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Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist. This program is dedicated to helping you better understand the Word of God and the doctrines of grace. The Bible tells us, do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the Word of truth.
Get your Bible and coffee ready and prepare to study along. Here's your host with today's lesson, Pastor Keith Foskey.
And welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist. My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist. Today is September 17th, 2020. And if you're following along on our daily Bible reading today, you're going to be reading 1 Peter chapter 4.
And if you'd like to be a part of our daily Bible reading, we encourage you to go to our website, sgfcjacks .org. That's the website for our church, Sovereign Grace Family Church of Jacksonville. And if you happen to live in or around the Jacksonville area, I want to invite you to come and join us for an upcoming Lord's Day service.
We have Sunday school at 930 and we have worship at 1030. We also have service in the middle of the week at 630 p .m. And we have Sovereign Grace Academy, which is our Bible school here on the campus of Sovereign Grace Family Church.
And it is available for anyone who is interested in going deeper in their study of the Bible. And you can go and learn more about that also on our website. Well, today is Thursday, September 17th, and Thursday is free for all.
This is the day that we sort of catch up on things that we've been wanting to talk about that we don't usually have something scheduled. We just sort of deal with whatever's on the table. And today we're going to be dealing with a listener question.
This was sent in by a listener who is a been listening for a while. And I want to say, I thank the person who listened and you know who you are. And thank you for sending in this question. This is a question about the president and his recent peace plan that was signed.
I'm going to read just a little bit from the Washington Post. This is dated August 13th, 2020. Israel and the United Arab Emirates agreed Thursday to end decades of enmity in a historic deal announced by President Trump that would put Israeli annexation of West Bank lands on hold as a condition of normalizing relations.
This is a very big deal. But how we define it as a big deal will probably be influenced by our eschatology. Now if you don't know what eschatology is, eschatology is the study of last things. It means the study of what is generally referred to as the end times.
So if you've ever heard somebody talk about the end times, the word eschaton means the last thing. So eschatology is where that comes from. And there are many different views about what is going to happen in the end, what the end times are going to be and what constitutes the end times and how that term and how it is to be understood.
I want to read to you from another website. This is express .co .uk and this is just to give you an idea of how other people in the world are seeing this. This was published Tuesday, August 18, 2020. So this is a more recent article but not as recent as the one we just read.
It says, End of the World, Donald Trump's Middle East Peace Plan Begins Final Countdown. And then it goes on to say the end of the world could be just around the corner as U .S. President Donald Trump fulfilled a prophecy to quote begin the final countdown to the return of Jesus, end quote, according to the sensational claims of biblical investigators.
So is this thing that has happened in regard to Trump's new peace plan, is this a sign that Jesus is about to return? Well, for a moment before I even seek to answer that, I want to sort of address the issue of eschatology as a whole because I think eschatology is one of those areas where a lot of people are very, very confident in the things that they think they know and oftentimes they are not getting this information necessarily from the Bible but from what people have taught them about the Bible.
And when it comes to eschatology, there are different schools of thought or different perspectives and when I teach on eschatology, I usually try to give a broad overview of the differing views of eschatology and this is sometimes difficult because people want an answer.
People want to know, well, what is the right answer? And that's a difficult thing to say because while we can say we have some confidence in certain things to have, what I see as often the danger is people who say I know exactly how it's going to happen and oftentimes they have charts and they have this is going to happen here and this is going to happen there and it's going to happen this way and that way and there's going to be all these things that happen and they're going to be very specific and very particular and it's going to happen just this way.
Many years ago, probably many of you in this audience heard or maybe even read the Left Behind series. Left Behind was a series of fictional books but it was supposed to be fiction based on a right understanding of the Bible and it was written by Tim LaHaye, who was a pastor, Jerry B. Jenkins, who was an author, and they came together and they put together these books called Left Behind and it expressed a certain picture of the end of the world that is typically understood to be known as what is known as dispensational premillennialism and so that's a big term and for those of you who've never heard that term before, it might sound a little daunting, but basically what that is is dispensationalism is a hermeneutic.
That means this is how we read the Bible and it gives us a framework for understanding the Bible and premillennialism deals with Revelation chapter 20 where it talks about a thousand year rule of Christ, a thousand year reign of Christ, and so the premillennialist would say that when Jesus returns, he is going to set up a thousand year kingdom where he is going to rule and reign from Jerusalem and during that reign he's going to reestablish Israel as a nation, he is going to rule as the king in the seat of King David, and there's going to be a reestablishment of sacrifices, there's going to be all these things that happen to fulfill Old Testament prophecy that the dispensationalists would argue have not been fulfilled yet.
See, dispensationalists believe that the church is not the fulfillment of the promises to Israel but that the church is totally distinct from Israel and therefore, and I've heard this statement said so this is not me exaggerating, the church is a parenthesis and Israel is the focus of God's plan, the church is only the focus now but it's a parenthesis in God's plan because eventually Israel is going to become the focus again and so therefore what happened in the past with Israel and what happened in the future of Israel is really the big picture of God's plan and what's happening right now with the church is simply a parenthesis in the midst of that plan.
And so that sort of helps you understand how the view of the hermeneutic of the Bible is seen and I'm sure somebody out there may be a dispensationalist screaming into the radio or telephone right now, however you're listening to this, you may be saying, he's not explaining it well enough, okay, I understand, this is a 20 minute program and I don't have time to get into all the particulars of dispensationalism.
I will say this, I graduated from a seminary in Jacksonville, Jacksonville Baptist Theological Seminary that is thoroughly dispensational and thoroughly pre-millennial so I did sit through many classes on eschatology and one of the things I remember specifically is that this was all that was taught.
We were not taught that the other views were even possibly correct. The views of amillennialism, postmillennialism or historic premillennialism, they were all mentioned and they were all dismissed out of hat.
The question of dispensationalism and covenant theology which is usually the distinction between two major hermeneutical schools are the difference between dispensationalism and covenant theology. Covenant theology was, we were told, I remember in class specifically being told that they do not rightly divide the word of God and that was it.
The covenant theologians don't rightly divide the word, dispensationalists do. And so, and I'm not saying, I am not trying to paint dispensationalists with a broad brush and say there's that hubris in all of it but certainly when you're at a dispensational school they believe that they're correct and so they're teaching in a way that they think is right and so here's what you often find with dispensationalism and this is what's going to bring us back to the question about Trump's peace plan is that dispensationalists tend to read the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other hand.
They tend to read current events as always some kind of fulfillment of something that's happening in, something that the Bible says will happen. And so, you go back to the reestablishment of Israel as a nation.
That was a huge moment and that got a lot of people's attention because that was for many the restarting of the clock for Israel becoming the focus of God's program again. Again the church has been the God's program for 2 ,000 years and now that Israel's a nation again it's going to be reestablished and all of these prophecies are going to become fulfilled.
And so this is why since the 40s we have seen a massive uptick in people who are making prophetic announcements based upon their interpretation of scripture and a lot of it has to do with what they're reading in the newspaper that's happening over in Israel and they look at things that are going on and they say see this here, this passage is referring to Russia, this passage is referring to China, this passage is referring to this or that and there's always something that they're trying to find an answer and to be able to say this is the end and this is the thing that's going to be the end.
But if you look back in the last several decades of history you will see over and over and over again a consistent and I would say a repetitive failure among those who believe they have the answers to the things that are happening, the answers to what's going on.
It's this constant repetitive drumbeat, we have it. Some of you may remember there was a book that came out, 88 Reasons Why Jesus is Going to Return in 1988 and of course that book came and many people bought it and 1988 came and Jesus did not and so that became sort of a picture of what this attitude causes, what this attitude can create.
It creates the idea where instead of reading the Bible in its historic context we begin to read the Bible in a modern context and we begin to interpret Revelation according to our modern situation. I personally come from a view on eschatology that I believe and I understand some of you may disagree with this and maybe this will be a topic for a later episode.
I believe that Revelation was written prior to the fall of Jerusalem in 8070 and because I believe that I believe that much of what Revelation was referring to was not something that was in the distant future, 2 -3 ,000 years in the future, but something that was literally months and just a few years away from when the writer was writing.
He said these things will soon take place and I believe that it was for the immediate audience that these things were being written and to the immediate audience that they should understand and be able to interpret these things.
Like for instance the issue of the Antichrist. Who is the beast of Revelation 13? Who is this figure? A lot of people would argue that the beast is some future world leader who is going to come on the scene and some people think it's Donald Trump.
I almost entitled today's episode is Trump the Antichrist but I don't want to create a huge backlash just with my title. But a lot of people see, I saw a picture the other day, it was people wearing MAGA hats and it said the Antichrist will have his followers wearing his symbol on their foreheads and it was people wearing the Make America Great Again hats and I just had to laugh because I said there's no better example of horrible eisegesis or reading into the scripture than that.
Somebody seeing somebody in a MAGA hat and saying that's a picture of the Antichrist and the hat is the mark of the beast. That's just silly talk and that's a bad example of how to understand the Bible.
So again, how would I understand something like Revelation 13? Well I would look back at what happened under Nero. I think Nero certainly qualifies as one who would qualify as the beast and I think that interpretation has been shared by many people.
But I would be taking what's known as a partial preterist view, meaning I believe that most of what happened in Revelation was fulfilled in the lifetime of those who it was written to. Now does that mean there are not some parts that have not yet been fulfilled?
No, I believe we're actually, I come from the amillennial position which means I believe we're actually in the millennium now and again, I don't have time to explain all of that but that differentiates me from a premillennialist who would say the millennium is yet to come.
Or the postmillennialist who would say there is a time coming where Christ is going to rule but he'll rule as the church Christianizes the world. And so there are all these different views and I do not say for any moment that I am perfectly correct in my eschatology.
I am learning and I'm growing and I'm actually in a process right now where I'm studying to teach on eschatology. In our Wednesday night we have a systematic theology class and so I am preparing those lectures and I'm working on eschatology.
And so again I'm working back through my own understanding of things like partial preterism and amillennialism and how to distinguish that between dispensationalism and pre-tribulation versus post-tribulation rapture and those questions that are big important questions that a lot of people have.
So I guess what I want to say today is to the answer to the question, is Trump's peace plan a sign of the end, I would have to compare this to so many other things that have happened in the past where everybody who saw it said that's a sign of the end.
The reestablishment of Israel, all these things, this is a sign of the end. And in general it is not a good idea to try to interpret the Bible with our current events when it certainly speaks to what is going to happen but we cannot sit here and say this is an exact fulfillment of this thing and start making charts and making promises.
We end up going down a dangerous road. There was a man, I think many of you probably remember his name was Harold Camping, I think it was called Family Radio, was a famous Bible teacher and he got so consumed with eschatology that he went way off the rails and became a person who began to declare this is the the this is the time and he would make direct specific things that are this is when Jesus is going to return.
And he made a prophecy, Jesus didn't come, so he made another prophecy, Jesus didn't come again. So he did it again. I think he did this multiple times through his life. Several years ago I did a sermon entitled Camping on Dangerous Ground and it was about the history of Harold Camping and the danger of this type of eschatological forecasting and that's what we have.
We have eschatological forecasters, people who are saying this is happening in the world therefore this is what's going to happen and I'm going to count up the weeks of Daniel and I'm going to divide by the three wise men and I'm going to come up with an answer and oftentimes it's not a good answer.
So the first thing I would say is don't always try to read every single world event into some kind of eschatological calendar thinking you have it all figured out. I think that's a dangerous way to try to understand the Bible.
And the other thing too is if all you've ever been exposed to is one eschatological position, for instance, if you've only ever been exposed to dispensational premillennialism, then my recommendation to you would be to expose yourself to some more.
I remember talking to a lady one time, I was at a Bible study at a high school and we just happened to have a chance to talk before the Bible study began and I said something about a different, she said something about eschatology and well we know this is going to happen before Jesus comes and I just said are you sure that's really, I said not everybody believes that position and not everybody agrees that that's how everything's going to work out and she immediately, well what do you mean there's other positions?
What do you mean people think differently? What do you mean? She had only been taught one particular eschatological position, she'd never even considered having herself challenged on this issue and as a result she didn't even know what I was talking about when I said that not everybody believes in a pre-tribulation rapture.
I do not believe that Jesus is going to secretly return seven years before his actual return and rapture the church. I don't think that that's biblical, I don't think that that is the way that we should understand the return of Christ.
So that again lets you know where I'm at. I'm not saying I couldn't be wrong, but I am saying that's not the position that I hold and because of having looked at the various positions I'm very comfortable where I am right now.
And if you want to know more about eschatology, if you want to be challenged on this subject, I would encourage you to pick up a book, if you've never read it, it's Last Days According to Jesus by Dr. R .C. Sproul.
That book was very helpful to me and if you prefer to listen rather than to read, if maybe you have a long commute or something and it's easier for you, I think that you can get these from Ligonier for free, but even if not it's very little money to purchase Dr. Sproul's in-time lectures where he goes through basically the position that I would hold, a partial preterist position, and he explains it so well.
So I would encourage you, if you've never been exposed to a different view on eschatology, to expose yourself to that and be open to the idea that maybe all of this idea of reading your Bible on one hand, reading the newspaper on the other hand, maybe might not be the best way to interpret what the Bible has to say about Jesus' return.
But one thing we do all agree on and that is Jesus is going to return one day and if you are not prepared for his return, let me say this to you, there is only one Savior that God has given to mankind and that Savior is the Lord Jesus Christ and he will come one day and when he comes he will come to judge the quick and the dead, the living and the dead, and the Bible says that there are only two types of people in the world, those who are in Christ and those who are not in Christ.
So if you today are not in Christ, my encouragement to you would be to repent of your sins, to turn from them and turn to the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved because in the end that's all that's really going to matter.
Do you know the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you found in him today? Thank you for listening to today's episode of Coffee with a Calvinist. I hope it has been an encouragement to you. My name is Keith Foskey and I have been your Calvinist.
May God bless you.
Thank you for joining in for today's episode of Coffee with a Calvinist. Keep in mind, we have a new lesson available every weekday morning at 6 .30am on YouTube and Facebook. If you enjoyed this lesson, please take a moment to respond by hitting the like button, leaving a comment, and subscribing to the channel.
On behalf of Pastor Foskey, thank you for listening. May God bless you.