Dispy PreMil IV: 3 Implications
The Dispensational Premillennial position is derived from a straight-forward, face-value reading of the biblical text. The immediate context of a passage and the most direct intended meaning from author to audience is always to be considered. It deploys as few interpretive lenses as possible. When meanings seem unclear, consultation of other scriptures are utilized. Coherence and consistency matter.
Other eschatological positions take different stances in regards to these priorities. Perhaps the most common reinterpretation of scripture comes by identifying the New Testament Church as the real, true Israel and subsequently reinterpreting Old Testament passages about Israel as allegorically referring to the Church.
I want to point out three serious and necessary implications of holding such a position.
1. Close to 30% of the Bible immediately becomes metaphorical or symbolic.
Much of the Old Testament is concerned with the future of Israel. Many promises and guarantees are made to the nation with regards to its national redemption and the establishment within it of the Messianic Kingdom: based in Jerusalem upon the throne of David. The book of Revelation, as well, spends the vast majority of its time focused on Israel and not the Church.
If, as these divergent eschatological positions contend, the Church effectively is the “real” Israel of the Old Testament, then the original Jewish audiences for these prophecies would have had no chance whatsoever to understand what was being declared to them by the likes of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Zechariah.
What all of these metaphors and symbols actually mean will always remain a subject of debate among those who insist on them, as well. No clear cypher for understanding the prophecies is provided in the New Testament and both Christ and the Apostles take the prophecies at face value. Those who insist that all of the prophecies regarding the coming kingdom of the Messiah are actually talking about the spiritual reign of Christ during the Church Age have not just a mountain, but an entire continent-wide mountain range of explanation and reinterpretation to contend with. They will no doubt have their explanations, but the question is whether those explanations are in any way consistent with the rest of the Biblical narrative or even coherent at all. (For just one particular example, what does Ezekiel 40-48 mean if it’s all an allegory for the Church?)
Regardless, the moment someone decides the Church is the true Israel, close to a third of the Bible instantly becomes an allegory nobody seems to have the ability to explain.
2. The prophetic curses of the Old Testament are borne out in history but the prophetic promises are not.
When God promised Israel exile and subjugation for the violation of His laws, they received it. The kingdom of Assyria really did conquer and enslave the northern kingdom of Israel from 732 to 722 BC (II Kings 17:6) and the kingdom of Babylon really did conquer and enslave the southern kingdom of Judah in 586 BC (II Kings 25).
The Israelites really spent 70 literal years in captivity (Jeremiah 25; II Chronicles 36:20-21) before being sent back by Cyrus, king of Persia (Ezra 1).
In short, promised punishments and prophetic curses played out literally in history - not figuratively or allegorically.
So, if the prophecies regarding disobedience were meant to be taken literally by the Jews that heard them, why should we think that the prophecies regarding the coming Messianic kingdom ought to be taken allegorically?
This is a massive and unnecessary contradiction.
Furthermore, Christ literally fulfilled dozens of Old Testament prophecies during His life, ministry and death. Our Lord’s precise and miraculous fulfillment of prophecy is one of the single most powerful evidences for both the veracity of the scriptures and the validity of His claims to divine identity.
Why on earth should we conclude, then, that prophecies regarding His coming kingdom were somehow delivered as a metaphorical picture and do not simply mean exactly what they say, as did the prophecies about His life and death?
3. The Church appropriates Old Testament language, symbol, ritual and identity for itself.
Rather than living as Gentile believers in Gentile churches, the rejection of a straight-forward understanding of the scriptures led Gentile believers to adopt Old Testament language and ritual into its practice.
Financial giving became “tithes and offerings.” The Lord’s supper became a “sacrifice.” The church building on the corner became “the house of the Lord” and the stairs inside leading up to the stage became an “altar.” Pastors became “priests” and infants were baptized as a sign of the New Covenant as they were once circumcised under the old.
New Testament churches adopted symbolic language for themselves from Old Testament Israel once they decided that they were, in fact, Israel. Different denominations appropriated different things to different degrees, but it has been such a longstanding tradition throughout Christianity that barely anyone even seems to notice anymore.
We have become so steeped in symbolic language that we tend to expect unexplained symbolism throughout our church experience. But the question arises: if the New Testament Church is the new Israel, and we have adapted certain language and ritual from Old Testament Israel, what in the world determines what we do and what we don’t use? If we are giving tithes and baptizing our children as a sign of the covenant, why aren’t we regulating the kinds of fabrics we wear? Do we have the right to appropriate some Old Testament practices and not others? What’s the standard and how do we know?
Again, there will be answers to these questions if you insist on finding some. The question is whether those answers satisfy reasonable standards of coherence and consistency.
I contend, rather, that the better option is to let Israel be Israel and let Gentiles in New Testament churches be Gentiles in New Testament churches. Let the Bible speak to Israel what it will and let Israel receive it. As Gentile Christians saved by the Jewish Messiah in the name of the Jewish God, let’s stop trying to be something we’re not. Let’s content ourselves with God saving Jews as Jews and Gentiles as Gentiles. Let’s stop trying to get in His way as He builds His own Church (Matthew 16:18) and is given His dominion (Daniel 7:13-14).
Confusion arises when the Bible becomes a foggy haze of impossible-to-understand symbolism. Priorities change when the emphasis switches from populating the kingdom through evangelism to building the kingdom through the establishment of institutions. Christian preachers and teachers like to point out that eschatology is a secondary issue, and in one sense they’re certainly correct. But when upwards of 30% of the Bible is prophetic and a significant portion of those prophecies have yet to be completely fulfilled, understanding what they mean and our own relationship to them is a very important part of the Christian life.
To say it another way, God would not have dedicated so much of the Bible to prophecy and eschatology if He intended for us to treat it as unimportant. And given that the Bible is meant to be understood, adapting a framework that makes so much of the Bible either impossible to understand or needlessly symbolic - without, I would like to point out, clear instruction from the scriptures to do so - is a massive misstep.
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I ask, then, has God rejected His people? By no means! For I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew.
Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry in order somehow to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them. For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead? If the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, so is the whole lump, and if the root is holy, so are the branches.
But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree, do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. Then you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. - Romans 11:1-2, 13-20