Truth in Love Special Interview- Gary DeMar

Hermeneutics as the Key to Eschatology

Welcome to the truth and love podcast. Thank you for joining us. We're so happy you're with us tonight. We have a special guest Gary DeMar and we're gonna be talking about hermeneutics. Stick with us.

Welcome back to the truth and love podcast. We are again. Thankful that you're with us. The comment line is open. We would love to hear for you. Just hear from you. Just let us know that you're watching.

Say hello. Ask a question if you're so inclined. Tonight we have a special guest brother Gary DeMar. Thank you for joining us Gary. Would you mind introducing yourself to our audience? Oh.

Wow.

Right now I'm living in Marietta, Georgia, which is right outside of the Atlanta area. We've been here since 1979 after I graduated from seminary. I graduated from Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi and I'm Originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

I went to college at New Mexico State University and Western Michigan University as well.

And.

First moved here. I Taught school for a couple of years and then I came on board at American Vision in 1981 full-time and I've been with American Vision since that time and I Did retire for for a while, but that didn't last.

The person I turned it over to Didn't do a very good job of keeping it up and so I've been back at American Vision and Probably will die at American Vision. It looks like.

Well, we're are excited and thankful that you decided to join us and you're up with us late tonight. Just want to.

Let everybody know this we're competing with with the debate. This is much this is much more relevant exciting and Newsworthy than probably what you're gonna what you're gonna hear tonight, you know, they'll the old phrase about how do you know?

When a lawyer is lying, he's he's moving his lips. Well, the same thing goes with politicians. So anyway.

You're you're absolutely right and and I'm thankful, um. So I just want to give everybody that's watching and listening a little introduction to how I was introduced to to you. It all started probably about eight years ago.

I couldn't nail it down, but I watched the roundtable discussion between John Piper Doug Wilson Hamilton and storms on eschatology and Despite what some of my friends said they they thought that some of the other guys had a stronger Argument from their perspective on eschatology.

That was that was the discussion where I was convinced of post-millennial ism and What happens once you become convinced of something you begin to Google and and look up videos and information? And that's what I did.

And of course you came up everywhere. And so I Watched as many Videos debates that I could of yours as it would pertain to post-millennial ism. And I just I just devoured it and I appreciated and loved so much your teaching That that you've allowed to be online and it's helped me so much and what I found so fascinating About watching all those videos and podcasts is that the the topic is eschatology.

But it's it turned out to be a lesson in hermeneutics. Because you won't you wanted to understand and you still want to understand from from what I'm hearing from you. What does God say? What is he teaching us and that's what and you and you showed us how you come to the conclusions that you've come to through scripture so tonight The top of being hermeneutics.

I simply just wanted to flip that and let the topic be hermeneutics and hopefully you'll give us some examples. From eschatology as you're helping us understand because I feel like from hearing your podcast most recently.

You see a strong importance of a good hermeneutic and and hearing what God has to say.

Scripture Interprets Scripture in Eschatology

Yeah, I look I think a lot of Christians When I became a Christian, I became Christian my senior year in college. You really really get into all of this. I Didn't know anything about anything. I was raised Roman Catholic went to Catholic school through the fifth grade.

Never really learned much about the Bible didn't know much about the Bible. So so it's my senior year in college I ran into a high school friend shared the gospel with me and you know I just I started reading the you know, the Bible particularly the New Testament the Matthews gospel in particular and This was the height of the late great planet Earth the late great planet Earth you came out in 1970 and it was a huge huge bestseller throughout the 1970s and some estimates of like 23 million copies of the late great planet Earth and So this was 1973 for me the book came out in 1970 and in that book You know how Lindsay?

He people would say he really never predicted this but when you read Original edition the hardback page 54 he goes to Matthew chapter 24. And he says this generation will not pass away and all these things take place generation is 40 years.

And you have you know, 40 1948 which is a nation again to the 40 years in 1988 and the Rapture is going to take place before all that. I mean, I mean it's so as a new Christian I didn't know anything in order to deal with that type of argument.

And I think that's true with most most Christians. They they generally generally hear what other people have to say about things because they believe rightly or wrongly that that person is More authoritative more studied in a topic and you you know, they wouldn't be lying to you about all this stuff.

So oftentimes we gravitate to various positions over time and we've never really developed a Sound hermeneutic what we what we end up doing is Kind of borrow the hermeneutic that has been that was used in order to bring us to the point where we are and since eschatology Was such a big deal in the 1970s and still is today I see the same arguments over and over and over and over again and yet with a sound hermeneutical model and basically hermeneutics is the science and art of interpretation.

But we've most Christians just have never been taught how to do it and They are I think somewhat dependent on other people and then they end up having a an interpretive grid passed down to them and now they see all these Bible passages in terms of that grid that they have and They don't have an apparatus in order to evaluate particular texts.

Because they see the whole big picture as it was presented to them in terms of that hermeneutical model. And I think I think that's where we are today. Not just in the area of eschatology, but I think in everything.

Yeah, no, I remember finding a book propping open a door in a church it was Norman Glass was chosen but free and I remember reading that book and being confused and thinking well Everybody's got the same views.

So let me just go and find another book to help explain it. Little did I know that I would pick up a book that was going to refute or seek to refute that one. And it opened me up to different interpretation models.

I just I had no idea. I had no clue that people could even Interpret the Bible differently or look at how to interpret it differently. It was just what didn't even cross my mind. So I kind of resonate with what you're saying there people just adopt what they're given.

Because I mean really they how would they know any different unless they're yeah.

To it and they're and so when they when they hear my view on eschatology and hermeneutic that it gives me that They're just they're they're they're flummoxed. They said wait, wait a minute. How can you say that.

And then I take them to a Particular text I said and give you an example. I was on a radio show. This was a number of years ago. And it was the fellow had me come on and talk about eschatology and and so forth and this woman called in.

And talked about Israel becoming a nation again and the land promises haven't been fulfilled yet and so forth and so on. And so I said, well, let me take you to Joshua chapter 21 and reject Joshua chapter 21 and I read it to her three times.

And.

She just still didn't get it and it's it's so specific it says all the promises that God made to Israel regarding the land hadn't had in fact been fulfilled and It's it's it's amazing to me for those people who claim to interpret the Bible literally.

That they make all kinds of excuses for that. Well, they didn't really they didn't really get all the land. They got all the lands what it says and it says you got a first Kings chapter 4 it's very specific as to to the the the land of Boundaries are very specific in terms of what was promised to Israel and some people will say well There were still there were still you know unbelievers in the land yes, there were unbelievers, but God had given them the land and The Bible also says that they are gonna be put in there.

They're gonna stay in that land to test you so so all the elements necessary to come to the conclusion that God had Fulfilled his promises regarding the land are specifically stated in the Bible and it's amazing what people try to do in order to get around it and the reason they Try to get around it because they've been given a an already developed Interpretive model that you now have to shoehorn everything into that model and you have to explain away passages that don't fit the model and I think that's that's where we are today and you just have to.

You know some people get it some people are willing to have their their their interpretive model. You know tested and I always tell people look you don't have to listen to me just and let's look at the text together and see what it says and Let's stick with what the text says and you don't know what a text means until you know what it first says and you can't make application to what a text says until you understand what it means and we're.

Most young people most most new Christians are never taught this and you don't need a seminary education in order to do this. So, you know God God, you know. Told a joke on me essentially is that you know, my background is is athletics.

That's that's what I did in high school in college. And that's why I was in college and I was on a track and field scholarship and that's that's what I did. And it was kind of kind of funny that God would pick me in order to do this kind of thing.

Because I was not at all trained in any of this Prior to becoming a Christian in 1973 and so I'd always tell people I can do this. You can do this. It's not that difficult if you're given the know-how, you know the process and how to do it.

It takes time takes practice takes diligence. It takes some research and all of that. Once you get it once you get the model of the interpretive model. Then you start looking at passages and making the association with that model things start coming together for you.

Yeah, that's good.

Basic Principles of Hermeneutics

So.

What are some of those fundamental principles of hermeneutics that They're gonna guide our interpretation of the Bible. You know start that process off for us if say you got somebody who doesn't really know what they're doing.

Start them off. What are some of the basics that they they they need to Really drill down and make sure that they have in line. Otherwise, they're gonna go off in the weeds somewhere.

That's a good question. And I and you mentioned the roundtable discussion with Doug Wilson James Hamilton Sam Storms and I guess John Piper. Was there anyone else? I think that was it. I was the host.

Yeah, and I remember that and the Typically what happens is on the area of eschatology. Let's just let's just kind of start there you start. People want to know what the book of Revelation is all about.

Well, you don't start in the book of Revelation. I mean, you know, come on and. Yet that's where people seem to gravitate towards or they become a new Christian they start reading you start reading Bible prophecy because that's what's what's in the news and You know that particular discussion dealt with you know, the millennial age.

Well, that's and that's that's way that's way down the road. Way down the road. And you've got to develop you have to just look at you got to get to the basic fundamental principles. With that and using eschatology as the model of this when I feel like I say when I first became a Christian I Start reading.

I started started reading the gospel of Matthew a lot of people start with John. I started Matthew and I came across passages that I just could not figure out. Matthew chapter 10 verse 23 you will not finish go going through the cities of Israel until the Son of Man comes.

Wait a minute. Just reading how Lindsay's late great planet earth and how Lindsay says well, this is something, you know, the coming of Jesus is going to be. Sometime in the future. And so at that point I just it was a question mark.

I don't know what that means. I got the Matthew 16 27 28. There's some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in this kingdom. Wait a minute. That didn't seem to that doesn't seem to fit either.

I got the Matthew chapter 24. This generation will not pass away into all these things take place. And then I read earlier in Matthew's gospel that the phrase this generation Was used and it didn't make sense with what I was hearing from people like Al Lindsay's Helen's II and others and that was the that was the key to me.

Because what I what I did is I compared what I had read in earlier in Matthew's gospel The phrase this generation to see how it fit in that context and what it meant in that context and so when I got to Matthew chapter 24, I Saw this generation again, and it dawned on me that Wait a minute these two these these various places where this generation is used.

Why would why would the definition of that of those of that phrase the change from the earlier use of it to the later use of it, especially since it's used so often in Matthew's gospel and. So that that's the that's kind of the first thing, you know.

Look at the text. What does it say? And You know, I even go to some people and say tell me what it doesn't say that's and that's another thing. Let's let's just stick with what the text says. And then what you need to do is compare what you're reading in that particular context.

You don't even have to interpret at this point but see if you can find other other places in Scripture where that same brain is used and Maybe in these some of these other examples. You will sit you can get a more clear understanding of what?

Something means based upon something that's much clearer in other contexts. And then when you start doing that you you're compiling in your your mind a Your the framework is starting to build a little bit you may not know exactly what's going on in the text.

But you have now asked the question Are these the same are they talking about the same thing should I interpret those in the same way? And that's not always the case. But when you have so many examples of the use of this generation.

In.

Matthew's gospel Mark's gospel and Luke's Luke gospel. You know, you really need to pay attention to that and. And then what what will happen is is that you may go research somewhere and say look I really don't know how to figure this out.

So I'm gonna go research somewhere and you pick up a book. Like you picked up something by Norm Geisler or what's popular today? You know, it was the left the left behind series Mark Hitchcock. And other writers and you and you look and you say oh those guys say well, we're really it doesn't this generation we don't mean.

This.

This generation remain it means this type of generation and. Then the question I would ask is does the text say this type of generation or does it just say this generation? Say so not only do you have to deal with what a text says, but you need to deal with what a text doesn't say or.

Someone Tim LaHaye and Tommy Ice wrote a wrote a book. And they say well, it means this is the way it needs to be interpreted the generation that these signs will not pass away until all these things take place and.

You say again, does that what the text says? No, no, the text doesn't say that all it says is this generation will not pass away and all these things take place. So some people will actually add words to a particular text in order to make it fit fit their particular interpretive model, so.

The first thing you have to do is to actually just stick with what the text says. Even if you don't even if you can't figure out what it means, that's always the first step. What does the text say and then the if you have any questions or Let me know at this point before I move on to the next point.

Oh.

You're you're doing just fine. I was just gonna say as you're talking about this I you know, you're totally right. Even if they do say this type of generation or whichever generation sees these signs.

Okay, let's go with that. Practice a good hermeneutic exegete the text before that and you'll see you'll see who he's talking about.

Yeah, so verse 30 match of 2434 this generation will not pass away and.

And.

Verse 33 uses the second person plural twice and I say to you. And that's by the way, this is going to be the next the next point I say to you you You will see these things take place if the. And You've got to wait a minute here.

There's an audience. There's Jesus has a particular audience and in view here Who's he talking to who. So, you know now you got to deal with the primary audience The. But Jesus wasn't talking to us first he was talking to a particular audience in Matthew 24 and You have to ask yourself the question who who were these people?

Why does Jesus use the second person plural? Throughout. And in fact if you want to really get into the context of all this You need to start with Matthew 21 because in Matthew 21 Not only do you find out who the audience is and that there is a particular audience to whom Jesus is speaking.

But it tells you also where Jesus was talking to that audience and that is the Mount of Olives. So Matthew chapter 21 22 23 24 and 25. And all takes place and the on the Mount of Olives and. Then when you all see what you also will find when you when you read those those through those chapters.

It's.

This the second person plural is used and then you get the chapter 21 when Jesus and there's another there are other people in this Audience there as we as you go through you'll find that Jesus deals with the disciples starting the cycles and a smaller smaller group of Disciples, but there are also the religious leaders if you go through chapter 21 and chapter 22 and chapter 23.

There were religious leaders there as well. So now you have a broader audience and the second person plural is used throughout and. Now you get a little key here if you find your context in chapter 21.

When the religious leaders heard Jesus talking about what was going on. They said he's talking about us. So now now you have that you have the text of Scripture. Telling you that what Jesus was saying to that particular primary audience.

It was understood by the religious leaders of the day that Jesus was talking about them not some future generation, but that particular generation and and then you this generation occurs back in Matthew 23 and then of course Matthew 24 so you've got what is the text?

Actually, what does the text say? What doesn't it say? Are there other places in Scripture where you can find? Phraseology that's similar to that to help you figure out the meaning in terms of the context that this is used.

And that that's that's the first that's the first. The beginning of this and it's it's and by the way, we do this with everything. We're always involved in hermeneutics. You meet somebody for the first time you're looking at their there, you know, are they looking at directly you?

Directly to you in the eye or a skirt, you know, they're looking over here. They're looking over there. Kind of language that they use mannerisms that they have we're always involved in hermeneutics if you take a literature class, you know Shakespeare.

What does that mean? Well, you've got to know Shakespeare Language in order to determine what he might know and then the other thing you have to do which is another element of this. Is there any history that you need to know in order to come to a better?

Understanding of why Jesus said what he what he said and. So you put those elements together and you are on. You are on the right track you the beginning track of figuring out what the Bible has to say.

Now there are some things that are very hard just hard to understand. Peter said that about Paul, you know. They're you know, he said some very difficult things. And so that's why I say don't start with the book of Revelation start with a place in Scripture again sticking with eschatology and you think about this so you have Matthew 10 23 Matthew 16 27 28 Matthew 21 22 23 24 25 Mark 13 Luke 21 Luke 19 Luke 17.

So there you have a bunch of Texts that are parallel with one another. And in Jesus, you know what the prime, you know who the primary audience is. You you've got ways to compare what's what's what those phrases mean using finding them elsewhere in Scripture.

They're used consistently, you know, you don't go to sit down and deal with a millennial question. You deal with okay. I've got it. I've got to understand this context here. What who is Jesus talking to and then the other element of this is why is he talking about this?

Why them? And now that's a broader broader question that you put a question mark up. So I don't know why he's typically talking about Them why that generation and that comes down the road as you begin to study more why Jesus was dealing specifically with that generation and not a future generation and You know and it look it takes time one of the first books I read.

Remember this is back in the 1970s. This is Hal Lindsay late late great planet earth. This is before the whole left-behind thing. And there I was a very new Christian and I was confused about Matthew 24.

I you know, I didn't have the equipment in order to handle it and I picked up a book that was Sitting on the library cart that the librarian was selling and it just sat on the spine Matthew 24 by a guy named Marcellus kick Kik.

And I read it and what I was learning in my hermeneutics class my interpret my interpretation class New Testament interpretation. Was compare scripture with scripture and that's what he did. He went through Matthew 24 and took each one of those phrases and compared those phrases with other places in scripture.

Paying paying a close attention to how they were used elsewhere and showed how Matthew 24 at least up to Matt verse 34 Was fulfilled before that generation passed away. Yeah, and you know that kind of set me on the you know on the kind of the path of dealing with this so and let me just say.

The reason I got involved in the whole eschatology debate was because I was I'm really a worldview guy. I want to know how the Bible applies to every area of life. And I wrote a series of books in the 1980s called God and government I wanted to know what God's government was like and how it applied to self-government family government Church government and civil government and so forth and I wrote these three volumes called God and government and when I went out to speak on this topic and.

Inevitably.

Someone would say Gary. Why are you why are you talking about? This all this because Jesus is coming soon all the signs are there for the coming of Jesus and why are we wasting our time? Dealing with politics and economics and education and welfare and foreign affairs and art and music.

Why are we bothering with this? This is 19. This is 1982 1980 so 1984 when the second volume came out and I started speaking on it. That was 40 years ago. And people are still asking the same question and so the reason I got involved in eschatology Was because I had to answer the objection.

People who saying we're living in the last days Jesus is coming soon why are we wasting our time dealing with the issues of the day because it's you know, the Antichrist is going to show up and he's going to make a covenant with with the Jews and the temple is going to be rebuilt you got the red heifers and You've got the breaks the covenant with with Israel is going to be the slaughter of the Jews.

You went on and on on, you know microchips and barcodes and QR codes now and I had to deal with all that and that's why.

Yeah, and you're right once somebody grasped the that the key one of the keys to biblical interpretation is the scripture. Interprets itself use the Bible to interpret itself. Once somebody grabs hold of that It will set a person on fire to deeper study whether it be eschatology or anything else.

And it's it's so.

It's.

It's so intuitive. What other what other book would you use to interpret the Bible other than the Bible itself? That's right 66 books. There's a lot of cross-references. I mean you can get any Bible today you see all the cross-references and there are many many more than what you see in your own Bible and.

There's a lot, you know, the Bible talks about the testimony of two or two or three witnesses. And the Bible is a witness to itself, but it also Says hey, I'm gonna give you a bunch of witnesses on this and this is on terms of eschatology.

There's lots of witnesses here. Like I said, Matthew Mark and Luke John. Not so much. You're given you can make do all these comparisons and you you'll almost say well. Wait a minute. There's differences in Luke Luke 21 and Matthew chapter 20 24.

Yeah, there are differences and you know that there are differences in the birth narratives and more and Matthew and Luke as well. So what you do is like a deck of cards, you know.

You.

Separate them and then you're gonna shuffle them and you shuffle and you bring them together and they make a more full picture and Luke Luke is dealing with it with a different audience than Matthew is dealing with talking about the same subject, but they each are emphasizing different things.

And a friend of mine Otto Scott, I don't know if you've ever heard of Otto Scott. He was a Friend of RJ rush duty became a Christian very late in life. And he tells a story about how I think it was his granddaughter.

I might have been his daughter came up to him. Wanted him wanted to read the Bible to you know to to her and and Otto Scott was an investigative journalist and as he read through the Gospels, he found these differences in the gospel accounts and He said it was the differences In the accounts that convinced him of their authenticity because as an investigative journalist When you find three people giving given this giving the same story with all the specific details one on top of the other you get suspicious that they collaborated with one another and So it was the differences in the gospel accounts that pre convinced him that the Bible was in fact the Word of God.

Because that his investigative journalism taught him. That's what you expect when you've got three different people. Looking at the same event, but given it but giving different Perspectives on it because they were looking at it a little different little different area.

So, you know the and these this just comes this comes with with time. So let me I don't know if you what you have anything else you want to want to do. So, let me take you to the next step in all of this.

Revelation, Time Texts, and Audience Relevance

And let me to get some better light here. Yeah, those of you who are listening to this for the First time and maybe later on. Go to the let's look. Let's look at the book of Revelation for a moment since everybody likes the book of Revelation.

Go there, and I I did a podcast on this. That will drop on September 20th, I have a I've got to go and have an operation have to get my thyroid Removed I some cancerous nodules on it. So I've been working Working ahead in order to I don't know what my space throat is going to be like after that.

So I'm trying to get ahead on it. So I've done something a little more elaborate than what I'm gonna do here and this particular person went to Revelation chapter 3 verse 10.

Now.

You don't start you don't start three chapters in to figure out what's going on in a book especially the Bible and so this is look before we get to 310 we want to look at Revelation chapter 1 verse 1 now.

Those who are listening to this may have an already scoped out developed eschatological view and What I'm gonna what I'm going to say at this point may mess you up. But we're following. Let's let the text speak for itself right a revelation chapter 1 the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his bond servants the things which must shortly take place.

And he sent and communicated it by his angel to his bond servant John. Who bore witness to the Word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ even to all that he saw? Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and heed the things which are written in it.

The time is near. So right off the bat, there are two time indicators shortly. Near later, we'll find the word quickly used and these time words appear at the very last chapter of the book of Revelation so to me.

You're stuck. The book of Revelation is describing things that were near and we're going to happen shortly. To the people who first read the book of Revelation now a lot of people who have probably you know been to church and they've heard The sermons on the book of Revelation and they've heard all this stuff about book of Revelations.

Why do you say that the book of Revelation is written? 1895 near, you know to God a Thousand years is the day and the day is a thousand years. And so this near could really mean far shortly. You know you I heard all the excuses and but if you stick to the text Shortly near and here's what I would tell people to do before we go any any further in this.

Get a concordance out and look up every use of near and shortly used in the New Testament and see how they are used elsewhere and. So the question you have to ask is would God change his definition of near and shortly?

When on every other occasion in which near and shortly are used. Always mean guess what near and shortly and. So right at the beginning we're told that the events in the book of Revelation are Shortly to take place because the time is near now at that point you say well, wait a minute.

How can you say their stars are gonna fall from heaven? There's a dragon. There's a giant woman. There are these beasts of beasts the two witnesses is bad, you know the Babylon's Sodom and Egypt Jezebel and all this other stuff in the book of Revelation and I say guess what?

Near and shortly are telling you that those things need to be interpreted in terms of those time indicators and you've got to figure out Why they were revealed to John in the way that they were revealed and I'm going to guarantee you if you're a new Christian You're not going to be able to figure that out very early.