One of the key textual conversations that the R2K theology uses to promote their teachings is the Noahic chapters in the book of Genesis. They make a case for a non religious, neutral common/civil sphere due to their alleged claim that the Noahic covenant conveys this paradigm for the nations in general. The common realm is thus said to share common life in the supposedly neutral non religious Noahic covenant. Furthermore the R2K theology alleges that the Noahic covenant is not a part of the one administration of the covenant of grace but rather a common grace covenant. This is necessary for their claim that the world is not to be governed by distinctly Christian principles for distinct Christian ends. The logic is as follows. The Noahic covenant is with the whole world and is not particular to the church. The Noahic covenant is not religious nor part of the covenant of grace. Therefore the nations are religiously neutral and secularism is the Noahic paradigm. Therefore the Noahic covenant demands for believers and unbelievers to participate in public life in a manner that is not distinctly Christian.

One of the key textual conversations that the R2K theology uses to promote their teachings is the Noahic chapters in the book of Genesis. They make a case for a non religious, neutral common/civil sphere due to their alleged claim that the Noahic covenant conveys this paradigm for the nations in general. The common realm is thus said to share common life in the supposedly neutral non religious Noahic covenant. Furthermore the R2K theology alleges that the Noahic covenant is not a part of the one administration of the covenant of grace but rather a common grace covenant. This is necessary for their claim that the world is not to be governed by distinctly Christian principles for distinct Christian ends. The logic is as follows. The Noahic covenant is with the whole world and is not particular to the church. The Noahic covenant is not religious nor part of the covenant of grace. Therefore the nations are religiously neutral and secularism is the Noahic paradigm. Therefore the Noahic covenant demands for believers and unbelievers to participate in public life in a manner that is not distinctly Christian.

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Introduction

Before responding to Dr. Clark’s article, a few qualifications must be said. Firstly and personally, I consider Dr. Clark a personal friend and highly respect him. I honestly would not be Presbyterian if it was not for his ministry. Nonetheless, I have some serious disagreements with the way he presents the Postmillennial position that I and most in church history have held (yes, I said most). Secondly, part of the reason for Dr. Clark’s article on Postmillennials was due to the recent content in my podcasts on false teacher, Doug Wilson, as well as my conversations with Scott (I verified this with him), which is to say that my ministry was specifically on his mind while writing the article. Thirdly, I believe that me addressing this article that has a personal connection to me will be of great benefit to you, reformed Christians. Fourthly, I consider Scott to be a credible Theologian and gift to the church though I find his views of Kingdom and Eschatology to be more novel than historic.

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Part 1: Postmillennial Glory and Premillennial Glory, Radical Differences

Let me start by addressing this quote in the article that says, “People regularly say that amillennialism is ‘pessimistic’ but postmillennialism is ‘optimistic.’” I cannot speak for others but I can speak for myself in saying that I believe that some Amillennials are pessimistic while others are optimistic. If you are an optimistic Amillennial, I do not consider you a pessimist though you would not consider yourself postmillennial. Someone like Dr. Clark would fall into the category of the pessimistic Amillennial; however, his view of Amillennialism does not represent the full spectrum of the position. Why do I say this about Dr. Clark? Simply because any talk about the extent of the gospel and its effects on society leads him to call the person making such arguments a dispensationalist, a chiliast, a glory theologian, a TheoRecon, and a Judaizer. If that is how you respond to any discussion of the extensiveness and effects of the gospel, you are indeed overly pessimistic. One of the first things that Dr. Clark does in his article and ministry overall is to collapse the chiliast (Premill) position with the Postmillennial position. Our only difference (Postmill and Premill), according to Dr. Clark, is that the Reformed Postmillennial position’s thousand years is lacking a literal interpretation while the Chiliast position indeed speaks to a literal thousand years. According to Dr. Clark’s position, Calvin, the Puritans, and I are nothing more than allegorical Premillennials. He says, “Our postmillennial friends reject a literal millennium but they agree with the chiliasts that there will be a period of earthly glory.” It is at this point that Dr. Clark proves to not understand the Postmillennial position with his connection of the Postmillennial to earthly glory in a manner that is parallel to the Premillennial. Let me show you the differences between the thousand years of the Chiliast and the Postmillennial.

The Chiliast generally believes that the glory of the Kingdom will come in a revived, geopolitical, earthly Israel (there are different versions of this); however, the Postmillennial believes that the Kingdom is coming and will come through Eschatological Israel (church) which is heavenly (Heb. 12:22). The Chiliast believes that Christ’s thousand year rule will be by Christ returning in military-like dominance and earthly force. However, the Postmillennial believes that Christ will rule from heaven in the power of the Spirit through the incremental progress of the gospel. The Chiliasts believe that a revival of the earthly Mosaic Theocracy (again, there are different versions of this) will comprise the thousand year reign of Christ, while the Postmillennial believes that God’s rule and reign from heaven on the earth will be in the final administration of the covenant of grace (new covenant). The earthly glory that the Chiliast speaks of concerning the thousand year reign of Christ is indeed of an earthly nature. However, for the Postmillennial, the metaphorical thousand years of Christ’s reign on earth is essentially Christological, Pneumatological, and Kerygmatic; its consequential effects are societal. The historic Postmillennial position does not see Christ’s thousand year reign as a metaphorical time period in which geopolitical, earthly, Theocratic Israel will be revived from its sleep through the means of cultural-transformational measures. The Chiliast position is generally geopolitical-Israel-centric and often lacks a high Ecclesiology. Dr. Clark tactically brings up the TheoRecons in this section; this is due to his inability to separate the novel, so-called “Postmillennial” from the historic ones. One of the ways that people like myself are discredited by Dr. Clark in these positions is by dumping us into the TheoRecon crowd. The idea is somewhat like this, “You are Post-mill? You do not want to be a TheoRecon, do you?” “Are you a Shepherdite?” Such conclusions and methods are quite unpersuasive to someone who knows our historic roots. Dr. Clark seems to see “earthly” kingdom to be simply understood as a kingdom that exists tangibly on the earth in some spatially verifiable way. However, the Bible and the Reformed tradition see the earthly kingdom as being a kingdom that you speak of on earth, and not simply a kingdom that is tangible on earth in a measurable way (Galatians 4:21-31). In the passage mentioned, both the heavenly and earthly Jerusalem are tangibly on the earth. However, the difference is one of Eschatological and Soteriological quality not simply a tangible existence on the earth. Satan’s Kingdom and God’s are both on the earth in a spatial and tangible sense; however, they are on the earth tangibly with different qualities, trajectories, and paradigms. An earthly institution like family being tangibly and visibly affected by the gospel does not make the Kingdom “earthly.” Paul addressing how law and gospel tangibly and visibly affect earthly institutions such as the family and vocation does not make his kingdom views earthly. For Paul, earthly is not about what is visual or measurable on the earth but rather what is not Christological on the earth. Contrary to what Dr. Clark says, the heavenly kingdom affecting the earth does not make it “earthly.” When you read Dr. Clark’s article, at times you get the impression that he is saying that the Old Testament Kingdom is purely earthly and the New Testament Kingdom is purely spiritual (similar arguments made by Anabaptists against Calvin). However, the Kingdom of God (both in Old and New covenants) is never unhinged from Creation. The New Testament Kingdom and the Old Testament typological and anticipatory Kingdom, are both earthly and spiritual, i.e, the New Testament Kingdom is both Eschatological and earthly-spiritual. Bodies, children, families, vocation, and the civil sphere do not fall out of the Kingdom conversation in the name of so-called New Testament gospel-centeredness. It seems that Dr. Clark believes that earthly things are purely things that are particular to the Old Testament Kingdom, which is why whenever the Postmillennial brings up how God’s Kingdom affects Creation, he throws down the Judaizer card. Why? In the New Testament Kingdom of God, we have left behind all those spatial, societal, and creational things. Sadly, it seems that the thousands of pastors from 1500’s to 1800’s would disagree. Sure, Dr. Clark can quote you a person here and there who holds to this radical discontinuity between the earthly Old Testament and the spiritual New Testament; however, my position has much backing from many in the Reformed tradition.

Earthly and Heavenly Glory?

In the next section Dr. Clark then writes, “Augustinian Amillennialists, as Bauckham describes them, reject the idea of a literal 1,000 year reign of Christ after his return (chiliasm) and they expect no earthly glory age (e.g., a converted world) before Christ returns.” Notice that Dr. Clark is claiming that an earthly glory age is understood as an age where there is a largely converted world. I find this definition of “worldly” most amusing considering what the Bible teaches about the supernatural nature of conversion. By this logic, lots of conversions means an “earthly” glory age. How on earth can conversions that are from above in the power of the Spirit through the means of grace be connected to “earthly” glory? There is nothing earthly about conversions as they are entirely heavenly (John 3:5-8). A large amount of heavenly, supernatural conversions on earth isn’t any more earthly than one conversion on earth is. The numerical abundance of conversions has nothing to do with earthly glory! Unless you are a Remonstrant (which Dr. Clark is not), who believes that nature has intrinsic qualities conducive to conversion? Every conversion, whether one or many, is about the glory of heaven. One conversion on earth is heavenly and 5 billion conversions on earth are also heavenly. Lest you define “heavenly" as being a matter of smaller percentages and numbers. The more I hear from Dr. Clark it seems that “less and loss” are what make up “heavenly” and its opposite is “earthly.” I suppose that Dr. Clark would call Moses a “glory theologian” when he said that the Abrahamic promises can be likened to the amounts of stars in the heavens. I also suppose that Dr. Clark would call the prophets like Isaiah and the apostle John “glory theologian’s’ due to the astronomical expectations they had about conversions. Why do I say this? Because when someone like myself talks about the numerical, overwhelming increase of conversions in the time period in between Christ’s comings, Dr. Clark says that such things are Judaistic glory nonsense. Am I putting words in his mouth? Dr. Clark writes,“Augustinian Amillennialists, as Bauckham describes them, reject the idea of a literal 1,000 year reign of Christ after his return (chiliasm) and they expect no earthly glory age (e.g., a converted world) before Christ returns.” My Amillennial brothers, you are free to not agree with the increasing conversions that the Postmillennial holds to. However, you are not free to, as Scott does, call us “earthly glory theologians” because we do.

Part 2: How the postmillennial reading of the OT is the reformed not “Jewish” reading of the OT.

Another fundamental issue in Dr. Clark’s logic can be seen in this quote, “The postmillennial hermeneutic typically requires us to read the Old Testament either in isolation from the New or in a way that the New Testament writers do not. In either case, it is not a tenable way of reading the Old Testament. Certainly the Old Testament is replete with promises of a future earthly glory. The question is: What did the New Testament do with those promises and how should we understand them now?” From my conversations with Dr. Clark and his various writings (including this article), it seems that he has a narrow back-to-front reading of the Scriptures which means that he understands the Old Testament primarily (almost exclusively) through reading the New Testament. The Reformed hermeneutic, however, has always been about reading the Bible front-to-back and back-to-front. Which is to say that you understand the new in light of the old AND the old in light of the new. This is where Dr. Clark begins to sound like someone who elevates the New Testament over the Old, as well as someone who reads the Old Testament with a level of heightened discontinuity. You can see this by the way Dr. Clark will shut down an Old Testament reference to the Kingdom by saying that it is not stated verbatim in the New Testament. This position somewhat reminds me of the way Baptists shut down Old Testament texts about Sacraments due to the New Testament not stating such things with identical language. Dr. Clark’s responses to Old Testament texts about the Kingdom remind me of James White shutting down Old Testament texts about ecclesiology in his debates with Presbyterians (most ironic as Scott is the champion of explaining New Testament concepts of Sacraments with Old Testament texts). Reformed thinkers have always understood New Testament concepts in light of the Old and Old Testament concepts in light of the New, while Clark seems to want us to see the Old entirely and exclusively in light of the New. Whatever the Old Testament says can only be said if it is understood verbatim in light of New Testament words. However, this front-to-back and back-to-front reading of scripture can be seen regularly from the reformed throughout history.

George Gillespie (one of the Westminster Divines) helped the church understand New Testament ecclesiology from the Torah (understanding the new in light of the old). Gillespie did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. In the WLC, Question 54, the Divines explain the New Testament reality of Christ’s ascension rule in light of Psalms 16:11 and 110:1. In the WLC, Question 191, the Divines explain the Kingdom of sin and Satan being destroyed in light of Psalms 68:1. When the Divines explain the church being furnished with gospel offices and ordinances they do so in light of Psalm 67. Would you like me to remind you what that Psalm says in verse 4? “Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Selah. Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you!” Did you see that? The Divines explain the New Testament concept of the Kingdom through the Lord's conquest over the nations in the Psalm. In Question 191, the civil magistrate's role (1229) in the New Covenant era is also understood in light of the Old Testament. Which implies that the Divines understood Romans 13 in light of Malachi 1:11 which says, “For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the LORD of hosts.” The Divines did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic.

Furthermore, in Calvin’s Institutes, he explains the role and nature of civil government through the book of Daniel and Jeremiah (Institutes 4:26-29). In his commentaries, Calvin explains the civil sphere and how it is to function post-Pentecost through expositions of Exodus 18 and 1 Samuel 8. Calvin used the book of Deuteronomy to give clarity to what Paul meant in Romans 13 concerning the civil sphere (See his commentary on Deuteronomy). Calvin did NOT use Romans 13 to read over Deuteronomy but read them both together and both in light of each other; he did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. Samuel Rutherford in his book Lex, Rex, Or The Law And The Prince: A Dispute For The Just Prerogative Of King And People, explained how to understand Romans 13 in light of the books of Moses and the prophetic books. Rutherford did not have a Judaistic hermeneutic. The Divines explain the administration of new covenant signs through Old Testament texts like Genesis 17:7 and Exodus 4:24. What is my point? My point is simply that the Reformed interpretation of New Testament revelation is through the Old and the Old through the New. Dr. Clark wants all of us to understand all Old Testament concepts purely through the New Testament and not understand concepts such as the Kingdom through the Old. That radical discontinuity which purely leaves us reading back-to-front is not the way the historic-Reformers worked out their theology. It is not Premillennial to understand the Kingship of Christ post-Pentecost through the lens of Moses, the Prophets, and Psalms, unless you have a view of covenant and Kingdom that stresses radical discontinuity. Calvin did not have a Judaistic view of Christ’s Kingship because he understood the role of the magistrate in light of 1 Samuel 8 and the divines did not have a Judaistic way of understanding the Kingship of Christ because they understood the magistrate in light of Malachi 1:11! Therefore, Reformed theologians read Old Testament and New Testament together in complimentary symbiosis but not at the expense of the Old Testament, neither in the dispensational elevation nor of the New Testament over the Old. Furthermore, I am a covenant theologian who can talk about baptism in the New Testament through Old Testament circumcision texts and I can talk about circumcision in the Old Testament through New Testament baptism texts. I am a covenant theologian who can speak about New Testament Kingdom and eschatology through Old Testament Kingdom and eschatology texts and vice versa. If Dr. Clark cannot agree with this then I am suspicious that a part of his theology has capitulated to the radical discontinuity of the dispensational paradigms.