Eschatological Observations From A Partial Preterist Reading

Eschatological Observation #1

Mt. 24:30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the land will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

Daniel 7:13
“I was watching in the night visions,
And behold, One like the Son of Man,
Coming with the clouds of heaven!
He came to the Ancient of Days,
And they brought Him near before Him.
Then to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom,
That all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion,
Which shall not pass away,
And His kingdom the one

Which shall not be destroyed.

Isaiah 19:1
Behold, the Lord rides on a swift cloud,
And will come into Egypt;
The idols of Egypt will [b]totter at His presence,

And the heart of Egypt will melt in its midst.

When we read Mt. 24:30 in light of the Daniel and Isaiah passages above cited we can only conclude that the reason that the Son of Man can come on the clouds of heaven is that He first ascended into the heavens upon the clouds where he was invested with dominion, authority, and a Kingdom.

Having been invested with such authority the mediatorial King Jesus now judges Israel in AD 70 bringing the Great Tribulation.

Those in rebellion in AD 70 do not literally see Jesus on the clouds but rather in the context of the judgment wrought against Israel in AD 70 as combined with the prophetic language in the OT regarding God’s judgment Israel is seeing Christ in those very judgments that are characteristic of AD 70.

Eschatological Observation #2

Isaiah 11:6 Then there shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as was not like it before, nor shall be like it again.

Joel 2:2

A day of darkness and gloominess,
A day of clouds and thick darkness,
Like the morning clouds spread over the mountains.
A people come, great and strong,
The like of whom has never been;
Nor will there ever be any such after them,
Even for many successive generations.

Ezekiel 5:9 And I will do among you what I have never done, and the like of which I will never do again, because of all your abominations.

Matthew 24:21 For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.

The first three OT passages provide commentary for the Mt. 24 passage. In Mt. 24 Jesus is using similar prophetic language to what we find in the OT to communicate the coming just and ruthless judgment of God upon a people for their disobedience and rebellion. Never was there a greater disobedience and rebellion that deserved the greatest tribulation of all time then the disobedience and rebellion of the Jews rejecting their Messiah. This Great Tribulation then, occurred in AD 70 in Jesus’ judgment against Jerusalem.

Eschatological Observation #3

Matthew 24:21 For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.

The reason for the greatness of this great tribulation is not found in the sheer body count number as if this great tribulation will outstrip every previous tribulation in terms of the number dead. The greatness of this great tribulation Jesus speaks of is related to a change of epoch.

The partial Preterist believes that the only tribulation that could have ever been considered great in the way Jesus uses “Great” is because salvation history is affected by the tribulation that occurred in 70 AD in Jesus’ judgment visitation upon apostate Jerusalem. With the destruction of the temple in AD 70 the Old Covenant officially passes away, the in-between time is completed, Israel is served her divorce papers, and the fig tree is forever uprooted. This is the “great” that is found in the idea of the “Great-tribulation.” However, if it is body count that you want Josephus tells us that the count was between 1-1.5 million deaths. Plus he describes all kinds of cruelties by the Roman armies that also contribute to the idea of the “great” in the “great tribulation.”

So… the great tribulation that Jesus speaks of in Mt. 24, Luke 21, and Mk. 13 was future to them but is past to us.

Author: jetbrane

I am a Pastor of a small Church in Mid-Michigan who delights in my family, my congregation and my calling. I am postmillennial in my eschatology. Paedo-Calvinist Covenantal in my Christianity Reformed in my Soteriology Presuppositional in my apologetics Familialist in my family theology Agrarian in my regional community social order belief Christianity creates culture and so Christendom in my national social order belief Mythic-Poetic / Grammatical Historical in my Hermeneutic Pre-modern, Medieval, & Feudal before Enlightenment, modernity, & postmodern Reconstructionist / Theonomic in my Worldview One part paleo-conservative / one part micro Libertarian in my politics Systematic and Biblical theology need one another but Systematics has pride of place Some of my favorite authors, Augustine, Turretin, Calvin, Tolkien, Chesterton, Nock, Tozer, Dabney, Bavinck, Wodehouse, Rushdoony, Bahnsen, Schaeffer, C. Van Til, H. Van Til, G. H. Clark, C. Dawson, H. Berman, R. Nash, C. G. Singer, R. Kipling, G. North, J. Edwards, S. Foote, F. Hayek, O. Guiness, J. Witte, M. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Mencken, Lasch, Postman, Gatto, T. Boston, Thomas Brooks, Terry Brooks, C. Hodge, J. Calhoun, Llyod-Jones, T. Sowell, A. McClaren, M. Muggeridge, C. F. H. Henry, F. Swarz, M. Henry, G. Marten, P. Schaff, T. S. Elliott, K. Van Hoozer, K. Gentry, etc. My passion is to write in such a way that the Lord Christ might be pleased. It is my hope that people will be challenged to reconsider what are considered the givens of the current culture. Your biggest help to me dear reader will be to often remind me that God is Sovereign and that all that is, is because it pleases him.

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