Dispensational Premillennialism (Part 4)

The Hymn and Introduction to Eschatology

Praise to the Sovereign King, hear His people sing, solely and wholly saving His own bride. There where the Lamb has died, hard died the blood of that great High Priest.

Hi there, welcome to Reformed Ex-Mormon. I am Pastor Braden. I hope you're having a wonderful and blessed day today. Today we are on part four of our multi-parted series on the topic of eschatology, the study of end things and end times.

And last episode or last part that we did was on part three, Dispensationalism and Covenantal Theology. If you have not watched this one, I would encourage you to go look at that and it will be utilized in this video as today's topic is Dispensational Premillennialism.

So one needs to know what Dispensationalism is in order to know what Dispensational Premillennialism is. Now, I would also encourage you that if this is something that interests you, I would encourage you to subscribe to this YouTube channel and keep on watching these videos as we look at all Orthodox views within Christianity that have been held within the last 2 ,000 years that all say Christ is coming again, but they have put the method and the means and the time periods of different things taking place in different orders or in different areas.

So I would encourage you to please like these things and to share them with your family and friends as we seek to give God glory and advance that kingdom. So today's topic, like I said, is on Dispensational Premillennialism.

The Rise of Dispensationalism in the 1800s

Now, it would surprise me if you have not heard about what Dispensational Premillennialism is in some form or fashion. In fact, you might even be saying to yourself, is there any other eschatology view?

Dispensationalism really came about in the 1800s. So when you're talking about the views of eschatology, it is truly the new kid on the block. So prior to the 1800s and the 19th century, this idea of how to view the church in Israel as well as the second coming in the dispensationalist's lens had not ever been on a Christian's mind until the 1800s as far as we can see written about.

It really came about by a gentleman named John Nelson Darby in the 1800s then was prostrated and pushed even more so by Schofield in his study bible and then went on and circulated even more by Charles Ryrie in his study bible.

Some other well-known adherents to Dispensational Premillennialism would be John Hodge, Daniel Fuller, Chuck Smith from Calvary Chapel, John Vernon McGee from the Five Years Through the Bible study guide, as well as John MacArthur, Ray Comfort, Todd Friel and many, many, many more.

In fact, today most non-Christians know what Dispensational Premillennialism is and I think that is because it is taught behind many pulpits in the United States today as well as its influence from those study bibles in the 1800s as well as its popularity in the Left Behind series, the book series and the movie series.

As well as in 1948, Israel was declared its own state and that really was seen as a fulfillment of prophecy when it comes to Dispensational Premillennialism. So today, just to recap some really quick things for us that we talked about in the last video is that Dispensationalism views most common is that there is seven dispensations, seven periods of time how God has acted differently with groups of people.

And that each one of these dispensations, I'll have a chart up on the screen right now, each one of these dispensations that took place had a responsibility given to a group of people, their failure to adhere to it, followed by a judgment.

After which, the new dispensation comes along and there's another responsibility given, followed by their ultimate failure, given a judgment, then following that a responsibility, failure, judgment and that just repeats itself throughout the entirety of all the dispensations until it comes about that there is this eternal state.

Now, I'm also going to put up a chart here for us as we look at some things and it'll be up there for a moment here. This is a common chart, a common view of how things take place in Dispensational Premillennialism.

Israel and the Church as Distinct Bodies

And I'm just going to read here some important tenets of Premillennialism, or Dispensational Premillennialism. The first and most important tenet that separates it from other eschatology views is that they would hold and view that the church and Israel are two distinct bodies that God views and deals with differently.

A Dispensational Premillennialist would also say that the church started, the church body started in Acts chapter 2. This is different than Covenantal Theology as we talked about in the last episode, how Covenantal Theology says that the church started in the Garden of Eden.

Some other tenets of Dispensational Premillennialism would be that the belief that Jesus will come again for a literal thousand-year millennial physical reign on earth where he'll sit physically on the throne of David and restore the literal promises to the nation of Israel back from the Old Testament, that during this grace period or this church age, God has withheld those promises from Israel.

And we'll look a little bit more into that. But they would also see that the majority of the Dispensational Premillennialists would hold to a literal seven-year tribulation period prior to the millennial messianic kingdom, which most view Jesus having a secret rapture prior to the seven-year tribulation where he raptures out the entirety of the church.

So the church will not go through the tribulation according to the Dispensational Premillennialists. That during these seven years, there will be an Antichrist that rises up, that is able to perform all these many mighty miracles and is worshiped inside the temple.

Following the seven years, there will be a battle of Armageddon, the Antichrist is destroyed, Satan is physically bound at this point, and the righteous dead saints are raised. The millennium begins with Christ physically appearing on earth.

Some tenants, some people that would hold to these tenets of Dispensational Premillennialism would even go on to say that during these thousand years on earth with Christ physically being here, since those Old Testament prophecies in the Old Testament had these rituals, those rituals will be restored.

And that would be that there will be another physical temple on earth, that the Old Testament priesthood will come back, sacrifices and possibly Jesus-offering sacrifices in the temple will take place, and other rituals that we would see in the Old Testament would also be restored.

They would say that after the thousand years, Satan will be released for a short period, that then after that, this final battle will take place, and all the dead, including the dead wicked, are resurrected.

After this, there will be this great white judgment that takes place, this great white throne judgment of those alive and those that died during the millennium. Just some important things to note within the Millennial view in understanding Dispensational Premillennialism, it would be that during the millennium, sin still exists, man is still sinning against God, conversion is still taking place, creation is still in a fallen state, and men are still dying.

Those are important things to notice that the Premillennialists, Dispensationalists would hold to. After this white throne judgment takes place, they would say that this is where the eternal state is, that sheep and goats will be separated, sheep will be given an everlasting paradise, heaven, all those kinds of words, and the wicked will be righteously judged by God and be sent to hell, judgment, torment for everlasting punishment in those ways.

Prophecies Used to Support a Future Millennium

Some Bible verses that they would look at to see these Old Testament prophecies having to be fulfilled in a future Millennial reign would be Genesis chapter 12, verses one through three, Genesis chapter 15, verse five and six, where Abraham sees the stars back in Genesis 12.

It would be there that it says that there will be a land that is given to the nation of Israel and that all the nations will look to it for blessings. Isaiah chapter nine, verses six through seven says that after the child is born, speaking of Christ, he has to sit on the throne of David and there will be no end or increase to his government and peace.

Dispensational Premillennialists says they don't see that right now. Therefore, that has to be in the future in the Millennium. That has to be future for us. Second Samuel 7, 12 through 13, Second Samuel chapter 22, verses 51, First Chronicles 17, 10 through 14, and specifically Romans 11, 25 through 27, as God is not done with Israel and that according to verse 26, then all of Israel will be saved.

They would put that then in the future after the fullness of the Gentiles or the fullness of the church aid, this gap period, the great parentheses that we're in right now, this dispensation we're in is what a Dispensational Premillennialist would say.

Futurist Interpretation of Revelation and Prophecy

Some of the other important things to know that a Dispensational Premillennialist will use to come to their understandings is when they come to the book of Revelation, as well as Old Testament prophecy and New Testament prophecy, they would hold to a futurism or a futurists view of interpreting the Bible.

And they would hold that they should always interpret something as literal as possible until forced otherwise to make it symbolic or spiritual. And we'll look at some examples of this, but they would say that according to 2 Thessalonians 2, verses 3, that there will be a man of lawlessness that is referred to in 1 John, 2 John, and 3 John, that the Antichrist will come about and that is the man of lawlessness that we see is the beast in Revelation chapter 13, 1 through 10.

And they would say that that is literal. Some more reasons why they would read the book of Revelation as a literal future for us is actually found in Revelation chapter 1, verses 19. I'll read it here for us so that we can understand this view a little bit better.

In verse 19, it says that Jesus says this to John. It says, the things which you have seen and the things which are and the things which shall take place after these things. So they would say that in that verse, we see that there's something that's prior, something that's current and something that is yet to happen.

And they would say that in chapter 2 and 3, we would see the things that are as John has already recorded that which has happened to him. And so after he has recorded the things that are the current at the beginning of Revelation chapter 4, verses 1, it says this.

And after these things, I looked and behold a door standing open in heaven and the first voice, which I had heard like the sound of a trumpet speaking with me said, come up here and I will show you what must take place after these things.

And so from Revelation 4 on, they would read that as a future literal period of time, specifically speaking about the seven-year tribulation that would be pulled from Daniel chapter 9, verses 24 through 27.

And that during the seven-year tribulation, they would say, they see many different things taking place, judgments taking place, marks on the head, marks on the hand, these type of things that we see in the book of Revelation.

And they would say, once again, that you must read the book of Revelation as literal as possible until you're forced otherwise to not do so, to then take something as symbolic. An example of something like this would be actually just found in Revelation 4 and 5.

It says that John sees a lamb standing before the throne as if slain. They would say that you cannot read that Jesus is a literal lamb and therefore you have to take that as a symbolic meaning or a symbolic picture or a spiritualized understanding of that thing.

Literalism, Symbolism, and Competing Readings of Revelation

But the issue of this is that in my opinion, when we hold to reading the book of Revelation as literal until we're forced to take it as symbolic, it can sometimes make for some interesting theology from one dispensational premillennialist to another dispensational premillennialist.

And the reason that is is that there is no clear line drawn in the sand of when we should then therefore take something as symbolic because somebody can take something completely as literal while the other person can only take portions of it as literal and are forced therefore to make something symbolic.

An example of something like this would be in, we'll look at two examples really quickly. Revelation chapter 9 verses 1 through 12. In there it speaks, in Revelation chapter 9, 1 through 12, it speaks of this bottomless pit where smoke comes out and out of the smoke comes this very interesting creature.

And I'll read in verses, we'll read verse 5 and on just so that we get the picture of what is coming out of this bottomless pit. It says, and they were not permitted to kill anyone but to torment for five months and their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it stings a man.

And in those days men will seek death and will not find it. And they will long to die and death flees from them. And the appearance of the locust, so this locust that stings like a scorpion was like horses.

So a locust that's like a horse with a stinger of a scorpion prepared for battle and on their heads as it were crowns like gold and their faces were like the faces of men and their hair like the hair of a woman and their teeth were like the teeth of lions.

And they had breastplates like the breastplates of iron and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots of many horses rushing to battle and they have tails like scorpions and sting and in their tails is the power to hurt men for five months.

And without reading anymore and looking at this you can see that the point of this is that are we to take this text as being a literal or a figurative being coming out of this bottomless pit? Is the bottomless pit literal or figurative?

That can change from dispensationalist to dispensationalist. Not each one will hold to the exact same reading of the text. In fact I'll put up two pictures here of two different understandings that somebody could take from this.

The first one here would be a literal physical fulfillment of the text. This is literal. This would be somebody that would say this is exactly what takes place. You do not need to read it as symbolic whatsoever.

Then there would also be those that would also say this is still literal but it has this symbolic literal fulfillment. And so they would say that they're still reading something literal but they just see it as this symbolic thing of today.

Now another clear example of this would actually be found in Revelation 13 1 -10 and this is the text where they would say that the beast that comes out of the sea is the Antichrist or the man of lawlessness found in 2 Thessalonians 2 3 -4 and just in that surrounding context there.

They would say that this individual is spoken of in Revelation 13 1 -10 and in there this beast comes out of the water and he has these 10 horns and 7 heads and on his horns was 10 diadems and on his head were blasphemous names.

And it goes on to say that it is fatally wounded but comes back to life and it is worshiped and they would look at that 2 Thessalonians verse and say that that's the one that sets itself up in the temple makes itself higher than God and seeks to be worshiped by man.

Now I'm gonna put up two another pictures here. The first one would be a literal reading and a literal depiction of what somebody could say that this is that this would be an actual beast that comes out of the water and is worshiped by men after having a fatal wound so on and so forth.

They say that you can read this as literal. Now the second picture would actually be a picture of a recent statue monument that was set up by the United Nations and they would say look this is the beast that's spoken of in Revelation.

Therefore the 10 kings that are spoken of in Daniel chapter 2 the 10 toes that people would say are the 10 kings that are in verses 45 and 46 that those are the kings that it's speaking of. This beast represents the United Nations and therefore the United Nations will have a fatal blow and come back and be worshiped and the interesting point of this that I'm trying to make clear in this kind of a understanding is that throughout the last 200 years less than 200 years since dispensational premillennialism has come about every individual has always looked at things that are taking place in their day and have been applying it to the book of Revelation and saying this is a literal fulfillment of the text and years go by and years go by and it fails.

Rapture Expectations and Closing Exhortation

Now if this is how we are intended to read the book of Revelation and this is how we should be reading it is to look out for these kind of things and be expecting the coming of Christ but this dispensational premillennialism really carries with it this notion of we are going to be taken out of tribulation that our clothes are going to be left behind cars are going to be swerving planes are going to be diving and no one's going to know what's going on.

Now once again if this is the truth we need to come to that understanding but if it is not we could be erring in so many different ways because we are looking to leave the world that we might not be meant to leave that we actually are going to be on this world evangelizing telling people about the gospel worshiping God throughout tribulation throughout a church period or so on and so forth so this is just scratching the surface of understanding dispensational premillennialism and I hope that this video has helped you I hope that it has encouraged you and if you are a dispensational premillennialist I hope that this might have shown you some stuff that you other tenants that believe in this stuff that you didn't even know that they would hold to and like I said I have barely scratched the surface so I don't expect to have fully covered that of dispensational premillennialism so next episode or next part of this series we are going to be continuing on into these other three views of eschatology next we are going to be looking at historical premillennialism followed most likely by amillennialism and postmillennialism and so if those things are an interest to you and that this would be a blessing for you I would encourage you to please follow along and subscribe like these videos share them with your family and friends and this is once again for God's glory alone go out into the world tell them about our King, Savior, Jesus Christ our Messiah who sits upon the throne in heaven right now worship him as such by telling people of his death, burial, and resurrection by which you and I are saved God bless and go in peace.