Read a very helpful introduction to the reasons for a preterist interpretation of the Revelation by Msgr. Charles Pope. HT: Micah Martin.

Currently in the Liturgies of daily Mass we have been reading the Book of Revelation. It is commonly read at the end of the liturgical year, for it bespeaks the end of, and passing qualities of all things of this world.

It is also a book of glory, depicting the ultimate victory of our Lord Jesus Christ, after a great period of conflict between the doomed kingdom of this world, and the victorious Kingdom of Christ. In this context the Book of Revelation is not a mere tour guide to the last days, but is a book of glory reminding us that Christ has the total victory already wrapped up.

I would like in this post to present a view of the Book of Revelation that, while a minority opinion, I think better articulates the original context of the Book of Revelation and provides important interpretive keys to understanding its fundamental message.

Continue reading at Archdiocese of Washington blog…

“Revelation is not just a vision of the King of Kings,
but of the King of Kings in His court.”

Preterists have a go at dispensationalists for interpreting the Bible through the lens of current headlines. We recognize that the Bible must be interpreted in its historical context, for its “first audience.” But there’s a brand of “newspaper exegesis” that plagues preterism as well.

In 2007, I listened to a lecture series on Revelation by Ken Gentry. I thought it was pretty good, but something didn’t sit right. Next, I got into James Jordan’s series, and it did sit right. Rather than forcing an interpretive framework onto the text, Jordan lets the text speak for itself. In fact, it sings.

What’s the difference? As much as I hate to set the work of these two gents in opposition, Gentry’s approach is to begin with Josephus’ account of the Jewish war and seek to find correlations in the text of St. John. But isn’t this just a first century version of “newspaper exegesis”? Gentry would agree that Revelation is “level-pegged” with Ezekiel as a prophecy against a corrupted Temple. But if we had a 6th century BC equivalent to Josephus, would anyone try to interpret the book in the light of the CNN of the day? No.

But what framework does this leave us with? Where does Jordan begin? How does he make near perfect sense of a text that has baffled scholars for centuries? Rusty Reno gives us a clue, in his foreword to the recent James Jordan festschrift, The Glory of Kings.

James B. Jordan is remarkable. There are plenty of Bible preachers in America who know the Scriptures well. Lots of professors read books in philosophy, history, and literature and have all sorts of interesting things to say about culture. Pundits cultivate a sharp, pungent, and readable style. But Jim is perhaps unique.

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Jim knows a great deal, but I have no doubt that the electricity in his writing and conversation come from his biblical vision. He does something remarkable. He takes the cultic core of the Old Testament—Temple and Priesthood, altar and sacrifice—and reads it into the full sweep of the biblical witness.
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Who else writes detailed interpretations of the Book of Daniel and quotes Allen Tate’s poetry? Who else can give a lecture on echoes of Leviticus in the apocalyptic vision of Zechariah and then chat over cigars about Friedrich von Hayek and Richard Weaver? Moreover, who can cover such a range with vivid images, punchy tag lines, and memorable turns of phrase? Not many, which is why I’ve come to think of Jim Jordan as one of the most important Christian intellectuals of our day.

Jim knows a great deal, but I have no doubt that the electricity in his writing and conversation come from his biblical vision. He does something remarkable. He takes the cultic core of the Old Testament—Temple and Priesthood, altar and sacrifice—and reads it into the full sweep of the biblical witness. The result is not the usual sort of “theological” interpretation we’re all familiar with: Christ’s fulfillment of the Old Testament explained by way of warmed-over theologies of substitutionary atonement or observations that really amount to little more than restating New Testament passages. Instead, Jim takes texts such as Leviticus seriously on their own terms. He brings to life the intense concreteness of tabernacle and sanctuary, and he allows the prophets a retrospective restoration as well as a prospective anticipation. As Jim has helped me see, the Scriptures are forever reaching back and renewing even as they reach forward to fulfillment in Christ.

We live in space and time. Our lives have a concrete and quotidian reality. Precisely because Jim’s reading of the Old Testament takes its bearings from the point of maximal particularity—the cultic focal point that is the most enduring and transparent anticipation of the Incarnation—his reading of the larger biblical witness is saturated with immediacy. Take a look at any of his writings on worship. The life of God’s people has a particular shape in Israel. The tabernacle and temple have a specific architecture. The sacrifices involve discrete patterns of action. As a result, we do not encounter nebulous theological concepts. The immediacy of the cult of Israel is accessible to us today. Indeed, it is more accessible and more immediate, because in Christ we have been brought into the inner sanctuary.

Any particular detail of Jim’s biblical theology is up for debate, but the larger project is compelling—and much needed today. Many of us have limited biblical imaginations. We have stock phrases and favorite passages. We think of ourselves as biblical, but our friends recognize that nine times out of ten we’re quoting from Paul’s Letter to the Romans or the Book of Revelation or the Gospel of John. The Old Testament functions as a hazy background. The Psalms have no living power. Although we would vigorously deny it, we are functionally allied with Friedrich Schleiermacher, who notoriously set aside the Old Testament, or Immanuel Kant, who rejected the “Jewish” parts of the Old Testament as unusable.

Should we be surprised, therefore, that our preaching and teaching remains “spiritual” or “theological” in an abstract and theoretical way? Nothing we say is heretical. Orthodoxy carries the day. But it all floats a few feet above the ground. The gears of faith never seem to do what Jim’s biblical theology does: mesh with the gritty realities of life.

If we diagnose ourselves honestly, then perhaps we can see that, unlike Jim, there are no biblical actualities at the center of our preaching and teaching, things to be seen and entered and touched. Perhaps, for example, we imagine ourselves agreeing with him because we endorse a “sacramental” view of the church. But there is a world of difference between “sacramental” and Jim’s trenchant reading of the Book of Revelation as a handbook for Christian worship, a reading that depends upon his interpretation of the cultic core of the Old Testament. Again, one can debate the details, or the biblical typology, or Jim’s assumptions about how to understand biblical inerrancy, or his conception of biblical history, or any number of other different technical questions. But of this I am certain. Jim does something few achieve, even (perhaps especially!) those who make loud claims about their biblical fidelity. He puts the living realities of the Bible at the center of his thought…

The rest of the foreword deals with the need for Jim’s sort of thinking in the Church today, but here I want to focus on his reading of the Revelation. The book is a “handbook” for Christian worship precisely because it is a worship service. We have little idea of the flow of what is going on because we haven’t internalized the books of Moses. Chilton started us in this direction, but it is Jordan who really makes sense of the details.

All the action takes place in the Temple court of God, and it brings with it all the baggage of Old Testament history. Well, not so much baggage as a royal entourage, tent and all. Revelation is not just a vision of the King of Kings, but of the King of Kings in His court. The detail of the Jewish war of AD66-70 is not what concerns Him. What concerns Him is the “changing of the guard” in His heavenly council. The shadowy concepts communicated by the Mosaic furnitures and rites have found their fulfilment in flesh, in the people of God. Instead of an Altar of Incense, we have actual elders with bowls of Incense, etc.

So, the structure of events cannot be interpreted through the lens of Josephus. The Jewish war is as relevant to the Revelation as the details of the destruction of Jerusalem under Nebuchadnezzar are relevant to the book of Ezekiel. That is, not very much.

However, I do recommend you read Gentry’s brilliant work on the actual dating of the book of Revelation, Before Jerusalem Fell. Current scholarly opinion is wrong on this one, again because they don’t listen to Moses. And on this one Gentry gets it right.

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Jordan’s lectures are available from www.wordmp3.com (click link in right column).

“…falling headlong, he burst open in the middle…”

Todd Robinson commented:

“I’ve enjoyed your particular brand of orthodox preterism. Working through Acts recently, I began to wonder what Michael Bull’s take on Acts 1:11 and 3:19-21 would be… Thanks for any insight.”

On Acts 1:11:

Luke works through the matrix, forming the Covenant Head in the first part, a New Covenant Body in the second part, with the death of Judas at the centre being the reason for the apostolic “Day of Atonement” goat drawn by lot, a makeshift Urim and Thummim:

Commandments (Ark – Transcendence)
…..Delegation to Israel (wait for power)
…..(Veiled promise concerning Israel – Hierarchy)
……….Ascension of Christ (Altar) HEAD – flaming torch
……….Ascension of Disciples – upper room (Table)
……………Judgment of Judas–head and body–under the
……………Old Covenant Law as a picture of AD70
……………(Lampstand – Ethics) [1]
……….Witness of Apostles (Incense) BODY – smoking firepot
…..Selection of Matthias for the “first” death (Mediators – Sanctions)
Apostolic Succession granted (Shekinah)

On the Day of Atonement, the High Priest made two approaches, one for the Covenant Head, the priesthood, with the blood of a bull; another for the Covenant Body, Israel, with the blood of a goat, the “first death.” (The second death was the Azal goat, carrying the curses. [2])

Jesus was taken into the glory cloud as Great High Priest, the Covenant Head, not with the blood of a bull but with His own blood.

“Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.” (Hebrews 9:12)

He would return from “behind the Veil” for the second approach. “So that where I am, you may be also.” He would receive them to Himself to complete the sacrificial ascension of Israel, Head and Body, Adam and Eve, and celebrate the marriage supper, the “rest” for the Old Covenant faithful. [3] This structure is laid out in the ascension offering in Leviticus 1. Notice that we see this predicted in Daniel 7. Jesus is already on His throne, and “one like the Son of God” ascends to be with Him. This interpreted later in the chapter to be the saints inheriting the kingdom. They see Him because they are like Him. [4]

On Acts 3:19-21:

I think verse 25 is the key, the “blessing of all nations” promised to Abraham. The Restoration was prefigured by Israel’s restoration from Babylon. But then, this first century restoration, at the end of the Old Covenant, was the end of that social divide. The end of the New Covenant will be the end of the Creational divide, an even greater restoration. History is chiastic. The judgments are: Physical / Social / Personal / Social / Physical. [6]

But I think, judging by Peter Leithart’s excellent exposition of 2 Peter, that Peter had AD70 in mind. [7] The prophets always preached for the purpose of a moral response in light of a coming judgment, i.e. be the good (repentant) goat, not the bad one.

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[1] See Fool’s Gold. It’s interesting that Judas is lifted up in the gospels and “deposed” around Pentecost, just like Satan, and just like the Herods. Notice that Abraham’s sacrifice had the holy birds as undivided head, and animals as divided (Jew-Gentile) body. (See Pass-over and Pass-through). Jesus’ and Judas’ bodies were both divided and emptied, but filth came out of Judas (like Eglon) and living water came out of Jesus. Jesus left the burial linen arranged in the same manner, head and body. The Covenant Head was not crushed.
[2] See The Second Death.
[3] See The End Is Not Yet.
[4] See High As the Horses’ Bridles.
[5] See James Jordan’s exposition of this in his Daniel commentary. The structure of Daniel 7 follows the same pattern as the Levitical Atonement rite, with the fragrant saints caught up in “clouds” prefigured by the incense.
[6] See A New Heavens and a New Earth.
[7] See How To Read the New Testament.

.
I haven’t read this, but it sounds like an eye-opener for those new to preterism. Perhaps this approach will be helpful in getting Christians used to thinking more contextually about the New Testament:

“Most people don’t realize that many if not most of Jesus’ parables were intended not as general morality tales, but as particular pronouncements of coming judgment and change. Jesus was warning Jerusalem to repent and to accept its new King (Jesus) or else fall under ultimate condemnation of God.

In fact, much of Jesus’ teaching in the Gospels pertains primarily to that pre-AD 70 crowd, and without reading it in this light, we misunderstand it. And when we misunderstand it, we misapply it.

The section of Luke covered in this commentary requires this understanding. The parables Jesus tells during His final journey to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51–20:26, and beyond) almost all pertain to the rebellion, faithlessness, judgment, and coming destruction of Jerusalem, and the salvation of a tiny remnant of His elect people.”

From the Foreword:
“Joel McDurmon’s work is original. He goes where few commentators have gone before. As he shows in page after page of tightly argued points, there is a unity to the prophetic message of the gospels and the rest of the New Testament. It’s about new wine in new wine skins. Everything about the old covenant was planned obsolescence. Jesus was always in view, from the first promise of a savior in Genesis 3:15 to the revelation that ‘the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy’ in Revelation 19:10. So much of modern-day prophecy commentary is an attempt to rebuild what was never meant to be rebuilt. The parables, as Joel makes abundantly clear, serve to show that the breaking down of the dividing wall was on the horizon for them and the world with the result that there would be ‘one new man’ in Christ (Eph. 2:11–22). The destruction of Jerusalem and the dismantling of the temple’s stones were a foregone conclusion because Jesus had always been the reality over the shadow (John 2:19).” – Gary DeMar

Available here.
See also How to Read the New Testament.

Veritas Hall Westlake “Kingdom” from Darren Doane on Vimeo.

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One thing that has struck me since becoming a preterist is how much evangelicals play down the badness of the baddies in the New Testament, i.e. the unbelieving Jews and Christian Judaisers.

Evangelicals would never believe that Jesus and the apostles were mistaken in their warnings of an imminent judgment (and let’s face it, this imminence is a facet of the New Testament that is inescapable). So the only other option they see as viable is a position that defies logic: an event that was near, at the doors, yet could happen at any time over next few millennia.

Of course, there is another position: preterism. The event of which Christ and His delegates warned came to pass. If you are willing to entertain this wild idea (temporarily) as you read the New Testament, all of a sudden a great many problem verses fall into place. And so does a secondary great truckload of verses which seemed somehow slightly disconnected from the reality of our experience. You suddenly GET WHERE THE APOSTLES ARE COMING FROM. It’s like you’ve been driving on outback dirt roads all your life and finally run across some bitumen. The New Covenant scriptures cease to jar.

Thus, evangelicals refuse to interpret the New Testament in context. They think they are interpreting it, but they are, in fact, only applying it. Like the rest of the Bible, the New Testament was written for us, but it wasn’t written to us.

Once you have the film actually aligned with its historical sprockets, the texts become a lot easier to interpret. The modern church’s failure to understand the significance of AD70 in redemptive history means that one has to cover a lot more ground to answer the tough questions.

One example, as Peter Leithart mentions in The Promise of His Appearing, is the problems caused by reading Reformation-era debates back into the epistles of Paul. Paul wasn’t actually dealing with Roman Catholics, regardless of how helpful his words might be in debating them. His epistles must interpreted correctly before they can be correctly applied.

Another example I came across today, beginning Peter Leithart’s recent commentary on the epistles of John, is the identity of the false teachers in 1 John. Understanding that the final letters are warnings to Jews concerning the impending end of Judaism allows us to find answers to many nagging questions much closer to textual home.

“…This background helps clarify some of John’s major concerns. John, for example, mentions “antichrist” several times. In 2:18, he writes, “It is the last hour, and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have arisen; from this we know that it is the last hour.” Where did they hear that antichrist was coming? They perhaps heard it from John, or from another apostle or preacher. But where did the apostles learn about antichrist? If John had already received the visions recorded in Revelation, that might be one source. Ultimately, though, Jesus’ own teaching is the source, especially the sermon recorded in Matthew 24 and its parallels. Early on in the discourse on the Mount of Olives, Jesus warns that “many will come in my name saying ‘I am the Christ’ and will mislead many” (Matt. 24:5). Again in 24:24 he adds, “false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so as to mislead, if possible, even the elect.” Similarly, John warns about antichrists and “false prophets” (2:18-19;4″1). John is saying that antichrist has come, just as Jesus predicted. As Jesus warned, the appearance of antichrist is a sign of the approaching end of the age.

Can we be more specific? Can we identify the specific kind of false teachers, false Christs, and false prophets threatening John’s churches?

Many commentators on 1 John believe he is opposing an early form of Gnosticism and Docetism…

In his first epistle, however, John doesn’t give a great deal of emphasis to the fleshliness of Jesus. He mentions it in 4:2, and it is implicit in the opening verses of the letter, but John does not indicate that it is particularly characteristic of the false teachers’ theology…

Does John appear to be responding to gnostic Christology? John’s positive teaching about Jesus is that he is “the Christ” (5:10), that he came in the flesh (1:1-4; 4:2), that he is the Son (repeatedly), and that he came “by water and blood” (5:6). That is a thoroughly anti-gnostic Christology, and the church was right to cite 1 John in later debates with Gnostics. Identifying the heretics of 1-3 John as Gnostics gets us close to the truth, but in my judgment John’s focus is elsewhere.

What then? What false teaching are the false teachers teaching? We can begin by how John defines “antichrist.” In 2:22-23, the antichrist is the one who “denies that Jesus is Messiah,” and this denial of the Son is also a denial of the Father. Though this might describe gnostic Christology, it is just as accurate as a description of anti-Christian Judaism. Many Jews, obviously enough, denied that Jesus was the Messiah, the Anointed One from Yahweh. In fact, John’s description of the views of antichrists applies more precisely to Jews than to anyone else. What sense does it make for a Greek to deny that Jesus is “Messiah”? Did they expect a Messiah in the first place? Wouldn’t they simply be indifferent, as Pilate was, to the internal Jewish debates about messiahship?…

John’s opponents, I submit, are primarily Jews or Judaising Christians. If this is the case, what do we make of the gnostic echoes that so many commentators have heard in the letter?

Here is a hypothesis: Gnosticism is, in (perhaps large) part, a product of Judaism and, more specifically, of Judaising. On the face of it, this is a bizarre thesis. Gnosticism is a radically dualistic system, while Judaism affirms the goodness of the creation from the very first pages of its Bible. Counterintuitive as it may seem, several lines of evidence link Judaism with Gnosticism…” [1]

It makes me cringe when smart Christians insist that we are in the last days, the same last days that the first century writers of the New Testament insisted were a reason for the Jewish Christians throughout the Roman empire to remain faithful and not slide back into a corrupted, rebellious, Satanic distortion of the faith delivered to their fathers.

Yes, we should also live holy lives today, with all the fear and reverance due to our God, and no fear of men. But that is not interpretation. It is application, and selling it as interpretation makes a great deal of the New Testament mysterious to modern Christians.

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[1] See also How to Read the New Testament.
[2] Peter J. Leithart, The Epistles of John Through New Eyes: From Behind the Veil, pp. 10-13.

After reading (“orthodox”) preterists for a few years, the failure of modern evangelicals to read the New Testament in its historical context, and to understand its constant allusions to Old Testament event structures now floors me. How is it that we so easily underestimate the importance of the destruction of Judaism in AD70? And worse than that, how is it that we fail to understand that the imminent warnings of the apostles as prophets related to that event? Here’s a perfect example that hits both these ugly birds with one stone; some pure gold from Peter Leithart this week:

Do Not Touch A Woman

Given the high view of marriage and sexuality in Scripture, Paul’s instructions to the Corinthians are odd and out of character. Why would Paul think it good for everyone to be as he is?

Jeremiah 16 provides a clue. In verse 2, Yahweh instructs Jeremiah not to take a wife or raise children “in this place,” because Yahweh is bringing distress on the fathers, mothers, and children who are born in doomed Jerusalem: “They will die of deadly diseases, they will not be lamented or buried; they will be as dung on the surface of the ground and come to an end by sword and famine, and their carcasses will become food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth” (v. 4). In view of the present distress, Yahweh says, Jeremiah ought not marry or have children. Jeremiah would remain unmarried as a prophetic sign of Yahweh’s determination to withdraw peace from His bride (v. 5).

As Paul makes clear in various places, he is an apostle like Jeremiah, not only in being called from the womb but also in his singleness, a sign of the approaching doom on Jerusalem and Judaism.

This kind of common-sense interpretation really isn’t that common, is it? How is it that garden-variety scholars miss the Old Covenant context of the warnings in the gospels, epistles and especially the Revelation? Flipping through Goldsworthy’s Gospel and Revelation again this week, he comments on the fact that the book is very Jewish, but the significance of this seems to escape him, as does the significance of the details in the book. In many places he does little more than summarise the text and make some helpful application. Where is the interpretation? The book has been misunderstood as “timeless wisdom” for the church, rather than an urgent seismic warning for those to whom it was written. And people wonder why I rave about Jordan and Leithart. They get it.

Does this mean, as a friend challenged me this week, that the New Testament doesn’t apply to us? No. Does the book of Ezekiel apply to us? The real question is, was it written to us?

The interpretation of this passage above must take into account that its context is a first century distress. It came and went. Being single is not a principle that applies to the church throughout history. It is a wartime measure.

This widespread misinterpretation of the New Testament leaves Christians open to ridicule, like that in the graffiti pictured above. The answer is, Jesus did come soon, as He promised. He destroyed the scoffers, the backsliders, those who loved money, those who were disobedient to their parents, etc. He allowed them to be slaughtered and their city to be burned. He prepared a place for His disciples AND THEN HE RECEIVED THEM AS HE PROMISED. It is history.

So, how to answer the graffiti artist? Just as the Herods were wiped from history in the church’s first victory as Jericho, every individual and institution that exalts itself against the knowledge of God and His Son Jesus Christ will be wiped from history when Jesus comes to judge the World. Just as Jericho began Joshua’s conquest and Hazor completed it, our Hazor is yet to come. (Go read what happened to Hazor.)

The New Testament records for us God’s judgment in the Garden and in the Land. The World is yet to come, but there is no promise that this final “Gentile courts” judgment will be soon.

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See also How to Read the New Testament.

“Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”  Matthew 7:14

Oh dear. This verse proves postmillennialism wrong. It also proves the rest of the Bible wrong because that is postmillennial too. Fortunately, this problem seems almost as simple to deal with as Irenaeus’ ambiguous text that non-preterists use to “unfound” preterism.[1]

Jesus built the sermon on the mount upon the Bible Matrix pattern. [2] Why wouldn’t He? He is the living Word without Whom nothing was made that was made (heptamerous Creation). He is Yahweh Who led Israel from Egypt to the promised Land (heptamerous Dominion). He is the fulfilment of all the annual festivals of the nation (heptamerous Feasts).

At this point in the sermon, the Lord has reached Yom Kippur. It is also Day 6, Adam standing at the door as mediator; it is Joshua as Captain crossing through the Jordan (the Laver), choosing between blessing and cursing at Mounts Ebal and Gerizim (a veil split in two) and letting Canaanite blood sate the horns of the “four-cornered” Land.

The narrow gate was guarded by real cherubim, God’s bouncers, veiled from the eye of every priest but One, guarded again by cherubim sewn into the tent curtains, and again by the Aaronic priesthood, who incidentally carried swords to deal with any man or beast that dared to approach.

When Jesus said the way was narrow and difficult, this is what He meant. It was a tunnel in the Temple of Doom.

It’s not that this narrow gate is now obsolete. There are still guards on the door – the saints – but as the body of Christ grows to fill the earth, so does the door. It is still difficult, but no longer narrow. Or should be say that it is still narrow but increasingly ubiquitous? It is anywhere faithful, vocal saints find bread, wine and water.

“See, I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it; for you have a little strength, have kept My word, and have not denied My name.” Revelation 3:8

The “harlot” is also an open door, a narrow door given wide appeal through compromise. She wears the robes (veils) of chaste religion to cover her  nocturnal “inclusiveness.” Her forehead says “all-embracing” to men but “SLUT” to God. If we are postmillennial, we believe that as history progresses, the “narrow” door will eclipse the wide way. The other woman always ends up alone and destitute. As Solomon said, it is she who is the true Temple of Doom. [3]

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[1] David Chilton’s brief mention of this in The Days of Vengeance [A4 PDF] led Kenneth Gentry to write a big book about it: Before Jerusalem Fell. Gentry makes an, I believe, irrefutable case for a pre-AD70 date of authorship of the Revelation.

[2] You can see the whole thing in my book, Totus Christus. Interestingly, the Lord’s prayer follows the pattern as a”seven-sealed scroll” within the larger pattern (the sermon), which is also the “Deuteronomy” of an even larger pattern that covers the first section of Matthew’s gospel.

[3] See Godly Intolerance.

“For as the new heavens and the new earth [Land] which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the LORD, “So shall your descendants and your name remain.”  Isaiah 66:22

If you’ve been around preterism for a little while, you will know that this phrase is Covenantal. It refers to a new firmament (blood covering) and new mediators (on the Land); a new crystal sea government (Laver) and a restored four-cornered Israel (Bronze Altar).

So, Isaiah’s and Peter’s references to a new heaven and a new earth refer to looming Covenantal events, events which were contemporary to the respective authors. Isaiah spoke of the Restoration of Israel from Babylon. Peter spoke of the full inauguration of the kingdom in AD70.[1]

But extreme preterists want to divorce the term from physical reality altogether. I do follow them up to a point, but I think the solution is that, yes, all Creation is Covenantal, but it began with the physical world and will end with a restored physical world:

Creation to Abraham: 
Physical heavens and earth (including flood) establishing the Covenant.
The world as Tabernacle

Abraham to Christ: 
Social heavens and earth (Israel as Covenant: world divided by circumcision/earth)
Tabernacle as microcosmos – governed from earth by Messianic bloodline

Christ: 
Human heavens and earth (Christ as Covenant)
A Man as Tabernacle

Christ to last judgment:
Social heavens and earth (Church as Covenant: world divided by baptism/heaven)
Church as microcosmos – governed from heaven by the ascended Christ

Eternity:
Physical heavens and earth restored, fulfilling the Covenant
The world as Tabernacle

This explains the use of the “physical” Covenant language within these other symbolic heaven-and-earth stages. [2]
It also helps us to understand the contemporary nature of the prophecies that use this language. [3]

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[1] See How To Read the New Testament.

[2] See also Cosmic Language.

[3] See Looking for a New Heavens and a New Earth by David Chilton.

Part One here (PDF)
Part Two here (PDF)

The movie Superman Returns ends with some powerful iconography. Lex Luther has used a crystal stolen from Superman to create his own ‘new earth.’ Unlike Superman’s white-as-snow fortress of solitude, this is made of dark stone, Adamic earth. It rises up out of the sea and its growth threatens mankind.

Superman carries the weight of the entire sinful rock, and its growing kryptonite ‘spears’ pierce him. He ‘dies’ in the air and his fall to earth creates a ‘tomb.’ It’s worth a watch.

My point is, the idea of Christ being ‘lifted up’ is more than the bronze serpent, more than us ‘lifting Him up’ in our witness. [1]

Lifted up between heaven and earth, He was an open scroll. The bloodied lid of the Ark, the Word engraved (opened) on tablets of flesh. [2] In the sky, He was a new kapporet [3], a firmament covering to replace the old one that was ready to vanish away. He was a veil that was open, still protecting yet providing full access.

The Old Testament is full of mediators who are ‘lifted up.’ Revelation shows the Satanic new earth (Herod and Rome) thrown down from her mediatory position ‘in the air’, and the saints ascending to meet their Lord ‘in the air’ as a new mediatorial city.

a)  Christ was lifted up.
b)  Satan was thrown down.

a1)  The saints of the New Jerusalem ascended.
b1)  The compromised mediators were thrown down.

Satan is no longer the prince of the powers of the air.

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[1]  A Herod also fulfilled the bronze serpent image, eaten alive by maggots on his throne ‘in the air’ after speaking ‘like a god.’ He prefigured the dirty scavenging birds feasting on the harlot in Revelation.

[2] The Tabernacle layout is a symbolic cruciform man. Notice that Christ on the cross was beneath ‘the Name’, an open scroll containing the disputed truth of His identity. The Lord’s Name was said to dwell above the lid of the Ark.

[3]  See Peter Leithart, The Footstool of His Feet.