Part 6: Pessimistic Amillennials Monopolize Hope to the Second Coming At the Expense of All That God Does In the Meantime.

Here is how Dr. Clark concludes his article, “The first comfort of the martyrs has always been that Christ is reigning now and, in his sovereign, mysterious providence, he sometimes sends his children through great suffering. A second comfort, however, which we find richly reflected in the Revelation, is that justice is coming. That is why French Reformed (Huguenot) martyrs sang Psalm 68 on the way to the gallows. “God shall arise and by his might, put all his enemies to flight.” They knew that justice delayed is not justice denied. They knew that our ruling King Jesus will return in glory to consummate the defeat of his enemies that he inaugurated on the cross. They knew that he sits in the heavens and laughs at his enemies, who will be crying on that last day. He will cast them into the pit and heaven will rejoice. Our chiliast and postmillennial friends want an earthly glory age and all the amillennialists are saying is: wait. There will be a new heaven and a new earth. It will not be a literal 1,000-year glory age and it will not precede Christ’s return, but there will be a glory age.” The issue with this kind of Amillennialism that he presents is that it consolidates the Eschaton in the consummation. Sure, a few elect here and there can get converted and grow in personal piety; but anything more than this is over-realized, Jewish, glory mongering. This is likened to the Christian’s hope being exclusively (not primarily) in His glorified state devoid of any hope in the time between Christ’s first and second comings. Which implies that God’s defeat of His enemies and ours is entirely understood in the consummation. Which suggests that if your eschatology expects any kind of triumph over evil and relief before the return of Christ then you are being presumptuous and have bought into the thousand year glory age. Meaning that unless the reign of Christ leaves you a perpetual marginalized victim then you have bought into an over-realized eschatology. While it is certainly true that the ultimate and final relief and conquest are consummate, it is false that incremental conquest and relief are presumptuous “glory theology.” Below I will provide 15 points that will address this discussion.

1. Psalms 110 speaks about Jesus presently ruling over and in the midst of His enemies. Which is to say that God is putting Christ's enemies under His footstool in the midst of enemies and opposition (not at His return when there are no enemies). In 1 Corinthians 15:26, The Apostle Paul states that the last enemy that Christ defeats is death, which speaks to how Christ is incrementally subduing His enemies unto the consummation, not simply and only in the consummation.
2. the Church cites Psalm 2 about the kings needing to repent or perish as a present reality. This ultimatum was inaugurated for the kings in the ascension event; it is not merely a statement about the ultimatum of consummation.
3. the seals and bowls and trumpets in Revelation speak of God’s present and incremental judgment on the kingdom of darkness. Meaning God’s conquering judgments are continuous, not merely consummate.
4. in the book of Acts God kills kings that oppose the church multiple times and Luke presents that as particularly connected to the Kingdom advancing.
5. after apostate Israel opposed the church He judged the nation of Israel to bring present relief to the New Israel. Meaning that God judges our enemies, providing relief before the eschaton.
6. In Romans 13 says that the civil office is God’s avenger who brings wrath on the evildoer which brings present relief and benefit to the church (as Paul says in verse 4.)
7. whenever Christianity spreads and saturates the spheres of society, they are affected and justice increases which brings present relief (Proverbs 11:11).
8. God makes covenantal promises to households up to the second and third generation which brings present relief amid generations of household decadence (Isaiah 59:21). God renews households that bears relation to the length of life and the spiritual quality of life (Ephesians 6:1-4)
9. God plants more (increasingly more) local churches in more places where God’s people presently experience the foretaste of the eschaton and the first fruits of its relief (Hebrews 6:1-8; Acts 3:19,20).
10. regeneration and its ethics benefit science, education, care of the vulnerable, and in turn provide present relief in the fall for the elect and the non-elect (the entire story of Joseph).
11. God presently judges and kills false teachers to protect the church and give it present relief from destructive doctrines (Revelation 2:16).
12. God makes Christians holy and wise which prohibits them from inordinate present sufferings related to sin and folly (1 Peter 3:8-12).
13. God, through prayer at times and when He chooses, heals Christians from the effects of the fall in the present (2 Kings 20:1-11).
14. God has the Devil bound and restrains His deceptions which brings relief and the comforts of the gospel in the present (Revelation 20; 2 Thessalonians 2:6).
15. God uses the church to save people in power to presently bring relief and blessing to the church (1 Timothy 2:1-2).

I think you get the point. The Christian believes that we can ultimately be hopeful about the relief that God will provide in the eschaton, but nonetheless, God in many ways in His present Kingdom defends the people of God and advances their cause and gives much relief and renewal in the present (not just in the church but in all spheres of life). Christ’s Kingdom is comprehensive, not ecclesiastically compartmentalized. His Kingdom is ultimately hopeful and yet presently powerful. The Christ who looks at His people and merely says that things will be better in the end is a fantasy Jesus; He is definitely not less than that but certainly is more. Scott is Dutch reformed. I would like to remind him what the Heidelberg Catechism Question 51 says, “First, through His Holy Spirit He pours gifts from heaven upon us His members. Second, by His power He defends and preserves us from all enemies.” Also, Question 123 says, “Your Kingdom come means: rule us by your word and Spirit in such a way that more and more we submit to you. Preserve and increase your church. Destroy the Devil’s work. Destroy every force which revolts against you and every conspiracy against your holy word. Do all this until your kingdom fully comes when you will be all in all.” All of this language makes it clear that the Lord is presently, not mere consummately, comforting the people of God with the Kingdom's advance and Babylon’s present demise. The Reformed view is that God’s Kingdom is advancing AND that the Devil’s kingdom is decreasing. This is why John says in 1 John 2:8 that the “darkness is fading away and the true light is already shining.”

I will conclude by quoting some more of those so-called “glory age theologians”. Iain Murray says in his book “The Puritan Hope Reveal and the Interpretation of Prophecy,” “when the Holy Spirit is poured out in a day of power the result is bound to affect whole communities and even nations.” James Kirkton says about Scotland, “every parish had a ministry, every village had a school and every family had a Bible.” John Owen (a Westminster Divine), another glory, Judaistic, glory age theologian” who reads the Bible like a Rabbi says, “God in His appointed time will bring forth the Kingdom of the Lord Christ unto more glory and power than in the former day, I presume you are persuaded. Whatever will be more, these six things are clearly promised... 3. Multitudes of converts, many persons, yea, nations, Isaiah 60:7, 8; 66:8, 49:18-22, Revelation 7:9... 5. Professed subjection of the nations throughout the whole world unto the Lord Christ, Dan 2:44, 7:26, 27; Isaiah 60:6-9- the Kingdoms become the Kingdom of our Lord and His Christ (Rev 11:15), amongst whom His appearance will be so glorious that David shall be said to reign. 6. A most glorious and dreadful breaking of all that rise in opposition unto Him, Isaiah 60:12- never such desolations, Rev 16:17-19.” Alexander Duff, another Jewish glory Scottish theologian says, “we think not of individuals merely; we look to the masses. Spurning the notion of a present days success and a present years wonder, we direct our views not merely to the present, but to future generations.”

The Postmillennial Benediction

• Dr. Clark is still one of the best theologians we have in this day.
• Heidelblog does not represent the Reformed position on Kingdom and Eschatology. In my case the Westminster Standards do.
• Dr. Clark does not understand the historic Postmillennial position. Many NAPARC Post-Mills that are men in good standing would agree. When we read articles like this we find Dr. Clark tobe not even close to representing our position. His credibility as a historian will suffer if hedoesn’t make adjustments here.
• Dr. Clark wrongly has Post-Mills like me, the TheoRecons, Anabaptists, and Dispy-Pre-mills in the same Eschatological/Kingdom soup.
• Dr. Clark needs to stop this ungrounded rhetoric of Post-Mills. Immediately. His ministry will be much better for it.
• The Calvinistic position of Kingdom and Eschatology and that of the Westminster Divines is in many ways not consistent with that of Westminster West.
• If my views on the Kingdom are Jewish then Dr. Clark needs to say that Calvin’s and the Divines’ are as well.
• Optimistic Amills are fine, the pessimistic ones need to consider moving next to their optimistic Amill brothers before they become irrelevant in our day. The time is up and the clock is ticking for the highly pessimistic Eschatology. We have watched it for about 60 years and it is anemic.
• The Postmillennial position is confessional, biblical, and to be respected by all in the confessional world. You can heartily disagree but show some respect and see its legitimate historic roots.
• The WSC Question 23 says, “Christ as our redeemer executes the offices of a prophet, of a priest, and of a king in his estate of humiliation and exaltation.” Dr. Clark talks a lot about the theology of the cross which I can affirm. However, the WSC says that Christ executes the offices of prophet, priest, and King in the state of humiliation AND exaltation. Meaning that there is too much cross and humiliation in Dr. Clark’s Eschatology and not enough resurrection and ascension and exaltation in it.

Pastor Aldo Leon

Miami, FL

Pinelands Presbyterian PCA