8/14/2019 Are Preterists Controlling Your Mind?

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One of the discoveries I recently made, after three years of battling the doctrines of systematicPreterism, is that, although few Christians know it, Preterisms tactics of exegesis are mind-altering. In order to accept the doctrines ofPreterism, one must assent to the premise that theBible is to be approached in a critical-historical, rather than canonical, fashion. WheneverPreterists use New Testament phraseology like soon, at hand, and shortly to assert that

eschatological events are now past fulfillment, the implication is always that the texts must beunderstood from a purely historical perspective, and not as they relate to the entire Body ofChrist. When the Christian finally agrees with the Preterists reasoning, and adopts suchinterpretations as his own, he is unaware that in his mind a subtle shift has taken place, wherebyhis thinking has been altered..

One of the main purposes of this blog is to re-enforce the premises of historic Christianity.This is needful at the present time, for many do not realize that without the right premises and presuppositions, error must always gain the upper hand. I know that many of my readersprobably have children. Well, suppose that your child came home from school one day and said: Daddy, I want to be a pirate when I grow up! All of us know that the problemwith his aspiration, is not that pirates are unsuccessful, or that they dont make any money.

Indeed, pirates become rich more easily than most folks. The problem is, that piracy is illegal,and that thievery and murder are sins. Unless the kid understands these things, he will not be ina proper position to evaluate piracy as a possible career choice. Hence, premises are important.

By the same token, the main contention with Preterism is not that Preteristic inferences cant be drawn, when all the data is arranged according to a historical-critical hermeneutic. Ofcourse they can! The problem is, that a historic-critical hermeneutic is not an acknowledgedChristian principle of interpretation to begin with. After the destruction of the temple in A.D. 70,Christians continued to look for the fulfillment of prophecies which Preterists claim werefulfilled with that event. The reason? They were employing an orthodox hermeneutic. It issimply not orthodox to read the New Testament as a series of mere historic documents, detatchedfrom their canonical relevancy to the Body of Christ. Such a hermeneutic is not the product of

orthodox Christianity, but of liberal textual criticism. Therefore, it needs to be identified andaddressed BEFORE the inquiring Christian undertakes to discuss the meaning of texts with aPreterist.

Heres another analogy. Imagine if some smarty-pantses on Capital Hill, citing the U.S.Constitution, claimed that the phrase we the people of the United States of America simplymeant Americans of the 18th century, and that because all the 18th century Americans were nowdead and deceased, the Constitution was no longer in force? Just imagine what an uproar thatwould cause! Why, if the new interpretation gained enough adherents, the result would be acomplete overthrow of the U.S. government. But that certainly would not happen, because somewise Supreme Court Justice would stand up and point out that the U.S. Constitution is not aMERE historic document, but is also a constitutional document. As such, it therefore has perpetual force over all citizens of the United States, in all places, at all times. End ofdiscussion.

Whenever I hearPreterists challenging 2,000 years of united Christian interpretation on thestrength of such statements as Behold, I come quickly! (Rev. 3: 11), I recognize immediatelythat the Preterist is making a mental suggestion, which requires that the listener to switch from agrammatical-historical hermeneutic to a critical-historical one. Then when I see peoplestarting to buckle under, denying the faith they once rejoiced in, and accepting Preterism as aviable theology, to their own embitterment and disillusion, I realize that they have had their

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thought-processes unknowingly re-configured to accord with Preterisms liberalistichermeneutic.

Such invasion of the mind and conscience can only be prevented by understanding thehermeneutical premises of Christianity. The New Testament was given to instruct and edify theBody of Christ. There is only one body, one faith, one hope, and one calling (Eph. 4: 4-5).

Anyone whose theology claims otherwise, or which results in a different constitution to thatwe find in the New Testament writings, has in reality broken the unity of the spirit, andintroduced schism in the body. But regardless of how bad it may become, the schism is healedand mended, whenever one takes up and enforces the premises that underlie Christianity as asystem of revealed religion. When this is done, and only when this is done, do Christians havean efficient safeguard against Preterist thought control. Maranatha!