HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT: Why I believe this about the timing of the NHNE

[Spiritual Israelite]

Mark 4:26 "The kingdom of God is as if a Man should plant a seed in the ground"

And again Luke 17:20-21 "The Kingdom of God does not come by observation, for indeed the kingdom is within you" (from memory)

In other words "the Rapture is within you" "the Rapture happens in a way that you do not know how"

Please ask God for wisdom (James 1:5-7).

 

[Spiritual Israelite]

the LORD rescued me from RCC = 40 years ago

Great.

amil is a placebo pill for those who lack understanding

LOL. Yet, you are completely incapable of refuting Amil. All you can do is make ridiculous comments like this. You are incapable of making a coherent argument against Amil or for Premil.

 

[Spiritual Israelite]

All I know is, I don't dislike Catholics. I have had numerous Catholic friends over the years. It's their religion I don't care for and I don't see it being reasonable that a saint, such as Justin Martyr was deceived about the millennium the entire time, but that Catholics who pray to departed saints, who perform ungodly rituals that the God in heaven could not possibly find acceptable in His eyes, that none of these billions of Catholics are/were deceived about the millennium, but Justin Martyr sure with. And yes I get @Spiritual Israelite point about JWs and Mormon, for example, that they too are Premil, and that I'm not letting that fact prevent me from being a Premil because they are. But in this case I'm meaning Justin Martyr, who lived closer to the times of the Apostles than we do now.

So what? Justin Martyr was one person. Why do you put him on a pedestal? Also, he said that there were many true Christians who disagreed with his Premillennial view in his "Dialogue with Trypho".

And besides, were there already JWs and Mormons during the days of Justin Martyr? There were obviously already Catholics during those days, though.

Not who went by those labels, but I'm sure there were some people even back then who had similar beliefs to JWs and Mormons and denied that Jesus is God and things like that.

The point being, in the event there were not already JWs and Mormons in the days of Justin Martyr, and surely there wasn't, his point is then moot in that regard, since I was comparing Catholics to someone such as Justin Martyr, where the latter wasn't even praying to saints nor performing ungodly rituals. He was simply being a Christian that also believed that the millennium is after the 2nd coming, not prior to it. Except he was apparently deceived about it, Catholics weren't.

LOL. You always find some way around every argument. It's ridiculous. Just admit that you believe in Premil because that's what you want to believe and not because you can back it up with scripture.

 

[PinSeeker]

Have I been assuming some wrong things about you this entire time?

It seems so, yes. It's okay, but yes.

Compared to @Spiritual Israelite, even though you and I might not agree about everything, you at least appear to understand where I am coming from and why...

I try, David. I really do. Thanks for acknowledging.

...where @Spiritual Israelite typically doesn't a lot of the time. Thus why he constantly charges me with misrepresenting Amil when all I'm doing is seeing whether Amil can be debunked or not.

I'm......... not so sure he doesn't; I think there's a couple of other, ah, issues that present with him...

But one thing that's sorely lacking across the board here is humility. Which is not surprising; we're all sinners, after all.

Therefore, why in the world are you having me saying that I myself believe satan's little season happens in this age when no Premil I know of believes that to begin with, including me?

Ah, okay... So you had just said of me that what I had said before "apparently means that (I) must think the day of the Lord begins with satan's little season, rather than at the end of his little season."

And in a previous post, you said, "Obviously then, 2 Peter 3:9-10 alone debunks Amil in light of if satan's little season were meaning in this age, that means no one can be saved during his little season the fact it is impossible to live and reign with Christ a thousand years if this era is already in the past once satan's little season begins."

The latter of those two seems to be a run-on sentence and was frankly hard to understand... But okay, fine. We'll chalk that one up to a misunderstanding on my part.

Can you not see how I'm arguing here? I'm not arguing Premil, I'm arguing that if Amil is the correct position instead

Understood. And much of what I'm doing is correcting some incorrect assumptions about amillennialism. Which, to be fair, there's an amillennial Christian or two here that are perpetuating some of those incorrect assumptions, at least to some degree... <smile>

I would just say this, David, about premillennialism, that the millennium cannot possibly ~ even logically speaking ~ be after the second coming because of what happens during the God's millennium, which is the first resurrection and our coming to share in it (Revelation 20:4-6), which is what Paul describes in Ephesians 2:4-10...

"God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ ~ by grace you have been saved ~ and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages He might show the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them."​

Logically, since this is happening ~ Gentiles are being born again of the Spirit and coming to Christ ~ the millennium must be now. We must be in the midst of God's millennium.

pretty much every Amil I'm aware of places satan's little season before the 2nd coming.

Sure. So, as a "Pre-mill," do you place it after His second coming? Or after... or before, maybe... His third? <chuckles>

Therefore, logically making it something fulfilled in this age, per this scenario.

So, fulfilled already? Or still to be fulfilled in this age? I'm guessing the latter, but either way, I would disagree. SI had a brief exchange on this point a bit earlier; you can see what I posted in response in Post #248, that:

I say that "this age" is the time in which, in Paul's words in Romans 11, the partial hardening upon Israel is removed and the fullness of the Gentiles is brought in, and thus all Israel saved. And when that happens, when Israel is complete, God's millennium ~ this age ~ will have been brought to a close, and the age to come, eternity, will have begun. This is what will prompt Jesus's return. I submit that the break from this age to the next, the age to come, eternity, is not from our perspective but from God's. For a short time, it will seem as if this age is continuing, and all has been lost. And this will be when Satan is loosed; I say that Satan's loosing, the final battle with and defeat of Satan, the fire coming down from heaven (Jesus, in His return) and consuming them, and the throwing of the devil into the lake of fire and sulfur all occurs at the beginning of the age to come, eternity. Then will be the final Judgment, and then will be the ushering in of the New Heaven and New Earth...​

It's not a big disagreement, in my opinion.

Grace and peace to you.

 

[Gottservant]

Please ask God for wisdom (James 1:5-7).

Ouch! Two scriptures per request and you say I lack Wisdom?

If I have the Rapture within me, how do I doubt it? If I understand that I do not know how the Rapture works within me, how can not knowing it confuse me?

Praise God, these disputes will all be resolved in Heaven!

 

[PinSeeker]

I see Satan's little season as just that. A little season or short time just before Jesus comes at the end during which wickedness is no longer restrained and the mass falling away that Paul references in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 occurs. Jesus also mentioned a time during which many would turn away from the faith and the love of most would grow cold with wickedness significantly increasing (Matt 24:9-13). I'm wondering how you interpret passages like Matthew 24:9-13 and 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12.

On this little subject under discussion between us, it seems the only question, then, is, is the time in which Satan is loosed at the very end of but in the present age, or is it the beginning of the coming age? I think it not important that we come to agreement on that, not a terribly pressing issue to resolve between us.

Grace and peace to you, SI.

 

[Zao is life]

One reason I have been opposed to Amil is not because I don't want Amils to win the argument, but is mainly because I despise Catholicism. I do not even remotely dislike Catholics, I just don't like their religion. I don't know how many Catholics there might be worldwide, maybe billions for all I know. And that pretty much everyone of them are Amil though not all Amils are Catholic. Then I'm thinking, billions of ppl that pray to departed saints, that perform ungodly rituals, so on and so on, then compare with someone such as Justin Martyr who was actually beheaded for his belief in Christ, and that was someone who believed the millennium follows the 2nd coming, that he was deceived the entire time and that the ones doing all these ungodly rituals, Catholics in this case, are the ones interpreting the millennium correctly this entire time. Sometimes I question why I even believe in a trinity since that is a major Catholic doctrine as well?

I believe in the Trinity not because it's Catholic but because I believe it's biblical.

I see a key doctrines taught by non-Catholic theology - mainly strictly adhered to by Amillennialists, but also by a lot of Premil churches - overlapping with Catholic theology - theology which has turned eternal life that has been given to human beings into something that is only or mainly 'spiritual', and has little or nothing to do with the quickening and resurrection of the body.
​

The 'quickening' of the human spirit is an example of the doctrine I'm talking about. Paul taught quite a lot about this:-

"Christ is risen [egeiro] from the dead, and become the first-fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection [anastasis] of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be quickened [zoopoieo: made alive]." (1 Corinthians 15:20-22).

He also said, "But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? "Fool ! That which you sow is not quickened [zoopoieo], except it die." (1 Corinthians 15:36).

He also taught,

"Ye are buried with him in baptism, wherein also all of you are risen with him [synegeiro] through the faith of the operation of God, who has raised him [egeiro] from the dead. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him [syzoopoieo], having forgiven you all trespasses." (Colossians 2:12-13).

The above Greek words are the same Greek words Paul used in Ephesians 2:4-6, when he said,

"God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love with which He loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, He has syzōopoiéō (quickened together with) Christ, (by grace ye are saved); and has raised us up together [synegeírō] and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus" (Ephesians 2:4-6).

But Amillennialists (as well as those among Premil Pastors and teachers who agree with this theology) assert that Ephesians 2:4-6 is talking about the resurrection not of the human body, but of the human spirit - and this is despite the fact that Paul made it abundantly clear that he was talking about the quickening of the human body in Romans 8:10-11:

"If Christ's Spirit is in you,

1. your body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit (of Christ) is your (eternal) life [zoe] because of (Christ's) righteousness.

2. Moreover, if the Spirit of the one who raised [egeiro] Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised [egeiro] Christ from the dead will also quicken [zōopoiéō] your mortal bodies through his Spirit who lives in you."

I can't understand why Amillennialists and those who adhere to the same theology cannot see (maybe because they do not want to see?) that Ephesians 2:4-6, like Colossians 2:12-13, is talking about the positional reality in Christ of those who belong to Him:

"If then ye be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life [zōḗ] is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life [zōḗ], shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." (Colossians 3:1-4).

(i) The word zoopoieo (quickening, being made alive) is being applied to the mortal body in all the above verses.

(ii) The words egeiro, synegeiro and anastasis - whenever they are referring to resurrection from death - are always referring to the resurrection of the body in the New Testament.

When Jesus died, His Spirit did not die: His soul went into hades (Acts 2:27), where by the Spirit he preached to the spirits in prison (1 Peter 3:18-20), and His dead body, being quickened [zoopoieo] (made alive by the Spirit), was raised from the dead.

Our quickening and resurrection is also applied by scripture to the dead body, and it comes to us through our having been born [gennao] of the Spirit and placed in Christ, who died, and whose dead body was quickened and raised.

A human soul comes into existence either at the moment of its conception, or at the moment of its birth, or somewhere in-between. After the baby has been born into the world (born of the flesh), there is no "death" of the human soul or spirit which requires the soul / spirit to be "quickened from the dead" - but BODILY death is certain for all whose time for it came up before the resurrection of all our bodies from the dead.

The hypothesis of so-called "spiritual death" is simply the absence of eternal life [zoe], and eternal life [zoe] is that which in Colossians 1:26-27 Paul calls,

"The mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints", which is "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

The New Testament tells us that "spiritual life" | eternal life [aionios zoe] exists in God alone. It is given in Christ to those who have been born of the Spirit of God, and without being born of the Spirit of God, a created human being does not also have life [zoe] that is eternal GIVEN to it;

When Jesus raised a young girl from the dead, we are told that "her spirit came again, and she arose straightway: and he commanded to give her meat." (Luke 8:55).

The dead girl's spirit was not "dead" before she died - but before she died, she had not received (from God) the GIFT of eternal life [zoe] which exists in Christ, in God alone, which comes through being born of the Spirit.

Leviticus 17:11
"For the life [Hebrew: nephesh | Greek: psychḗ] of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls [nephesh | psychḗ]: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul [nephesh | psychḗ]."

Whether we believe it's at the moment of conception or at the moment of being born of the flesh, once the soul has come into being there is no death for any person before death. There cannot be a "quickening" of a "dead human spirit" without such a thing ever having occurred with someone who has been born into the world. "Quickening from the dead" is always referring to the dead human body - and eternal life comes through being born [gennao] of the Spirit.

And I haven't even started with the way Catholic and Amil theology completely conflates these realities:

Zoe & Aionios Zoe: Life & Eternal Life. Source: God. He alone possesses life [zoe] in Himself:

Zao: Living | being alive.