26. Christ returned in A.D. 70 (?), but according to preterists the literal cloud was missing (see Acts 1: 9; Matt. 24: 30; Rev. 1: 7).

The “Bible matrix” pattern always begins with a Word from God’s glory cloud on the Lord’s Day (Sabbath), the accepted Mediator received into this single-cloud “Tabernacle” (Firstfruits) and ends with multiple clouds, a corporate Mediator (the body). The Feast of Tabernacles (“succoth”) is literally the Feast of Clouds. This was fulfilled in AD70. Christ ascended to prepare the place, and the firstfruits church was received into it at the destruction of the Temple.

See also Not Just Any Old Cloud.

27. Israel never repented in A.D. 70 (Acts 3:19-21).

Paul wrote, “They are not all Israel which are of Israel.” The Word of God is always a sword that divides in two. That is the sword that Jesus brought. Many Jews converted, but many hardened their hearts. Many converts died to fulfill the first goat, many more hard-hearted hardliners died to fulfill the second. After the end of the Temple, over the next two centuries, many Jews converted to Christianity. The will of God concerning Judaism, and His wisdom throughout this “harvest”, had been made plain to all.

28. Christ said the nation won’t see Him until they repent. Matt. 23: 39. According to preterists “every eye saw Him” in A.D. 70.

The context of this verse is undeniably first century—unless of course we resort to some wild “postponement” theory that divorces these predictions from the historical destruction of Jerusalem.

Jesus’ mention of eyes is the product of the literary structure:

1. Eyes at the centre of the chiasm refer to the “seven eyes” of the Law. Christ died under the Law, but He was filled with the Law. He became the Lamb with seven eyes—and seven horns to gore the Law’s offenders with! The seven Lampstand eyes are opened as seven seals (Pentecost) which in turn blow seven Trumpets, which result in seven bowls of wrath (Atonement).
2. When they appear at the end of the structure (Tabernacles) it is the eyes of God inside a Man. (For more on this, see Eye Spy – 1.)

The idea is that Adam is given two eyes to judge with—two witnesses. If he  judges rightly between good and evil in the light of God’s Law (which he heard with two ears), he becomes a “Solomon” at the end of the process. His judgment is the Law incarnate. He is given (symbolically) seven eyes. If, however, he fails to judge with his two eyes, at the end of the process, the Lord visits the Garden and Adam is judged under God’s seven eyes. And Adam, like Isaac, Eli, Samson, etc., loses his two eyes. The process starts again with a fresh Word from God. What’s interesting is that after Isaac’s lack of judgment concerning the blessing, his judgment later returns concerning a bride for Jacob. He follows the example of Abraham and sends to Laban. The literary structure puts his “coming to” at the centre. His spiritual eyes had been reopened. I bet judges does the same with Samson also.

So, to get back to the question, “every eye” is a sudden return to sound judgment. The faithful martyrs literally did see Christ. They did “see him face to face” as did Jacob and Job, both of whom wrestled with God and prevailed. The Judaisers would realise God was actually against them. They would lose their eyes—and their sons—like Zedekiah. This last step often concerns Sabbath-wisdom and Covenant succession. The Jews who mourned the death of the Son repented. Those who wouldn’t mourn (ie. “I sit a queen and am no widow” Herodian worship) did not repent.

29. The land was smitten with the curse. According to preterists, John the Baptist failed. See Mal. 4: 5-6.

The gospel is a “liberating curse.” It kills the “Canaanites” and frees the faithful “Rahabs.”

Revelation describes the gospel as four horsemen. Word-Division-Fullness/Starvation-Judgment. It was a winnowing process. The Old Covenant “bread” became expensive, but the New Covenant oil and wine were not harmed. The book of Ruth follows the same pattern. Bethlehem (“house of bread”) begins in famine, the old generation is killed off by God “in the fields of Moab” [as spiritual harlotry], but the Lord builds a new body out of Jew and Gentile, and Bethlehem is again a house of bread. Herod was eaten alive by maggots and his big white house of bread Temple was eaten alive by Romans who tore up the masonry looking for gold. Maggots, and I guess Romans, only eat death. They cleaned the open wound wrought by the gospel sword while the chaste virgin bride feasted with the Bridegroom in heaven. Two goats, two parties. One on the mountain/Altar of God and one on the Altar of the Abyss. [1]

See Totus Christus for more on this theme: the “liberating curse”, especially the notes on Zechariah 5.

30. The living saints weren’t rewarded in A.D. 70. Matt. 16: 27-28. (According, they had to wait until death!).

The context of this passage is first century martyrdom. Those who were rewarded were actually dead by that time. This ties in with Hebrew’s exhortation to boldly draw near. See The Context of Drawing Near.

“But if anyone draws back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” Hebrews 10:38

50FPDZ

“Paul knew his kinsmen. This is a group of people on whom this tactic would work.”

Doug Wilson has been preaching through Romans (subscribe to his podcast now!) and recently commented on his blog about Romans 11, and the relationship between Christians and Jews today.[1] I’ll have to listen to his sermon to figure out whether Doug sees this as interpretation (“all Israel” is yet to be saved), or application.

I made some comments and a gent called Lemuel replied, and I made some more. It brings out the significance of the phrase “the sons of God.”

Mike:

There are no longer any Jews – or Gentiles – in God’s economy. That went out with Circumcision. So did the provocation. God made a short work on the Land.

Doesn’t mean there won’t be (or isn’t currently) a time when many Jews will convert. It’s just not what Paul’s talking about in Romans.

I think Jordan’s essay The Future of Israel Re-examined, although controversial, covers Jewish history, identity and eschatology very well. And it makes sense of Romans.

Any application of this to post AD70 “Jews” is exactly that – application.

Lemuel:

To say that Jews (Judaeans) and Gentiles no longer exist in God’s economy because in the church they are united is kind of like saying that men and women don’t exist in God’s economy because of Galatians 3:28. Admittedly, the usage of “Jew” varies. There is the inward Jew, whose heart is circumcised. There is the Gentile who gets fleshly circumcision. And then there is the genetic Israelite, the descendant of Israel – the way in which tribes/ethnic groups are identified, just as Amalekites descend from Amalek, Semites descend from Shem, etc. One of the groups discussed in Romans is ethnic Israel, Paul’s kinsmen according to the flesh, his race. None of this would necessarily rule out a 70 A.D. fulfillment, but I think Christians spend too much time pretending that racial groups don’t exist.

Mike:

Good point, but Galatians 3:28 is not the argument. There were Jews and Gentiles in the church together before AD70. The writer of Hebrews insisted that they keep meeting together (in defiance of those who were falling back into old habits?) as they saw the Day approaching. After that Day, it was no longer an issue.

Although we do need to accommodate for racial groups, the Judaism Paul was dealing with no longer exists. As the apostles kept preaching (and dying), the unconverted Jews (and the apostates) hardened their hearts like Pharaoh. During this period of “plagues”, Judaism became something else entirely — a synagogue of Satan.

In context, Paul is not dealing with “racial” Jews at all, but with their calling as mediators to the nations. This calling was the reason that the judgment for all the innocent blood shed from Abel fell upon that generation. Both the blessings and the curses of their Covenant calling were irrevocable. But that calling ended with the Old Covenant when it finally passed away with the Temple.

In the first part of Romans 11, Paul follows the pattern of Israel’s feasts, ending with the “branches” of Tabernacles. See Seven Thousand Who Have Not Bowed to Baal – 2.The book of Ruth also follows this pattern. The “fullness” of the Gentiles came in in the first century, just as Ruth came into the Covenant and bore Obed on barren Naomi’s lap. [2] So does the account of Noah: “Gentile” beasts substitute for the faithless “branches” who died in the flood. [3] And AD70 was a flood (Dan 9:26; Matt 24:37-38). Notice that the sin of the “sons of God” (those with the priestly calling) in Genesis 6, in Ruth, and in Matthew 24 is ungodly “intermarriage”.

AD70 revealed who were the true “sons of God.” It wasn’t the Circumcision. (Romans 8:14-19; John 1:12; Phil 2:15; 1 John 3:1;-2).

The context of Romans 11 is the imminent judgment of Herodian worship and the end of the Jews. As much as it distressed Paul, God’s wisdom in this process of “jealous inspection” blew him away (Numbers 5; Rev. 14:10). By AD70 it was all over.

One more comment. This would also mean that those with the title “the sons of God” in Job were not angels but priestly, mediatorial men (an obervation I have heard from Gary DeMar). Satan envied them, accused them, as he always does. They are Adams in the garden, Covenant heads, and he hates them. Job was a priest-king.[4]

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[1] Preliminary Thoughts on Envy and the Jews.
[2] See Fairy Tale in a Field and Feasts in Matthew 13 for more on this.
[3] This gives greater significance to the dove’s olive branch. Concerning Noah’s animals and their use in Isaiah, see The Wolf and the Lamb.
[4] See Jordan’s Was Job an Edomite King? Part 1 and Part 2.

“Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition.” (2 Thessalonians 2:3)

Non-dispensationalists are often accused of “Replacement Theology,” that is, the church replaced Israel. But we find in the Old Testament many examples of the same process prefiguring what the people of God went through in the first century. It is not replacement, but transformation. 

James Jordan writes:

When God called Israel out of Egypt, most of the people refused to follow Him and died in the wilderness. The old Hebrew people ceased to exist and were transformed into Israel, their new name. (I have discussed this succession of names in my book, Through New Eyes.)

The Israel that entered into the promised land was a new people made up of a mixture of Hebrews and converted gentiles, the mixed multitude. Their leaders were Joshua, a converted Hebrew, and Caleb, a converted gentile Kenizzite (Gen. 15:19; Josh. 14:6). (By “conversion” I mean that they entered the Mosaic Covenant.) According to Numbers 13:6, Caleb’s family had not only been adopted into the tribe of Judah, but had risen to prominence in it.

This event is directly analogous to the New Testament situation. The wilderness wanderings lasted 40 years, as did the span between A.D. 30 and 70. The Jews were called by Jesus and the apostles, and many converted (that is, they entered the New Covenant). Some reverted to Judaism, turning into apostate Judaisers, and like the apostates in Moses’ day, they “died in the wilderness by A.D. 70. Meanwhile, many “mixed multitudes” gentiles joined the kingdom. By A.D. 70, it was time to enter the promised land, and the old Jewish people ceased to exist, being transformed into Christians, their new name.

The same kind of event happened at the Exile. A study of the book of Ezekiel will show that God called His people out of Judea into the wilderness of exile, where He tabernacled with them. The people were given a choice: either move forward with God or perish by looking backward to the old ways. During the time of exile, as we have seen, many gentiles were converted into the nation. By the time the Exile was over, and the people returned to the Promised Land, the old Israel ceased to exist, being transformed into Jews, their new name.

Let us return to the Mosaic transition and examine the phenomenon of “falling away.” At Mount Sinai, all the people accepted the new Mosaic Covenant. Before too long, however, a large group of people were objecting to one of the most distinctive features of the Mosaic Covenant. During patriarchal times, any man might offer sacrifice at an altar to God, but the worship of the Tabernacle was “closer” to God and therefore holier and more dangerous. It is dangerous for a sinner to get too close to the Consuming Fire, and so the only people allowed to approach the new Mosaic altar were the priests, who were specially ordained and anointed for this purpose. God forbade all sacrifice except that conducted at the Tabernacle, which meant that the Hebrew people were no longer permitted to build and sacrifice at altars.

As it became clear that the people had “lost” this “right,” those who did not perceive that the Mosaic Covenant was in fact more glorious than the Abrahamic Covenant had been, rebelled. Their argument was that “all the people are holy and all are priests” (Ex. 19:6) and that Moses and Aaron were exalting themselves over the congregation (Numbers 16-17). They were drawing the wrong inferences from Exodus 19:6 because they were clinging to the older covenant.

This group of rebels is closely paralleled by the Judaisers of the New Testament era. The Judaisers were people who became Christians, and then realised that the leaders of the Christian community were changing the rules on them. Just as Korah, Dathan, and Abiram did not want to give up the old Hebrew ways in order to become Israelites, so the Judaisers did not want to give up the old Jewish ways in order to become Christians.

Just as Korah and company accused Moses and Aaron of inventing their own religion, so the Judaisers accused Paul. Just as many of the Israelites in Moses’ day wanted to return to Egypt, so the Judaisers wanted to return to Judaism. This is the “falling away” to which the New Testament refers a number of times.1

“Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.”  (Jude 1:11)

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1  James B. Jordan, The Future of Israel Re-examined, here, in issues 13-15.

See also The Man of Sin.

“If Satan was defeated at the cross, why was there so much Satanic activity before the destruction of the Temple?”

(*Satan was thrown out of the heavenly Temple but moved into the earthly one – seven worse demons – a false Lampstand. Judaism’s seven eyes were darkened. [Matt. 6:23])

“Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.”  (1 Cor. 3:12-17)

Are the gold, silver and precious stones our heavenly bling? From the structure of this passage, I think what Paul is referring to is the church. If we are building disciples who remain despite trials and testing from God, we will be rewarded. The immediate context of this is the false doctrine of Judaisers, and their house of gold, silver and precious stones (Herod’s Temple and his puppet High Priest’s robes). While Paul was building a Temple out of people, Herod was busy polishing the brass on the Titanic that he knew Jesus had said would be submerged under a Gentile flood (Daniel 9:26). Herod’s precious stones didn’t make it through God’s judgment. The Day declared what it was in truth.

The question is, are our disciples a robe/house for Jesus, or are they kindling in His nostrils? When He comes to judge, what will our ministry be revealed as?

And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. He opened the shaft of the Abyss, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft. Revelation 9:1-2

The fifth trumpet aligns with both the Feast of Trumpets, and Deuteronomy. It is the summoning of armies on Day 5, swarms of birds and fish filling sky and sea as glorious clouds. The Altar of the Abyss, in this case, is now an evil twin of the Altar of Incense, a demonic response to the ascension of Christ and His new government.

This “de-ascension” of Satan mirrors (chiastically) his fall in the third trumpet. Like Christ, he was given a key. His throne-coming was also accompanied by clouds of smoke, but instead of a sweet-smelling aroma it was the sulphur of Sodom. As the fire of Pentecost came from the Altar of Incense in heaven, its evil twin, a Babylonian furnace (Daniel 3) bore an army of unholy mighty men in a false Pentecost. Preaching the Word of God raised up monsters. In this case, they arose from the Jews’ deconstructed Altar under the Land and the Sea in the Abyss—the deep. The flaming mountain that Jesus cast into the Sea was wounded, but not dead. These Judaisers would torment and devour “men” (Adams = Jews) for five months, the period between Pentecost and the Trumpet warnings of the final epistles. Revelation alludes to Joel to describe them. They are like soldiers from a new Babylon.

With a showdown between the true and false altars, the victory of Elijah on Mount Carmel would be repeated. Again, the self-mutilating false prophets would be slain by the sword and their bodies washed into the nearby Sea. TAOTA