stand distinct within Jonesboro because Jonesboro is the city of churches.
09:20: And so he wanted something that was a little bit distinct. And so 12 -5 comes from Romans 12, verse 5.
09:28: That's a reverse reference to the church body. Though we are individually one of another, we are one together in the body of Christ.
09:36: And so we're Reformed Baptists. You don't really see that advertised. I mean, we are just evangelical church.
09:43: But when you come on the inside, there is a zeal for robust, sound theology.
09:50: And we contend for that with love, with grace. And we tell people in order to have a right understanding of who man is, a right biblical anthropology, you need to have first a right understanding of who
10:02: God is and His sovereignty. And when you kind of start with that foundation, everything seems to line from there and flow from there.
10:11: And it's just been phenomenal. In fact, on our Wednesday nights, we do discipleship.
10:16: I'm teaching the youth in First John, and they'll have me come over to the adults. Like I taught on the
10:22: Trinity not too long ago. But the adults are going through R .C. Sproul's book, Everyone's a
10:28: Theologian, An Introduction to Systematic Theology, because they're getting that taste of like, we care about the whole counsel of God and its richness.
10:37: Amen. Amen. That is so important. God down, not man up. That's how theology is taught.
10:43: Let's play this brand new promo. You're going to be the first one to hear it. You're going to be the first one to benefit from it.
10:50: You are getting affected by this greater than anybody because we're directly connected via the interwebs right now.
10:57: So everybody else is going to get this later. So here we go. Let's go ahead and play this promo real quick.
11:03: Grace and peace, everybody. This is Tony from The Standard Beard Care. Let me give you a little pop quiz. What did
11:10: Charles Spurgeon, J .C. Ryle, and Claude Ramsey all have in common? Besides great theology, all three of them have awesome beards.
11:19: Claude himself is using product from The Standard Beard Care. So if you want to look like Claude, and let's face it, who doesn't?
11:27: Head over to thestandardbeardcare .com and check out the vast array of all -natural, handcrafted products to make that beard, well, look a lot like Claude's.
11:37: But if you're listening and you don't have a beard, don't worry. We got you covered. Coming very soon to The Standard Beard Care family will be an all -natural line of total men's care products, such as deodorants and body sprays, and a whole lot more.
11:53: So again, head over to thestandardbeardcare .com, a Christ -exalting, veteran -owned, and simple name in beard care.
12:01: That's thestandardbeardcare .com, where the standard is the standard. All right.
12:08: And while we're at it, let's go ahead and just do a little bit of beard care here on air. My wife loves it when
12:14: I do this. The very first podcast we did in 2020, I just out of habit did this.
12:21: And my wife said, I can't believe you did that. She didn't say it like that. She's much more. She is a beautiful, intelligent, wise, loving, tender, caring person.
12:33: But I did that. And since she said, why did you do that? I do it on every podcast now.
12:38: So there you go. So Jeremiah, you and your wife, as we mentioned, you've been married since 2015.
12:44: Correct? Yes. All right. So here's where we're going to play. I'm calling it a game.
12:51: It's not really a game. It's just where I tell you, or I ask you a question. And you tell me the dumbest thing that you've said to your wife since you've been married.
13:01: So Jeremiah, what's the dumbest thing that you've said to your wife since you've been married? Oh my goodness.
13:11: You didn't tell me to think about this beforehand. No, this had to be spontaneous.
13:17: Oh man, there's so many. So tell me, you know who
13:35: Sanford and Sonny is in Red Fox. You do, right? Okay, good.
13:41: Good. Because I didn't want to hit the You Big Dummy button again. Because a lot of young folks don't know who
13:47: Sanford and Sonny is. I'll be honest, it rings a bell. I don't know in total. I'm turning 31 in just a couple of weeks.
13:55: Okay, so I'm going to give you some homework. I'm going to give you some homework. Deal. Look up Sanford and Son, the
14:00: TV show. Will do. You caught me on the spot.
14:06: Yeah, that was tough. That's the beauty of podcasting. All right, so I'm not going to try to catch you off guard anymore.
14:14: So Jeremiah is known as the apologetic dog, and that is why we're having him on today.
14:21: We are going to be talking about a very difficult subject, a subject that's really starting, an idea that's really starting to rear its head in reform circles, in theological circles in our day and time.
14:37: And Jeremiah, as I told him before the podcast, and I'm going to say to the public now,
14:42: I appreciate his love and passion for the Word of God. I appreciate with him particularly being a young man and being so knowledgeable and articulate with the
14:55: Word of God, with theological ideas and doctrines. And so what we're going to talk about tonight is the danger of full preterism.
15:05: And in talking about the danger of full preterism, we're going to kind of try to lay a foundation for the audience.
15:12: We're going to go through some terms. Jeremiah is going to be breaking it down for us. And then at the end of the podcast, we're going to take a few minutes and we're going to sort through the bulk of the video that we showed you at the beginning as the teaser.
15:28: So Jeremiah, let's begin with two terms. Okay, let's begin with orthodoxy and heterodoxy.
15:35: What is orthodoxy and what is heterodoxy? Orthodoxy is essentially right teaching, and heterodoxy is essentially that which is not orthodox, that is outside the bounds of right teaching.
15:49: And so the best way that I explain orthodoxy, a lot of times goes hands in hand with orthopraxy, right living, but that has to be informed by right teaching, is you've got to believe in the right
16:00: Jesus and you have to receive the right Jesus on the terms in which he prescribed.
16:06: And so the way I break that down is the right Jesus is the second person of the Trinity, the triune
16:11: God, and we receive the biblical Jesus by faith alone, not looking to ourself or trusting in the things that we do, but looking to Jesus in faith, right?
16:22: Which is saying from the heart, we realize that we cannot earn favor with God by the task that we accomplish.
16:29: And so what is tethered with this gospel promise of being in sweet relationship with Jesus Christ is many promises.
16:36: He promises us not to leave us as orphans, but he goes to make a way for us, prepare a place for us, for us to be with him one day, to be asked when the body is to be present with the
16:47: Lord, and he is going to restore all things. This is getting into our blessed hope, and he's promised that these sin -cursed bodies, they're going to rot, they're going to decay, but he is going to restore the whole person.
17:00: We are at least a two -part being of body and soul, and so we are going to be resurrected with new bodies fit for eternity in the eternal state.
17:10: And so we're going to get into full preterism, but full preterism goes outside the bounds of orthodoxy and takes away that blessed hope, saying all these things are somehow shoehorned into 70
17:21: AD, and a lot of these Christian biblical terms are just redefined. And so I'll pause there if you want to speak any more to that before we go any further.
17:30: No, that's very good. Very good. So basically there we see the contrast between orthodoxy and heterodoxy, right?
17:38: Heterodoxy outside the bounds of orthodoxy. And as you mentioned there, it's so important as Christians.
17:46: I mean, a lot of folks think that—and I'm going to use this term, and I don't mean it despairingly, but it's just a plain -Jane term.
17:55: A lot of people take and hold to Christianity with kind of a fly -by -the -seat -of -their -pants mentality, right?
18:03: Whatever feels good, if it works, we'll roll with it. But there are clear -cut doctrinal standards set out in the
18:12: Word of God that we must, as believers, hold to, and the Word of God being the standard.
18:19: As Christians, we must allow the Word of God to shape our thoughts as opposed to allowing our thoughts to shape our idea of God's Word.
18:30: So on that, let's move on very quickly here to some eschatological terms.
18:36: I know some of our audience likely is far up on this. They know what's going on, but it's so good if there are some folks who don't really truly understand these terms to have these terms defined as we talk about the danger of full preterism.
18:52: So in eschatological terms, really, we can look at four major views.
18:57: We've got premillennial dispensational, historic premillennial, postmillennial, and amillennial.
19:06: Would you care to take a moment and break those down, starting with premillennial first?
19:12: Claude, I would love to. And so we're talking about eschatological views or eschatology.
19:17: We're talking about the study of end times. And so this, once again, I mentioned that term earlier, blessed hope.
19:24: What are the things that we look forward to in this gospel promise? Jesus has made us right before God and our sins forgiven, but that's just the beginning.
19:34: We look forward to eternal relationship with Him. And so these four eschatological views are trying to sift through the essentials of eschatology and the non -essentials of eschatology.
19:48: And so what I want to say about these four views is they all unite around the essential things of eschatology that can be broken up into three or four things.
19:57: Number one, Jesus is coming in the future bodily to judge the living and the dead.
20:05: That is a future reality that He's going to come back truly and really. And then
20:12: He's going to judge the living and the dead. So the just and the unjust are going to be resurrected bodily, fit for eternity, either in eternal justice and damnation before God, who is holy, holy, holy.
20:26: And those that know Jesus relationally will be resurrected with bodies fit for eternity to enjoy
20:32: Him forever, like our catechisms say. And so then Jesus is going to restore all things, meaning that this intermediate state where the heaven, where God's abode is now, is going to come to earth and He's going to transform this world to dwell with man.
20:51: And so even depending on how we interpret revelation, we can see that picture at the very least.
20:57: And so those are essentials in eschatology, Claude. And so all these views that you talked about, they all affirm that.
21:05: And so where these views differ is on non -essentials within eschatology.
21:11: They differ on the nature of the millennium, the millennial reign of Christ. If someone goes and looks at Revelation 20, you see a thousand years, a thousand years, a thousand years mentioned six times.
21:21: And so these different views either view this a little bit more literally in the future or more metaphorically and symbolically.
21:31: And it has more of Revelation and then other eschatological points in Scripture as being in the past.
21:38: So we get into these terms called futurism, future, or past, or praetor, or preterism.
21:44: And so these four views are trying to find that balance on the non -essentials.
21:50: Does that make sense, Claude? Yes, sir. And so I want to lay that foundation really quick. So it's wonderful because they unite around the essentials.
21:58: And we'll get into a little bit how full praetorism literally destroys all the essentials, destroys them, redefines it all, and is not
22:06: Christian and has only been on the scene for the past, I want to say maybe 100, 200 years, not very long.
22:12: It is new and on the scene. That should always cause us to hold the brakes and hold up the red flag.
22:19: Can I ask you a quick question? So that's about the same time frame that Jay and Darby came out with premillennial dispensationalism, too.
22:29: Yeah, and I think dispensational premillennialism came out before, but it's definitely later on the scene like you're talking about.
22:39: And I want to tell people that doesn't make it wrong necessarily, but we have a historic faith. And so we need to be careful to say, are we discovering something brand new that the church hasn't already understood for the past 2 ,000 years?
22:55: Well, the church is infallible. In fact, when you study church history, there's a lot of myths, right? There's a lot of polemics.
23:01: And that's a part of that refinement. Jesus building his bride. And I believe in semper reformandus.
23:07: So there's a sense that theology is being refined against heresies, especially. So I tell people that's not a defeater, but that should cause us to pause when something is brand new.
23:18: And now this is the difference between dispensational premillennialism and full preterism is the
23:25: Johnny Mac dispensational premillennialism is very similar to some of the views that the early church second century held.
23:32: I say similar, like it wasn't codified and you didn't have the dispensationalism, but there's a lot of shared features in premillennialism.
23:39: In fact, that's probably the first eschatology that came on the scene in church history. And so the pause with dispensationalism is because of how new it is, but it's not just a total reinvention of the will.
23:52: And it's not saying, well, church history has just gotten basically everything wrong on this issue.
23:57: It's just looking at things in a slightly different light. Full preterism does a complete overhaul and changes how the
24:04: Old Testament relates to the New Testament has a backwards hermeneutic where it starts with the timing indicators of 70
24:10: AD and then reads everything else in light of that. So I want to be out, you, Claude, you will hear me be very kind and charitable towards dispensational premillennial theology.
24:21: Number one, I believed it for a long time. I know it like the back of my hand, but they're not heretics for crying out loud.
24:27: They believe in the fundamentals and essentials of eschatology. And I will be the first to remind people of that.
24:33: They are our brothers. And so when people are like, are the dispensational crowd, is that what's wrong with eschatology?
24:39: It's like, no, they're not. So I know we have not defined them yet, but I really wanted to lay that foundation of the essentials and non -essentials.
24:47: And I want to encourage people. If you go to the Apologetic Dog, I did a teaching series where I did an overview of all.
24:56: I just said the three major views of eschatology because we're going to talk a little bit about the differences between dispensational premillennial theology and historic eschatology, but they're in the premillennial camp.
25:06: I did a fly overview of all three and then spent time preaching through each historic view in a positive fashion.
25:15: So I had people understanding me because people were like, which one are you? And I'm like, to be continued, letting them know we are brothers in Christ to sharpen one another on the non -essentials.
25:28: And we have to come together to fight the heresy of hyper or full preterisms.
25:36: I agree 100 % there. And I can attest to the goodness of those sermons that Jeremiah preached.
25:45: I watched those and listened to those as well. So Jeremiah, you just continue on here.
25:51: So let's just in a couple of quick statements, the difference between premillennial dispensational and historic dispensational premillennialism pretty much sees the book of Revelation unfolding chronologically.
26:08: This is the take that John MacArthur would hold. So very much everything is kind of building on one another.
26:14: And you have a hard distinction between Israel and the church. The church you see drop off after chapter three with the church of Philadelphia and Laodicea.
26:22: You don't really see the church until the marriage supper of the Lamb. And so MacArthur's dispensational view says,
26:28: OK, now the focus is shifting on Israel there in this time of persecution.
26:33: You got different interpretation, whether the church is going to be raptured at the beginning of the tribulation, in the middle or post at the very end.
26:41: So there's conversation to be had there. And then this is the big distinction here is because when
26:47: Jesus returns in chapter 19, he's bringing the church with him. And so during this thousand -year reign, the focus shifts back on to Old Testament Israel to finish these dispensational promises that was allegedly given to Abraham and then is fulfilled there.
27:03: The main difference with historic premillennialism is historic premillennialism doesn't necessarily see the book of Revelation as chronological.
27:09: You could have a very cyclical view and things like that. But the focus stays on the church in the future millennial reign, if that makes sense.
27:18: The early church was more of a historic premillennial framework that saw not a pre -tribulation rapture, but the church would undergo persecution, meet
27:28: Antichrist, and would have to be martyred for the faith. But when you have the thousand -year reign, the focus is not on Israel's unfulfilled promises, but is laser -focused on the church.
27:41: Okay, and so what's the difference between the postmillennial and the amillennialist? That's razor -sharp.
27:49: I mean, that's fine. It's a fine line, really, when you go to history. It is, but I've noticed a few.
27:54: I would honestly boil it down to two things. There's probably more, but two big things that I've noticed because they are so interconnected.
28:02: They see the thousand years as not literal future, but symbolic for now and began at Christ's first coming, whether you put that as resurrection or as ascension.
28:13: But his inauguration essentially began the thousand -year reign, which we are still living in, until he returns.
28:22: So that's a shared feature. Typically, all mill sees things as getting bad, so that would actually be something in common with premill.
28:29: Sin will continue to abound, and society will get worse, worse, and worse.
28:35: And then postmill kind of sees things getting better. The nations will be Christianized, the pagan nations will be converted by the gospel and the preaching and the
28:46: Holy Spirit, and the laws will conform to the laws of Scripture.
28:53: I want to say mosaic law, but being charitable of saying that theonomic, equitable principles, the nations being one.
29:01: So that's a difference. Things get better postmill, all mill doesn't, and you can kind of fall on either side.
29:08: You can be optimistic all mill or pessimistic all mill, and I laugh at that phrase.
29:13: But here's the thing. The function of the law of God is what distinguishes them two. All mill sees the law of God as going forth as a preservative, right?
29:22: We're to be salt and light. So that salt is kind of preserving the stench of the culture, okay?
29:29: And so it's delaying the inevitable, if that makes sense. And so postmill fundamentally sees the law of God going forth with the gospel difference, saying, nope, the battle cry would be
29:41: Jesus wins. And I think it's funny because it's all in how you define how Jesus wins, right?
29:47: Because the all mill could easily make that same point. But the function of the law of God is different. Postmill sees the law going forth and the world getting
29:55: Christianized, being growing in obedience. And when virtually the world is Christianized, that's what's going to trigger
30:00: Christ's return. And then all mill says the law of God is supposed to go forth in some measure, but more as a preservative.
30:08: The other big distinction between the two, Claude, is how you understand this age and the age to come.
30:17: I really think this is a big distinction, especially in my study of this. So the all mill would see this age as this temporal age that began back in Genesis three at the fall.
30:28: That kind of started this age. And so this age, this temporal age is going to go on until Christ returns and restores all things.
30:37: And so the age to come is the eternal age, the eternal realities. But there's an already not yet paradigm going on where Jesus, the age to come began at Jesus's inauguration, right?
30:49: His first coming, essentially. And so that's kind of a lot. And not all mill see it that way.
30:55: But I know Real Barger. I just recently interviewed Sam Frost and Storms.
31:01: And those are their views. And many scholars hold that view. As we're post mill, like the
31:08: Jeff Durbin's and now James White. And I'll be honest, I love post mill and all mill.
31:14: I lean more all mill. But to me, I hold it with the open fist of saying
31:20: I'm always ready to be scrutinized for it. But the way they view this age and the age to come is actually one of the things that I've circled around and thought, okay, this is going to be similar to full preterism.
31:34: This is a shared feature between full preterism and post millennialism is this age we read in scripture in the last days necessarily is referring to this age in the last days of covenant
31:46: Israel. Okay, which post mill would say terminates in 70
31:52: AD. And then the age to come is post 70 AD. This Christian age that kind of goes until Christ returns into the eternal state.
32:03: Which is a little bit dispensational leaning, is it not? It's kind of pulling from that kind of idea.
32:11: This is why I tell people I don't hate the term dispensation. Paul uses it two times in the book of Ephesians.
32:19: It's a stewardship that God has with his people. So God gets to define the terms, right? Because even the
32:25: Johnny Macs, I love John MacArthur, like he's going to affirm the unconditional elect of God, the bride that the father gave to the son, right?
32:35: Eternal covenant of redemption. And so the conversation is how is that bride being manifest over time?
32:42: And so I know we get into these conversations of who's being consistent and whatnot. So I just try to encourage people like dispensational.
32:51: If you have a King Jimmy or new King Jimmy, you're going to find the word dispensation.
32:57: So it's not a bad word. It's just the baggage it tends to carry with the ism, dispensational ism.
33:03: Yeah, I agree. So I primarily use the elect standard version, the
33:09: ESV. Let me also add this, and I'm also trying to learn to talk faster because I am very country and I talk very slow.
33:22: But my friend, Greg Moore from the Dead Man Walking podcast, a while back, him and Keith Foskey were talking about listening to podcasts and having to listen to them.
33:33: What speed you listen to podcasts on, right? And I'm like, I'm an old dude. I just got to listen to it regular.
33:40: I cranked him up as fast as I could possibly listen to him. Oh, gosh, you must be so wise, though.
33:45: So I can't do that. But Greg said, I got to be honest. On air, he said,
33:50: I have to put Claude on 2X because he talks so slow. So I'm trying to learn how to talk faster.
33:57: But in any case, amillennial is really kind of a misnomer because it means no millennium.
34:05: And let me be up front. This is the Here I Stand Theology podcast. So I'll say what
34:12: I want on here, not on anybody else's, but on here.
34:20: I claim to be optimistic amillennial. I don't believe that things are getting worse and worse like the premillennial dispensationalists.
34:28: I don't think things are getting better and better like the hardcore postmillennialists. I take the position that according to the scripture, that all things continue as they have from creation, that we're aware of sin more certainly now and the wickedness of man due to technology and media, but all things continue.
34:46: I believe the gospel still has the power it has had from the very beginning. It's still the power of God unto salvation that men and women until Christ comes back will be saved.
34:57: And the only way they'll be saved and redeemed or culture itself will be saved and redeemed is by and through the gospel of Jesus Christ, by being born again by the grace of God.
35:07: Can I add something real quick with that? Yes. Something I like about the amillennial position, which you rightly said, it's a misnomer.
35:14: That's why inaugurate kingdom, like we believe the kingdom is now not existent.
35:21: But I believe the amillennial position can truly say Christ can return at any moment.
35:28: As where I feel like the postmillennial position is committed to saying, well, we're still in the early days of the church.
35:36: And that's kind of the mantra is you need to get up and contend for the kingdom, which we like that phraseology.
35:43: But what they mean is we have a lot of work to do before the world gets Christianized and Jesus has returned. And that's supposedly the thing that convinced
35:52: Dr. James White is Doug Wilson's point of, what if, Claude, what if we're not in the last days of the church, but the early days?
36:01: Apparently, that was paradigm changing for Dr. White. And I just thought that logic can work against the position as well to say, well, if we are in the last days and not the early days, then the return is imminent and not future.
36:18: You're correct. And those are wise words. Those are wise words. So let's move on now.
36:24: Very quickly, define preterism, impartial preterism. Give us again, because Jeremiah is a fantastic debater, and he understands what is necessary and correct in a debate.
36:40: And so I've asked Jeremiah to give us an objective definition, an objective explanation of both beginning with full preterism and then partial preterism.
36:53: So let's start there. These terms are necessary because in these conversations, I'll have people just say preterism, period.
37:01: And I've learned you have to ask, what do you mean by preterism? Because on one hand, we're all preterists.
37:06: We believe things in Christianity that have happened in the past. Full preterism is this whole entire worldview that sees the entirety, entirety of Scripture as being already fulfilled at 70
37:19: AD. So preterism means past, praetor in the Latin. And so full preterism, as the name says, it's all fulfilled.
37:28: And then it's terminating point is 70 AD with the destruction of the temple. They believe that this is also the return of Jesus Christ.
37:36: And most take the position, Claude, not all, most take the position that that second coming of Jesus was spiritual.
37:44: But I have met those full preterists that say, no, it was a physical return as well, which blows them up. But the second coming already happened.
37:52: The resurrection of the dead had already happened. And I've met people say, well, that was a resurrection of Old Testament Israel.
38:02: We see people coming out of the graves in the Gospel of Matthew. So this is kind of an Old Testament paradigm where Israel was resurrected.
38:09: Then I've also met those full preterists to say, well, the resurrection of the dead was never meant to be bodily. It just means our regeneration.
38:16: It's the spiritual rebirth. So there's some redefining of terms there. But anyway, the resurrection of the dead was happened at 70
38:23: AD. And one of the kickers is the new heavens and new earth is in total, not just an already, not yet, but just an already since it started at 70
38:34: AD. And we are living in the new heavens and new earth now, not with this already, not yet paradigm, but things like we see now, sin, evil, death, wars, rumors, wars continue on.
38:48: And this is key into infinity. That's full preterism in a nutshell.
38:54: Everything that we read in Scripture, hard fulfillment in the past. So that's full preterism, hyper preterism.
39:02: So if I was to play a video that described how that makes me feel. Let me tell you all something.
39:09: War had made me vamp. That's a nice way of putting it, right?
39:21: Yeah. It's hard to be a happy Calvinist when I hear that view of Scripture communicated by people.
39:31: Yeah. People have asked why I've taken such a hard stand against full preterism. I'm like, it distorts the gospel.
39:39: And we're going to get into a little bit of how I think it actually touches on, remember, we're talking about orthodoxy earlier.
39:45: I think it actually touches a necessary feature of who Jesus is. Most full preterists, even if they claim to be
39:51: Trinitarian and believe in the hypostatic union and Jesus took on flesh, most full preterists do not believe that Jesus is still currently the
39:59: God -man now. He abandoned his flesh. They have a very odd interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15.
40:05: And so when you read flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, they say, OK, well, Jesus had to ditch his flesh.
40:11: So point is they believe in a different Jesus, not the God -man. And I believe it's cautions to none in him.
40:19: The fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily. That's in the present tense. So what happened in the past when
40:25: Jesus took on flesh that has future ramifications. Jesus is still the God -man.
40:30: I'm teaching through 1 John. This is fundamental in testing the spirits because Jesus still has flesh.
40:37: He is the God -man. It's a Gnostic teaching to actually deny that Jesus is no longer in the flesh or didn't come in the flesh.
40:45: Dr. Justin Marchegiani Amen. John said that. I recall that to mind. Who is Antichrist? But he who denies that Jesus Christ has come into flesh.
40:51: Dr. Justin Marchegiani Yeah. So much more can be said, and we're actually going to get into that.
40:56: How it relates to the Great Commission. Oh, this gets my blood pumping a little bit, too.
41:05: Partial preterism is still on the table. If you want, I can just touch on that a little bit. Partial preterism, something beautiful, something much different than full preterism.
41:15: So partial preterism is acknowledging there are many things in Scripture that does have past fulfillment.
41:22: This is where you won't hear me be too harsh on the dispensationalists because I see them as brothers.
41:29: We can continue to sharpen one another, and as much as I can point at every Christian and say, you're a preterist to some degree,
41:36: I can equally say, and we're all futurists to some degree, especially with our blessed hope.
41:42: So there's a balance that I'm trying to get people to be aware of in this. Partial preterists typically see the bulk of Revelation having a past fulfillment.
41:52: Namely, chapters 1 through 20 is an already -not -yet paradigm.
41:58: We're living in it now. And then many principles that we see embedded throughout Revelation, but in Revelation 21 and 22, show us a beautiful picture of what is to come.
42:08: And that's historic, baby. You know what I mean? And so a lot of this affects how we interpret the
42:14: Olivet Discourse, which we'll be getting and seeing how there's a big bulk that was fulfilled, perhaps at 70
42:20: AD with the destruction of the temple, with this generation, but not the coming of the Son of Man, the parrhesia, the promise of His coming where we will be transformed and be like Him, for goodness' sake.
42:34: And so partial preterists, I think, have a really good balance of what's in the past and what is future.
42:41: And so that's important, Claude, to make those distinctions when you're talking about preterism.
42:47: What do you mean? Right? That's what we should be saying. Exactly. Very good. Very, very good distinctions there.
42:55: We are going to enter into the theater of full preterism and listen to and watch.
43:04: As we watch, we'll be commenting. Hey, I know this is going to be recorded.
43:10: It's not live, but I would encourage you to put your questions in the comment section.
43:17: Hey, Jeremiah will be more than happy to answer all of them. Aim them all at him, not at me.
43:24: But if you want to aim them at me, I'll be glad to answer. I even got the boys with me to help me out. Oh, yes.
43:31: The reformed boys. Okay, here we go. So let's play this. What we know is the Great Commission hasn't been fulfilled.
43:39: Yes, and it wasn't fulfilled in our lifetime. It was fulfilled in the first century. The reason that the commission had to be fulfilled is because the gospel had to go to the
43:50: Gentiles and the kingdom, the new covenant kingdom had to be built and expanded. And it was and that was the picture.
43:57: And it was necessary that the gospel reach all of these inhabited people in the known world in order that the second coming might happen.
44:06: It had to happen then. And I believe with all my heart, according to the testimony of the scripture, that it did happen.
44:15: Here's where we get to the boss. Nova break. There we go. Although it's super hard to beat you when you hear something.
44:26: Warren stood up and talked about how within the next 10 years, we should set a goal to actually fulfill the
44:31: Great Commission. Well, today, I want to discuss a little bit about what preterism does to the
44:36: Great Commission and the way that we view it and how we see it. And I want to do so by looking at some text.
44:43: So, by the way, Jeremiah, all you have to do is say, stop. OK, all right.
44:49: You interject any time. And that predicted the fulfillment of what we call the
44:55: Great Commission. And then I want to show the fulfillment and the text that specifically say this has been fulfilled.
45:02: Some of you are thinking right now, well, I'm going to turn this off because if he's going to say the Great Commission has been fulfilled, there's no way you can convince me of that.
45:09: Well, that was kind of my take, too, until I examine the text and then I'm left with the option.
45:14: Well, I don't have any choice but to believe that it's been fulfilled because it's the clearest, clearest teaching that's in the scripture.
45:22: So let's look at one passage here to begin with. Let's examine the text. Matthew 24.
45:27: Stop. All right. So I think, help me out here. Earlier in the video, did he make a kind of side point of saying, well, the
45:36: Great Commission is actually nowhere to be found in the text? That's just how we've added that.
45:42: Is that right? So I encourage people go back because I think he said that earlier from the time that you played it.
45:47: Yes. And when I heard him first say that, that, well, the Great Commission is actually not in the text. I thought, don't make too big of a deal of that because your argument of the
45:56: Great Commission being fulfilled equally would not be found in the text. That's right. So my point is, he's doing that to kind of front load the conversation in his favor, that everything is kind of shoehorned back in 70
46:10: AD. So if someone goes back and listen to it, because I want to encourage people, listen to everything in context.
46:16: That's why we're going to play a big bulk of this. But the words, the Great Commission aren't in the text.
46:22: But if you go read Matthew 28, 18 through 20, well, that's our marching orders.
46:29: That's what the Great Commission has historically referred to. And so what Zach is about to try to make the case for is that was only meant to go into the known world.
46:40: So I'll let him pick up. And I would add, too, that it's kind of undercutting himself as a teacher of theology to say that's just a concept or an idea that's not specifically laid out in the scripture, which we have the same thing for the
46:59: Trinity, right? So it really makes it hard to go back and try to stand on Trinitarian doctrine that's taught throughout the scriptures when that's not mentioned.
47:09: Claude, I bet you if a Jehovah's Witness asked Zach to prove the Trinity, you know where I think
47:15: Zach would probably go to? The Great Commission, Matthew 28, 19, to show the name, right?
47:21: That's right. The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. So I bet you Zach would appeal to the Great Commission more than he thinks.
47:28: I agree. All right. Here we go on the text. Verse 14 says, And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.
47:40: Now, the first thing I want to note is that anyone who takes Matthew 24 up through verse 29 or up through verse 34, 35, believes that this text is fulfilled, and they would distinguish this text.
47:57: Okay, and we may let him play a little bit more to get the whole thought, but I already know where he's going.
48:03: He's trying to appeal to partial preterist here, and rightly so. If anyone's familiar with the
48:09: Olivet Discourse, most people believe two questions are being asked to Jesus, talking about the destruction of the temple.
48:16: The disciples' first question are, When will these things be? And then they ask a second question that says,
48:24: And what will be the sign of your coming in the end of the age? And so most partial preterists say
48:30: Jesus is answering the first question and then the second question. Now, what Zach is strategically doing is saying,
48:37: Okay, well, most people see the transitional verse in verse 36, where verse 34, he's talking about this generation with the destruction of the temple, but in 36, but concerning that future day, okay, that's your breaking point.
48:51: And so what he's doing here, and I laugh a little bit because I know what you're doing,
48:56: Zach, but he's saying, Well, then fine. Verse 14 means that it's fulfilled in total.
49:03: And so, I mean, and he's read the commentaries. I remember back when we used to talk. I mean, he went from dispensational pre -meal, all meal for the shortest season, and then post -meal and then jumped into full preterism.
49:16: And so we were reading through the commentaries about verse 14. Not everyone is in agreement, just because this is before verse 36, that that is fulfilled in total.
49:26: In fact, Jesus, as he's explaining the first question, he can also be touching on features of the second question as well.
49:34: And I believe that Jesus does that. And so this is important. I want to read verse 14 for everyone again.
49:40: This is the verse that Zach is saying in order for partial preterist to be consistent, you have to read this as being totally fulfilled.
49:49: And I'm going to offer one way of saying, of course, this doesn't mean that verse 14 is fulfilled. Verse 14 says,
49:56: And this is the gospel of the kingdom. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations.
50:06: And then the end will come. Well, for one, not all partial preterists are in agreement of what the end means.
50:14: You got congenitally and many post -millennials that think this is talking about the end of the temple destruction. You know what, if that's what you see, then you can come to historical
50:25: Orthodox conclusions that are still attempting to be consistent and derived from the text as we continue to sharpen one another.
50:32: I take the position that the end here is talking about the end of the age.
50:38: OK, so, well, of course, by necessary implication, this would not be fulfilled.
50:45: You know what I mean? So remember when you look back at the second question that the disciples are asking Jesus and what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age.
50:54: And so what Jesus is saying here in verse 14, yep, he's talking about the beginnings of birth pains with this first century.
51:03: And there's going to be wars, rumors of wars, death, intense persecution. If you look down at verse 9, it says, and they will deliver you up, tribulation, put you to death, and you'll be hated by all the nations for my name's sake.
51:16: And then he eventually gets into, but the one that endures to the end shall be saved. So, yes, in people's life, they're going to have to endure maybe unto death.
51:24: But then Jesus reminds them of the focus in view here, the purpose of what is about to take place.
51:31: And so he gives a picture of all these things are necessary in God's redemptive plan.
51:37: The gospel is going to be preached to the oikomene, which I'm not going to get ahead of myself.
51:42: We're going to talk more about this word and the phrase the whole world as a testimony. Claude, testimony is such a strong word here.
51:51: This is giving evidence that Jesus is king and that he rules and he reigns.
51:56: And so Jesus puts this in the context of the Gentiles, the nations, plural. Now, Zach's going to push for the known
52:04: Gentile world. And I'm saying all of them, baby, even the unknown ones. That's right. And then he says, and then the end will come.
52:11: Well, Zach, Zach's aware that not all full preterists interpret this the same way.
52:16: So when he just kind of waves the hand and says, oh, all full preterists think it's fulfilled all the way up to verse 35, we're saying, but read
52:25: Jesus in context, right? What does the end of the age mean? Because not all full preterists or not all partial preterists interpret that the same way.
52:34: I love what John Calvin said. He said this was unambiguously talking about the end of the world, right?
52:40: The end of redemptive history. I don't want Zach to get away with theological murder and just say, well, if you're not being consistent, you're supposed to believe that that's already been fulfilled.
52:50: So, and when you said what you just said, you're talking about the consummation of the ages, right?
52:55: Yes, I think he's giving us a slight picture of what it looks like when he picks up back in or later in verse 36, but concerning that day, which there's no timing indicators for angels don't know the son doesn't know only the father.
53:13: And, and this is around his parousia at his coming when he will restore all things.
53:19: That's not for us to know, but the partial preterist says, but there are timing indicators when it comes to the destruction of the temple.
53:26: So there's a huge contrasting going on. I think verse 14 is reminding us of the purpose of why all these things have to take place from the beginning all the way to the end.
53:36: Amen. Amen. And that's, I get a little fiery though. Hey, amen. You should.
53:42: And, and that's, and that's why the biblical doctrine should, it should always be a two handed event or a two handed attack.
53:54: When we go into it, a lot of people think they can just hold the biblical doctrine in one hand and, you know, you know, free will it do whatever they want to do.
54:03: Right. But they can't do that. The Bible doctrine is too big for us. If we try to handle it one handed, it's a two, it's two handed.
54:13: So let's move on. Let's listen to what he says. You say stop when you want. From Matthew 28 verse 19 and the great commission and probably even
54:22: Acts chapter one, they would distinguish these texts. And one note that I want to make is these texts cannot be distinguished.
54:29: Whatever is spoken of in Matthew 24, 14 is also spoken of in Acts 1, 8 and in Matthew chapter 28 and verse 19.
54:37: Can I stop real quick? Just a slight point. This is where I found myself agreeing with Zach. I do.
54:43: I am of the persuasion that we want to have a strong consistency with Matthew 24, 14,
54:50: Acts 1, 8, and we're eventually going to get into Romans 10, 18. I agree with Zach.
54:56: I think the best position is to have a view that interprets all of them on the same page.
55:02: Now, I will say I don't throw out most of how post -millennialists do see verse 14 as primarily talking about the known world.
55:14: I actually don't. I think it's actually talking about the most broadest sense. And I have a good reason.
55:20: It's because of this point that I agree with Zach is because of a strong consistency that I feel like is super clear in Acts 1, 8 and then later in Romans 10, 18.
55:30: So we're going to get more into that. Go ahead. Really, all of your post -millennial world, especially partial preterist post -millennial are going to take
55:38: Matthew chapter 24 and verse 14 as fulfilled. They're just not going to connect it or call it the
55:44: Great Commission. That is one of the greatest inconsistencies that I think I've ever seen in studying eschatology.
55:51: What we want to look at here. So he's just simply wrong. What he doesn't like is for a partial preterist post -millennialist to grant.
56:02: There are those that grant verse 14 is talking about the known world, but that doesn't mean that's necessarily the implication of Matthew 28, 19 and Acts 1, 8.
56:13: You could easily say, well, Luke could expand on what Matthew said about what's pertaining only to the known world to the end of this age, this
56:22: Jewish age. I don't particularly take that view, but I'm not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater. You know what
56:27: I mean? And so he's seeing it as an inconsistency. It's so easy for Ken Gentry and those guys,
56:33: Philip Kaiser to push back and just say, oh, different context, right? This is one of the fallacies of full preterism is when you see one word used over here, they necessarily make it apply across the boards.
56:46: And one example of that is how they interpret one timing indicator here.
56:52: They apply it across the boards, irregardless of how the context and the flow of argumentation is going.
56:59: Well, that's exactly what's happening throughout this video, as folks will see. That's exactly what's taking place.
57:05: He's taken the one word, making the generalization that it's for every area that is mentioned in Scripture and context when it's not.
57:14: The word world in Matthew 24, 14. It's the Greek word oikomene, which
57:19: I and numerous scholars would denote means the known empire. So to say.
57:25: Okay, so this is where we're going to slow Zach down. So he doesn't spend much time.
57:32: He doesn't give you the full semantic domain of the word oikomene, and you notice what he did.
57:37: He says, me and many other scholars. This is just talking about the Roman Empire and what he's getting as the known world.
57:42: I want to encourage people if you go to Blue Letter Bible, you can look up a Thayer's Greek. I mean,
57:48: I would encourage people to invest money in BDAG, the highest respected lexical source that we can look at.
57:57: This has a full range of meaning that easily could apply to the entirety of the inhabited world to where animals dwell, where humans dwell from the known world to the unknown world.
58:10: And we're going to get into some of the text that actually makes that case. But what he's doing is he's saying oikomene,
58:16: Roman Empire. That is one usage of that.
58:22: And I'm the first to say, yeah, even cosmos, which is a different word for world that can be translated, could refer to the
58:29: Roman Empire. In fact, there's a couple of verses in Romans one where it definitely seems to be making that case.
58:35: Paul says this in Colossians, just talking probably more about the known world.
58:41: But what he's doing is he's shoehorning this one definition, and he's not being transparent with everybody of saying that there is a wide range of meaning for oikomene.
58:51: And so point is, this could be exhaustively talking about the entire inhabited world, not just the known world.
58:58: Agreed. Okay, so I'm pausing it here.
59:31: Yeah, I was like, you're good. I'm going to I'm going to take a stab at this too, because this is this is really what
59:40: I was laser focused on this particular statement in this particular passage.
59:46: So let me do something real quick here. I'm going to duplicate my screen so I can keep up with what
59:52: I'm going to talk about. So I want to first quote what he quoted there in Romans 10, right?
59:59: It was Romans 10 verse 18.
01:00:07: All right. So Paul is speaking to the Roman church about, of course, you know, we all know the first three chapters.
01:00:17: You know, he spends talk about sin, then he breaks everything else down. But he's pointing them to who
01:00:24: God is in the work of Jesus Christ, his son. So in Romans 10, 18, when he says, but I ask, have they not heard?
01:00:31: Indeed, they have. And then he quotes. Okay, he's not making a generalized statement here using that the oikomene is speaking of the gospel is speaking of the reality of the knowledge of God back in Psalm chapter 19.
01:00:48: And if we read Psalm chapter 19, beginning in verse one, it begins, the heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
01:00:58: Day to day pours out speech and night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words whose voice is not heard.
01:01:05: Their voice goes out through all the earth and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun.
01:01:11: But let's not stop, which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber and like a strong man runs its course of joy.
01:01:17: Its rising is from the end of the heavens and its circuit to the end of them. And there is nothing hidden from its heat.
01:01:23: It's speaking about the glory of God. It's not making a generalized statement about the gospel being heard by every person in the world.
01:01:32: And then boom, it's over. All right, you go ahead. No, you teed me up well, because what's unfortunate,
01:01:44: Zach did a little bit more waving of the hand and didn't spend a ton of time on it. He just spoke through it real fast because literally
01:01:50: Paul is making the exact opposite point that Zach is making. For one, verse 17 says, so faith comes by hearing and hearing through the word
01:02:00: Christ, the gospel. So what Zach is saying, OK, listen, but I ask, have they not heard the gospel is what
01:02:07: Zach is interpreting that to mean. Indeed, they have for their voice has gone out into all the earth and their words to the ends of the world.
01:02:16: See, Claude, the preaching of the gospel to the oikomene is already fulfilled.
01:02:22: It's Zach's interpretation. It's like, OK, time out. So verse 17 is a summation for the first 16 verses where the message of salvation is for all
01:02:34: Jew and Gentile. Right. So verse 12, for there is no distinction between Jew and Greek.
01:02:41: OK, and so the gospel, when you go back to the Old Testament, we see
01:02:46: God's heart of always wanting salvation to go even to the pagan world.
01:02:51: Right. And in Abraham's seed, all the nations will be blessed. And I love how you read
01:02:58: Psalm 19, because even the heart of David, he talks about the general revelation of God is exhaustive.
01:03:05: That's right. Worldwide, not just to the known world, which, by the way, Rome didn't even exist back then, but the whole world has knowledge of God.
01:03:14: Now, Romans 1, we see that they distort that and suppress it. But the point is, the knowledge of God pervades all of our existence, not just the known world, but even to the unknown world.
01:03:25: That's right. And so the point is, we need to send the gospel message to the uttermost parts of the earth, which is
01:03:32: Acts 1 -8, which we'll look at here in a moment. Because I agree with Zach, Acts 1 -8 and Romans 10 -18 go hand in hand.
01:03:41: But where Zach missed it 100 % is Paul is not talking about the gospel in verse 18.
01:03:47: He's actually saying, have they not heard? And the they would be referring to Jew and Greek, right?
01:03:55: He's talking about all people, but he's doing it in a snide way of rebuking Israel.
01:04:00: He is saying, have Jew and Gentile not heard of the voice of God?
01:04:07: Do they not know of his existence? How do we know this, Claude? How do we know this, Zach?
01:04:12: It's because of the verse that Paul quoted in Psalm 19 -3. Psalm 19 is made up of two parts, general revelation and special revelation.
01:04:23: Because if you continue to read that Psalm, it's the law of the Lord that converts the soul.
01:04:28: That's right. Abraham believed God and was counted to him as righteousness. If you put your faith in the coming Savior, that's how you're justified, right?
01:04:36: And so God's plan of redemption has always been for his people to bring the message of salvation to the entirety of the world, to the known world and to the unknown world.
01:04:47: Paul is literally saying, Claude, that the pagan unknown world is ready for the gospel that we've not yet tapped into.
01:04:59: And Israel is complaining and basically saying, he's asking a rhetorical question.
01:05:06: Oh, you haven't heard? You don't know of the revelation of God? Oh, you doubly know, right?
01:05:12: To you have been given the oracles of God and you've rejected the Messiah, right? The son of God who came down.
01:05:18: And it's like, okay, now God's going to use a small group of men to evangelize the world.
01:05:28: The known world, this is the thing. To me, Zach is just inconsistent with himself.
01:05:33: We don't disagree that the known world had the gospel. We see this progression in Acts 1 .8.
01:05:39: Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria. And this is the thing where Zach is wrong to the uttermost parts of the world.
01:05:47: And I believe the word is eschaton. So the last of its sequence, literally where there's dirt, you were to continue preaching from the known world into the unknown world.
01:05:57: And so that's Paul's point is he's like, we've only begun that task. Beautiful are the feet of those that bring the gospel of peace.
01:06:06: And so Zach knows better. That's why he appeals to kind of obscure verses in Revelation saying, we see the kingdom of people going in and out.
01:06:16: Come, let the bride say, come. We're saying, yeah, because the great commission is not fulfilled.
01:06:21: He's coming back and saying, well, the great commission was just the known world. We're saying that's baloney, right?
01:06:28: Because here in verse 18, if this is not talking about the gospel, which it's not, then
01:06:33: Zach's argument is literally backwards, right? But I ask, have they not heard?
01:06:39: So he's kind of being snide towards Israel, saying all of men know of God's existence, their voice, the voice of creation, the knowledge of God has gone out.
01:06:48: Now, here's the key to all of the earth. This is real similar to Acts 1 -8 that says the ends of the earth, eschaton to gay earth.
01:06:58: Here it's pos, pos here. So to me, it's the same idea of the entirety of the inhabited world, known and unknown.
01:07:07: So I'm saying it's really similar language of Matthew 24 -14 and Acts 1 -8. And their words to the ends of the oikomene.
01:07:17: Now, because now this is key and you said it first, he's quoting
01:07:22: King David about general revelation, showing the heart of God that all of creation, all image bearers of God need to hear the gospel.
01:07:32: That's why we send out missionaries, right? They're ready. Now we're reformed, so we trust
01:07:37: God and his sovereignty and all that. But that is an exhaustive look. If we are right with the context, oikomene is not the
01:07:46: Roman empire. It is the entirety of this inhabited world. And so I just want to tell people also earlier in Romans chapter 1 is we see the word cosmos.
01:07:55: I want to also say this, cosmos and oikomene. I've been studying these words for the past week or so. They can be used interchangeable.
01:08:03: Cosmos just has a wider semantic domain than oikomene does. But in Romans 1 verse 8, this is where I would say,
01:08:11: Zach, Paul is talking about the known world here. Listen. First of all, Paul says, I thank my
01:08:17: God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world.
01:08:24: Well, we could say this is either hyperbole or just at least saying to the known world, it finally reached
01:08:30: Rome. That was maybe the brim of a lot of people's knowledge of the pagan world, the Roman empire.
01:08:37: And so I'm over here clapping my hands saying, yeah, this is the start of the Great Commission, not its fulfillment, which, by the way,
01:08:44: Zach, you don't even think is in the text. So neither is its fulfillment. So does that make sense? You have an exhaustive look of oikomene here, and it's not talking about the gospel has literally made it to the oikomene, but all of the earth, all of the inhabited world is ready for this gospel of grace to reach the ends of the earth.
01:09:04: Amen. Good exegesis, brother. And the word for world there in the text,
01:09:11: Paul says, oikomene has been fulfilled. How do we not believe then that it's been fulfilled?
01:09:17: If Paul clearly says that this known world had heard at this time, let's examine another word.
01:09:24: Acts 1 in verse 8, we read this, but you shall receive power when the
01:09:29: Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all
01:09:36: Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. Now, the next Greek word that we're going to look at here is the word for earth, and it's the
01:09:43: Greek word gay. This is understood to be a reference to the inhabited land, so the inhabited land would hear it.
01:09:53: And if you start to think about the book of Acts, really what happens is the gospel begins in Jerusalem and Judea.
01:09:59: It spans out, and eventually Paul takes it, and it reaches all of the inhabited earth that we know is spoken of.
01:10:08: Let me give you a verse. It's a familiar verse to you because we just looked at it while ago. Romans 10, 18, not.
01:10:14: Hey, can let me ask you a question then right here. Let me ask you a question. So I just picked up on this.
01:10:20: So if this is the full preterist angle on, quote, unquote, the great commission being fulfilled, and I know he says it at the end of his video.
01:10:36: He kind of goes back on it, but would it not logically necessitate that if this is their angle and their view, that after that period of time, the rest of the world would be kind of left out?
01:10:53: All right. So full preterist, there's so many different flavors, different brands of full preterism.
01:11:02: So Zach just stands. Now you got to think, they are united on Jesus's second coming being 7
01:11:07: AD, resurrection of the dead already happened, and we're living in the new heavens, new earth.
01:11:12: Those are kind of their essentials. Everything else is up in the air and up for grabs. So Zach is not an
01:11:20: Israel only full preterist. So they would say the great commission is fulfilled and therefore we shouldn't evangelize.
01:11:28: Like to me, I think that's the logical conclusion. No more great commission. Why are you evangelizing, Zach? And then he's going to come back and say, because of revelation, because people are coming in and out of the new heavens.
01:11:38: And I'm saying, so the great commission is not fulfilled then, right? This is a full preterist attempt to have their cake and eat it too.
01:11:49: And so, we're just going to call foul. We're saying, so you really don't believe the great commission is being filled.
01:11:55: And what Zach will say is, well, the great commission was defined as just going to the known world and that was fulfilled.
01:12:01: And we're saying for one, no, it doesn't. That's not what Paul's point was in Romans 10. But for him just to say, but by implication and obscure texts and revelation, we need to continue into the unknown world.
01:12:13: I'm like, dude, you did this video just to kind of rally the troops.
01:12:19: You know what I mean? Because he doesn't even believe what he's saying. I mean, he's trying to sound evangelical and it's not.
01:12:26: Full preterism is not Christian. It's a redefining and overhaul of everything that the saints have held near and dear to for 2000 years.
01:12:35: Absolutely correct. Now, can I make a comment on Acts 1 .8 here? Because I don't know all the order of what he says things.
01:12:43: So, I do get ahead of myself a little bit. So, I believe he's mishandling Acts 1 .8.
01:12:48: Now, I do agree with Zach. You got to look at Acts 1 .8 with Romans 10 .18
01:12:54: and Matthew 24 .14. I do think there is a strong consistency. I think
01:12:59: Romans 10 .18 does the reversal, what he thinks. I think it gives us an exhaustive account of the entire inhabited world, even the unknown world, because it's not talking about the gospel.
01:13:09: It's talking about general revelation that screams God, and that's where we're to take the gospel to.
01:13:16: And so, here in Acts 1 .8, Jesus is making the same point. And so, when we see earth gay, once again,
01:13:24: Zach, go look at the semantic domain. I think the point here is talking about literally where there's dirt.
01:13:31: But Zach's saying, yeah, the known dirt, the known world. And it's no, no, no. It's to the end of the earth, the last of its sequence, not just what's known.
01:13:41: But wherever you go and can find earth, that's where we're to be witnesses to. That's where Matthew 24 .14
01:13:48: says, as a testimony, we are to take the gospel of grace. And so, that Jesus is a conquering king.
01:13:58: Sorry, I get. No, that's good. That's good. That's why you're here, brother.
01:14:04: It not only gives us the fulfillment of oikomene, but it also gives us the fulfillment of gay.
01:14:09: I say, have they not heard? Yes, indeed, their sound has gone out, past tense, to all the earth.
01:14:18: Gay. That's the Greek word gay. Paul, again, says fulfilled. Oikomene, fulfilled.
01:14:23: Gay, fulfilled. And this really starts to bring in our understanding of what we know as the
01:14:30: Great Commission being fulfilled. But there's more. Let's look at another passage. But wait, but again, he's using, he's using the premise of the
01:14:40: Great Commission, which he denied earlier, which is like an atheist trying to use the Bible to prove their point.
01:14:47: Yeah. OK, OK, here we go. Mark chapter 16, verse 15.
01:14:53: And he said to them, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
01:14:58: And the word here for creature is the Greek word katesis. Well, do we have anything in the
01:15:04: New Testament that tells us that all of the katesis had heard? And the answer is 100 percent, clearly, yes, taken straight out of the text.
01:15:13: And please note, I'm not just giving you the opinion of Zach Davis. I'm giving you exactly what the Apostle Paul.
01:15:20: Well, he's not even giving us what the Apostle Paul said. He's giving us a cherry -picked definition within a broad semantic domain.
01:15:26: And Zach's not being charitable with the context, especially in Romans 10.
01:15:32: So I just want to remind people of that. Exactly. Said, Paul got his eschatology from Jesus.
01:15:38: He's using these words intentionally. And he says of the katesis in Colossians 123, if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached, past tense, to every creature, katesis, under heaven.
01:16:01: Now, I'm a simple country man, but is it not obvious that in that sense, too, that the word katesis is being used in an exaggerated, you know, kind of hyperbolic fashion?
01:16:16: Absolutely. And I want to tell people there's nothing magical in the Greek, right?
01:16:22: Because, you know, I think he reads from the New King James because there's a few verses that he thinks pushes for preterism more.
01:16:29: But the ESV renders verse 23 and says, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel, this is key, that you heard, right, the people that Paul has evangelized at Colossae, which has been proclaimed in all of creation under heaven, in which
01:16:49: I, Paul, became a minister. So it's funny. He's reading into the has been as fulfillment.
01:16:55: Remind you, Zach, we don't see that in the text, right? Remember early in the video, that was a big point, I thought.
01:17:01: But I was curious. I'm like, yeah, because it seems obvious, like this is a type of hyperbolic language.
01:17:07: I can hear the full preterist saying, oh, of course it's going to be hyperbole when it doesn't agree with your theology.
01:17:12: It's like, wait. So for one, time out. Let's just think about what
01:17:17: Paul is saying. So he is talking about the gospel that the people at Colossae have heard.
01:17:24: So, yes, there is something in the past tense here, and it's the gospel that Paul brought to Colossae, right?
01:17:30: Because this gospel expansion is going on to the known world, and it's being in process to the unknown world.
01:17:37: And so I looked more into the has been here, Claude. So this is an aorist passive participle.
01:17:45: OK, now I've noticed this very same thing elsewhere.
01:17:50: The full preterist want to use as a timing indicator of passive fulfillment, passive fulfillment, passive fulfillment. And so I'm not a
01:17:57: Greek scholar. This is something that I'm learning into. But I'm starting to learn participles. They aren't hardcore in the past.
01:18:04: They're also verbs, right? There's an ongoing nature to it as well.
01:18:10: And so this has been, and Zach and other conversations with him will try to appeal to verses in like Romans 8, saying these things have already been fulfilled with the restoration of all things.
01:18:20: And it doesn't work from the Greek as a participle. It has an idea that, yes, something is in the past, which
01:18:27: Paul literally preached the gospel to those at Colossae. And it has an ongoing verb idea that's being carried like it's not stopped.
01:18:35: It's not fulfilled. Yes, there is something past tense, but it's ongoing as well. And I like what you said.
01:18:41: Even us simple country folk, we can just look at the context and realize how excited
01:18:47: Paul is that he's preaching the gospel to Colossae at Colossae and people are being saved and he is thrilled to death.
01:18:59: Oops, I pressed it there, which I, Paul, became a minister. Paul again says, oikomene, gei, ketesis, fulfilled.
01:19:09: Let's look at another one. Mark 16, 15, again, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
01:19:16: Well, the word here that's used for world is not oikomene, it's the word cosmos.
01:19:22: And that's what you mentioned earlier. I'm going to take that again to be the known world.
01:19:29: I'm going to jump ahead a little bit. Just like oikomene. Well, can you pause a little bit? Not only did he say it real quick too. The reason why to me the
01:19:36: Mark 16 is not a big deal. For one, it's a disputed text, the longer ending of Mark.
01:19:42: I debate a lot of Church of Christ, so I don't want to give them the benefit of saying, oh, you want to dispute
01:19:48: Mark 16, 16 because it hurts you. It's like, you know what? I think the whole context is clear enough to where I can say,
01:19:55: Jesus, this manuscript is not saying what you think it is. And so I'm not going to let Zach and the full predators have that same thing by saying, oh, they're going to merely a disputed longer ending of Mark.
01:20:05: But here's the deal. Mark 16 Great Commission is going to parallel Matthew 28
01:20:12: Great Commission as well. So I'm just saying, Zach would agree. However you interpret one, you got to be consistent with the other.
01:20:18: And so something that is important to this conversation is verse 20 of the
01:20:24: Great Commission that is in the text. I just want to encourage people it's there and it's substance. Verse 20,
01:20:30: Jesus says, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.
01:20:38: So the end of the age is key in this whole conversation. We're talking about the differences between the all millennial position and the post millennial position.
01:20:46: Well, you can ask the question, is this the end of the Jewish age, the covenant Jewish age, or is it the end of this temporal age?
01:20:56: Now, when I look into the gospel, especially Luke's version, it seems like this age is talking about people are going to still be given a marriage.
01:21:03: People are going to have houses. All these things are going to continue in this age, but something radically different in the age to come.
01:21:11: You know what I mean? So I want to just caution, lovingly caution post millennialists. Just know that you have something in common with full preterists.
01:21:18: Not that you're guilty by association, but don't let them hijack what is near and dear and precious to us.
01:21:26: And so what you hear Zach also bringing out is the word kosmos. So this is the deal.
01:21:32: Oikamene, so you got kosmos, oikamene in the Greek. Both can be translated world into English.
01:21:39: A lot of times they're just interchangeable, Claude. Oikamene is mentioned once in Matthew's gospel, and it was back in all of the discourse,
01:21:47: Matthew 24, 14. However, Matthew uses kosmos a lot in his gospel.
01:21:53: And I noticed something that was interchangeable between kosmos and oikamene is when
01:21:59: Satan took Jesus up on top of the mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world.
01:22:05: We understand that Satan had the Gentile nation's heart captive in the known world, the unknown world, the whole world lies in the power of the wicked one, right?
01:22:16: And so Satan wouldn't be taking Jesus just to the known world, right?
01:22:21: I see this almost step into another dimension to just see the entirety of this realm that has been given power to him.
01:22:30: The point is, in Matthew's gospel, it's in the nations of the whole kosmos, right?
01:22:36: I looked in Luke's account, and it's oikamene. So oikamene, simply you have to look at the context, because I agree oikamene is used throughout
01:22:44: Acts to probably refer to the Roman Empire, right? But Zach is not being charitable with showing you the full extent of these words, and I don't have it pulled up.
01:22:54: But if you go look at BDAG, a lot of times oikamene is being used in reference to the entirety of the inhabited world.
01:23:01: So he is cherry picking different definitions that go against BDAG's understanding of how these verses are linked with this.
01:23:09: So I just want to encourage people, go look into these definitions. Don't just take my word for it, especially don't take
01:23:15: Zach's word for it, because it has a much broader meaning than what he's laying on. Agreed. He said that it's bringing forth fruit as it is also among you since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth.
01:23:28: You're starting to see a pattern and some consistency here. And one final one we want to look at is
01:23:34: Mark chapter 13 and verse 10. This is the fifth one. We read this, that the gospel must first be preached to all the nations.
01:23:44: And the word here for nations is the Greek word ethnos, and ethnos means people groups.
01:23:49: Well, do we have anything in the New Testament that tells us the ethnos had heard? Yes. Romans 16, 26, the apostle
01:23:56: Paul said, but now made manifest and by the prophetic scriptures made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting
01:24:06: God for obedience to the faith. Nations in this text in Romans 16, 26 is ethnos.
01:24:13: Paul again says fulfilled. Ethnos. Gay. Poikimene. Catesi. Paul does not say it has been fulfilled.
01:24:21: I know that's the contrary. Paul is saying it's being fulfilled. Yeah. Present continual.
01:24:32: Absolutely. I mean, you know, it's just irritating when he makes the point at the beginning of his video that it's not in the text.
01:24:40: And yet he's going to constantly break his own standard of showing us things that aren't in the text.
01:24:45: What he means is his interpretation of everything being shoehorned back into 70.
01:24:51: Yes. And yet he wants to still preach the gospel. Yeah. All of it fulfilled.
01:24:58: It's a beautiful picture. And that's why I would say what we know is the Great Commission. Has it been fulfilled?
01:25:04: Yes. And it wasn't fulfilled in our lifetime. It was fulfilled in the first century. The reason that the commission had to be fulfilled is because the gospel had to go to the
01:25:15: Gentiles and the kingdom, the new covenant kingdom had to be built and expanded. And it was.
01:25:21: And that was the picture. And it was necessary that the gospel reach all of these inhabited people in the known world in order that the second coming might happen.
01:25:32: It had to happen then. And I believe with all my heart, according to the testimony of the scripture, that it did happen.
01:25:38: And if you really want to. All right, go ahead. And we're going to stop right there because I mean, it's that was condemning right there.
01:25:45: That was condemning. Go ahead. If it's if it's fulfilled, man, stop trying to preach the gospel.
01:25:50: Stop it. If it was fulfilled in the first century, stop it. Don't appeal to revelation trying to make your case that it's a field.
01:25:58: But then we're supposed to go tell people to come into it. No, it's not fulfilled. If I be consistent,
01:26:04: Zach, join your other little full preterist groups that believe that, you know, it's for Israel only and they don't preach the gospel.
01:26:12: They're universalist because we're living in post redemptive history, Zach. If if it's fulfilled, then stop preaching the gospel or stop playing your word games.
01:26:23: Realize that the gospel still is going to the uttermost parts of the earth to those people who haven't heard, who do know the knowledge of God, of all of creation, screaming at them of God's existence in their heart, you know, pointing to them that they are held accountable to their judge.
01:26:39: They are ready for the gospel. The Great Commission is not fulfilled. It is being fulfilled.