[Response To Gentry's Analysis of the Full Preterist View...]

[GENTRY] Tenth, if A.D. 70 ends the Messianic reign of Christ (cf. hyper-preterist view of 1 Cor. 15:24, 28), then the glorious Messianic era prophesied throughout the Old Testament is reduced to a forty year inter-regnum. Whereas by all accounts it is a lengthy, glorious era. A problem with premillennialism is that it reduces Christ's reign to 1000 literal years; hyper-preterism reduces it further to forty years! The prophetical expressions of the kingdom tend to speak of an enormous period of time, even employing terms that are frequently used of eternity. Does Christ's kingdom parallel David's so that it only lasts for the same time frame?

Tenth – Gentry is confusing the millennial period (a transitional building and establishing phase) with the finished eternal kingdom period. And, he again shows he misunderstands the full preterist view of 1 Cor. 15:24-28 when he alleges we believe “A.D. 70 ends the Messianic reign of Christ” and that “the glorious Messianic era prophesied throughout the Old Testament” is nothing more than a mere “forty year inter-regnum.” He says the full preterist view “reduces [Christ's glorious Messianic reign] to forty years.” He admits too much when he says that the “prophetical expressions of the kingdom [in the OT] tend to speak of an enormous period of time, even employing terms that are frequently used of eternity.” Gentry has given the farm away by that admission. That is exactly what we believe. The reason the full preterist view is so confusing to Gentry and many others on this point is because they have not taken the “already, but not yet” idea fully into account. The NT speaks of an earnest, pledge and seal of their full inheritance. They did not have the fullness yet. That 40-year period between Pentecost and Holocaust was just a transition phase between “this age” and “the age about to come.” It is “the age about to come” that was to be the eternal one. We have several examples of 40-year transitional periods in the OT (wilderness wandering, David’s reign, etc.). According to Moses and the prophets the transition between the two ages was not supposed to be eternal, nor even a long protracted period. Gentry has missed the significance of the transition period, and confused the passages about the transition period with those about the eternal kingdom.

It is this transition period that the rabbis discussed frequently in their Messianic debates. They labeled that period “the days of the Messiah.” It was a period of travail and difficulty in which the Messiah would have enemies to defeat before His reign was established and His kingdom consolidated. The rabbis differed as to how long that period would last. Some spoke of it as a thousand or more years. Most agreed it would probably be about 40 years, like the transitional period of wandering in the wilderness and the 40-year preparatory reign of David before his son Solomon (the prince of peace) built the Temple. This transition period would see the consummation of all redemptive things and the bringing in of the victorious and full eternal kingdom reign of Christ (not the ending of that reign).

Jesus told the parable about a nobleman who went to a far country to receive a kingdom, then returned to begin His rule (Lk. 19:12-27). His citizens hated him and sent a delegation asking that he not be allowed to reign over them. What did he do to those folks when he came back to his country to rule? He put the rebels to the sword. The point of the parable is that this Nobleman (Christ) did not begin ruling over His people until He returned from the far country (heaven). Was He reigning in the mean time? He had “received the kingdom” (Lk. 19:15), but His right to rule was being challenged by the citizens of His country. He had to put the enemies down first before His kingdom was fully established. There was an “already, but not yet” aspect to His rule. When He returned and crushed His enemies, He began His eternal reign at the right hand of His Father. The Messiah’s enemies had to be put down, and His eternal reign at His Father’s side was then permanently established. And this implies that if Christ’s eternal reign has begun, He must have already “returned from the far country.”

Notice 1 Cor. 15:24-28 doesn’t shut out the idea of Christ reigning eternally with the Father. If we took Gentry’s approach, however, we would have to say this text denies an eternal reign of Christ after His parousia. If Gentry believes the parousia mentioned in 1 Cor. 15:23 is still future, then he would have to believe that when Christ returns He will quit reigning. Is that what Gentry believes this passage is saying? Of course not, and neither do full preterists. We both believe Christ continues to reign eternally after His parousia (regardless of whether we put the parousia in the past, as preterists do, or in the future, as futurists do). If Gentry puts the parousia mentioned in vs. 23 at AD 70, then he has established full preterism, simply because the resurrection and end occur in conjunction with it. And if the parousia, resurrection and judgment all occurred at AD 70, full preterism is true.

Here’s the question begged by this text: Can Gentry show any context in the NT where an inspired writer differentiates between two different parousia’s of Christ separated by thousands of years? Did Jesus speak of two different parousia’s of the Son of Man separated by thousands of years? (cf. Matt. 24:3,27,37,39 where the Greek word parousia is used four times in the Olivet Discourse) Where does the Bible tell of a parousia after the one in AD 70? Take a peek at Gentry’s own interpretation of Matthew 24 (BJF, pp. 123, 242, and HSHD, pp. 160-161, 343-349), where he applies two of the four “parousia” passages (Mt. 24:3,27) to the AD 70 destruction of Jerusalem, and even indicates that the “coming” (Gr. ercomenon) mentioned in Mt. 24:30 is the same AD 70 “coming in clouds of judgment” (BJF, p. 123).

Now think about Gentry’s inconsistency here. He divides Matthew 24 into two sections, saying the first (vss. 4-34) was fulfilled at AD 70, and the second (vss. 36ff) is yet to be fulfilled at Christ’s “glorious Second Advent” (HSHD, p. 343). Please stop right here and go to Appendix I and study the Matthew 24 – Luke 17 chart. It shows clearly why Matthew 24 is not dealing with two different widely separated events. The main difficulty with Gentry’s idea of dividing Matthew 24 is that the second section of Matt. 24 contains “coming” passages (using both parousia and ercomai) that are worded exactly the same as the “coming” passages in the first section. We have listed them below for easy comparison to see if there is any clear indication that Jesus was talking about two totally different “comings of the Son of Man” separated by thousands of years. Please read them for yourself. Check the Greek.

• Gr. parousia, “parousia” – Mt. 24:3, 27

• Gr. ercomai, “erchomai” – Mt. 24:30

• Gr. parousia, “parousia”– Mt. 24:37,39

• Gr. ercomai, “erchomai” – Mt. 24:42,44,46,50

We have already noted that Gentry applies all three of the “coming” passages in the first section to AD 70, and that he is forced to assign the coming passages in the second section to a future “glorious Second Advent.” Do you see the problem here? Is there any indication in the text that Jesus (and the gospel writers) are even remotely aware of two different comings separated by thousands of years? Were they confused or mistaken? Gentry’s arbitrary distinction between two different comings gives critics (e.g. Bertrand Russell and Albert Schweitzer) license to charge Jesus with an even greater mistake than they already have. Taking the chapter as one unit, they would say Jesus failed in His prediction of His parousia in that generation. But if we divide the chapter into two different comings (as Gentry does), those same critics would howl not only about the failure of the first section’s parousia to come to pass in that generation, but charge Jesus with arbitrarily and ambiguously changing subjects without modifying His terminology. This would make Jesus not only a false prophet, but a deceiver. In other words, Gentry has Jesus speaking about two totally different parousia’s separated by thousands of years (compare Mt. 24:27 versus 24:37,39) using not just “similar,” but exactly the same language (“coming of the Son of Man”). Deliberate deception, as well as false prophecy, if it did not occur in that generation. The skeptics and liberal critics of Jesus would have a party over this. There is no room for a split interpretation of this chapter, since the word parousia is used in both sections, and the events mentioned in each section are connected inseparably with the parousia of the Son of Man. Either we have to say it is all future (and make Jesus a liar for saying any of it would occur in that generation), or make it all fulfilled at AD 70 (and preserve Jesus' integrity). Gentry is inconsistent on this. Full preterists are the only ones with a consistent solution to this dilemma which still preserves the integrity of Christ and the NT writers.

Gentry says he only feels comfortable assigning an AD 70 application to a text if it has clear time indicators in the context. Well, Matthew 24 has several “time indicators” in its context. But, I suppose he would say that there really are two completely different contexts in Matt. 24. The burden of proof rests on him to prove that, since the traditional position of the church was to take this whole chapter as a unit.

This same “parousia” is mentioned in 1 Cor. 15:23 in connection with Christ’s deliverance of the kingdom back to the Father (1 Cor. 15:24-28). To be consistent, Gentry has to apply this 1 Cor. 15:23-28 context to AD 70, or else give up his application of Matt. 24:4-34 to AD 70. They both use the Greek word parousia, and there is no indication in Paul’s or Jesus’ teaching that they knew of two different parousia’s separated by thousands of years.

1 Cor. 15:25 speaks of Christ reigning in some sense at that very time until He puts down His enemies and returns the kingdom to the Father at whose side He will co-reign eternally. Rev. 20 speaks of Christ reigning until the millennium is over. Then He comes in wrath upon Gog and Magog to crush His final enemies (Death and Hades) and usher in the New Heaven and Earth, the New Jerusalem and the New Temple where He reigns with the Father eternally. So, 1 Cor. 15:23-28 is speaking about Christ’s millennial reign during that 40-year transition period, followed by His eternal reign with the Father after AD 70. So, A.D. 70 does not “end the Messianic reign of Christ,” as Gentry has charged.

What is 1 Cor. 15:24ff talking about when it says that Christ “delivers up the kingdom to the Father,” if it is not talking about an end to Christ’s reign? Glad you asked! In 2 Samuel, the Psalms and the OT prophets, David is told that His descendants will enjoy living in an eternal kingdom under a Son of David. The Jews rejected God’s reign over them and insisted on having an earthly king. They picked Saul. He was not God’s choice. David was the man after God’s heart, and David (through his descendant) was prophesied to be the one who would bring the kingdom back to God. Jesus’ parables talk about taking the kingdom away from the Jews and renting it out to a new nation that would produce the fruit of it. (Matt. 21:33-46)

The 40-year transition period was a period of “already, but not yet.” When Christ returned at AD 70 He finished crushing the enemies of His Father’s reign, took the kingdom away from them, gave it back to the Father to whom it belonged, then sat down at His side to rule eternally with Him. I suspect Gentry believes the same, except for the timing of it. He might put some kind of “parousia” still in the future, while full preterists understand that Christ has already crushed His enemies and begun to reign at His Father’s side eternally.