November 1995
Dear Co-laborer,
Once again we approach the holiday season.
Leette and I wish you a most blessed season as you reflect on God’s
goodness in your celebration of Thanksgiving and Christmas.
We hope that you and your family will be able to gather for a memorable
time together, and that you will sense His presence in a special way.
Eschatology, Part
13
If God took Israel into His confidence regarding their
future, as noted with Abraham, Jeremiah, and Daniel, then we can conclude that
He does not do this with the Church. From
the time of Christ's disciples to the present, God's people have been unable to
ascertain the time of Christ's return.
I remember a book entitled Eighty-eight Reasons Why the
Lord is Returning in 1988. When
1988 came and went, the author published a new book, Eighty-nine Reasons Why
the Lord is Returning in 1989. I
thought at the time, if he keeps writing and lives long enough, he will
eventually get it right! The best
seller 1994 is another of this species.
No one is able to maintain a high intensity of waiting for
the return of Christ. You only wait
on the top of the mountain so long before deciding to go down, build a house,
and live out your life. This is
obviously a caricaturizing of the point, for Jesus told us what to do between
the two Advents.
Nevertheless, it was this loss of imminence that caused the
Church to begin institutionalizing. As
Dewick noted, there was a "slow but steady decline of the eager expectation
of an immediate return of the Lord....and thenceforward with every fresh decade
the primitive hope silently retires more and more into the background."
The Patristics reveal in their writings this evolving from a preoccupation with
Christ’s return to the building of the institutional church.
If you believe that Jesus will come tomorrow, you probably
will not spend today buying a piece of property for a new church building.
All of the New Testament writers anticipated the imminent return of
Christ, and for this reason, as Paul Johnson notes,
they left no instructions on how to organize and institutionalize the
church. Thus it wasn’t until the
third century that the first church buildings appeared.
JUSTIN MARTYR
Justin, a Christian apologist, living about AD 100-165,
established a school in Rome during the reign of Antoninus Pius (138-161) and
died a martyr. We were introduced
to him in part 7 of this series. In
his First Apology he tries to allay the fears of the emperor regarding
Christians seeking to establish a kingdom.
He says, “And when you hear that we look
for a kingdom, you suppose, without making inquiry, that we speak of a human
kingdom; whereas we speak of that which is with God, as appears also from the
confession of their faith made by those who are charged with being Christians,
though they know that death is the punishment awarded to him who so confesses.
For if we looked for a human kingdom, we should also deny our
Christ...”
Later in this series we will note that with the rejection
of chiliasm, the church began to develop political aspirations, which in turn
fostered persecution from Rome. Not
so, Justin Martyr; his hope in an earthly rule of Christ in the millennium
precluded his having a political agenda. In
his extensive writings, Justin gives a clear picture of his perception of the
Church's view of millennialism and the Church's replacement of Israel.
For this reason, I will quote him extensively.
MILLENNIUM
Regarding the millennium, Justin, in writing to Trypho,
says, “But tell me, do you really admit that
this place, Jerusalem, shall be rebuilt; and do you expect your people to be
gathered together, and made joyful with Christ and the patriarchs, and the
prophets, both the men of our nation, and other proselytes who joined them
before your Christ came: or have you given way, and admitted this in order to
have the appearance of worsting us in the controversies?"
He answers that the opinion of Christians is divided on
this point.
"But I and others, who are right-minded Christians on all points,
are assured that there will be a resurrection of the dead, and a thousand years
in Jerusalem, which will then be built, adorned and enlarged, (as) the prophets
Ezekiel and Isaiah and others declare.”
ANTI-SEMITISM -
CHURCH REPLACED ISRAEL
Since God reveals Himself to the poor, blind, and contrite,
it is obvious to Justin that the church, not Israel is the receipient of the
affection of God. God is not
delighted with those who keep the rituals of the Old Testament, but rather with
those who live lives of purity and righteousness.
“.For the true spiritual Israel, and descendants of Judah, Jacob, Isaac,
and Abraham (who in uncircumcision was approved of and blessed by God on account
of his faith, and called the father of many nations), are
we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ, as shall be
demonstrated while we proceed.”
(Emphasis mine).
“For the circumcision
according to the flesh, which is from Abraham, was given for a sign; that you
may be separated from other nations, and from us; and that you alone may suffer
that which you now justly suffer; and that your land may be desolate, and your
cities burned with fire; and that strangers may eat your fruit in your presence,
and not one of you may go up to Jerusalem. For you are not recognized among the rest of men by any other
mark than your fleshly circumcision. . . Accordingly,
these things have happened to you in fairness and justice, for you have slain
the Just One, and His prophets before Him; and now you reject those who hope in
Him, and in Him who sent Him - God the Almighty and Maker of all things -
cursing in your synagogues those that believe on Christ.”
Making reference to the circular letter sent out by the
Jews warning the synagogues against those preaching Christ, Justin says:
“For other nations have not inflicted on
us and on Christ this wrong to such an extent as you have, who in very deed are
the authors of the wicked prejudice against the Just One, and us who hold by
Him. For after that you had
crucified Him, the only blameless and righteous Man,- through whose stripes
those who approach the Father by Him are healed. . . you not only did not repent
of the wickedness which you had committed, but at that time you selected and
sent out from Jerusalem chosen men through all the land to tell that the godless
heresy of the Christians had sprung up, and to publish those things which all
they who knew us not speak against us....Accordingly, you displayed great zeal
in publishing throughout all the land bitter and dark and unjust things against
the only blameless and righteous Light sent by God.”
The spiritual gifts have been stripped from Israel and
given to the Church. “For the prophetical gifts remain with us, even to the present time.
And hence you ought to understand that (the gifts) formerly among your
nation have been transferred to us.”
The Jews hate Christians, having perpetrated all manner of
lies. Christians, on the other
hand, love and pray for Jews. “...yet
you not only have not repented, after you learned that He rose from the dead,
but, as I said before, you have sent chosen and ordained men throughout all the
world to proclaim that a godless and lawless heresy had sprung from one
Jesus....Besides this, even when your city is captured, and your land ravaged,
you do not repent, but dare to utter imprecations on Him and all who believe in
Him. Yet we do not hate you or those who, by your means, have
conceived such prejudices against us; but we pray that even now all of you may
repent and obtain mercy from God, the compassionate and long-suffering Father of
all.”
Justin calls the Church, “Israel.” “As, therefore, all these
latter prophecies refer to Christ and the nations, you should believe that the
former refer to Him and them in like manner....For you are neither wise nor
prudent, but crafty and unscrupulous; wise only to do evil, but utterly
incompetent to know the hidden counsel of God, or the faithful covenant of the
Lord, or to find out the everlasting paths.
"Since then God blesses this
people, and calls them Israel, and declares them to be His inheritance, how
is it that you repent not of the deception you practice on yourselves, as if you
alone were the Israel, and of execrating the people whom God has blessed?"
“What, then?” says Trypho; “are you Israel? and speaks he such
things of you?”
“If, indeed,” I replied to him, “we had not entered into a lengthy
discussion on these topics, I might have doubted whether you ask this question
in ignorance...As therefore from the one man Jacob, who was surnamed Israel, all
your nation has been called Jacob, and Israel, and Judah, and Joseph, and David,
are called and are the true sons of God, and keep the commandments of Christ.”
(Emphasis mine).
This last paragraph is an illustration of the point Harnack
made (cf. parts 8 and 9) when he noted that the Gentile church stripped from
Israel her promises, applying them to herself.
In Chapter 131, Justin sets out to show that the Gentiles were more
faithful to God than the Jews, having been converted to Christ.
In Chapter 132, Justin sees the name of Jesus in the OT word Joshua, and
the marriages of Jacob are a figure of the Church in Chapter 134.
Notice in this next set of quotes how Justin handles the Old Testament,
comparing it with the footnotes.
“And when Scripture says,
‘I am the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, who have made known Israel your
King,’ (Is 43:15)
will you not understand that truly Christ is the everlasting King? For you are aware that Jacob the son of Isaac was never a
king. And therefore Scripture again
explaining to us, says what king is meant by Jacob and Israel: ‘Jacob is my
servant, I will uphold Him; and Israel is mine Elect, my soul shall receive Him.
I have given Him my Spirit; and He shall bring forth judgment to the
Gentiles. He shall not cry, and His
voice shall not be heard without. The
bruised reed He shall not break, and the smoking flax He shall not quench, until
He shall bring forth judgment to victory. He
shall shine, and shall not be broken, until He set judgment on the earth.
And in His name shall the Gentiles trust.’ (Is 42:1-4)
. Then is it Jacob the patriarch in
whom the Gentiles and yourselves shall trust? or is it not Christ?
As, therefore , Christ is the Israel and the Jacob, even so we, who have
been quarried out from the belly of Christ, are the true Israelitic
race....understand, therefore, that the seed of Jacob now referred to is
something else, and not, as may be supposed, spoken of your people.
For it is not possible for the seed of Jacob to leave an entrance for the
descendants of Jacob, or for (God) to have accepted the very same persons whom
He had reproached with unfitness for the inheritance, and promise it to them
again; but as there the prophet says, ‘And now, O house of Jacob, come and let
us walk in the light of the Lord; for He has sent away His people, the house of
Jacob, because their land was full, as at the first, of soothsayers and
divinations;’ (Is 2:5f)
even so it is necessary for us here to observe that there are two seeds
of Judah, and two races, as there are two houses of Jacob: the one begotten by
blood and flesh, the other by faith and the Spirit.”
CONCLUSION
Read and reread carefully Justin's treatment of Scripture,
especially how he interprets Isaiah in his 135th chapter in the Dialogue With
Trypho. This hermeneutic,
viewing the Old Testament figuratively, and tampering with the text, is
necessary if you are going to get the Old Testament to say that Israel has been
replaced by the Church.
In the bonds of Christ,
op. cit., ANF, Vol I, p. 166, The First Apology of Justin, chapter XI.
The KJV says, “In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and
with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land:”
This is entirely different, i.e., not a third Israel, but Israel the
third with... In his endeavor to demonstrate that the Church is Israel, he
misquotes the OT.
The KJV says, “I am the Lord, your Holy One, the creator of Israel, your
King.” Isaiah does not call
Israel “King” as does Justin.
In the KJV the words Jacob and
Israel are not mentined. Isaiah does not identify who the “servant” is.
Justin assumes that it is Jacob and Israel, which alters the meaning
of the text.
Justin quotes from Is 2:5-6 and stops.
Actually, Is 2-3 deals with the chastisement of the Lord, and Is 4
deals with the blessing of God on the restored nation.
As the seemingly first of the patristic writers to appropriate
God’s promises given to Israel, transferring them to the Church, Justin
sets the pattern for amillennialists that follow, even though Justin himself
was premillennial.