Parables 2

I am writing this on the first of January, and, naturally, my thoughts are on the new year ahead. I am encouraged by the Lord in that the message of fulfilled eschatology is continuing to make inroads into the minds of God*s people. It is changing their perspective of the future, and giving a brighter hope for us here and now.

The traditional message is ultimate defeat in terms of earthly sin and evil. The only way God can conquer the world is to blow it up and start again with a literal new universe, sun, moon and stars, and new dirt (earth). This is always to happen “soon,” though, the “sky is falling” routine is wearing thin. The church/boy can only cry, “wolf ,“ for so long before no one believes him anymore.

Because the church is fallible, their message can also be fallible. We believe that the only infallible message is found in the Bible, and that when the apostles cried, “wolf,” they were absolutely correct. 2,000 years of crying, “wolf;” with no results proves to me that the apostles are the only true ones with the infallible message of “it is near.” In short, if they were wrong, then we all are wrong.

But, ever persistent as modern wolf-cryers are today, they will bend Scriptures to keep their message alive (and their pockets full). So, being even more persistent for the truth of God*s holy word, let us continue to share the message of what Christ has fully accomplished for our redemption, reconciliation, and, indeed, our resurrection.

Recently, I finished reading the rather lengthy book by Rikki E. Watts, associate professor of New Testament at Regent College, Vancouver, British Columbia. This work, entitled, Isaiah*s New Exodus in Mark is from the Biblical Studies Library (Baker Academic, 1997). I have also read another work in this series by David W. Pao, Acts and the Isaianic New Exodus (Baker Academic, 2002). Both works draw heavily from scholarship in the past 70 years. Both see the Isaianic “salvation/restoration” being worked out in that generation.

The basis of both works is the interpretive principle that the Gospels and Acts is to be read in light of audience relevance. That is, what it meant to them at that time. Ben Witherington III states the case succinctly. “what it meant to the original audience is still what it means today” (Bible Review, August, 2002, p.52). It*s a simple rule, but one often lost in the “me” mentality of modernism. An over-concern by the modem “me” reader eclipses what God is saying in the text.

God did not visit 21st century America in the form of the incarnation. He visited in a specific period, at a specific time, for a specific reason. His ways are perfect. To overshadow, then, this aspect of reading the Bible is to miss the purpose in the reason God visited them at that time. God wants us, therefore, to read the Bible in light of that period, for, as Paul called it, it was “the fullness of the time” (Galatians 4:4 – to pleroma tou chronou – Greek).

Watts book consistently follows this line of reasoning and concludes, for example, that the Parable of the Tenants, which we have commented on, refers to the destruction of Jerusalem. This scholar is more direct: “To reject Jesus and to seek to destroy him results in the destruction of the Temple” (op. cited, 346). Jesus confronts, in Mark the religious leaders of his day in parables which visit this theme time and time again.

In the Parable of the Sown Seed, Jesus prepares his disciples for the types of hearts they will have in their assemblies. He prepares them, as we mentioned last issue, to “let both grow together” until “the end of the age” when God would “separate the sheep from the goats.” After AD 70, it was apparent to all the world who the goats were, and who were “accepted into the beloved.” The pattern can be consistently applied throughout the parables.

The Parable of the Wedding Feast explicitly gives the sequence of events in that generation: The “kingdom of the heavens” is likened to a king preparing a wedding banquet for his “son.” He “sends forth” (aposteilen) the “servants” of him to call the ones invited, but they would not come. This is to Israel, which, time and time again, we find Paul lamenting the fact to the end of his ministry that a great population of the Jews worldwide were not hearing the message.

He quotes Isaiah 6:9,10, “Go to this people and say, ‘You will be ever hearing, but never understanding’” (Acts 28:26). The message of the servants was “everything is ready (etoima): Come to the feast!” This echoes Peter*s message concerning Jesus: “Who is ready (etoima) to judge the living and the dead” (1 Peter 4:5).

The judgment of the dead occurs in connection with the destruction of the city of Jerusalem in Revelation 11, after the “last trump” (11:8, 13, 15, 18). The “servants” in the “great city” of Jerusalem in 11:7 are killed. The servants in Jesus’ parable of the wedding feast are “killed.” Then Jesus announces, “The king was angry and sent armies and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.” We find this in Revelation 17:16-18. The “beast with ten horns” (Rome) will attack and destroy the “great city,” who is also identified as the “Whore,” a constant Old Testament name for apostate Israel and Judah.

After the city is burned in Jesus* parable, the invitation is given openly and without regard to ethnic genealogy. John, in Revelation 21, 22 pictures the living waters streaming to the “nations of the earth,” to “whosoever wishes, let him drink freely.” The parables of Jesus becomes the eschatological message of the apostles, once they understood the full meaning of them.

The apostles preached what the Son taught them, and nothing more. The Son taught that persecution would come from their own brothers and sisters in the Jewish world for taking up the cross of Christ. It happened. The Son taught them to remain “together” with Israel until the “end of the age.” They did. The Son taught that the city would be burned and their kingdom taken from them and given to another. It was. These were the future events prophesied by the Son which would occur in that generation. They did.

The Parable of the Ten Virgins equally applies to the situation facing the apostles and saints of that generation. The apostles constantly evoke the saints to be ready for the coming of the Lord. To be on guard, and eagerly expect its arrival. For, it will be as a thief in the night. Paul, John, and Peter use this particular phrase. They got it from Jesus.

The virgins were all going to meet the “bridegroom.” Here, again, we see the “wedding” motif. Compare this with the destruction of the “great city” in Revelation 17:16-18, and in Revelation 19:7 when the city falls, the “wedding feast” occurs. The pattern is identical. The wise virgins were filled with oil (the Spirit), whereas the unwise were not. The bridegroom comes and find five of the virgins without oil. Again, the reference is to those Jews who believed in the coming Messiah (bridegroom), but failed to see Jesus as that very one. They were all going out to meet the bridegroom. But only those “filled”

What a time for pause. How horrible. Those very Jews who heard Messiah in their city, who saw the miracles, who, for 30 some years heard the message of the apostles, received the collections from the churches worldwide saw the miracles of the Twelve, yet, still rejected the Messiah Jesus. Those very ones who knew of the crucifixion and resurrection held themselves up in the city for a “times, time and half a time.” Their city was burned. Their insurrections, often against their own people, were quenched. Their Kingdom did not come as they had anticipated. Rome was not defeated as they thought. What they received instead was judgment, wrath, bloodshed, and, finally, eternal punishment. The door was shut.

They had “tasted of the heavenly gift” and “shared in the Holy Spirit”; they had “tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age about to come (mellontos aionos).” They “fell away” and it was, therefore, “impossible to renew again. . .unto repentance” (Hebrews 6:4-6). The author of Hebrews goes on. “For the land which drinks in the rain that is coming. . .receives a blessing from God. But that [land] which brings forth thorns and thistles is rejected and a curse is near (eggus).” Then, the author wrote, “whose end is to be burned” (6:7, 8).

Folks, I beseech you in the name of Jesus Christ to listen to what the Bible says concerning the “last days” of Israel “according to the flesh.” It is not talking about our time or day, but is talking about the end that was “near” to the “land” of Israel. It was impossible to renew covenant Israel if they rejected their very Messiah. Their city was burned. Their end came. Salvation is now brought to every soul, male, female, slave, Greek, prisoner, Chinese, poor, rich, Jew, Gentile. Why? Because the Old Covenant, which tied salvation to the nation of ethnic Israel was “removed” (Hebrews 8:13).

The author of Hebrews goes further in chapter 10. There, he wrote, “If we (Hebrews) keep on deliberately sinning after we have received the full knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but a fearful expectation of judgment and zeal of fire being ABOUT to consume the adversaries (mellontos). To trample the blood of the covenant was to continue to support the Temple sacrifices of “bulls and goats.” The Jews, by proxy of their covenant, “were sanctified” (v. 29).

Paul stated in Romans that “if the root is holy then so are the branches. If part of the dough is offered then the whole batch is holy” (11:16). The Jews were “holy” and “sanctified” by their relationship to the covenants of the promised salvation. This does not mean they were “saved” in the sense we usually mean. But they were “bought with a price” (2 Peter 2:1; Deuteronomy 32:6) and they were “virgins” who “went out to meet the bridegroom.”

In the wedding feast parable, one of the invitees is found in the wedding hall “not wearing wedding clothes” (Matthew 22:11). He had access. The same with the virgins. They knocked on the door, but the master responded, “I never knew you.” He never “knew” those who “went out to meet him.” There was close proximity between them.

The Parable of the Sower shows those having “faith,” but they “fall away” because of persecution. Christ died for Israel, his “people” and purchased them, but they “rejected” that salvation in which they were placed because of their relationship to the promises of the covenants. They were the prime recipients. Their names were “written in the lamb*s book” but was also able to be “blotted out” (Psalm 69:21-28). They were “sanctified,” “bought,” and “holy” by virtue of this tie. But this ethnic tie did not qualify them for salvation in the fullest sense of the term which they were waiting for Him to bring (Hebrews 9:28). It qualified them as recipients (“to the Jews first...”).

By that fact they were “enlightened,” they “tasted,” they “heard,” and in the end, many of them, if not most, rejected it and hung on to their temple customs. Their lamps were not filled with oil, they did not have wedding clothes (though they were invited), they did miracles “in thy name,” but the response was, “I never knew you.” By AD 70, it was too late. The “door was shut.” Those Hebrews killed by the sword were eternally lost without a second chance. When they appeared before Christ*s Seat, they had no claim, no wedding clothes (Matthew 22:12, 13).

One theme-ending of the parables is “I never knew you.” The counter-punch to this is the fact that they claimed the one who declares this. On what basis? Only one: “We have Abraham as our father.” This was true. Covenantally, it was a fact. Did it mean anything? Paul asked, “What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? Much in every way! First of all they have been entrusted with the very words of God.” (Romans 3:1, 2).

And again in Romans 9:1-5, Paul wrote, “theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs is the divine glory; theirs is the covenants of the law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ...” Paul is affirming this of “Israel, the people of God” who is also, in the days of Paul, “hardened” and “enemies of the gospel” How can wonderful things about them be said on one hand, then, on the other, horrible things? The answer is found in one idea:

We can see, then, how the parables interact with the later epistles. We again confirm our premise: The apostles taught what Jesus taught them to teach and nothing more. Thus, we should be able to find the same themes in the Gospels as we do in the epistles concerning eschatology. We do.

Continuing however, with Hebrews 10. After stating the case that there is no repentance, no chance of salvation after a rejection of the truth, the author states that “The Lord will judge his people” (v. 30). This is a quote from Deuteronomy 32:36. And, O, what context that is! First, let*s read a little more of Hebrews. “For we (Jews) know him who said, ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,* and again, ‘The Lord will judge his people* for in just a very little while he who is coming will come and will not delay” (10:30-37). And now, Deuteronomy 32.

This chapter is a threatened prophecy. It was given directly to Israel, “in the hearing of the whole house of Israel” (31:30). Then, “Hear O heavens.. .Listen O earth (“land”).” Is he addressing clouds and dirt, or Israel? Here is one place, among several, that Israel is identified with “the heavens and the earth.” Remember, our study in 2 Peter spoke of the dissolution of the “heavens and the earth.” But let*s move on.

In 32:18 the charge is brought that they “deserted the Rock” (Christ), and as a result, the prophecy takes up “what their end will be” (20). These who reject the Rock are called a “perverse generation” (v.20). Ring a bell? Jesus and Peter both called their generation a “perverse generation.” Paul did as well. We can see that the author of Hebrews is quoting from Deuteronomy 32 already. Then he quotes it again, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay” (32:35). Thus, he is familiar with this all important passage in the Law. He knows what it concerns: Israel*s “end.”

Moses then prophesies that their vine is from “Sodom” (v. 32). Ring a bell? Revelation 11:8 identifies the “great city” where “our Lord was crucified” with “Sodom.” I wonder where John got that idea? Again, after the author of Hebrews quotes 32:35, we find him saying that “very, very soon he who is coming will come and not delay.” In the same verse from which he quotes, the rest of it reads, “in due time their foot will slip, their day of calamity [will be] at hand, and swiftly comes their doom” (32:25).

For too long, folks, we have been interpreting New Testament eschatology in light of newspaper headlines written 2,000 years after the events instead of reading them in light of the the old covenant stipulations and sanctions against Israel. Thank God that a clear indication is seen in scholarship in which this fact is now being considered the most important theological task of our day. The passage we quoted above concerning “thorns and thistles” comes straight out of the “cursings” for Israel*s rebellion. They will have “no oil” (28:41), which, I think, relates to the parable of the virgins. They had no oil. They were “cursed.” And “in the end” the “door was shut.”

Note the connection with Paul, in 1 Corinthians 14:21, “for in the Law it is written, ‘through men of strange tongues and through the lips of foreigners I will speak to this people.” In Deuteronomy 28:49 one of the curses against Israel (“this people”) was “The Lord will bring a nation against you from far away.. .a nation whose language (“tongue”) you do not know.”

Scripture after Scripture, parable after parable bears out the truth of what transmillennialism is saying: The “end of all things” as it related to the summing up of “all things” in Christ has come: it is a new heavens and a new earth in God*s eyes, things are “changed.” The thing is, most Christians already live as if this were true, but when you ask them why they still hold to an unrealized eschatology, they begin to quote, “Well, we have always been taught to believe this,” or “The creeds tells us so,” or “Well, Jesus never split the Mount of Olives in two, yet,” or “Well, there*s still bodies in the ground, so the resurrection could not have happened, yet,” or some other excuse for what we present as clearly linked together Scriptures.

I realize I have gone off the track a little on the parables, but the point was to demonstrate that the apostles taught what Jesus taught them to teach and nothing more. Thus, I used examples from parables, then ventured into the epistles to confirm our premise. After that, it was seen that the entire basis for New Testament “last days” language was not just Jesus* words, but the words Jesus based his own teaching on: The Law and the Prophets. Thus, we have interweave a great tapestry of Gospel -> Epistle -> Law to prove one thing: The “end of all things” came in that “perverse generation” who saw its “end” according to the “law.” No need for quoting Hal “I get my theology from the newspaper” Lindsey here. Only serious students need apply.

Of course, the Parable of the Virgins is directly connected to the Olivet Discourse, which, hands down, is directly related to “not one stone being left on another” in Jerusalem. AD 70, since the time of the early second century church, was seen in this connection. We have no problems proving this. Unless a “gap theory” of 2,000 years is not introduced between 24:35 and 36 (which so called “partial-preterists” arbitrarily do in order to save “orthodoxy”), then the two parables following in chapter 25 are linked. The “ten virgins” is followed by the Parable of the Talents. Thus, in wrapping up this edition of our study, let us briefly consider this parable and see if our pattern holds with what has been said so far.

Three servants are given talents (a little over $1000.00), two earned more than they were given, and one buried his and earned nothing. The master “came back” and “settled accounts” (this is the reward theme). Two, because of their investments, enter into “the master*s happiness” (which many Christians are still looking for!).

The last “servant” who was also “entrusted with property” and is called “a servant” (note, the topic above covered how the Jews were covenantally regarded as such, for they were “entrusted with the word of God”). He, however, earned nothing on what was given to him. I return to our theme above: They were given the adoption of sons, the promises, the covenants, have tasted, had known, and were “sanctified” and made “holy,” and, yet, invested not in their status, but hid it in the ground. What is the judgment? “Take the talent from him and give It to another.” Ring a bell? “For the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to another where It will bear fruit” (Matthew 21:43).

See, the first two servants bore fruit, or, in this case, interest. The last one bore no fruit, no interest. His “claims” alone could earn him nothing, though, at first, on the basis of that claim, he was a “servant” and was in charge of property. Finally, “throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Remember our wedding guest who had no wedding clothes on? What happened to him? He was invited, he was at the feast, but had no clothes. “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 22:13).

Both parables are speaking of the same thing by using two different metaphors. One is a wedding feast, another is property. Both end in the same way and follow the same pattern. Many Jews had talents given to them (“having once been enlightened”) but did nothing with it. In the end their claim was not enough. To claim “Abraham is our father” got them court-side seats, but before the championship game started, they were tossed out. They thought they could enter in by their claim, but it was not enough. The “righteousness of the Scribes and the Pharisees” must be superseded.

Oh, it is a righteousness. Jesus called it that. But the “righteousness” that supersedes that righteousness is the found in the message of the apostles: “But now a righteousness from God, apart from the law, has been made known, to which the law and the prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference” (Romans 3:21, 22).

Paul*s gospel confirms the parables. Those who “bore fruit” entered into the kingdom of God. Those who claimed Jewish privilege could not enter in on that basis alone, for “there is no difference” between Jews and Gentiles, if there is no differences, then the ONLY way for “all” to participate is by faith in Jesus Christ. For the Jew, this was a “stumbling block* (1 Corinthians 1:23). Paul taught nothing apart from what Jesus taught in the parables. Paul*s message and Jesus* message are identical. The former got it from the latter.

I suppose there are some, many reading this that will still say, “Sam, you are really forcing this preterist thing into everything you read.” The only thing I can say to that is that it fits so nicely! The parables flow into the epistles and the revelation of John, and into the Law and Prophets which is its entire basis – the vocabulary, the time-statements, the problems of the Jews of Jesus* day in accepting the message, the Gentiles (nations) coming to “Mt Zion, the heavenly Jerusalem” (Hebrews 12:22).

Isaiah 2 foresaw this event “in the last days” with the “mount of the Lord raised above all mountains and the Gentiles (nations) streaming up to it.” The only way not to see the connection between what Hebrews says and Isaiah is that the latter is not “literally” fulfilled That is, Mount Zion over there in Israel today is not the highest mountain in the world, yet. Therefore, Isaiah 2 is not fulfilled. To this I say, “Well, it is not going to be fulfilled according to carnal expectations, but ‘in Spirit and in Truth’ to which the author of Hebrews stated.” The reply, “Well, you preterists just spiritualize everything away.” To which I reply, “Is the Spirit that bad?”

Carnal eschatology hopes for a future geographical utopia, with brand new eyelashes, and a better body than the flabby body we have today. It is a carnal hope rooted in a “better me.” But this entire false hope is not rooted in what Christ has accomplished, but on what he will accomplish “for me.” Thus, logically, the church is reduced into a waiting game, not fully coming into what it really needs to be until we get better biceps and less back hair. Excuse me, glorified biceps.

God wants us to focus on the “here and now”, since the “hereafter and later” has been accomplished in Christ “then and there” in that generation. Look around you. See anyone hurting? Bring them the “healing of the nations” (Revelation 22:2). See anyone thirsty from a cruel world? Give them a drink from the living waters of life that flow from the New Jerusalem (22:17). See anyone “outside” the New Jerusalem gates? The “dogs, those who practice magic, the sexually immoral, murderers, idolaters, and those practicing falsehood?” (22:14,15). Invite them inside the gates, where there is “no more curse,” “no more death,” and “no more impurity.” Don*t invite them to “join our church,” which focuses on four walls, a steeple and inside, many dismal people. Invite them to Jesus and the Heavenly New Jerusalem. Increase Him so that you may decrease. Increase His kingdom. It is here, not “near.” It has come, and is not “coming.” It is now, and not “some later day far in the future.” Christ is King, Lord, Priest, and eternal Intercessor NOW. “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ” (Revelation 11:15).

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