Download "God Partners, Sept 2, 2007.mp3 We wrapped up our series today with a review of God's mission to restore all things through Jesus, his desire to partner with people in implementing restoration, and our response to God's invitation. We then opened it up for questions during the teaching. We have never done this before so it was interesting to see how it would go. Thanks for being willing to experiment.
For those interested, I will expound on some of the questions that were raised since they were related in regards to end times, is our ultimate home in heaven or on earth, how does this passage relate ect...
1) End times scenarios. If you were lost in the pre/post millennial discussion here is a primer. These words come from categories of interpreting Revelation chapter 20, where there is reference to a 1000 year reign of Christ here on earth. Pre-millenial: Jesus returns before the 1000 year reign (2 main categories, Historic premillennialism and Dispensational premillennialism.) Post-millennialism: Jesus returns after 1000 year reign of the kingdom coming through the church. Amillennialism: The 1000 years is a literary devise used by John and is meant to be a picture of Jesus' endless reign on earth.
My first recommendation when considering end times rhetoric is to focus on the big story first and allow the big story to inform your smaller stories (end times scenarios). God is reconciling all things through Jesus. He is bringing heaven to earth--this is the big story.
My second recommendation when considering end-times views is to learn the history of how and when each of these views became popular. Each of them has been the dominant view at some point in the past 2000 years. A good overview is "The Millennial Maze" by Stanley Grenz.
2) How does John 14:1-4 relate to God bringing heaven to earth? This is a great question because I know that my view of this passage was that God was making my own personal mansion in heaven and when it was done that is when he would "take me home". Now there is nothing necessarily wrong with saying that or hoping that, it just isn't Jesus' point in using this illustration. Jesus is giving a picture of what his leaving will be like. He is not ditching his disciples or leaving them stranded (or like orphans Jn 14:18) His leaving will be like a groom going to prepare the house for his bride and when he returns they will be married and together physically forever. "In my Father's house (insula) are many rooms" an isula is the family house that you add rooms onto as the family grows. Jesus then gives two images in John 14, the first is the fulfillment of his marriage proposal "I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am" Jn 14:3 and the second gives the location of the house, where Jesus will be in verse 23 "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." We are left with the picture that Jesus will always be with us 1) by the Holy Spirit Jn 14:16 while he is with the Father, 2) we can make the assumption from other passages that in our death we will then be with Jesus, 3) and then finally when God's home is brought fully to earth Rev. 21 and the marriage is complete we will be with our groom forever and ever...the location being the restored earth.
3) I was asked a similar question about the passage in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18 and will comment below.
"The Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, comfort one another with these words" 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18.
Paul is using a common illustration of how one greets a king (or Caesar) in the fist Century as a way of helping the church understand the coming day of the Lord. When a king comes to visit your city, everyone goes outside the city gates in order to meet him and then escorts the king back into their city. This actually occured in Thessanonica after and earthquake dessimated the city. The Roman emperor Domitian gave money to rebuild the city and then came to visit to see how they completed the project. The citizens went out to meet him and then escorted him back in so he could see what they had done with his resources for the renovation.
Knowing this context is needed to understand that this passage is about Jesus' coming and staying on earth, rather than Jesus coming to take people out of the city and back to heaven. The illustration is that we meet Jesus in the air as the true king of the world, and then escort him on his way down to set up his final and permenant rule on this earth. The whole rapture interpretation popularized off of this passage originated 100 years ago by a british preacher named John Darby. It became widely distributed through the publishing of the scofield bible, but sadly lacks historical and theological grounding. What Paul is actually doing is combining images from the book of Daniel with the metaphors of greeting a contemporary ruler in order to paint a picture of an event that defies our words and imaginations. The picture is of God's kingdom fully coming to earth, not us getting rescued from the earth. It is about the day of the Lord, not an interlude leading up to the day of the Lord.
I hope this is helpful. Faith, Hope, and Love.
David
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