Understanding Eschatology: Preterism and the Hope of Resurrection

Now, full preterists argue that that prophecy about the future has already been fulfilled, which is a startling and astonishing conclusion. Well, let's argue -- well, let's see first why they argue for its past fulfillment, and then we'll look at how they present that argument. [00:07:00]

Now, notice that this is not a statement whereby Paul says I will be alive explicitly and concretely. But rather he just says in passing, those of us who are alive at that time, and here in 1 Corinthians, "We shall be changed," and so on, does not necessarily mean that the Apostle expected that he would be alive when these prophecies would be fulfilled. [00:09:44]

In order to take the position that both the resurrection and the rapture took place in the first century, one has to spiritualize the texts in terms of the descriptive ideas and concepts that are used about this resurrection. And if there's any place where it's a serious problem to begin spiritualizing something is when that which you're spiritualizing is discussing something that is supposedly physical and bodily. [00:12:48]

It's very difficult to spiritualize the bodily resurrection of the saints without at the same time actually denying the bodily resurrection of the saints, because if it's only a spiritual resurrection then manifestly it's not a physical resurrection. But advocates of full preterism such as Stuart Russell and Max King do precisely this. [00:13:08]

They say that the resurrection of which Paul speaks did take place in AD 70, but it was a spiritual resurrection of those who have died; they were spiritually raised and are now in heaven, and they are not to be understood in physical categories. Not without reason this position has been charged with being a form of gnosticism, because as the Gnostics deny the full reality of the physical resurrection of Jesus, and even of His physical incarnation, this would seem to be denying a real physical resurrection of the saints. [00:13:41]

Now, the same type of thing happens with respect to the treatment of the rapture, which Paul describes in his correspondence to the Thessalonicans. In 1 Thessalonians, in chapter 4 of 1 Thessalonians, we read the following account of the rapture, which has gained so much attention in Christian eschatology that it warrants that we read the text. [00:14:57]

Now, here the Apostle is addressing a concern that was a vital concern of early Christians. The early Christian community had the hope for the future resurrection and for the return of Christ in clouds of glory, and yet before these things took place many of the Christians of the early community died. And so the obvious question that their relatives were asking was this: Does this mean that our relatives and our friends who have passed on will miss these great eschatological events that have been promised to us? [00:16:50]

And Paul is answering the Christian community by saying, by no means. In fact, not only will those who have died not miss the return of Christ at the end of time and the great resurrection, but they will be front-row-seats participants. They will be at the head of the line, because the Apostle says, "The dead in Christ will rise first." And they will be taken up into the air, and we who are alive at His coming will also be taken up to join the Lord, or "to meet the Lord" as the language of the Apostle Paul says, "in the air," as He descends with the trumpet sound and that sort of thing. [00:17:23]

Now, the full preterists have to speak again of a secret rapture, a rapture that was spiritual, that was silent, and that was invisible. To argue that the rapture has already taken place means it occurred, nobody heard it, nobody saw it, and no one was aware of it. And so if it were simply spiritual and invisible and silent, we wonder how we can do justice to the language of this text and others. [00:18:11]

Paul does not say that the Christians will be caught up in the air and then stay up in the air with Jesus. The imagery here is of meeting Christ as He is returning in glory, so that the Christians are participating in His victorious return to this world. It's not that He'll come so far, catch up the church and then stay there or go back to heaven until a later time. [00:21:13]

But the whole point of the imagery here echoes and reflects something that was commonplace in the contemporary world in which Paul wrote; namely, the pattern and practice of the triumphal return to Rome of the Roman armies. Whenever the Roman armies would come back from a campaign, before they would enter the city of Rome they would camp outside the city, about a mile outside the city, and there would be all of the soldiers plus all of the captives that they had brought home from the campaign. [00:21:47]

And then they would send a messenger into the senate to announce their arrival. Remember they carried the banners, of SPQR, the Senate and the people of Rome, and that would give time for the city planners to erect an arch of triumph and to decorate the city, much as we would for a tickertape parade for conquering heroes. They would spray garlands with a sweet aroma throughout the city to cover up the smell of slaves and their odor and so on, and then at a prearranged time a signal would be made whereby the trumpets would be blown, and that was the signal for the armies of Rome to march in triumph into the city. [00:22:02]