COMPREHENSIVE HOPE IN ESCHATOLOGY

New Creation, Old Testament, Optimism March 28, 2025 Comments: 8

PMW 2025-024 by Donald E. GowanGowan eschatology

Gentry note:
The following is a series of thoughts selected from a very helpful book by Gowan on Eschatology on the Old Testament (pp. 122 ff.). Though he is not writing as a postmillennialist, he has many helpful observations that this article will share. His book basically argues for a holistic concept of redemption, both man (body and soul) and the broader creation (new heavens and new earth). He is not a conservative evangelical (as far as I can tell), but he is a good scholar insightful analyses of important eschatological issues.

Gowan’s Observations
The OT’s expectations and longings are distinct from those to be found in other religions and cultures. Thereby they offer a challenge for alternative forms of hope — Christian and otherwise — and insight into the nature of the eschatologies of the Western world.

1. Old Testament eschatology is a worldly hope. The OT does not scorn, ignore, or abandon the kind of life which human beings experience in this world in favor of speculation concerning some other, better place or form of existence, to be hoped for after death or achieved before death through meditation and spiritual exercises. This sets the OT in sharp contrast to Gnosticism, to the otherworldly emphases that often have appeared in Christianity, and to the concepts of salvation taught by Hinduism and Buddhism. Whether it is better and truer than those other forms of hope, or is just irredeemably “unspiritual,” remains, of course, a matter for faith to decide. But this quality of the OT hope surely ought to commend its outlook to an age that is equally worldly in its concerns. Continue reading →

THE GOSPEL’S LAST DAY VERDICT

salvation, Two-age Structure, Worldview March 25, 2025 Comments: 2

PMW 2025-024 by Dr. Ardel B. Caneday (from All Things Christian blogsite)Judgment day

Gentry note: Below is an insightful article that comports with the evangelical and Reformed understanding of the Already/Not Yet principle of biblical interpretation. An excellent read! For 28 years Dr. Caneday served as Professor of New Testament & Greek at the University of Northwestern-St. Paul. He recently retired from full-time teaching and now serves as an adjunct professor at UNW.

Dr. Caneday’s article:

In December 2021, I published four articles responding to Harrison Perkins’s criticism of my chapter, “Covenantal Life with God from Eden to Holy City” in Progressive Covenantalism: Charting a Course between Dispensational and Covenantal Theologies. R. Scott Clark published the article on The Heidelblog. There, Perkins blatantly claimed, “In the end, Caneday does promote a salvation by works.” So outrageous was his accusation that I patiently responded with four articles demonstrating that his assessment and accusation were wrong and thus slanderous. Those accusations by Perkins, Clark, and others derive from their common failure to account for the New Testament’s presentation of the salvation of the Last Day brought forward in the person of Christ Jesus, consequently the already but not-yet character of salvation, including justification and forgiveness of sins, featured in this article.

Despite being available for more than four years, neither Perkins nor Clark have ever acknowledged their error of judgment nor repented of their published defamation. Though I did not write my recently published article at Christ Over All to counter Perkins’s false accusation published by Clark, it nonetheless does just that. Thus, though I rarely repost articles I have published elsewhere on this blog, I repost this article as a capstone to the earlier four-part series to expose the slanderous accusation written by Harrison Perkins and published on The Heidelblog.
Continue reading →

NEW CREATION IN 2 PETER 3 (2)

New Creation March 21, 2025 Leave a comment

PMW 2025-023 by David RussellEarth aflame

Gentry note: This continues from my previous posting of an insightful section of David Russell’s The “New Heavens and the New Earth” published by Visionary Press. To get the context of this posting, you must read the previous one.

It is difficult, if not impossible, to determine the best reading and its interpretation in the context. While there is strong support for the translation, “will be found” in the sense that humanity’s works “will be laid bare” (NIV), this view nevertheless seems strained. It may reflect the thinking of the scribe who at an early stage introduced the reading but whether or not it represents the reading of the author’s hand is uncertain. The reading has merit since the primary focus of the passage is the judgment upon the wicked. However, this view drives a wedge between humankind and the created order. A solidarity between humanity and the creation is always a basic working assumption whether or not it is expressed. The author’s contemplation of God’s judgment on evil works naturally leads to a consideration of the effects of that judgment upon the created order. Just as the decree upon humanity affected the creation according to Genesis 3 so also will God’s judgment have cosmic consequences. Additionally, verses 10–11 imply that the earth will suffer a similar fate as the heavens. This clearly accounts for the reading of aphanisthesontai. Wolters’ interpretation does not necessarily demand the acceptance of eurethesetai. He could have arrived at the same basic conclusion from the verb katakaesetai (cf. Mal. 4.1). Wolters’ strength is the emphasis upon the OT context, and moreover Bauckham’s conjecture that an apocalyptic source lies behind 2 Peter 3, while plausible, merely affirms the use of traditional motifs. Particularly noteworthy is 1 Enoch 1.6 which as noted above by Metzger also may contain an acceptable solution for the reading. Continue reading →

NEW CREATION IN 2 PETER 3 (1)

New Creation March 18, 2025 Leave a comment

PMW 2025-022 by David RussellEarth burning

Gentry note: The following paragraphs are cited from David M. Russell, The “New Heavens and New Earth,” Philadelphia: Visionary, 1996, pp. 186–97. Though not agreeing with all of his arguments, I highly recommend this book. This will be presented in two posts.

2 Peter 3 is important for discussion not only because of the reaffirmation of Isaiah’s promise of the new heavens and new earth but as the most explicit statement in the Bible of the total destruction of the earth by fire. Conclusions regarding the teaching of the passage are far from evident and are immediately complicated due to text-critical matters and the general worldview of the author. These will be addressed in the course of the discussion of the text. Significantly, 2 Peter provides an appropriate vantage point for this study for it addresses three important aspects central to the concept of creation and cosmic hope: the creation and constancy of the created order (vv. 4-5), the world’s plight and judgment (vv. 6-7, 10-12), and the new creation (v. 13).
Continue reading →

DABNEY ON THE RESURRECTION BODY (2)

Resurrection, Theologians March 14, 2025 Leave a comment

PMW 2025-021 by Robert L. DabneyGeneral resurrection

Note: This concludes our previous posting presenting Robert L. Dabney’s argument for the physical resurrection of the dead.

Objection From Wonderfulness, Answered
The general objection is from the incredible greatness of the work. That is, since the particles that composed human bodies are scattered asunder by almost every conceivable agency, fire, winds, waters, birds and beasts of prey, mingled with the soil of the fields, and dissolved in the waters of the ocean, it is unreasonable to expect they will be assembled again.

We reply (reserving the question whether a proper corporeal identity implies the presence of all the constituent particles; of which more shortly), that this objection is founded only on a denial of God’s omnipotence, omniscience, and almighty power. The work of the resurrection does indeed present a most wondrous and glorious display of divine power. But to God all things are easy. Continue reading →

DABNEY ON THE RESURRECTION BODY (1)

Resurrection, Theologians March 11, 2025 Leave a comment

PMW 2025-020 by Robert L. Dabneyflower in concrete

Gentry note:

R. L. Dabney (1820–98) was a Reformed Presbyterian theologian who served as professor of systematic theology ot Union Theological Seminary (back when it believed something in particular), then he served as Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy at the University of Texas. This excerpt below is from pp. 832–34 of his Lectures in Systematic Theology. Please note: I have slightly tweaked some of his punctuation, Roman numerals, and nineteenth century style without changing his meaning.

True Meaning of Resurrection
In Scripture the image of a resurrection, anastasis, is a undoubtedly used sometimes in a figurative sense, to describe regeneration (John 5:25; Eph. 5:14). And sometimes to speak of restoration from calamity and captivity to prosperity and joy (Ezek. 37:12: Isa. 26:19). But it is equally certain that the words are intended to be used in a literal sense, of the restoration of the same body that dies to life, by its reunion to the soul. This then is the doctrine. For when the resurrection of the dead (nekron), of those that are in their graves, of those that sleep in the dust of the earth, is declared, the sense is unequivocal. Without at this time particularizing Scripture proofs, we assert that they mean to describe a bodily existence as literally as when they speak of man’s soul in in this life, as residing in a body. And this, though wonderfully changed in qualities, is the same body in the proper, honest sense of the word “same,” which the soul laid down at death. This resurrection will embrace all the individuals of the human race, good and bad, except those whose bodies have already passed into heaven, and those of the last generation, who will be alive on the earth at the last trump. But on the bodies of these the resurrection change will pass, though they do not die. The signal of this resurrection is to be the “last trump,” an expression probably taken from the transactions at Sinai (Exo. 19:16, 19; cf. Heb. 12:26), which may, very possibly, be some literal, audible summons, sounded through the whole atmosphere of the world. But the agent will be Christ, by His direct and almighty power, with the Holy Ghost. Continue reading →

CHRISTIANITY AND FUTURE REVIVAL

Optimism, Theologians March 7, 2025 Leave a comment

PMW 2025-019 by O. T. AllisAllis

Gentry note:
O. T. Allis (1880-1973) was an internationally recognized philologist and Reformed theologian who helped found Westminster Theological Seminary, along with J. Gresham Machen, Robert Dick Wilson, and others. He is noted especially for his work in the Old Testament. Allis was a postmillennialist, as we can see from his Foreword in Roderick Campbell’s Israel and the New Covenant, a powerful postmillennial book. The following is his Foreword in full.

The author of this valuable contribution to Biblical Interpretation belongs to a class of writers which is not as numerous today as has sometimes been the case, the lay theologian. Being both an earnest and active Christian and a successful man of business, Mr. Campbell very naturally became, as he tells us in his Preface, deeply concerned over the economic depression and the moral degeneracy which followed in the wake of the first World War. Being a Christian he turned to the Bible for the answer; and he also consulted many of the ablest interpreters of the Bible, in the hope of solving this pressing problem. The answer which he found is the thesis of the present volume. It can be stated briefly and in a single sentence: The Christian church has for centuries failed to take seriously and carry out fully the Great Commission. Continue reading →