Featured The early Church was not Pre, but Postmillenial. ???

http://www.francisnigellee.com/wp-c...h-Not-Pre-But-Postmillennial-Dr.-F.N.-Lee.pdf
Found this today....have to work through and consider it. How do you see it?

 

Yes Martin that's why I try to focus more on what was said rather than who said it. Yeah it's nice to know the person who said it and you know did he have special qualifications or not but at the end of the day the verses that are offered last longer than the person does here on Earth so we got to get back to the verses and compare the scripture with the scripture

 

(11) Now the Older Testament  just like the later Puritans who believed it  clearly teaches that the (first) advent of the Messiah2 would be followed (sooner or later) by a long period of prosperity (of undeclared length), right here on Earth.3 Moreover, this prosperous period would occur prior to the simultaneous4 physical resurrection of the godly dead and the wicked dead  right before the Final Judgment.5


3 Joel 2:28-32;
Am. 9:11-15;
Isa. 2:2-20; 9:6f; 11:6-10; 49:22f; 60:2-5; 66:12-23;
Mic. 4:1-5; 5:2-4;
Zeph. 2:11f; 3:9f;
Hab. 2:14,20;
Jer. 3:16f; 23:5f; 31:31-34;
Ob. 15-21;
Ezek. 47:8- 12;
Dan. 2:34f,44; 7:13f,27;
Zech. 2:4f,11; 9:9f; 14:9-16;
Mal. 1:11 etc.


4 Ex. 3:6;
Mt. 22:29-32; Job. 19:25-27; Isa. 26:19; Ezek. 37:1-14; Dan. 12:2.

5 Eccl. 12:1-14; Dan. 12:2f; Mal. chs. 3 & 4.

 

ALWAYS VICTORIOUS! THE EARLIEST CHURCH NOT PRE- BUT POSTMILLENNIAL

-4- (13) Also the Newer Testament (including Revelation chapter twenty) says that Christ's Messianic reign will constantly increase toward a 'Golden Age.' That reign commenced at His first advent, with His incarnation and His earthly preaching of the Kingdom of God.11 And that realm got underway especially at His resurrection from the dead and His ascension and heavenly session.12

(14) Since then, His reign has been expanding continually. It will keep on effecting glorious improvements to the condition of the Earth and its various inhabitants  until it brings blessings World-wide.13 Then, a "thousand years" after that  thus Revelation chapter twenty  Christ will simultaneously resurrect14 the dead saints and the wicked dead unto their final reward or punishment at the end of History.15



11 Mt. chs. 1 to 5; Lk. chs. 1 to 4; Rev. chs. 1 & 5 to 9 & 20:1-7.


12 Acts ch. 2; Col. 1:13-20; Rev. 1:5,18; 20:1f; 22:16.

13 I Cor. 15:24-28 cf. Mt. 24:14; 28:18-20; Acts 1:5-8; Rev. 1:5-9; 12:11; 17:14; 20:1-6.

14 Jh. 5:28f; Acts 24:15; I Cor. 15:23; Phil. 3:20f; I Th. 4:16; Rev. 20:13-15.

15 Mt. 25:31-46; Jh. 5:27-29; 6:39f,44,54; 11:24; Rev. 20:7-15.

 

Have you read this article???...or are you offering more of your "thoughts"

 

How does this sound?
The Book of Jubilees says that the 'Golden Age' would gradually be realized by an ethical and physical transformation of the Earth during a 1000-year period, until international bliss and spiritual immortality was reached (I Baruch 5:1-7; Syb. Orac. III:46-50; I Enoch 10:21f; Test. Levi 4:3f & 18:2-12; Test. Judah 22:2; Test. Zeb. 9:8; Test. Asher 7:3; Test. Joseph 19:11f; Jub. chs. 1 & 15 & 23:26-30f; DSS in Bened. 1 Q 5b III:25,28). It was believed that this period would last: for 400 years (thus II Esdras 7:28f); for 1000 years (thus II Enoch 33:1 & Jub. 23:26-29); temporarily, for three "World-weeks" (thus I Enoch 91:12-19 & chs. 93 to 104); or permanently (thus I Enoch chs. 1 to 5 & 11:2 & 83 to 90).

20 Cf. Irenaeus's Against Heresies V:30-36 with Justin Martyr's Dialogue with Trypho (81f), and the partial absorption (by Tertullian in the Phrygian colony of Carthage) of Montanistic Chiliasm from Phrygia in Asia Minor. See D.H. Kromminga's book The Millennium in the Church, Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1945, pp. 77f. This Phrygian theatre of Neo-Chiliasm, is significant. For Phrygia in Asia seems to have been the central dissemination point of this 2nd to 3rd century A.D. brand of Chiliasm on the fringes of Christianity. The heretic Cerinthus (A.D. 100f), who was also a Chiliast, hailed from Phrygia. See Douglas's op. cit. p. 207. Papias (A.D. 145) and Justin Martyr (A.D. 150) both seem to have been in contact with that region. And so too do Irenaeus (A.D. 185) and the A.D. 220 Tertullian (thus Kromminga's op. cit. pp 29 & 44 & 53 & 77 & 89). No doubt Cerinthus picked up the "Phrygian heresy" of Chiliasm from those more-eastern Asian quarters of Persia and Babylon. Even Augustine (City of God 20:7)  himself chiliastic during the earlier period of his Manichaean and Post-Manichaean life  prior to his conversion to Christ(ianity)  appears to have derived that Chiliasm from Persian Manichaeism (cf. n. 19 above). See too Van der Leeuw & Bleeker's volumes The Religions of the World, Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1956, II:136. Moreover, it should be noted that the Chiliast Justin Martyr was also rationalistic and subordinationistic. The Chiliast Irenaeus upheld other doctrinal errors too  holding to baptismal regenerationism, episcopalianism, and believing that Lot's wife continued menstruating even after being turned into a pillar of salt. Even the offbeat suspected Chiliast Tertullian was both legalistic and Semi-Montanistic. Modern Premillennialists who appeal to the assumed 'Chiliasm' of Justin and Irenaeus andTertullian  assuming them to be orthodox in all their theology (so that their Chiliasm too should then also be deemed to be orthodox)  should therefore be evaluated with caution if not also with scepticism. 2

 

Hello 1832,

Do you believe this happened at Pentecost?

27 And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed.

28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:

29 And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.

30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.

31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come.

32 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord hath said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call.

what about this portion?

13 Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great.

14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lordis near in the valley of decision.

15 The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.

16 The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the Lord will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel.

17 So shall ye know that I am the Lord your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.

18 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth out of the house of the Lord, and shall water the valley of Shittim.

19 Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.

20 But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.

21 For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the Lord dwelleth in Zion.
Do you think the language of the sun , moon, and stars....are literal and physical...or do they have another application?

 

(33) Justin's 'Occasional Chiliasm' sui generis  which was strongly antipretribulationistic  was followed possibly by Pothinus in A.D. 175 and more probably (around 185) by Irenaeus.29 Around 220, there were some similar influences on Tertullian  though only with very important and extremely optimistic (if not perhaps even postmillennial modifications and implications).30 On the other hand, 'Christian Chiliastic' ideas were indeed advocated in 240 by Commodian; in 250 by the Egyptian Bishop Nepos in his Refutation of Allegorists; in 260 by the almost unknown Coracion; and in 310 by Lactantius. (34) It is true these few Christian leaders did advocate the chiliastic teaching of "two resurrections." Yet they differed from most modern Premillennialists in many ways. For they denied that, since Calvary, the Jews are in any way "God's Chosen People." They also denied it was predicted the Jews would return to Palestine. And they were all antipretribulationistic. (35) Justin Martyr, for instance, believed that the Gentile Christians would ultimately live in Jerusalem. Irenaeus was an Anti-Judaistic Covenant Theologian. Tertullian expected a massive World-wide conversion of the Gentiles prior to the millennium.30 The premillennial views of Bishop Nepos were grossly materialistic. Commodian believed in the establishment of the New Jerusalem before the millennium. And Lactantius (who frequently quoted from pagan sources to support his views) believed that the Non-Christian Gentiles would be enslaved during the thousand years. What modern Dispensationalist would agree with any of these views?


(61) So-called 'Amillennialism'  is really postmillennial. For it too rightly says Christ will return visibly to resurrect all people simultaneously unto Final Judgment  only at the end of the millennium (however conceived). Even if modern 'Amillennialists' do not wish to be called Postmillennialists  all of them and also Premillennialists too need to know that each and every Early Church Father before the A.D. 150 Justin Martyr  was a nonchiliastic Postmillennialist (whether a consistent optimist, or whether somewhat less hopeful). So too was every Church Father from A.D. 230 until A.D. 300  from Origen of Caesarea to Victorinus of Pettau

 

I do not put much stock in any of the ECF's.... The documentation is in dispute. After 1033 ad...some thought the 1000years where over?

There are many stories of apocalyptic paranoia around the year 1000. For example, legend has it that a "panic terror" gripped Europe in the years and months before this date. However, scholars disagree on which stories are genuine, whether millennial expectations at this time were any greater than usual, or whether ordinary people were even aware of what year it was. An excellent article on Y1K apocalyptic expectations can be found at the Center for Millennial Studies. (Gould, Schwartz, Randi)
1033 After Jesus failed to return in 1000, some mystics pushed the date of the End to the thousandth anniversary of the Crucifixion. The writings of the Burgundian monk Radulfus Glaber described a rash of millennial paranoia during the period from 1000-1033. (Kyle p.39, Abanes p.337, McIver #50)

A Brief History of the Apocalypse

 

PrmtvBptst1832,

Hello PB1832,

Thank you for a nice solid response in which you lay out your case biblically. can I use this now to suggest how others might come to a different conclusion?

Peter by the Spirit identified a key portion of the whole book...which is always good to read...and yet The Spirit gave him this portion to highlight.....THIS IS THAT..... He did not say, this is like that....or this is part of it ....but he said...THIS IS THAT.

People who read Joel before the cross looked forward this time when whosoever called upon the Lord will be saved.
He identifies that time as the last days!
Can Acts 2 be the last days?....Yes....especially if it is the last days of the Jewish theocracy.
Hebrews 1 identifies the time of the incarnation as the last days. Do you think it could be the last days of the OT. giving way to the NT.

Now if that is indeed the case, let's see how part of what you posted could fit nicely

Yes...so then the fulfillment was prior to the setting up of the kingdom...The Ascension....the coming of the Spirit.

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