What's the Point of Spiritual Gifting?

In a series of posts last year (here, here, here and here), I discussed the realities of how leadership (eldership) actually gets expressed in the modern church. Some of what is said this post will touch on some of the same material, but from a slightly different perspective. You may find it helpful to take a look those articles in conjunction with this posting, hence the links for your convenience.

When he dealt with the subject of spiritual gifts, Peter divided them into two classifications: speakers and servers. Paul divided them into two different classifications (what this post will develop) of two classifications. In Ephesians 4, he presents them in terms of the equippers and the equipped; and in 1 Corinthians 12, he presents them in terms of the foundational and the following. 

As I have argued before, the ordinals used in 1 Corinthians 12:28 refer to the sequence of emergence, not to comparative importance. Paul's point in using this demarcation was to show the proper development of gifts in the body from those first appearing to those appearing after some development. He was not setting up a hierarchy of value as much as he was trying to get the Corinthians to not be fixated on tongues to the exclusion of other gifts, important gifts needed for the church to properly develop. 

Certainly, his aim wasn't to offer v. 29-31 as a qualitative gradient that would allow future cessationists to dismiss the miraculous.

The body of Christ, in any area, starts with one, or at best a very few people. Generally, that one was sent there by God to be his representative and to establish his kingdom in that place-- the very definition of the ministry of an apostle. When the apostle starts his work in any given place, he is the body of Christ, and whatever ministry comes forth, comes forth through him. As the Word, signs attending, begins to reap a harvest of souls, folk are added to the one and the body grows.

As the body grows, God raises up people from among those the apostle's ministry has added to speak forth as he leads them for the strengthening, encouragement and comfort of God's people-- the very definition of the ministry of a prophet. The church is thereby established as ministry is expanded beyond the apostle to the prophet. Therefore, it can be said that the apostles and prophets are foundational to all that is built upon their work in the time which is following. 

As growth and development continue, God raises up folk who can teach those who have come to believe in Christ what he has commanded and how to apply that word to daily living-- the very definition of the ministry of a teacher. Once the body is at the place where some greater measure of folks have become disciples of Christ, ministry expands into a host of more specialized giftings. At that point, the fact that not all are apostles, or prophets, or teachers, or work miracles, or heal, or speak in tongues, as a ministry, becomes self-evident. 

A obsessive fascination with, or a "self-appointment" to a particular gift out of place or prior to its time only hinders the proper Spirit-directed development of the body; hence, Paul's dissertation to the Corinthians on the subject. 

The list of gifts found in Ephesians 4, which we tackle now, is perhaps the most misunderstood of them all. Today, especially in some of the newer church movements, these gifts are seen, it seems to me, as expressions of authority rather than as functional utilities. Polity is established on having people serve in the "offices" of apostle and prophet, rather than understanding these things as endowments which serve a need in the body.

I believe this is a misappropriation of the scriptures, and practically, breeds cult-like authoritarianism rather than Christ-like service. Rather than misappropriating the names of apostle and prophet, why not borrow the tried and true and use the term, bishop. Church leadership is established, very clearly, by the New Testament in the office of elder (or bishop). If one can see that folks with differing gifts can serve as elders, the fight for biblical polity and proper understanding of gifting is half won!

There are four gifts mentioned in the list in Ephesians: apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor/teachers. Listing them this way, rather than as five, acknowledges the particular grammar of the passage, even though other lists mention teaching separately. Evidently, in the context of Ephesians 4, it is the teaching aspect of pastoring that is being highlighted by Paul, rather than more administrative functions.

What these gifts have in common, and what is focused upon in this text is that they serve a preparatory function within the body of Christ. The named four (the "some" in the text) are equippers, whereas the unnamed masses are the equipped. The aim is that some in the mass will eventually be one of the four, and all of the mass will become functioning parts of the body doing the work the Spirit of God has gifted them to do.

What is the means by which equippers take the raw material of Adamic flesh and build it into the body of Christ? It is the Word. The proclamation of the Word to the unbeliever brings new birth; the presentation of it to the novice is what inculcates truth; the application of it is what guides the established. In the kingdom, faith is what matters, and faith arises on the wings of the Word. So, the most fundamental quality of these four gifts is not authority of position, but God-given ability to proclaim the word within the context of their gift.

Presenting pastoring in the unusual fashion he did (with teaching emphasized), I think, clinches the argument.

Apostles proclaim the word among a people which has not heard it in order to establish the church of Christ among them. Evangelists proclaim the word to folks that have not heard it so they might receive the good news of the gospel. Prophets proclaim the word, fitted for the moment, which helps folks be built up in it. Pastor/teachers proclaim the word to people who need to apply it to living with understanding. All of them endeavor to move folk along on the pathway to maturity and to their own service in the body through functional gifting.

So spiritual gifting is never about the titles or authority of leaders, but always about maturity, health and function of the body.

Although the passage in Romans 12 leads into its gift list by associating them with the expression of God's grace (as does the Ephesian passage), and although it focuses upon how the gifts are used (as does the greater Corinthian context), its take on gifts is unique in demonstrating how we actually "act" in the gifts. It's not a list of nouns but verbs. It's not about prophets, servants, teachers, exhorters, givers, rulers, or empathizers, but prophesying, serving, teaching, exhorting, giving, ruling, and empathizing. That may be a subtle distinction, but an interesting one regardless.

What do I think that distinction tells us?

Among other things, it tells us to use the gift in producing the results of the gift. I could go on and on about what that says about our modern fascination (er, distraction?) with strategy and techniques, but I'll do my best to stay on task! Suffice it to say that the ability that grace deposited in us (gift) is not only sufficient to produce its intended result, but it should be relied upon to do so. The gift within us should not remain idle; it should not be suppressed (by ourselves or others); method should not be substituted for it; and its compulsion should not be considered secondary. Instead of wondering what the experts think about a ministry endeavor, we should be asking ourselves what the gift of God within us is inspiring.

That is not to say that we should be uncooperative and unsubmissive to the body of Christ around us, that is contraindicated by the concept of body itself. It does mean that what the Spirit intends to get done through us won't get done because the Grand Poobah (read vision-caster) has a plan we become cogs in, or that a consultant figured out a really good way to do that kind of a thing, or that we have achieved some level of preparation that now qualifies and certifies us to do it. No doubt, those things can be useful in building a successful organization, but what do they have to do with a temple indwelt by the Spirit of God?

All of us have had our fuse lit by the Spirit of God. In grace towards us, God dropped a bit of spiritual nitro into our souls which infused us with an energy that self-organizes the matter of life into its foreordained design. The gift itself compels us to produce the effects of the gift. Jesus experienced this, Paul did too, so should we. The gift is the tiger in our tanks, so with faith in in the promise of God, take that tiger by the tail and go for the ride of a lifetime.

Manifestations of the Spirit vs.Spiritual Gifting

How are we to understand the concept of spiritual giftedness given the complex descriptions of them throughout the New Testament? Peter speaks of them once, Paul four times, none of what is said in one place overlays what is said in the other places neatly. Confusing, perhaps, but I think we can clear things up a bit, so let's take a deeper look.

What is a spiritual gift in the first place? In a nutshell, spiritual gifts are resident abilities granted by God to the born-again, which are different from person to person so that every need of service is covered and every believer is needed by every other believer in the body of Christ. These gifts can be looked at from different angles and thereby appear quite distinct even when referring to the same thing, which explains why Peter and Paul were able to present them so differently every time they mentioned them.

Peter saw them in their most fundamental nature. According to that angle, spiritual gifts (χάρισμα) either result in someone speaking or someone providing some non-verbal service. That's a helpful division because it means the preacher isn't the only one gifted or used by God in the church. He's not even the only one who speaks! Peter specifically states that each one (ἕκαστος) or everyone, in the church is gifted by God as either a server or a speaker.

Paul saw things a bit more layered. According to that angle, the results of being "inspirited" (πνευματικῶν) by the Lord can be seen in three different facets of functional inspiration. On one hand, these are expressions of grace (χαρισμάτων); on another, they are utilities, or services rendered (διακονιῶν); and lastly, they are the spiritual influence, or energy, that produces the intended outcomes (ἐνεργημάτων). Regardless, they were all inspired by God in everyone (πᾶσιν), and each of them have been given the manifestation (φανέρωσις) of the Holy Spirit.

In other writings, Paul gives lists of gifts three times. Some of the details in each occurrence are repeated, or are similar, some are different. In each instance, he approaches the subject from a slightly different perspective. I'd like to think those perspectives correlate to what he wrote in 1 Corinthians 12:4-6. In other words, I see one of Paul's lists emphasizing the grace that is responsible for the gift's expression, in another the utilitarian result of their inspiration is emphasized, and in the third the motivating, or enervating, quality that compels them is what is in view.

Because this is so, there are two types of inspiration behind those qualities generally called spiritual gifts today.

One type of inspiration is the endowments of utilitarian grace, which could properly be called gifts. The other type is those spontaneous, momentary inspirations of spiritual power that is better, and more accurately, called manifestations of the Holy Spirit. A gift is something that is resident within the gifted person and correlates to the gift/service/working level mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12:4-6. A manifestation is a momentary effect or evidence that the Spirit of God is in action through a person and which correlate to the list in 1 Corinthians 12:7-11.

Gifts are taken to the self and possessed. They remain with the possessor over time, though they may go through a developmental process over that time. They are without repentance from God's perspective and so cannot be lost. Gifts are the body part a believer is. Every Christian is gifted by God with some resident ability or abilities that make that believer of indispensable utility to the body of Christ. Giftedness is just part of the nature of being born of the Spirit.

Manifestations flash on and then dissipate. Like a neon sign announcing the Spirit is open for business, they turn off when that business is done. They may or may not be indicative of that person's resident giftedness, they may or may not be something that recurs. They are the privilege, one or all of them, of any who are born of the Spirit and so are gifted in the body.

I would liken these spiritual skills and manifestations to the plying of a trade in the world at large. Though each trade has it's own skill and art, generally limited to that trade, each tradesman still has a toolbox. The individual tools in a tradesman's box may look a little different from similar tools in others' boxes, yet every tool box has a hammer, some kind of wrench, a screwdriver, a cutting implement, some kind of tape, a measuring device, etc.

You get the picture-- all the tradesmen use the same basic tools despite the differences in what they do. I liken this tool "interchangeability" to the manifestations of the Spirit. It is the task at hand, as determined by the Holy Spirit, that decides which tools get used and how. No tradesman uses only a hammer, nor is one sentenced to use only a saw, just because he or she used one once, or even because he or she happens to be a carpenter.

The Apostle Paul, not wishing us to be ignorant about how the Spirit inspires what he does, laid out this basic concept: in God everyone is gifted, and all the gifted can manifest the Holy Spirit. Your gift doesn't determine what you manifest, the Holy Spirit does, in the moment according to his will. Your gift will be apparent to others over time, what you manifest is never apparent until the moment it flashes on. Some gifts, of course, will manifest some things more than others, but any of the gifted can produce any of the manifestations.

I think we need to expand our horizons and whet the appetite of our expectations in regard to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. God means more for us than we are generally satisfied to receive. The Holy Spirit isn't cheering us on from the sideline, he's in the game with us-- in fact, he's our uniform and padding. We're all meant to play, and he intends us to win! Regardless of what position we may play (how we are gifted), we are all meant to evidence the miraculous moving of the Holy Spirit (through manifestations).

Where Did Evil Come From?

There is evil in the world. Everywhere.

A biblical worldview would even see that there is a cabal of unseen conspirators promoting that evil. How did it manage to sprout like weeds under the eye of an omniscient, omnipotent God and where did it come from in the first place? To answer "the Devil" is too facile and actually leaves the question intact unanswered. The Devil is evil (it's in his very name!) and he certainly is the source of much that is evil, but then, where did his evil come from?

The Bible tells us that mankind is inherently evil-- an uncomfortable thought when applying it to oneself, yet readily understandable when applying it to others. Nonetheless, they surely are, and I attribute their evil to the same source as the Devil's. It wasn't God, he is inherently good, at least it wasn't him directly. God is the ultimate free moral agent: he is conscious and rational, with powers of will and choice. 

When God made mankind and angels with similar powers as he possessed and set them free in creation, the root of all evil was laid.

How can those abilities which so distinguish humans from the plethora of the living be responsible for evil? A definition would be helpful before proceeding: evil  is simply that which is not good, and more fundamentally, that which is out of harmony with the ultimate good, which is God. Evil is the "un-God." When choice and will were expressed by man or angel independently of, and in opposition to God, evil was born. 

Evil, then, is the risk inherent in freedom.

All that was made was made as a home for mankind, the crowning achievement  of God's creation. When humans embraced evil and thereby shattered the crystal purity of that pristine environment, they alienated both the creation and the creature from God and what was good. As a result, sin, death and evil, which are the fruit of such a choice, have spattered everything in the universe, alive or  inanimate, with their rot. Man, beast and the environment we live in have all been tainted by evil. 

Creation still bears the fingerprints of God, but its smudges betray, all too clearly the evil cost of image bearers going their own way instead of God's.

Evil came from us.

Interpreting the Whore of Babylon

In Revelation 17 we are introduced to the enigmatic figure of the Whore of Babylon who sits by many waters. She's riding on a strange, fantastic, Scarlet Beast, which seems the very picture of a symbiotic relationship to me. Who or what do these mysterious figures represent and why are they joined at the hip? Let's take a little ride of our own...

Whores function as sexual substitutes, providers of sexual pleasures without the entanglements of a committed relationship. God means for those experiences to occur only within the context of heterosexual marriage, so prostitution short-circuits the righteous directive of God for an upright life. Throughout the Bible, God applies the sordid concept of prostitution to the sin of serving gods other than him, the one, true God. Substituting the false for the true was an affront to decency and fidelity, and worthy of judgment. 

The prophets of the Old Testament, in bringing God's word of rebuke to idol worshipping Israelites, called their sin "harlotry" and "adultery." Instead of living in a committed relationship with the living God and seeking the blessings they wanted and needed from him, idolaters exchanged the true God for one of their own making. God, who could not be managed nor massaged, was jettisoned by the unfaithful and replaced with gods who at least gave the appearance that they could be. 

Wonder where they got that idea from?

Idolatry was part of the Devil's hijacking scheme mentioned in my last post. The Devil's plan, from the earliest times in human history, has been to subvert and steal the redemptive promises announced in the protoevangelium. There is a governmental component to his plan-- the Devil wants to rule, and there is a religious component to the plan-- the Devil wants to be worshipped. Until he can manage to get the human race to worship him instead of God, having them worship something other than God would do.

The governmental aspect of the Devil's plan is centered around bringing the Antichrist, the man of lawlessness, into worldwide political dominion (as covered in the last post). The religious aspect is the subject of this post and revolves around the figure of the Whore. Revelation 17 shows both aspects of the Devil's plan linked as part of one overarching strategy by displaying the figures for each together, one riding the other.

The scarlet beast is the Antichrist Scheme, the Whore is the Spirit of Idolatry.

In the Devil's plan to separate humanity from God and to torpedo whatever possibility of reconciliation there might be, his prime strategy has been substitution: the Devil for God, the Antichrist for Christ. In order to achieve that ultimate objective, he had to hijack the promise to Eve (protoevangelium) first. So, deep in the past, at Babylon (ie., Babel), the Devil hatched a substitution plot, where the Whore was offered as a displacement of Eve (or, from the perspective of ultimate fulfillment, Mary).

This was the root of the Mother/Son imagery which is part of ancient idolatrous religion the world over.

Highlighting a few details concerning the Whore may be helpful:

1) She is riding on a scarlet beast, which means that even though she may seem to be in control, she is actually only being carried forth by the Devil's efforts as he wills; 

2) She is of Babylon, which means that is where the effort first found traction; 

3) She is of Babylon so she will have a Roman connection; 

4) She is the mother of all harlotries, therefore the genesis of all idolatry; 

5) She is a prostitute which means she has a certain utility that will make her worthless once accomplished; 

6) She is the mother, which points to a hijacking of Eve's promise from God; 

7) She is the mother of all abominations, which means she is the genesis of practices (in the name of spirituality) that make God gag; 

8) She is drunk on their blood of God's holy people, so she is a murderer of and the implacable foe of true believers in Christ.

Point #5 comes into especially clear focus in v.16. Even though the Whore represents perhaps the most successful of the Devil's stratagems through time, she actually deflects attention away from him and is thereby hated by him. It makes a lot of sense, for even in our contemporary culture, even the pimp hates the whore.

She is first mentioned in Revelation 14:8 where her fall is announced by an angel. Her evil influence in the world is likened to wine and its effects. Her name comes up again in 16:19 in association with the seventh bowl in which God makes her drink the wine of his wrath, the very picture of poetic justice. So important is she in understanding the unfolding of redemptive history, chapters 17 and 18 form an interlude which takes the reader aside from the flow of prophetic time just to take a deeper look at her. It's necessary, for she is a mystery that cannot be understood by man apart from divine illumination.

It has not been uncommon, since the Reformation, for the figure to be interpreted as the Roman Catholic Church, despite the fact that most of the Reformers did not take the Petrine remark as a reference to Rome. Evidently, the references within the description of the whore were clear enough to them without any other scriptural references. Exactly how clear are they?

In 95 A.D. there was only one city in the entire world that could have fit the description, and since then, no real contenders have emerged. There are only a handful of great cities renown for sitting on seven hills (or mountains): Rome and Constantinople are the most obvious, a case can be made for Jerusalem (but a lame one in my mind). Either of the capitals of the Roman Empire could be made to fit the rest of the description through chapter 18, but Jerusalem doesn't even come close. When Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453, it ceased being the center of idolatrous worship in all but name only, which leaves Rome standing unassailable as the target of the figure.

That's not the same as saying that the RCC is the whore, but there is a great deal of sense in seeing her that way, especially in light of 18:4-5. I think the whore imagery reaches far beyond the halls of the Vatican, but suffice it to say, I think she knows her way around those halls in the dark!

Satan's Antichrist Scheme

The one word that describes Satan, as well as any could, is proud.

Hubris led him to the conclusion that he could manage things as well as his Creator, even better, and he was more worthy of adulation too-- the ultimate narcissist. He thought this way despite being in the very presence of God and being graced with great intelligence. When you experience the Almighty as he actually is, and then come to think as Satan did, nothing remains that God could show of himself that could alter that opinion. The Devil was intractably lost as were all those angelic beings that rebelled with him.

Even apart from that rebellion, Satan cannot ever learn from his mistakes. Pride hardens the categories and seizes the mind, and dooms the prideful to endlessly repeat the same errors. Satan is a one-trick pony, forever trying to accomplish his aims by using the same means over and over again. Since the Fall, he keeps working the same tired plan in an attempt to thwart God's ultimate aim of redeeming mankind from the Fall. 

In his mind, the Devil cannot conceive of an invention of his failing.

In the garden, God announced the protoevangelium, the first gospel message, in the midst of his curse upon Eve. A glimmer of hope for humanity, it spelled the Devil's doom. It was cryptic enough for the Devil not to fathom, even though I think he understood it much better than we often do. I think he grasped that it was the woman's child, not the man's, and he seemed to pick up God's subtlety in the using a collective singular noun (seed) with a singular masculine pronoun (he). That meant one particular son was in view rather than offspring in general, a point Paul was able to apply to God's promise to Abraham as well. 

I'm absolutely certain that Satan picked up on this by the time the promise was reiterated in substance to Abraham. Why? Because it's revealed in his strategy of dealing with that promise--namely hijacking it. The basic outline of the plan he developed involves displacing the seed promised through Eve and Abraham (and Isaac and Jacob since they were the heirs of the promise) and undermining the place of the Jews as the seedbed. So his plan focused on substituting a seed for the seed and the destruction of the Jews as the seedbed.

Up in smoke goes the plan of God, at least in the mind of the Devil. A flawed strategy for sure, but one which the Devil's pride causes him to repeat over and over again. By the end of time, he will have tried it eight times! In the last couple of iterations he comes closer than ever to succeeding, but in the end, Christ steps in and throttles his efforts. This is what I call, the Antichrist Scheme.

In the 17th chapter of the Apocalypse, through the use of the symbolic imagery of the seven heads of the Scarlet Beast, John spells out the efforts made to ply this scheme throughout all redemption history. Up to the time of the writing of the Apocalypse, so in past history, five iterations of the scheme had been attempted. At the time of writing, effort number six was winding up. Efforts seven and eight were coming in the future (so some time after 95 AD). 

The efforts all centered around dispossessing or disposing of the Jews, and then, if he got that far, offering his shill as the "God-man". The gospel promise, which was funneled through Abraham and accrued to the benefit of all mankind, had to be undermined, undone and displaced. Some schemes got farther than others, but all fail, ultimately, because of divine intervention. Six are actually recorded in scripture and attempt #8 (the last) is defeated by the physical return of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Satan's Attempts at the Antichrist Scheme

The five kings who are fallen, and the one who is:

1) Egypt under Pharaoh at the time of the Exodus (ca. 1446 BC)

This was an attempt to undermine the gospel promise by destroying the promise of land to Israel (the seedbed). If one aspect of God's promise is derailed, all promises are called into doubt. God may call his Son from Egypt, but if one doesn't trust God's word of promise, one can never be redeemed. So God raised up Moses and Joshua who led the people to Canaan by divine interventions and thwarted this attempt.

2) Assyria under the dynasty of Sargon II (ca. 722 BC)

The ten northern tribes of Israel (Samaria) were exiled from the promised land (seedbed) and an attempt was made to besiege Jerusalem and destroy Judah (under Sennacherib, Sargon's son). God intervened in response to Hezekiah's prayer, and Judah was delivered and stayed in the land insuring that a remnant survived to see the promise.

3) Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar (ca. 586 BC)

In his third foray into Judah in 19 years, Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem, razed the Temple, and deported what was left of the population after the siege and two earlier deportations (605 and 597 BC). Thus, the Babylonian Captivity began; it was not ended until God intervened by appointing Cyrus to deliver the captive Jews (539 BC). Had God not sent Cyrus, the Israelites would never have returned to the promised land, and God's promise would have blown away like dust in the wind. 

4) Persia under the influence its highest noble, Haman (ca. 475 BC)

Though a "champion" of Israel under Cyrus and other emperors who followed, under Xerxes (Ahasuerus, and particularly his prime minister, Haman) Persia became a murderous foe of the Jews. Haman scheduled the slaughter and plunder of all the Jews throughout the empire and the hanging of his archrival, Mordecai. God raised up Esther for such a time as that and through her intervention and God's favor, turned the plot back on Haman's head. If Haman had been successful, there would have been no Jews left to receive God's promise

5) Seleucid Empire under Antiochus Epiphanes (ca. 165 BC)

Dubbbed, "the King of the North" by Daniel, under Antiochus, this kingdom  attempted to eradicate Jewish customs, to destroy all the Bibles (scrolls) it could, and modeled the abomination of desolation which the Antichrist will replicate in the Great Tribulation. God intervened by granting the forces of the Maccabees a stunning, upset victory which resulted in the purification of the Temple (which is celebrated in Hanukkah), and eventually, independence for Israel (after 40 years of war). Antiochus sought the complete assimilation of the Jews into his Greek, pagan Empire which would have destroyed the seedbed Messiah was to be planted in.

6) Rome under Tiberius, Vespasian and Hadrian (ca. 33-135 AD)

The Messiah, the promised seed, began proclaiming his gospel of salvation during the reign of Tiberius. Satan had unsuccessfully tried to kill Jesus as an infant through Herod's demented decree to slaughter the innocents. He would continue to press that effort during Jesus' ministry, apparently succeeding through the betrayal of Judas and the sentence of Roman Procurator, Pilate. Killing the seed would definitely destroy the promise and open the way for the Devil to accomplish his aims, but God raised Christ from the dead and overturned Satan's plan. 

When the forces of Roman General Titus (under Emperor Vespasian) finally broke into the besieged city in 70 AD, no stone was left unturned in Jerusalem. The Temple was utterly destroyed, the city was left an uninhabitable ruin. It forced a depopulation of the city by the Jews for some time, but in 135 AD, after another rebellion by the Jews against Rome (Emperor Hadrian), Jews were banned by law from the environs of Jerusalem all together. Thus they became another part of the Diaspora. Perhaps this seems irrelevant in light of Jesus' death and resurrection, but that still left the unbelieving Jews bereft of promise, and all Jews without a homeland. 

God's promises get fulfilled, or the one who promised them isn't God-- he's either too powerless to be God, or too unrighteousness.

God's intervention had already delivered the promised seed (Jesus), which provided redemption to all who believe on him. With that, one might suppose that the Devil was a pound shy and a day late in his efforts, but sin and death have continued on since then, and the Devil still roams about seeking someone to devour. Why? Because nothing is complete without the Jews. Though the focus of God's redemptive work shifted to the Gentiles after the Jews' rejection of Christ, undermining the promise of land still holds the potential of taking the promise of the seed with it in the minds of humans who still need to believe in Messiah in  order to be saved.

The king who is to come for a short time, and the eighth:

7) Germany under Adolph Hitler (ca. 1933 AD)

Apart from world domination, Hitler's aim was to eradicate the Jews, once and for all. He had them systematically rounded up within his domains (which was where most Jews lived at the time) and killed approximately two-thirds of them. The unseen hand of God guided the situation into the defeat of the Nazis and set off a migration, unexpected by the world, of Jews to their ancient homeland in Palestine. The end result was resurrection of the nation of Israel in May, 1948.

After the failure of seven schemes, the Devil actually found himself in the worst situation ever, with Israel reestablished and the gospel reaching into all the world, EVEN AMONGST THE JEWS! He has one more flare to fire, and it will be the one that gives him the greatest whiff of victory but then suddenly delivers the most crushing defeat.

8) The Ten Horns under the Antichrist (ca. SOON!)

After the cataclysms of the Epic of Magog and the Sixth Seal, the Antichrist will step into the vacuum created by them and establish his hegemony over ten nations in his region. He will sign a treaty with Israel establishing peaceful relations for seven years and which grants Israel the right to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem.

As the Temple is nearing completion,* and similar to Antiochus Epiphanes before him, he will enter the Temple, curtail expected activities, install his False Prophet as high priest and idol of himself as the object of worship, and kill those (they'll be Jews) who refuse to worship him as God and take his mark of submission. He will be defeated and destroyed by the Return of Christ.

In his pride the Devil has attempted to one-up God over and over again, only to fail over and over again to achieve his ultimate aim. Even at the end of time, when he knows failure awaits him, his pride will compel him to bang his head against that wall one more time. He'll get farther than he ever did before, but end, nonetheless, in dismal failure just like every time before. 

*Since the only acceptable sacrifice before God (the Lord Jesus Christ) has already been offered and received, and that sacrifice was so perfect in its qualities that one offering was sufficient for all time for all people, I do not expect that God will allow any sacrifice of a lesser, and at best presaging nature, to be offered in his name again.

Identifying the Seals of the Apocalypse

The Seals of the Apocalypse

In Revelation 5 we have that grand scene in the throne room of God, where no one but the Lamb was found worthy to take the scroll. He had successfully redeemed mankind by his own blood, and thereby proved his worthiness to be the heir to power, wealth, wisdom, strength, honor, glory and praise. The scroll represented the consummation of all redemptive history, God's master plan to save the lost human race. Each seal broken was a witness to the Lamb's legitimacy to rule and reign in that ultimate place.

We know that Jesus ascended to heaven shortly after his resurrection, only to return shortly thereafter to reveal himself to his disciples and ready them for the task ahead of them. It seems to me, the prophetic scenario in Revelation 5 would have to represent the moments immediately after Christ's resurrection when he ascended to his Father, entered the throne room, and, having completed his mission as the Redeemer of Mankind, received the scroll. His return to the disciples, though not included in the prophetic scene of that chapter, becomes the perfect segue into the First Seal, since the Great Commission is what that is all about (as we shall see).

#1 - The White Horse

Where in the Bible, and especially in the Apocalypse, was the color white ever used symbolically for anything other than good? The answer: never! The white horse does not represent anything evil, such as the Antichrist, the idea itself is ridiculous if one gives it any thought at all. No, this seal represents the church being turned loose on the Great Commission (ca. 33 AD). Its breakage initiates the Church Age, really, the Age of the Gentiles.

#2 - The Red Horse

The color invokes the thought of blood. Fittingly, the rider is tasked with taking peace away from the earth. To understand this image, we cannot overlook the "world" in which John and the early church existed. It was a Roman world, ruled by the strong-armed, yet prospering comfortably within the steadying hands of the Pax Romana. Into that "tranquility" dropped the Emperor Commodus, after which everything began swirling down the commode. The red horse represents the loss of the Pax Romana (ca. 192 AD).

#3 - The Black Horse

Grain was effected by the famine unleashed by this rider, but not oil and wine. Why? The crops that produce oil and wine were grown in more southerly climes than was grain. The implication is that this broken seal effected northerly climes more than southerly ones. Factor in the color, which speaks of the loss of sunlight and warmth, and out pops the Little Ice Age as the proximate cause of the shortage. The black horse itself represents the Great Famine, ca. 1315 AD.

#4 - The Pale Horse

Even though this rider has the power to kill by sword and famine, like the two before it, its unique claim to fame is the decimation of one fourth of earth's population by the added means of pestilence and wild beasts. The combination of details could not describe better in condensed, artistic language the outcome of the bubonic plague. It was world-wide, borne by rats, and caused enough chaos in its wake to produce war, anarchy and famine. Most importantly, it killed a fourth of the population of the entire earth. The jaundiced horse represents the Black Death (ca. 1347 AD).

#5 - The Martyrs

Often, the assumption is that martyrdom was a phenomenon of the early church, but point in fact, the numbers of martyrs were not large then. That changed with the advent of Protestantism in the sixteenth century, when a sudden uptick in the numbers of martyrs rose precipitously to become a flood of multiplied thousands. The rate is still escalating today-- it must be getting downright crowded under that altar! Why doesn't God step in and put an end to it? It's a full number thing again. Suffice it to say, this seal represents the increase in martyrdom that began with the Reformation (ca. 1520 AD).

These five seals are historical to us. Their initial breaking unleashed something that still reverberates in the warp and woof of current events. For instance, the church is still actively engaged, and more successfully than ever, in winning the world to Christ; the world, particularly the Mediterranean world, has never been as peaceful again as it was before the unleashing of the red horse; severe grain famines have occurred over and over again since the black horse went riding; frightful pandemics seem to cycle through regularly since the pale horse first clip-clopped over planet Earth; and martyrs are being killed today at record pace though that "seal was broken" 500 years ago.

Let's get on wtih the rest of the seals which remain prophetic.

#6 - The Volcanic Cataclysm
The text does not mention a volcano, it just seems to describe one to me. From pyroclastic material falling from the skies (stars), to pyroclastic flows (rolling clouds), to ash choked skies (blackened sun, red moon), to moving mountains and islands, the description seems to fit. This, of course, is not your grandmother's volcano (like Krakatoa), this is something more akin to Toba or perhaps Yellowstone. People survive the cataclysm with the anticipation of the immediacy of God's wrath. If the Antichrist needs a story to cover the disappearance of the Church, this would fit the bill!

The Rapture
This is more akin to an inset, or an interlude, within the narrative of the sixth seal. The four angels holding back the winds refers to the events of verses 6:13-14, and makes the inset a snapshot taken as those events began. In the moment of earthly time that it takes the events of the inset to occur, the marking angels complete their task (v. 7:3). Then, time and space (the winds) are no longer held at bay and destruction continues. Both aspects (A and B below) of the inset are set off by the phrase, "after this" and reveal those who are ready (ie. truly believing in Christ) as the 70th week begins:

A) 144,000 Jews are sealed on earth, and remain there, and

B) Gentile saints are translated out from the Tribulation to the throne room of God.

#7 - The 70th Week of Daniel

This seal, when broken, hands off the flow of end time events to the Seven Trumpets and the Seven Vials. It points to the same period as the 70th Week of Daniel, which is also divided into two. So, the Trumpets represent the first half, the Vials the second half of the 70th week, which is often referred to as the Great Tribulation.

That's my take on the Seven Seals. I think it makes sense. When it comes to the Revelation, my firm belief is that it should make sense, to any of God's servants. It should make sense to you. I hope this helps.

Rightly Interpreting the Apocalypse

The key to understanding the Apocalypse is to read it, as much as possible, with the assumption that it simply means what it says. Don't get caught up in trying to unravel a knot of hidden symbols as if the work was a mere allegory-- it's not, it's a prophecy. Some things have symbolic meaning, some things are just scenery (so much for Idealism). If everything in the book means something other than what is written, what is written ends up meaning nothing at all.

As the very first sentence of the work clearly states in rather straightforward language and grammar, the work is meant to reveal what is about to occur. It's not written to confound, nor to encrypt, and even when symbolizing, not to leave the reader clueless as to what those symbols represent. The Revelation is not the biblical equivalent of a Rubik's cube. It's written to the general audience of God's people, and it should be understandable to that audience.

The work is generally dated to around 95 AD, although there is a body of people who believe it was written before 70 AD. The usual reason given for the earlier date is because the work does not mention the Temple's destruction in 70 AD. That argument is a vapor, however, because it assumes Herod's Temple had any significance to the temple(s) envisioned within the work. Just as the First Temple's destruction was not treated by Ezekiel, neither did John mention Herod's.

Really, the earlier date only serves one purpose: to give cover to erroneous interpretations arising from the unsound doctrine called Preterism. Historical, textual, and archeological evidence for the earlier date, when examined, proves non-existent. Beside, to cram the last four chapters of the Apocalypse into to any temporal framework that has the events mentioned as already occurring is to take a wrecking ball to the text.

And since that first sentence declares that it is about things which must (Koine: dei, necessarily) soon (Koine: tachos, quickly, without delay) take place, the reasonably justified assumption is that the work would be referencing things beginning to take place around 95 AD. Therefore, any approach attempting to jam virtually all the events foretold in this book into the distant future during the last seven years of history is a fool's errand. 

So it appears that the opening statement of the prophecy precludes every preterist (by dating) and every futurist (by definition) interpretation of the work. Only an historicist interpretation can clear the very first sentence of the work intact!

Some historicists have interpreted the letters to the seven churches as describing, symbolically, seven epochs of the Church Age, starting from the Apostles and ending with the Return of Christ. Whereas that approach at least understands the historical implications of the prophecy, there's nothing in the text or context that demands interpreting it that way. These were churches extant at the time of writing, all at once in real time and were addressed for more transparent reasons, it seems to me, than as symbols for epochs unhinted at in the text.

A simpler (and thereby, generally bound to be better) approach is to take them as representing the totality of the church at any given time. The number seven is associated scripturally with completeness, or entirety, and today one will find churches existing in the same space and time, which would fit rather neatly into the general categories limned out by those seven churches. I think that has always been true, and so take the overall effect of their mention to be symbolic of the church universal throughout time, and representing the diversity in the character of individual congregations.

Whereas the letters to the churches should not be interpreted epochally, the seven seals on the scroll should be. The imagery comes right out of Roman testate law-- under that regimen, wills were sealed with seven wax seals only broken in the presence of the heir. The Lamb, being the first-born from among the dead, had earned the inheritance of creation and mankind: breaking the seals only he could open was the formality that had to occur to bring the will into ultimate enactment. Since each broken seal is related in a process over time, the action represents not only a witness to the authority of the Son of Man, but also reveals epochs proceeding in history leading up to the coronation of the coming King.

In an upcoming post, each seal will be identified by its antecedent historical event. I hope you stay with me!

The 70th Week: Lost in Delusion

As I interpret biblical prophecy, during Daniel's 70th Week, often styled The Tribulation, absolutely no Gentiles will be coming to Christ. In fact, none will even hold on to him. After the full number of Gentiles has come in, the 70th week which follows exists redemptively for the Jews and Jerusalem alone. Gentiles will not be "left behind" and get saved, not even one. You may be wondering about how such such a thing could be so, I think Paul explains it quite well in 2 Thessalonians 2, so let's explore.

This passage makes a few things clear:

1) Even now, during the Age of the Gentiles, there is a generally imperceptible effort being made to produce lawlessness in people (i.e. an unwillingness to accept restraint). 

2) That effort is being held down (hindered, restrained) by someone Paul assumed that the average Christian in Thessaloniki would understand the identity of from his prior talks with them. 

3) At some point in time, that restraining influence would be moved out from the midst of the people it was operating among, which would in turn loose (send) that which would produce the effect of wandering (i.e. delusion).

4) The delusion would culminate in ALL the affected in the world believing THE lie.  

5) That lie is that the man of lawlessness (the Antichrist) is god.

The Devil is at work as I type and as you read this article. His work can be summed up succinctly as murder, marauding, and mayhem. His tools are fear and deception. He seeks to alienate and destroy what God has made for his own pleasure. His efforts are opposed by the active work of the Holy Spirit, the servants of Christ and the finitude of his own limits.

Ultimately, he seeks to personally replace God as the rightful object of mankind's worship through a carefully prepared human shill called the Antichrist.

If the Holy Spirit was no longer poured out on all flesh, and God's servants (the church with its angels) were moved out from the midst of people and gathered together unto Christ in the air, how would anyone get saved? They could not. The Jews are the outlier in the scenario, God specifically pours the Spirit out on them. So how long would it take the Devil to succeed in his plot to compel THE lie?

Just about three and a half years is the biblical answer.

The Devil's efforts from the beginning of time have been directed at getting people to cast off the restraint of God over us. In such lawlessness we are estranged from God and easy pawns for the Devil's wiles. Lawlessness (iniquity) will increase amongst mankind as we near the end of time, but Christians must not let that disillusion us. There is coming a day when we will be gathered unto Christ in glory, while the world that refused to believe the gospel will, instead, be lost in delusion.

The 70th Week: The Temple Is the Issue

According to my understanding of end-times, there are two streams of redemptive history, dealing with two distinct groups of people, flowing toward a common end. In saying this, let me be clear: there is only one way to be saved, and only one name given under heaven by which men must be saved. Whether Jew or Gentile, apart from Christ, there is no hope-- not yesterday, not today, not forever. Yet, God is dealing with each of these groups distinctively in time. How? 

When the Jews rejected their own Messiah, Paul tells us that God shifted his redemptive focus from them to the Gentiles. Granted, there have been quite a number of Jews who have put faith in Jesus Christ through the ages since he was rejected by the bulk of them, but by and large, they are hardened to even the consideration of him. The banner over them as a people has been Ichabod: the glory has departed.

Does that mean that God has washed his hands of them? No, God never fails to keep a promise and he won't fail to keep those made to Abraham and Daniel. So, there are seven years of redemptive work yet to unfold in which will bring God's work with the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to a glorious end. Ever true to his word, God will not forget them nor stop short of his promise to them.

So when will the redemptive shift from Gentile stream to Jewish stream take place?

It will be marked by the full number of the Gentiles coming in (the Rapture) and will start Daniel's 70th week, but according to the scriptures, no one knows, and no one could ever know! There are no dependable, precise, biblically given signs that will clearly specify when this moment is about to occur, and so his return will always remain unexpected until it's upon us. We can gather that we are getting closer, but we will never be able to pinpoint it.

Now Christians have thought that the end was at the door since Jesus ascended to heaven, yet here we still are. The bridegroom has stretched the concept of delay long past what anyone could have envisioned. It will occur when it occurs-- all the faithful can do is be ready at any moment. Trusting Jesus, obeying him, longing for his appearing is sufficient to accomplish that. 

There is one thing, however, that does mark the beginning of 70th week itself.

In putting forth the prophecy of the 70 weeks, the issuing of a decree to rebuild Jerusalem (ostensibly, to protect the Temple) started the clock. The Temple was front and center throughout the first 69 weeks, it will be central during the 70th week. This, despite its complete destruction in 70 AD. Since the Temple features so prominently in the prophecy of the 70 weeks, it seems to me, that in shifting God's redemptive focus from the Gentiles back to the Jews, the Temple in Jerusalem become the central issue again. 

So, when the Antichrist signs the covenant that marks start of the 70th week, it will have a provision which allows the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem.