At first the preterist view seems like a tree of life, liberating the person from stodgy, dry theological ponderings of the past...but as a person consumes more & more from the fruits of preterism they are soon consumed themselves.
If they had not been inoculated against blantant falsehood, they will soon find themselves completely unmoored & drifting along on the abysmal "journey" that is hyper-preterism.
The journey into this lethal land of latitudinous error typically begins with an unfortunate experience.
The experience ranges from anything where the person begins to question a mentor about eschatology & the mentor clearly has a poor grasp of the subject & thus is seen to flounder or even hypocritically & inconsistently answer, or the person may have already had side-effects of some rejection they are suffering. Perhaps they didn't fit in well with some mainline group so now they look for the most off-the-beat-and-path concept they can to really stick it to the rejectors. (This is the reason many of the original Hyper-Preterists were from the denomination of "Church of Christ" -- a group that thrives on being self-piously "rejected" by mainline Christianity)
At first everything seems new, like they have just 'rounded a corner to find an open vista of glorious green & a pure river flowing from a tree of life -- but in reality they are about to eat from the root of death. Death, because hyper-preterism kills the morality of a person. I don't mean it COULD or MIGHT or POSSIBLY but 99.9% it DOES adversely affect their character. Just as true hyper-calvinism or universalism leads people to behave in a "tolerant" manner that would even shame the immoral "tolerance" of the Christians in 1 Cor 5 -- hyper-preterism is all of this combined into one.
For many people, by the time they see this, it is too late. They have already invested so much of their life into it that it is almost impossible for them to UNpreterism themselves.
I am devoting this site to helping people stop their addiction to the root of death that preterism has become. In the coming weeks, months, & years if needed I will step through my 15 years of time within the preterist community. I will bring foward the details of the various preterist propositions & show where they veer from the biblical path.
May God use this site to help someone escape from their self-made oblivion.
4 comments:
Hi Roderick,
On Dec 26th, at your site Kingdom Come, you state you are not returning to futurism.
(Quote) Some people have been asking me if I am saying that I am returning to "Futurism" (belief that Jesus is coming in the future & most prophecies are still unfulfilled) -- No I am not, it is not possible for me to honestly return to futurism. Some people have asked me if I am turning to "Partial-Preterism" (belief that AD70 did mark "a coming" of Jesus in judgment but that there will still be a future coming of Christ) -- No, I don't see that as viable either, especially how partial-preterist often handle the Olivet Discourse, specifically how they tend to split up Mt 24 at verse 36 as being some past & some future. What then? Shall I turn to "Preterist Idealism"? (a new invention by Todd Dennis, of preteristachive.com which seems little more than over-application, hyper-individualism with a huge dose of personal/private interpretative hermeneutics, having Christ constantly returning to each individual) -- No, I have no intention leaving one man's bandwagon for another man's bandwagon. Besides, I have not seen much better character from the founder of PretIdealism as I have seen from the main proponents & would-be trademark holders of "Full Preterism" -- that is a red-flag right there.
(me)
So what position are you refuting? It sure doesn't sound like you are refuting full preterism here. If, as you say, you can't return to futurism, then how are you un-preterizing yourself? Please explain.
Dorothy
Before a complete refutation first must come the realization that something is wrong. Again, I know enough at this point that the root of full preterism is causing bad fruit -- AND it is NOT just a "few" people or a "splinter-group" among Full Preterists that behaves like this -- it is the majority, so those people comparing the general corruption in the early Church & during the Reformation are making poor comparisons. Corruptions in the early church & in the Reformation were minorities AND were dealt with, not allowed to fester.
Dorothy, you & the few others I know who do not have corrupt characters NOR wink at those who have corrupt (& corrupting) characters are such a minority. you know that.
Does this alone make Full Preterism wrong? No, I even said so on the audio with Gene Cook. But this is a starting point.
Some exegetical specifics I'll get into soon & again mentioned on the audio is how most Full Preterists advocate that the "Law has been destroyed". The next will probably be how Full Preterism is anti-creedal & anti-confessional -- YET proposes to introduce its own new "creed" & "confession" & obviously anyone that disagrees with their creed/confession will endure the wrath of the most arrogant among them.
Give me time Dorothy -- I'll get to the source of what causes the bad fruit...I'm simply following the stench backwards at the moment & it is leading me down these paths.
Lastly, for some people to keep stating I should shutdown this & other websites until I specifically settle what I believe about eschatology is just more evidence that these people are consumed by their eschatology...which is a very dangerous position for them to be in. One-trick pony's tend to only run in circles.
There are more "ologies" than just eschatology & I am fairly settled on many other "ologies". I see no reason to shutdown anything while I go through this process.
Hi Roderick,
Quote: Before a complete refutation first must come the realization that something is wrong.
(me)
So what plumbline are you using to identify something is wrong? Scripture OR experience. If experience - then you are on a emotional tare. If scripture - show it to me. I can assure you, and you know me, I'm not going to stop asking for it.
IF you can't refute preterism scripturally, then all this blog becomes is a postmodernist version of a conversation. All talk, no substance.
You know me, I'm going to ask for scripture again and again and again. I do hope the others here will join me in that effort.
A postion must be built on the truth of scipture or it has no foundation. I know of no Christian who will not support that statement.
Dorothy
I'm a bit disappointed by this blog. You used big words, like 'lethal' and 'death' and even claim preterism affects a person morally - and given your position I presume you don't mean a change for the better! But unfortunately, those are nothing but claims and you don't present anything to back it up.
At this moment, in the Netherlands a whole debate has started on preterism, because of a recently published preterist book. My take is that the whole subject of eschatology is highly overrated and people take too absolute positions. I don't buy hyper-preterism as I never bought the extremes of other positions. The bible is simply not that detailed on eschatology. Maybe the whole issue is just a matter of Christians wanting to know more than God revealed. If someone writes a 500 page book about the Millennium or the Great Tribulation or the Antichrist, there's something wrong anyway as the bible only has a few verses mentioning those notions. I think theologians should be more modest about eschatology anyway. It's not the heart of the gospel.
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