Aug. 19, 2015 Show with Dr. Barry Horner & Dr. James M. Hamilton on “Historic Premillennialism” [End Times 6-Day Marathon]

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in Pennsylvania, it's
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Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors, Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.
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Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another.
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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.
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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.
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Now here's our host, Chris Arnzen. Well, good afternoon,
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Cumberland Valley, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming.
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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this 19th day of August 2015, and today is day number three of End Times Marathon here on Iron Sharpens Iron.
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We already addressed on Monday amillennialism, on Tuesday we addressed pre -tribulational premillennialism or dispensationalism, and today we are going to be addressing historic premillennialism, and we have two different guests to do that today.
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Our first guest is going to be Barry Horner. He is the author of Future Israel, Why Christian Anti -Judaism
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Must Be Challenged, and he is also the host of a website on that very issue, which we will have him describe in a moment.
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And we are also, for the second hour, starting at 5 p .m. Eastern, going to have as our guest
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James Hamilton, who is professor of biblical theology at the
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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. And there is a possibility that our two guests, although they are addressing, they're both addressing and defending historic premillennialism, they may take a slightly different spin on the topic.
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As with most of our eschatological views being presented, there typically is not just one view.
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There are varieties of views that usually fall under the heading of each, and I'm trying to do the best job as I can in six days from today through the 24th to get a variety of views and so on.
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And, of course, you have the ability as a listener to email your own questions, and so if you disagree with how any of our guests are representing any of their respective views, you can feel free to email a question at chrisarnson at gmail .com,
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chrisarnson at gmail .com. But first of all, let me welcome our first guest today, my dear friend
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Dr. Barry Horner, and it's been a long time, brother. I'm so glad that you're on the program again.
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Thank you for inviting me, Chris. It is a pleasure. We've certainly interacted before, and I look forward to today.
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Yes, in fact, regardless of your eschatological view, or regardless of whether you're a
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Calvinist or a Minian, or what kind of a Calvinist you may be, I heartily and strongly urge you to invite
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Dr. Horner to your church to give his presentation on The Pilgrim's Progress. He is a thoroughly knowledgeable expert on the life of John Bunyan and on his masterpiece,
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The Pilgrim's Progress. I've seen his presentation probably close to five times at least, and I actually organized most of those events that featured
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Dr. Horner discussing The Pilgrim's Progress. So I strongly urge you to look up Dr.
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Horner at futureisraelministries .org, futureisraelministries .org.
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And you also have a separate website, don't you, for the John Bunyan Ministries? Yes, it's again www .bunyanministries
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.org. bunyanministries .org, and that has nothing to do with a foot disorder. This is regarding the great man of God, John Bunyan, author of the classic allegory,
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The Pilgrim's Progress. Well, once again, our email address, if you have any questions on historic premillennialism, email them today at chrisarnsen at gmail .com.
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That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com. And please, if you,
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I ask of you to please at least give your first name, the city and state where you reside, and the country where you reside, if you live outside of the
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United States. And you're originally from Australia, as is evident from your accent, brother, correct? Yes, that's right.
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I'm from Melbourne. Yes, and now you are living in Arizona. Are you still pastoring?
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No, I'm sort of semi -retired, really. Okay. Well, it's an honor and privilege to have you on the program again.
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Dr. Horner was featured as a guest several times on the old Iron Trepans Iron between 2006 and 2011, and it's my joy to have him back.
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Now, your eschatological view is known as historic premillennialism.
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Obviously, premillennial refers to something that is going to happen before an event called the millennium.
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So what is the millennium? And what exactly do you believe will occur prior to this event?
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Well, first of all, of course, it's based upon, I would say, two major passages.
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One, of course, is Revelation 20. And then the other one would be
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Zechariah 14. I know one reform scholar, Verne Poitras, and in a discussion he had with dispensationalists, he made a frank admission.
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He said, if I was premill and I was arguing that case, he says, I would also include Zechariah 14.
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But it's really, of course, well known in terms of Revelation 20. And so it, of course, involves a whole relationship to the second coming of Jesus Christ.
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He will come bodily, personally, gloriously, at a point in time. And the whole basic aspect of premillennialism is that at his return, and following that subsequently, there will be a thousand -year reign, as mentioned in Revelation 20, verses 1 through 6.
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You could give another name. I sometimes use the word messianic kingdom. But Revelation 20 does mention this time element, although Zechariah 14, again, is speaking of a millennium, but it doesn't mention a thousand years.
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So essentially it's saying there's a glorious kingdom in which, again, Christ will reign from Jerusalem, personally, gloriously.
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Israel will have been restored there. There will be regenerate Gentile nations surrounding.
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And as Zechariah says in chapter 14, again, the earth, you know,
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Jesus Christ will be king over all the earth, and the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the
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Lord, as the waters cover the sea. Why is the word historic included in the term describing your eschatology?
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Historic premillennialism? Yes, yes, yes, I understand. I think the reason would be to distinguish it from a distinctive premill, correction, pre -tribulational view of the premill understanding of Revelation 20.
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In other words, there's a very widespread view in a pre -trib rapture, and that, of course, then involves anticipation then of the millennium following that.
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And so there's the pre -trib rapture, which presupposes then a premillennial view.
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But there are others, of course, who have distinctive views, other views, on the rapture. So they would not see it that way.
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The actual premill view can go back even to the Church Father Irenaeus, but there was real revival of studying millennialism in about the 17th century.
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The armill, the postmill, the premill views all really were very much loudly debated.
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And the postmill view is anticipating, of course, the millennium now, and a gradually
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Christianized world, and then Christ comes back. In the 17th century, that was probably because of great optimism about the new world, and they had hopes, again, that we were heading toward the completion of the millennium, if you like.
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However, then there was the postmill, then the premill view was basically simply
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Revelation Chapter 20, but it would not have involved any thought of a rapture at all at that time.
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So now we have people today who are premill. One very well -known person in this regard is
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George Eldon Ladd, a former professor at Fuller Seminary. He was well -known for upholding a premill view.
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I personally do not believe that he really is a classic premill. The reason is because he believed definitely in a plain exegesis of Revelation 20.
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But when you enter the Old Testament, he said all the prophetic passages there and all the eschatological passages there had to be reinterpreted and filled in through the
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Gospel of the New Testament. So he didn't type the Old Testament at all, really, into Revelation 20. For that reason alone,
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I believe he is not typical of a historic premill. I'll list a number of probably a little more recent ones, but I've quoted them in my book.
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Go back to, well, you've got Charles Simeon, very well -known because of his ministry in Cambridge.
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Horatius Bonar, great Presbyterian man of God, and he has written extensively on this.
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And he's very much premill, but the rapture is not an issue with him at all. J .C. Ryle, Bishop Ryle, same thing.
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He's written on this. He's very clearly, explicitly premill, and yet he doesn't get into the rapture at all.
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Another one would be Charles Spurgeon. A great illustration of this would be his message on Ezekiel 37, and there he makes it very clear that he is premill in his views.
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But again, he's not into a pre -trib view of the rapture or anything like that at all. Another one
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I'd add, too, interestingly enough, is Charles Wesley. I have an article on the millennialism of Charles Wesley, and it's written by Horatius Bonar, and he draws on Wesley's hymns, and the number of hymns you've got there, this whole collection involving
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Wesley's perspective and anticipation of a millennium, is very interesting. That's another one.
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There are others, but that's enough anyway. These are the historic ones, and also
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I would say this, too. All these ones I've quoted historically are very pro -Israel.
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They see a definite restoration of the Jews to Israel and where they're converted and so forth, and so they're very clearly pro -Israel, such as Spurgeon in Ezekiel 37, etc.
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Of course, the current nation of Israel didn't exist when Spurgeon was alive in the 19th century or J .C.
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Ryle. Would they view the current nation of Israel, formerly known as Palestine, in the
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Middle East, would they view today's Israel as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy? Well, what they clearly believe is that the promises of the land were definitely intended for Israel in an eschatological sense.
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As a matter of fact, I can tell you, now, in Ryle's book, he even declares, he's not being dogmatic on this, but he very much declares that he prefers the thought that Israel, the
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Jewish people, will return to the land in unbelief. So that's interesting.
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I personally believe, yeah, if Ryle and Spurgeon were alive, they're not going to be looking at Israel as though they baptize everything they do.
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Not at all. But they would see this, the remarkable things that happened in 1948, 1967, and I'm confident they undoubtedly say, surely
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God is sovereignly in this. I could quote you Dr. Martin Lloyd -Jones. He was interviewed in Christianity the other day.
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He makes it very clear that the 1967 war in which Israel captured the city of Jerusalem, he makes it very clear,
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God is in this. And you can look me up, it was here before he passed away. That's it.
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That's significant. Yeah, well I think any, well in fact I don't think, I know all Calvinists, regardless of what eschatological view they have, even if they're amillennial, they have to believe if they're
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Calvinists that God is in control over all things, and that would include the modern day gathering and settlement in Israel.
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But the difference would be, do you view it specifically, the modern day nation of Israel, as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
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I believe the return of the Jews there is a, I believe that personally, is a fulfillment of prophecy.
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I mean the land they got, that's the borders that were promised, and no one would ever suggest that. The fact they're back there, the fact there's a state, the fact that the providence of God led them to be back there against tremendous opposition, you know.
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And this leads me to Romans 11, 28, where Paul clearly says, he says regarding the
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Jews, he says they are enemies for you, you the Gentiles' sake, but as regarding their election and the promises of God, the promises of the fathers, they are beloved for the sake of the fathers.
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So, in Romans 11, 28, Paul says clearly that even unbelieving
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Jews are God's beloved enemies. And I believe that the Jews in Israel, the promised land which was promised to them, they are
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God's beloved enemies right now. So if you could just recap, as briefly as possible, how
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George Ladd, who is known by some as the one who really holds to the genuine form of historic premillennialism, but that is obviously a debatable issue, how is he different from Horatius Bonar, J .C.
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Ryle, and Spurgeon, and even the church fathers that you mentioned? No question, that's the point
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I'm getting at, that when you look at Bonar and Spurgeon, Ryle, etc., their view of the Old Testament is very much a literal one.
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Read his sermon on Ezekiel 37, it's very clear he accepts a literal interpretation there of the regeneration of Israel and so forth.
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Ryle and Bonar, they're exactly the same, just read their work, there's no question about it. They believe that there's a literal return back to the land in fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, especially
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Zechariah, Ezekiel, etc. Now when you come to Ladd, Ladd, as I said, accepts that Revelation 20 should be interpreted literally and we come up with a thousand year reign of Christ after his return.
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However, and this to me is a big issue, he's been asked, well what do you do with Ezekiel 37 and Zechariah and all his passages?
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He says you reinterpret them, that's his own expression.
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He says you reinterpret those passages and you filter them by reinterpretation through the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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And so you really come up then, you'll come up with a sort of an Augustinian understanding of the
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Old Testament messianic prophecies there. And that to me is where, I mean these others
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I've mentioned to you, they categorically would disagree with that because they see, well
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Isaiah 2 and Zechariah and Ezekiel, they see these all basically having a future messianic interpretation subsequent to the return of Christ.
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And please forgive me if I get repetitive sometimes, but I'm just trying to be as systematic in this as possible because it is sometimes confusing to talk about in times.
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But do you believe in only one return of Christ as amillennialists and postmillennialists do, or in two returns of Christ, one secret and invisible to those on earth who are lost and one that will be visible to all as pre -tribulationists believe?
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Okay, that's a rapture question, without a doubt. That you're asking me basically, my view of the rapture.
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I'll be honest with you and tell you where I am now. I had been pre -trib, now
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I am more in line with what is called a pre -wrath rapture. There is a rapture, it's obviously, there's a rapture, it speaks about a seizing of the people, they're taken up.
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There's no question about there being a rapture, the key question is when does it happen? Well, pre -trib view tends to give the idea, well, we're going to be raptured out when things get really bad, you know, and they give the impression that, you know, well, if it gets real bad, you're going to be raptured out of it so it won't be too bad.
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I can't accept that at all. With a pre -wrath view, what we're saying is at the end of the age, there are going to be, this is my term here, but I use the word, there are going to be covenant judgments.
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Now, these are direct interventions of God. For instance, when God judged, say, with the time of Noah, that was
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God's direct intervention with judgment, with the judgment of Noah and Sodom and Gomorrah, the same thing.
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That was God's direct intervention. So I call it, for want of a better term, a covenant judgment.
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This is where God comes in, you know. You get it, for instance, in Revelation 6, where you get men saying, let us hide ourselves from the wrath of the
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Lamb. That wrath of the Lamb there is a direct intervention of the Son of God at the end of the age.
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So, and you've got other passages, I think, in 2 Peter there, 2 Peter chapter 2, you'll see where it says that God delivered
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Noah and his family and God delivered, I'm sorry, from the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah there, and that God delivered the family there of, what's his name, remind me, what's his name, just had a blank there.
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Anyway, that was when Sodom and Gomorrah were judged. It's a lot, a lot. Oh, a lot in his life, okay.
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Yeah, just, I had just had a little blank there. And of course, when God judged Sodom and Gomorrah, he got, he took
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Lot and his family out. When God judged the era of Noah, he took
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Noah and his family out. And it goes on, it says, God will judge. It says there that God knows how to deliver the righteous.
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So my belief is that when we get to the end, when you get God directly intervening with judgment,
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God will take out his own people. So in other words, what it's saying is that just prior to the direct wrath of God coming on mankind, then
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God will take his people out at that time, because you can't have God's children suffering double jeopardy.
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You know, you can't have people saved by the Lamb being then yet experiencing the judgment of the wrath of the
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Lamb. That can't be, you know. And so you're saying that the visible return of Christ is when he returns to set up the millennial kingdom, and it's not a secret thing that happens before the tribulation.
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Is that what you're saying? All I'm saying is God will take out his remaining church members from this world when he then pours out his direct vials of wrath.
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When he's intervening, he will take his people out. He cannot judge them since he's already pardoned them.
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So they will be taken out. And then, of course, Christ will be instrumental in the fulfillment of that judgment there.
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Again, you know, let's hide ourselves from the wrath of the Lamb. It's a vision that is not commonly seen today.
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But it's speaking of the wrath of the Lamb. You know, men just totally in judgment. And Christ is the mediator of that judgment, it seems.
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And there he is returning in judgment. He takes out those who are his own just before his direct wrath.
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They'll be assumed up into heaven. And then when the judgment is finished, we'll have a completely regenerated earth.
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You've got it described in Matthew 19, 28. I often ask my amillennial friends what this means.
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And in Matthew 19, 28, we're told that this is our Savior speaking to his own disciples.
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He says, at the regeneration. Poengenesia is the word. It means the rebirth of the earth.
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It's speaking of the radical transformation of the earth. At the regeneration. When the
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Son of Man sits on his glorious throne. And then he says, you will be, you my disciples, you my apostles, you will be sitting on 12 tribes judging the 12 tribes of Israel.
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That's a good statement of what's ahead there. It's obviously Christ returns and is a regenerated earth.
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He sets up his kingdom. He reigns from Jerusalem. He has the regenerated nation of Israel around him.
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And then the Gentile nations are around them. Okay. And if you could go into more detail of what the tribulation will be like.
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The great tribulation. Okay, there is that. Yeah, this again is what is
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God's intervention. It's a time of, to quote the Old Testament, I would say Jacob's trouble.
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A great tribulation such as, you know, not being in Matthew 24.
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When I quote that passage in Matthew 24, however, I do not in any way go in a direction of some there who try to say that will all happen in 70
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AD. I'm not into that. But I am saying you've got this great tribulation. And I believe the great tribulation very much like Jacob's trouble.
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Again, this is God's judgment. This is God. It's not persecution because, well, not simply, there may be an element of that.
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But what I'm saying is there's been persecution. And the church now even could suffer much greater persecution, even in the
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United States, you know, let alone in the Middle East, where there is great persecution of Christians over there.
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That's persecution. But that has been going on since Pentecost, you know. So what we're dealing with here with time of Jacob's trouble, this great tribulation.
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This is God's imposition of direct judgment upon a godless and rebellious world.
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So it's interesting that you somewhat favor a pre -wrath rapture view, which is our topic tomorrow.
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We have two other guests. Who's speaking that one? Tomorrow we have
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Alan Kirshner. Oh, yeah, I know him well. He'll smile. And then at 5 p .m.
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after Alan, we have Pastor Vincent Sawyer, who is a dear friend of mine, who was a pre -tribulational dispensationalist and became a believer in the pre -wrath rapture, probably about seven years ago or so.
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I don't know exactly when, but when I first met Vinny and knew him for probably a decade or more, he was still pre -trib.
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So it wasn't that long ago. But give him my regards. Give my regards to Brother Kirshner.
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Yes, I will. I might add, I'm speaking at a conference he's arranged in California, in Glendora, California.
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He'll tell you about that, but I'm speaking there with him at that conference in January. So who or what in your scenario of eschatology is the beast, the false prophet, and the
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Antichrist? Oh, dear, dear, dear. I don't feel at the moment
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I want to get into that in detail, except that they are satanic agents, personal agents, who will be at the end there, particularly having positions of authority in the terrible kingdom of the
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Antichrist. There are many Antichrists, but there's one Antichrist, and the Antichrist, of course, will be the top opposition to Christ and his gospel.
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But I do, I believe these are all agents of the
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Antichrist, and they will manifest themselves at that time.
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At the end of Revelation, in Revelation 19, before you get to chapter 20, you've got there, you know, let us make war.
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You've got war taking place, and the beast and the Antichrist and the false prophet, they'll all be involved in that.
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So do you believe that these are three separate entities, the beast, the false prophet, and the
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Antichrist? Oh, yes, I tend to believe that, yes. Okay, and who or what is the Whore of Babylon?
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Well, that's an interesting question. Dare I say it, that the traditional view, I think, has been, that is,
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I mean, conservative traditional view has been that this is the Catholic Church. I am not one of those today who goes soft on what the
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Catholic Church is really about. I believe it is an Antichrist religious movement.
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It so is in opposition to the true gospel you read in the
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New Testament, especially in Romans and Galatians. The popes and all of their chicanery,
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I have no time for. My heart bleeds for Catholics who are so misled as to what the true gospel is.
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You have there, they're so devious because you've got the Vatican. The Vatican is a whole political system with untold wealth, and what goes on there, no one knows.
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I mean, the pope is an autocrat or a dictator in a sense. He's under the cardinals, but he,
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I mean, here they are, the Catholics here, loving democracy, and yet the
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Catholic Church doesn't believe in democracy. It believes in the reign of the pope. One of the earlier titles of the pope was the king of the kings of the earth.
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And so I believe that at the end time, the Roman Catholic Church will also have a major role in what
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Satan is involved with, and it is the epitome.
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It is the epitome of a counterfeit Christian religion. Tell us how you really feel,
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Barry. Well, I mean, the present pope, you know,
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I mean, what about this present pope? Some of his beliefs, I mean, he comes from South America.
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He's into what we call baptized socialism. That's what he's into, really. And I could go on more about that, but that man,
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I mean, that's enough said. I won't say any more, but I have no time for the pope.
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Right. And so if you could also, I know that you've already gone into the millennium, but if you could describe the thousand -year reign of Christ and the binding of Satan, where we get the concept of millennium in Revelation 20, how does your view of the millennium differ from a pre -tribulationalist, dispensationalist?
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I don't know. One thing, again, when
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I'm trying to defend a premial view of Revelation chapter 20, to me, the biggest argument is continuity between chapters 19 and 20.
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Now, the Armill take William Hendrickson, what they do is you get the end of chapter 19, which clearly is speaking about the end times and war between Satan and Antichrist and Christ and so forth.
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I mean, you can't miss it there at the end of the 19th chapter. The question is, after that time then of the war and God's judgment on the
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Antichrist and the beast too, at the end of that, the question, this is the big question, do you read on to chapter 20 in continuity or do you recapitulate?
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Take Greg Beale as a well -known Armillennialist scholar and you get
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William Hendrickson who has a volume called More Than Conquerors. Now, Hendrickson is well -known.
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He gets to the end of chapter 19. He recapitulates and when you get to chapter 20, you then have, we're back to Pentecost in the beginning of the church age.
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To me, that is preposterous. There are many other elements. There's the mention of the beast at the end of chapter 19 there.
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Then you get into chapter 20 there. It speaks of those who have not, as it were, yielded to the beast and there's continuity there.
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Now, okay, you get continuity. So chapter 20 takes us into what we call the Messianic Age.
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Messianic Age, again, is well -described in Zechariah chapter 14.
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There, again, I've quoted this before, but a fine verse in which it says, and then Jesus will be king over all the earth.
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That's what it says. Revelation, I think, confirms this too. But he shall be king over all the earth.
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This is a West thing about the historic Jesus who shall come again in like manner.
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This glorified Christ, he is sovereign over the whole earth. He will gather his people
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Israel together. They will reign in Jerusalem with him or in the land of Israel as it's been designated and so forth.
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And it will be a period of righteousness. The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the
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Lord as the waters cover the sea. And there's so many passages about this,
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Azar chapter 11 and so forth. And it's been written. Now, the only question what you're really getting to is there is this little season in which
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Satan is given a little ride, a little bit of leeway and so forth. It says it there.
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And I would recommend in handling this matter and some of these other matters like Ezekiel's temple, you know, all that sort of that matter.
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I would highly recommend you read Horatious Bonar in his book,
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Prophetical Landmarks, because he mentions there are some difficulties.
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We're not denying their difficulties. But to me, I'll switch and go to Ezekiel chapter 20, the
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Ezekiel, you know, on there 40 onwards there, the temple of Ezekiel.
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When we get to that, there's some problems there. It's not easy. I'm not saying that. But he makes the point.
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He says the difficulties we have are infinitely smaller than those who try to just make some broad general statement about the vindication of God and resurrection and that sort of thing there.
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And I agree with him. All I can say is read Bonar because he gives such a wonderful, careful, judicious explanation of these matters.
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We're going to be right back after these messages from our sponsors. If you have a question for Dr.
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Barry Horner, submit your email to chrisarnsen at gmail dot com. That's C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail dot com.
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Please include your city and state of residence and your country of residence if outside the
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U .S .A. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Dr. Barry Horner in Historic Premillennialism.
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We are discussing historic premillennialism. This is day three of our six -day end times marathon, where every day we are featuring a different view of the last days, a different eschatological view.
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We've already addressed amillennialism and pre -trib premillennialism.
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Today we are discussing historic premillennialism, and our first guest has been, for the last half hour,
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Dr. Barry Horner of Future Israel Ministries and Bunyan Ministries, and are following Dr.
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Horner at the top of the hour. We are going to have a guest from the
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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, James Hamilton, who will be discussing the same issue and may take even a different perspective on historic premillennialism, because there are varying views.
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As we've already heard from Dr. Horner, historically, the differences between George Ladd and Horatius Bonar and Charles Spurgeon and J .C.
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Ryle and so on, and who would be more in line with the Church Fathers on that and so on.
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So there are varying opinions and differences of opinion on who rightly wears the name historic premillennialism.
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So if you have any questions, you can email them to chrisarnson at gmail dot com.
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chrisarnson at gmail dot com. And going back to the differences that we have between premillennialism and historic premillennialism and dispensational pre -trib premillennial views.
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Going to what the millennium will be like. In your view, are glorified saints who were once enjoying indescribable bliss in paradise with Christ going to once again be experiencing sorrow, grief, and anguish during the millennium as they did before death, since they will return to a world surrounding them with mortal sinful men and will be witnesses to sin and death, even if it's to a lesser degree than before Christ's physical reign?
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Well, first of all, I would come back and say, do you think the saints during the millennium will have emotions?
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This gets to the point, too, even a bigger point, a profound matter, is the question whether God does have emotions or are they just anthropopathisms.
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You know, you end up sometimes when you consider this, well, we're just going to be on clouds waltzing around in an amorphous sort of similarity.
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We'll all be the same. I mean, that to me, I can't accept at all. One good illustration would be the transfiguration.
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When our Savior is there revealing his glory for a short time, also
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Elijah and Moses were there. I mean, it seems to me probably Peter recognized and learned quickly this was
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Moses, this was Elijah. They were distinctive. They had a distinctive character about them that I believe in the millennium,
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David's going to be there, Paul's going to be there. Have they suddenly lost all their identity?
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Are they just again this sort of homogenous group without any distinctive
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Biblical identity? I can't accept that for a moment. So we're going to have them there distinctively and we're going to have, of course, glorified bodies.
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Everything's going to be gloriously new, renewed, but nevertheless we'll have that distinction.
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But there'll be emotions. We won't be doing nothing there.
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This is what is sometimes conveyed, especially in the Amillennial view, where just things are sort of, you know, doing nothing except praising and that's all there is to it.
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I mean, it's not right. I don't think it's... And some, mind you, I've got to say this, some Amillennialists have seen the weakness of this and they have admitted that it's far more the fact that we shall be there distinctively.
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I will have what I call a term spiritual materiality. I'll have a body, but it'll be a glorious spiritual body like under Christ's body.
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But I will have a distinctive spiritual materiality there and I will be doing things and some will have high positions and lower positions.
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David will be there and so forth. And so now the emotions, what the emotions are,
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I think there'll be emotions. But we've got to be careful there. Again, I refer you to Reed Bonner because he handles this so well.
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It's not easy. You can go in either direction. You go in the direction where you end up with an emotionless sort of existence and we're all just, you know, the same and there's no distinction at all and that's just not right.
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Now, if you get distinction, then you get distinction, one with another doing different things, interacting with one another, and surely that will involve emotions and so forth,
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I don't doubt, you know. Again, the releasing of antichrist, I'm not sure what's going to be like. But God has a good purpose.
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I am convinced in the sequence of Revelation 9 and 20 that even the letting loose of Satan for a little season is clearly at the end of the millennium and that's way ahead of us now.
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Yeah, I got confused there for a little bit because amillennialists and postmillennialists don't believe that the departed saints that live before us who are in glory in our own paradise will be a part of the millennium with the living human beings here on earth.
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So, I'm not really sure what you meant by reference to amillennialists. They don't believe that...
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In the millennium, I meant. Yeah, I have more in mind the historic amillennialism which comes through the
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Catholic Church, you know, over the centuries. That's still amillennialism. But the idea is, you're sort of up there in this wispy, heavenly, floating existence and that's it.
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There's nothing specific at all which the prophets speak about, you know, so that's what I had in mind.
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You're speaking about in heaven? Yeah, as a matter of fact, as a matter of fact, I'm no fan of N .T.
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Wright, believe me. I really, I have real problems with N .T. Wright. However, I heard him speaking on something recently and I agree with him thoroughly.
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He was making the point that when we die, we go to Abraham's bosom, we go to an existence, but that existence does not really, is not the same as what shall then come when the kingdom is finally fulfilled.
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And I agree with him on that, you know, so, because we, for instance,
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I mean, we die, we go to be with Christ, which is far better. Then we have this messianic kingdom or millennium, which then we will be participants in.
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But when we die, we don't get into participation with that at this moment. So N .T. Wright was correct in saying that when we die, we go into Abraham's bosom, this set up position of where we are blissfully with Christ in some way.
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Then, when things are wrapped up, then will come the kingdom in a fully manifest sense.
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Yeah, I agree with that. But what I'm saying is that the amillennialists and postmillennialists believe that we will not, on earth, we will not be reunited with the saints that departed before us until the final things when we are in glory with them.
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Not during an earthly millennium we won't be together with them. That's what I meant. Well, I'm not sure,
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I get a bit confused with some of their views that way. All I know is I go to be with Christ.
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Right. And then I will probably see loved ones who are also with Christ. I'll see people
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I've known who will be with Christ, but then will come a separate introduction of the kingdom and that will be a new existence.
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That seems to be what's coming. But I was talking, matter of fact, I've got to mention this,
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I was talking with a postmillennialist just the other day and we were talking about this and he's more a historic pre -mill, a postmill
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I should say. He's very historic. So I said to him, I said, tell me, I said, have you read
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Lorraine Bednar's book, The Millennium? Oh yeah, he's read that book. I said, tell me, I said, in there,
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Lorraine Bednar has a classic postmill, he has a chapter called The World is
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Getting Better. I said, tell me, do you believe that? Well, he ducks and weaves all over the place, you know, and he says, oh, well, it's not events, we can't look at world events, we've just got to look at scripture.
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He just dodged the issue. But the postmill says everything's getting better, the world's getting better. And that to me is just fancy, that's all it is.
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Right, well, the postmillennialists that I've heard say that it's not necessarily a straight line that goes upward and gets better and better and better, that we could receive a century or centuries of horrible conditions here on earth before we go on the rise to the millennium.
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Well, tell me, let me hear that again once we get an outbreak of nuclear war.
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Right, well, that's what I meant. I don't think that postmillennialists deny that that could happen on earth.
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Yeah, but they're really dodging the issue. I mean, it's just fanciful what they're saying there. What, we're going to have a nuclear holocaust, then the world's going to get better?
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That's just, it's fanciful. I can sympathize with the postmills of the 17th century, because the new world was coming into the fore, the new world in America, and things were going, the
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Reformation, with all the weaknesses, the Reformation had brought revolution to Europe. I mean, things were going well in a broad sense, you know, so therefore we're heading toward, you know, this
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Christianized earth. And I can understand them thinking that way, but it hasn't turned out that way.
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I know that you have, as a very top priority, an opposition to anti -Semitism, and one thing that some amillennial and postmillennial folks are confused about is that a common, the common view that the two -thirds of the
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Jews will be wiped out off the face of the earth in Israel during the
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Great Tribulation, and yet you have premillennialists joyfully and enthusiastically and excitedly witnessing
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Jews return there. That's a caricature, I have to be honest with you,
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Chris. That's a pure caricature, and I could believe that,
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I do believe, that the Jews have yet to suffer their worst encounter with the
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Antichrist and war and persecution. The worst is yet to come. I can say that.
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I don't say that with any joy, you know. I don't say that at all.
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That, I believe, is ahead. There's worse things to come, but yet I believe very much that the hope of any
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Jew today is the Gospel. That's what the Jew needs to hear, is the Gospel. And our
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Savior said to the Jewish people, he said, except you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.
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And he said it twice on that occasion there. Yeah, no, I wasn't trying to insinuate that you were experiencing joy over the mass slaughter that will take place in your eschatological view of the
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Jews. I meant that the Jews are returning to Israel that you're rejoicing over, and it seems...
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Yeah, of course, yes. I rejoice when I see Scripture being fulfilled. I don't see that return in some isolated issue.
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I see that as something which Scriptures throughout the Old Testament repeatedly speak about, the return of the
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Jews to the land and so forth. I rejoice in the fulfillment of Scripture.
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I rejoice in the fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. I rejoice in the Jews, even their unbelief, going back to the land that was promised to them.
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A common objection to premillennialism is found in Ezekiel's temple vision, in Ezekiel 40 -48.
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And amillennialists and postmillennialists argue that if this is a literal future temple, then it will require a return to the sacrificial system that Christ made obsolete, since the prophet speaks of atonement in Ezekiel 43 -13, 27, 45 -15, 17 -20.
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Critics believe this to be a blasphemous contradiction to the finished work of Christ.
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Oh, yeah, I've heard that. I've heard that probably 50 times I've heard that. Maybe 51 now.
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Yeah, yeah, right. Okay, 51. I mean, anyone who is in the camp where I'm at, that to me is just somewhat a perversion.
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But what really is involved here, we have to face what the Scripture means by what it says.
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We have to go exegetically to Ezekiel there and 40 -48, what does
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Scripture say? Now, what does the amill do? What do they do? And they make these broad conclusions about this long section, which is very specific and very detailed, and they make these broad sort of conclusions.
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Well, it's just being about resurrection and the triumph of the church or something like that, you know. And anyone who reads that passage will say, it's got to mean more than that.
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Why all that detail? And anyway, now what we do is we go exegetically to it, and we come to passage that speaks of some sacrifice, it would seem, you know.
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I haven't got the final answer there, but what I'm saying is something like that is going to happen. It will be,
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I believe, in the messianic kingdom, this kingdom of spiritual materiality, it will be a specific edifice.
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And that I can't avoid, especially in terms of the contrast. If you come on from Ezekiel 36, 37, you go to 39, when you come through that route, and then you come up to the temple there, you know, and try and say that takes us back to the church age, that to me just doesn't fit at all.
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By the way, I think I am on the borderline of becoming charismatic, Barry, because yesterday a woman emailed me who did not know that I was interviewing you today, and she emailed me and she said, how can
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I get a hold of Dr. Barry Horner's book on future
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Israel? And I couldn't believe that she said that yesterday. Oh no, she's not on the internet,
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Ben, is she? I'm sorry? She's probably not used to the internet. She doesn't know anything about Amazon or anything like that.
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I guess not, but I just thought it was uncanny that it was just yesterday, and so I was able to share with her that you were going to be on my program today.
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Right. Now, what is dispensationalism and how do you differ from it?
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Well, that's, you know, I would need an hour, really, to go over that, and I find this again,
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I want to say this, that so much misleading comment on what is dispensationalism, somewhat frustrates me.
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I'll illustrate this. John MacArthur is dispensationalist.
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One of his friends, Mike Vlack, who is a professor there. Who I had on the show yesterday.
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Yeah, right, Mike Vlack. Mike is dispensationalist. You know, but you cannot just associate them with the dispensationalism that came around the time of Darby and so forth.
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You know, you can't do that. Now, let me also say this. For those reformed people who say, ah, they've changed, reformed truth has changed.
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The idea that somehow reformed truth, coming from Augustine through to Luther and Calvin, and now today it's the same.
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I don't accept that at all. One good illustration of this would be the introduction of Covenant Theology, you know?
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And Covenant Theology is a subsequent development within the Reform Movement. It comes out of probably, out of Europe and Dutch emphasis and so forth.
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But that's a modification. That's a variation on the theme of basically
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Reform Calvinistic emphasis there. Now, as I say, look at MacArthur.
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And I may not agree with him on everything, but the idea that they, I know some reformed people, they throw that word dispensation around a bit.
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They try to slay you with it. It's a nasty word. It's a bad word. I won't have that at all.
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I will challenge anyone who is reformed to take Lewis Berry Chafer's book,
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He Who Is Spiritual, and read it and tell me what they think about it. Because that book, you know, of course,
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Chafer is the founder of Dallas Seminary and very, very significant in the development of dispensationalism.
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But on the other hand, what a man of God he was. His book, He Who Is Spiritual. Let's read it and see the spirituality of this man, you know?
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And I hope some reformed people will just use this word in a cunning sense.
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It's the bottom of the pole. And I won't have that. Well, actually, I hope you don't think
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I was doing that. I was just asking you a question. No, no, no, but I've faced it. Because I have a reformed, sovereign grace background too, you know,
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I've faced it. You know, it's a nasty, it's not a good word. Okay, I'll say, what about reformed
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Baptists? Go to the reformed Baptists and just mention the word dispensationalism and see how they react.
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Boy, you know, anyway, that's enough said. But I'm trying to be careful there.
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Charles Hodge, read Charles Hodge's Systematic Theology, the beginning there, I forget what section it is actually.
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He has four, he mentions, he believes there are four dispensations. So in other words, you are not necessarily offended then if somebody somehow associates you with dispensationalism, is that what you're saying?
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Well, only if they're honest in their assessment of me and put me, you know, I would,
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I suppose I might be associated with a moderate dispensationalism in this.
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I believe there's only one redeemed people of God. Okay, but I believe within the unity of the one people of God, there is a diversity.
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There is a diversity of the Jewish people and Israel and the Gentiles. And that will be evident clearly in the millennium.
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There will be one people of God in the millennium. And yet there will be the diversity of Israel in Jerusalem and so forth, and then the
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Gentile nations around, you know. So it's a, it's a, it's a unity with diversity and that's my dispensationalism.
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And there have been some perverse groups, I think, is that too strong a word?
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In the early history, you got George Mueller. He was a great man of God. He was, he was a dispensationalist, you know.
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One of the great Greek scholars, S. P. Tregellos, great Greek scholar. He was brethren and dispensational and so forth, but they even didn't agree.
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I mean, you had a difference between Tregellos and Darby and so forth. And so you get all this going on there.
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But one of the, I'll tell you where the problem lies. Dispensationalism does not believe in covenant theology.
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Reformed people believe, a lot of them, in covenant theology. There is a ground upon which they really differ.
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That's what part of the problem is. And so where do you find yourself in regard to that?
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I would be a moderate dispensationalist. I'm happy with that. I'm not in trouble with that at all. Okay. Now, in 1
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Peter 2, 9, we read, but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy priesthood.
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A people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
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Is this a description of the church or Israel? Okay. You know, I've answered this in my book.
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There's a section there about two pages in which I deal with this passage. In the second page. Okay. Again, we've got to, you know, you can read a passage out like that.
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Is this a church? No. What you've got to do is you've got to go to scripture at exegesis. First question.
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Who is Peter speaking to in this epistle? Apart from that verse, but considering the epistles of, who is
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Peter speaking to? Let me tell you. Probably the best critical commentary of the
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Greek text of 2 Peter is by a very good British scholar called Selwyn.
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Selwyn's commentary on the Greek text. He deals with this whole issue and points out this has been debated over the centuries since the time of Augustine, who the company is that Peter was running to.
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And he comes to a conclusion. There's no question. You can look it up and you'll see he says, it seems that most, not
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Augustine, I think it was Augustine and Jerome. They didn't believe this, but everyone else, a lot of others. He gives a long list.
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They all say that 2 Peter was written to Jewish people. And after all, knowing that Peter is the apostles of the
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Jewish people, it is a very reasonable thing to expect that Peter, when he writes his epistles, is writing especially to Jewish people.
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So he writes there to Jewish people and he's writing to them and they understand this in the context of the
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Old Testament and so forth. You can easily, of course, say that while he's writing to the
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Jewish people, there is the point that comes out in the New Testament that the Gentiles are engrafted into the blessings that come to Israel.
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And so, in a sense, they participate of this, but be that as it may, there's no problem if Peter is writing to Jewish people.
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That's it. So if the Gentiles... See, this is where some of the confusion with amillennialists and postmillennialists.
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If the Gentile believers are being grafted in with the Jews, the believing
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Jews, how could that be Israel if Gentiles aren't being grafted into Israel if Israel is not the church?
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You know, I mean, isn't there one body? And if the Gentiles are grafted in with the Jews, wouldn't that...
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One body with distinction. One body. Paul makes it clear when he speaks about one body in Corinthians that the arm and the eye and the ear and everything is all a unity with diversity.
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This, to me, is a very important principle, that within the people of God, there's diversity within unity.
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It's the same with gifts. There's even diversity in the Godhead. You've got the Father, the
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Son, the Holy Spirit, and economically, they're involved in distinctive ways. You've got one
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God, and you've got diversity within the Godhead. It comes down through Israel and 12 tribes and so forth.
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And so you're going to have diversity within unity, and that's all
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I can say there. And by the way, Dr. Horner, I forgot to mention that sister in Christ who wrote asking about your book, she asked about it because she heard that day, yesterday,
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John MacArthur was promoting it in a sermon that he was preaching. That's right. Yeah, well, I love dear brother
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John MacArthur, and it's not because he says nice things about my book. I've always respected his exegetical, his expository ministry, and I continue to do that very much right now.
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So anyway, if she goes to Amazon, she'll find it there very easily. All right, and could you repeat your websites once again for our listeners?
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Yes, the Bunyan website is just www .bunyanministries .org, and then the other one is www .futureisraelministries
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.org. Well, it has been a pleasure to have you back on the program again,
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Dr. Horner, and I look forward to having you back on the program to discuss John Bunyan, and I love that seminar that you put on regarding Pilgrim's Progress, so I would really love to have you return to address that issue and others.
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Oh, yes. Well, God bless you, brother, and we're going to be beginning our second hour with James Hamilton in a minute, so we thank you for joining us on Iron Sharpens Iron.
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So much, Chris. It's a real pleasure to deal with these, I think, important matters. All right, well, God bless you, and we'll be right back after these messages, so don't go away.
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will be able to be on Iron Sharpens Iron in the future to address this topic and others.