# What is more dangerous to our theology? FV or Dispensationalism?



## Doulos McKenzie

Just wondering y'all's thoughts.


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## Dachaser

Doulos McKenzie said:


> Just wondering y'all's thoughts.


many of those holding to Dospensationalism still would agree on the justification of the Cross as Reformed would, but think those in FV have a different justification model, correct?


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## arapahoepark

FV is inherently anti-Gospel, get in by baptism stay in by works.
Dispensationalism, as horrendously stupid it is and for all their torturous exegesis does not deny the Gospel. Older forms by implication may(like antinomianism and as well as some two covenant types but, by and large it is not the mainstream dispensationalism any longer.


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## RamistThomist

Most modern dispensationalists today (you will find very few Scofieldists) hold to sola fide.


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## Edward

FV is more dangerous to theology. Dispensationalism is more dangerous to the Church.

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## Doulos McKenzie

Edward said:


> FV is more dangerous to theology. Dispensationalism is more dangerous to the Church.



could you elaborate?


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## RamistThomist

Doulos McKenzie said:


> could you elaborate?



FV ruins the doctrine of salvation. Dispensationalism ruins the doctrine of the church

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## GulfCoast Presbyterian

*


Edward said:



FV is more dangerous to theology. Dispensationalism is more dangerous to the Church.

Click to expand...

Nailed it. *


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## greenbaggins

Hmm, I'm not sure I agree that Dispensationalism is more dangerous to the church than the FV. The FV is the most divisive doctrinal dispute I have ever personally experienced. It even separates previously close friends. The FV's doctrine of the church is very problematic, being a rather authoritarian version of church government. I have seen case after case of church power being abused. And yes, while Dispensationalists believe that there are two peoples of God, which is highly problematic, I can usually get along better with them than with ANY FV supporter.

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## Dachaser

greenbaggins said:


> Hmm, I'm not sure I agree that Dispensationalism is more dangerous to the church than the FV. The FV is the most divisive doctrinal dispute I have ever personally experienced. It even separates previously close friends. The FV's doctrine of the church is very problematic, being a rather authoritarian version of church government. I have seen case after case of church power being abused. And yes, while Dispensationalists believe that there are two peoples of God, which is highly problematic, I can usually get along better with them than with ANY FV supporter.


I came out from those circles, and can say that a majority of the Christians who are still really into it were not seeing it as being saved bylaw and now Grace, but more dividing what the church and Israel now still is...


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> FV ruins the doctrine of salvation. Dispensationalism ruins the doctrine of the church


How so though? as they still would see the church as being made up of both Jews and Gentiles, just see still a distinction between Israel and Church?


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## Parakaleo

Federal vision is more dangerous overall. It is a romanizing doctrine and therefore a tactic of antichrist. I'm not sure if you can say the same thing about dispensationalism, since I don't see dispensational people crossing the Tiber.


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## Gforce9

Dachaser said:


> How so though? as they still would see the church as being made up of both Jews and Gentiles, just see still a distinction between Israel and Church?



In part, Dispensationalism has always made a separation between the NT "church" and the OT "people of God". The degree or sharpness of the separation has relaxed some since the early manifestations of Dispensationalism, but the seperation remains. There is one people of God, saved by Christ alone, period. Is the church different, segregated groups, saved by various means or one people of God saved by Christ alone? I believe that is why Rev. Winzer on one occasion commented, in part, that if one is not covenantal, they are by definition, dispensational


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## Dachaser

I was raised up and taught on it though, and was always taught that there has only been one way to get saved, that being the Cross of Christ...


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> How so though? as they still would see the church as being made up of both Jews and Gentiles, just see still a distinction between Israel and Church?



Did God fall back on Plan B?


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> I was raised up and taught on it though, and was always taught that there has only been one way to get saved, that being the Cross of Christ...



How many peoples of God are there?


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> Did God fall back on Plan B?


No, as he always had the church in mind, as it was destined to start at Pentacost....


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> How many peoples of God are there?


One right now....


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## Doulos McKenzie

Dachaser said:


> One right now....



One always. Past Present and Future. If that is denied then by definition you are not Reformed.

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## Dachaser

Doulos McKenzie said:


> One always. Past Present and Future. If that is denied then by definition you are not Reformed.


Since there has always been just one way to be saved, would there not be just one people of God?


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## Gforce9

Ask a Dispensationalist if Abraham & David are their brothers..... Progressive Dispensationalists may answer this a bit differently......


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## Edward

greenbaggins said:


> The FV is the most divisive doctrinal dispute I have ever personally experienced...I can usually get along better with them than with ANY FV supporter.



You have, perhaps inadvertently, proven my point. While a good FV heretic may get in your face and otherwise make himself (I haven't run across any leading FV women) unwelcome, the Dispensationalists are going to be winsome infiltrators, eager to volunteer and help out, as they sneak into leadership roles and subvert the Church over time.


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> One right now....



Overall? We can bracket out things like Covenant of Works, since that leads to questions regarding Supra and Infra.


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> Since there has always been just one way to be saved, would there not be just one people of God?



Are we currently in God's parenthesis, ending with the rapture of the church?


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## Edward

Doulos McKenzie said:


> could you elaborate?



As to theology, FV has been labeled heresy by respectable sources. (See some of the older threads here). Dispensationalism is merely grave error. 

As to the threat to the church, generally see my comment above to the Rev. Keister. It's generally easy to smoke out and deal with FVers. Dispensationalists are going to work their way into position to spread their error.


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## BG

I will say dispensationalism has done the most damage and continues to do so.

I have never met any one who holds to the FV.

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## Gforce9

BG said:


> I will say dispensationalism has done the most damage and continues to do so.
> 
> I have never meet any one who holds to the FV.



I hold to a bi-weekly "pizza day". This is irrespective of Josh's bathing and cologne application schedule......


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## BG

Not really sure what you mean?

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## Gforce9

BG said:


> Not really sure what you mean?


Just trying (and failing) to add a little levity to the current discussion....


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## Dachaser

Edward said:


> You have, perhaps inadvertently, proven my point. While a good FV heretic may get in your face and otherwise make himself (I haven't run across any leading FV women) unwelcome, the Dispensationalists are going to be winsome infiltrators, eager to volunteer and help out, as they sneak into leadership roles and subvert the Church over time.


Think that most of my friends who are still in Dispensational churches would disagree with trying to force a takeover though....


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> Are we currently in God's parenthesis, ending with the rapture of the church?


I currently see that the Church was always part of the plan of God, so was done after israel proper rejected Jesus as messiah, so do not see it as plan B, but also do see Israel as still part of the plan pf God in the sense that to me spiritual israel would be saved Jews, and that Jesus does save a faithful remnant of them in each generation... Also take the all israel shall be saved as the generation alive at time of Second Coming...


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## Doulos McKenzie

Dachaser said:


> I currently see that the Church was always part of the plan of God, so was done after israel proper rejected Jesus as messiah, so do not see it as plan B, but also do see Israel as still part of the plan pf God in the sense that to me spiritual israel would be saved Jews, and that Jesus does save a faithful remnant of them in each generation... Also take the all israel shall be saved as the generation alive at time of Second Coming...



Congratulations my friend, you are by definition a dispensationalist.

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## Dachaser

Would tend to see myself more along lines of a Covenant preMil person though!


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> Would tend to see myself more along lines of a Covenant preMil person though!



Covenant Premil guys like Blomberg and Ladd do not hold your views on Israel. All a Covenant Premil needs to say is that some of the cosmic promises in the OT can't be fulfilled until Jesus returns. Nothing about Israel.


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## KMK

Dachaser said:


> I currently see that the Church was always part of the plan of God, so was done after israel proper rejected Jesus as messiah, so do not see it as plan B, but also do see Israel as still part of the plan pf God in the sense that to me spiritual israel would be saved Jews, and that Jesus does save a faithful remnant of them in each generation... Also take the all israel shall be saved as the generation alive at time of Second Coming...



Do you agree with the LBC, Chapter 8?

Paragraph 6. Although the price of redemption was not actually paid by Christ until after His incarnation, successively from the beginning of the world, in and by those promises, types, and sacrifices wherein He was revealed, and signified to be the seed which should bruise the serpent's head; and the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,being the same yesterday, and today and for ever.


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## Edward

Dachaser said:


> Think that most of my friends who are still in Dispensational churches would disagree with trying to force a takeover though....



That's because they've already taken over those churches.

I can think of only a couple of fairly recent new Dispensational plants in the heart of Dispyland, and one of those was a split from a former Presbyterian church taken over years ago; the other is a legitimate, 'from scratch' operation. From a group that claims to be evangelical, you don't see a lot of new "Bible Church" works.

And, of course, they infiltrated and took over lots of Southern Baptist churches a generation or two back.

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## MW

To the OP, because it asks specifically about "our" theology, I would have to say FV is the more dangerous because it seeks to alter the meaning and practice of what we confess, whilst dispensationalism is fairly recognisable as being a different theology belonging to a different group. Dispensationalism creates all kinds of troubles in its own environment, but it is not native to the reformed community. FV causes all kinds of troubles in a reformed community because it grows up within the environment, sucking all the nutrients out of the soil, overspreading the garden, and slowly choking the life out of the plants.

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## greenbaggins

Edward, you say that FV'ers are fairly easy to smoke out. That has not been true in my rather extensive experience, precisely because they use terms in such a slippery manner. Even the diagnostic questions that I usually ask can be answered by the more intelligent proponents in a way that is just ambiguous enough to try to allay fears, and yet still allow room for their own withheld definitional changes. The only easy ones to spot are the ones who used to use the internet extensively to promote their views: Mark Horne, Jeff Meyers, Steve Wilkins, Peter Leithart, etc. The smaller fish can be much more difficult to spot.

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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> Covenant Premil guys like Blomberg and Ladd do not hold your views on Israel. All a Covenant Premil needs to say is that some of the cosmic promises in the OT can't be fulfilled until Jesus returns. Nothing about Israel.


I do not see the Lord hving promises still to them as a nation per say, but do see that the lord is still dealing to save out of them a remnant unto himself in each generation, that He did not cease dealing with them totally after AD 70, is that wrong?


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## Dachaser

KMK said:


> Do you agree with the LBC, Chapter 8?
> 
> Paragraph 6. Although the price of redemption was not actually paid by Christ until after His incarnation, successively from the beginning of the world, in and by those promises, types, and sacrifices wherein He was revealed, and signified to be the seed which should bruise the serpent's head; and the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,being the same yesterday, and today and for ever.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


Yes


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## Dachaser

MW said:


> To the OP, because it asks specifically about "our" theology, I would have to say FV is the more dangerous because it seeks to alter the meaning and practice of what we confess, whilst dispensationalism is fairly recognisable as being a different theology belonging to a different group. Dispensationalism creates all kinds of troubles in its own environment, but it is not native to the reformed community. FV causes all kinds of troubles in a reformed community because it grows up within the environment, sucking all the nutrients out of the soil, overspreading the garden, and slowly choking the life out of the plants.


Good point, as those Christians who hold to non Covenant theology would be seeing it in total different ways, but would not be part of the reformed landscape


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## Gforce9

Dachaser said:


> I do not see the Lord hving promises still to them as a nation per say, but do see that the lord is still dealing to save out of them a remnant unto himself in each generation, that He did not cease dealing with them totally after AD 70, is that wrong?


Who is the remnant? Who is the Israel of God? Who are Abraham's true sons?


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> I do not see the Lord hving promises still to them as a nation per say, but do see that the lord is still dealing to save out of them a remnant unto himself in each generation, that He did not cease dealing with them totally after AD 70, is that wrong?


 Perhaps we can phrase it a different way: is the land upon which the current, atheistic nation-state of Israel significant to Judaism in the future promises of God?


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## Dachaser

Gforce9 said:


> Who is the remnant? Who is the Israel of God? Who are Abraham's true sons?


The remnant in this case would be the jews God chose to save out in each generation, just as He did under the Old Covenant. The israel of God now would be those saved by the grace of God, and the true sons of Abraham are those with faith in Jesus, not those just of the flesh!


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> Perhaps we can phrase it a different way: is the land upon which the current, atheistic nation-state of Israel significant to Judaism in the future promises of God?


Not at the present time, honestly not sure if will be when Jesus sets up his Kingdom l reign here upon the earth...


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## RamistThomist

Dachaser said:


> Not at the present time, honestly not sure if will be when Jesus sets up his Kingdom l reign here upon the earth...



Okay. When you say stuff like "God still has a plan for the Jews/Israel," does that mean that they will be converted en masse at the end of history, or does it mean that the territory in Palestine belongs to the atheistic nation of Israel today? The first proposition is the view by most in church history. The second is to be rejected.


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## Dachaser

ReformedReidian said:


> Okay. When you say stuff like "God still has a plan for the Jews/Israel," does that mean that they will be converted en masse at the end of history, or does it mean that the territory in Palestine belongs to the atheistic nation of Israel today? The first proposition is the view by most in church history. The second is to be rejected.


My take would be that all of the jews alive at time of the Second Coming will get saved, as they will see and mourn over their true messiah.... So its not the land, but the Jewish people...


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## Gforce9

Dachaser said:


> The remnant in this case would be the jews God chose to save out in each generation, just as He did under the Old Covenant. The israel of God now would be those saved by the grace of God, and the true sons of Abraham are those with faith in Jesus, not those just of the flesh!



Are not we the remnant, the Israel of God, and Abraham's true sons?


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## Edward

greenbaggins said:


> Edward, you say that FV'ers are fairly easy to smoke out. That has not been true in my rather extensive experience, precisely because they use terms in such a slippery manner. Even the diagnostic questions that I usually ask can be answered by the more intelligent proponents in a way that is just ambiguous enough to try to allay fears, and yet still allow room for their own withheld definitional changes.



I will concede that they are slippery in that they use secret definitions for commonly understood terms. But many (most?) will trip themselves up with Paedocommunion.


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## greenbaggins

Edward, that is true that they will. However, paedo-communion is not a sure-fire sign of FV theology. I have known several PC guys who were not FV (although they tend to be soft on FV, which is its own problem). So there is a slippery tendency even there.


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## Backwoods Presbyterian

BG said:


> I will say dispensationalism has done the most damage and continues to do so.
> 
> I have never met any one who holds to the FV.



This is a good point. FV is very localized in one corner of the Reformed world. Dispensationalism effects the entirety of the Protestant world (even more so, you'd be amazed at how many RC's I know who hold to a Pre-Trib Rapture) and strikes at the vitals of a number of doctrines (Covenant Theology, Ecclesiology, Anthropology, etc...)

Dispensationalism is at the heart of the Antinomianism, especially when it comes to the 4th Commandment, in evangelical circles.


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## KMK

These things almost never come up in conversations I have with people. 


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## Edward

greenbaggins said:


> I have known several PC guys who were not FV (although they tend to be soft on FV, which is its own problem)



If someone is PC and soft on FV, I really don't have any problem counting them as being on the other side of the river. Just because the FV Pope in Idaho might not consider them orthodox doesn't mean that I have to accept them.

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## Dachaser

Backwoods Presbyterian said:


> This is a good point. FV is very localized in one corner of the Reformed world. Dispensationalism effects the entirety of the Protestant world (even more so, you'd be amazed at how many RC's I know who hold to a Pre-Trib Rapture) and strikes at the vitals of a number of doctrines (Covenant Theology, Ecclesiology, Anthropology, etc...)
> 
> Dispensationalism is at the heart of the Antinomianism, especially when it comes to the 4th Commandment, in evangelical circles.


Most of those whom i still are friends with though do not seethe life in Christ as being just do your own thing now, as they would pretty much agree that since now saved by Grace, they do not have the licensee to now just freely sin...


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## Dachaser

Gforce9 said:


> Are not we the remnant, the Israel of God, and Abraham's true sons?


Yes, but to me there is also 'something" God is still doing with the Jewish people, NOT their nation/land, but among them., as He always seemed to call out among them that faithful remnant unto this present day... And i am still trying to understand better just what is meant by all israel being saved in the end, and also what Peter in Acts meant when they turn to the Messiah, how much more glorious that will be...


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## Dachaser

Parakaleo said:


> Federal vision is more dangerous overall. It is a romanizing doctrine and therefore a tactic of antichrist. I'm not sure if you can say the same thing about dispensationalism, since I don't see dispensational people crossing the Tiber.


FV seems to be trying to get us back to the mother Church of Rome, and have unity at sake of doctrine purity, and don't know any Dispensational who would agree with that!


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## Pilgrim

Gforce9 said:


> Ask a Dispensationalist if Abraham & David are their brothers..... Progressive Dispensationalists may answer this a bit differently......



I think most would say they are their brothers. I think what you are driving at is that they would deny that they are _members of the church_, which isn't necessarily the same thing from their point of view. They would say that the "tribulation saints" are also not part of the church and that the church only exists between Pentecost and the (pre-trib) Rapture. This divvying up of the redeemed is what even MacArthur's statement of faith teaches. 

BTW, anyone who claims to hold to the 1689 as well as MacArthur's eschatology should pointed to the respective articles on the church and the incompatibility should hit them immediately. The 1689 says that the church encompasses the whole company of the redeemed from Genesis to Revelation. As noted above, every form of dispensationalism that I know of denies this.


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## Pilgrim

Dachaser said:


> Yes, but to me there is also 'something" God is still doing with the Jewish people, NOT their nation/land, but among them., as He always seemed to call out among them that faithful remnant unto this present day... And i am still trying to understand better just what is meant by all israel being saved in the end, and also what Peter in Acts meant when they turn to the Messiah, how much more glorious that will be...



God doing something with Israel/the Jews (including a restoration to the land) isn't even limited to premil, much less dispensationalism. (One would probably be correct in saying that what is nowadays called Zionism is generally limited to millennialism though, which would include some forms of postmil that are rarely espoused today.) Things have gotten so polarized these days though that too often one is considered to have Dispensational leanings if one espouses anything more than maybe a "end time" conversion of a great many Jews just before the Second Coming.


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## Pilgrim

Parakaleo said:


> Federal vision is more dangerous overall. It is a romanizing doctrine and therefore a tactic of antichrist. I'm not sure if you can say the same thing about dispensationalism, since I don't see dispensational people crossing the Tiber.



FV also calls itself Reformed, which is a big difference.

Perhaps a better way to state the question is *which one is more dangerous to Reformed churches in 2017*. When is the last time the alleged dispensational views of a ministerial candidate were discussed or debated in a Presbytery of a NAPARC church, whether in committee or on the floor? Maybe it happens more than I would imagine, but surely it is much less often than FV and related doctrines.

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## Pilgrim

ReformedReidian said:


> Perhaps we can phrase it a different way: is the land upon which the current, atheistic nation-state of Israel significant to Judaism in the future promises of God?



If that is the litmus test, then the historic premils Spurgeon, Ryle, Bonar, M'Cheyne as well as Edwards and a number of other postmils should all be considered dispensationalists. 

Historically, whether or not there are any promises related to the promised land that are yet to be fulfilled is not the dividing line of "historic premil" and dispensationalism. Ladd basically recast the view and moved it closer to amil with regard to interpretation of OT prophecy.


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## Semper Fidelis

MW said:


> To the OP, because it asks specifically about "our" theology, I would have to say FV is the more dangerous because it seeks to alter the meaning and practice of what we confess, whilst dispensationalism is fairly recognisable as being a different theology belonging to a different group. Dispensationalism creates all kinds of troubles in its own environment, but it is not native to the reformed community. FV causes all kinds of troubles in a reformed community because it grows up within the environment, sucking all the nutrients out of the soil, overspreading the garden, and slowly choking the life out of the plants.


I saw this thread and mostly avoided it but came to this conclusion as well. Dispensationalism is not really something that we have to root out within Reformed communions. It exists as sort of a "default" for many American Evangelicals who attend PCA Churches because the PCA is a Church that preaches the Word and stands on Biblical authority. A Baptist friend of mine from Okinawa ended up in our Church here and he wondered why they always found themselves in PCA Churches (not yet convinced of the baptism of their covenant children) and he agreed with me that it was our confidence in the Scriptures to change hearts and not gimmicks, etc that was attractive.

I think FV is a danger but I also think it's a fading one. I like the analogy you used about sucking the marrow out of folks. I think it had its apex a decade ago and there are matasized errors that creep up but they tend to group up if they're really committed. The saddest thing for me is to watch a really sweet family whose father was really into patriarchy pretty much abandon the faith. His beautiful daughters and wife have now turned their back on the Lord. I've other friends of Churches I attended where there was a similar pressure of showing how "perfectly" you were raising your kids and practically obsessing about noise from children in Churches who have left Reformed Churches as a result.

I think FV-thinking is always a danger to Reformed people but especially to those with families or those who use their theology as a way to idealize family relationships and the promise that the right kind of parenting will produce the Godly offspring that is otherwise a good goal. It's sort of a sophisticated version of Raising Kids God's Way but it has the allure of faux scholarship and the dressing up the doctrine of wolves in the misapplied ideas of Puritans and other Reformed thinkers. 

I don't expect it to survive as a movement much beyond some of its charismatic leaders. Their multi-generational vision will be thrown down and they'll find the world or others to blame leaving many victims in its wake who ought to have received the richness of Reformed theology for wearied souls rather than sucking the life out of them with a cheap alternative.

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## Pilgrim

Semper Fidelis said:


> I think FV is a danger but I also think it's a fading one.



It seems to me that the biggest danger now is probably the various forms of progressivism in the PCA (and elsewhere) that some have raised the alarm about. But that could also be a vehicle for more openness to FV since they are "conservative" after all. That's how many have been drawn to Roman Catholicism.

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## Warren

Doulos McKenzie said:


> Just wondering y'all's thoughts.


While it is certain the FV are aggressively developing an atomic arsenal, Dispensationalists prefer to accelerate doomsday by arming Jews and provoking Arabs to attack them. It is hard to say which is more destructive to our theology.

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## RamistThomist

Pilgrim said:


> If that is the litmus test, then the historic premils Spurgeon, Ryle, Bonar, M'Cheyne as well as Edwards and a number of other postmils should all be considered dispensationalists.
> 
> Historically, whether or not there are any promises related to the promised land that are yet to be fulfilled is not the dividing line of "historic premil" and dispensationalism. Ladd basically recast the view and moved it closer to amil with regard to interpretation of OT prophecy.



Maybe, but they couldn't have had in mind the modern secular state of Israel.


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## Pilgrim

ReformedReidian said:


> Maybe, but they couldn't have had in mind the modern secular state of Israel.


There are at least some dispensationalists who say it doesn't necessarily have any significance either. 

Interestingly, the amil Lloyd-Jones once told the premil Carl Henry that we shouldn't bother with social justice because the Jews had just retaken Jerusalem and therefore the end was nigh. 

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## brendanchatt

Dachaser said:


> Most of those whom i still are friends with though do not seethe life in Christ as being just do your own thing now, as they would pretty much agree that since now saved by Grace, they do not have the licensee to now just freely sin...


Maybe to Rev. Glaser's point, it's not just the intent but their view of the law, how it applies. Antinomianism may be not just people trying bold-face disobey God, but neglectors or ignorers of duty.

I don't remember too much about dispensationalism, though.


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## MW

Semper Fidelis said:


> I think FV is a danger but I also think it's a fading one.



I hope so; but recoil from antinomianism has a tendency to lead towards neonomianism and vice versa, so these concepts have manifested themselves on a recurring basis.


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## KMK

MW said:


> I hope so; but recoil from antinomianism has a tendency to lead towards neonomianism and vice versa, so these concepts have manifested themselves on a recurring basis.



As some have recoiled from dispensationalism to hyper preterism.


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## arapahoepark

KMK said:


> As some have recoiled from dispensationalism to hyper preterism.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


Same thing there, just 2000 years apart.  or rather just a different generation.


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> God doing something with Israel/the Jews (including a restoration to the land) isn't even limited to premil, much less dispensationalism. (One would probably be correct in saying that what is nowadays called Zionism is generally limited to millennialism though, which would include some forms of postmil that are rarely espoused today.) Things have gotten so polarized these days though that too often one is considered to have Dispensational leanings if one espouses anything more than maybe a "end time" conversion of a great many Jews just before the Second Coming.


The main thing that O would hold yo regarding the Jewish people would be do see that those alive at the Second Coming will be saved by God enabling them to call upon then the name of their Messiah...


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## Dachaser

KMK said:


> As some have recoiled from dispensationalism to hyper preterism.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


Full Preterism is by far the worst...


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> If that is the litmus test, then the historic premils Spurgeon, Ryle, Bonar, M'Cheyne as well as Edwards and a number of other postmils should all be considered dispensationalists.
> 
> Historically, whether or not there are any promises related to the promised land that are yet to be fulfilled is not the dividing line of "historic premil" and dispensationalism. Ladd basically recast the view and moved it closer to amil with regard to interpretation of OT prophecy.


Think that some reformed who hold to historical premil. like those that you mentioned, saw God still doing 'something" with national israel and the Jews still, correct?


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> There are at least some dispensationalists who say it doesn't necessarily have any significance either.
> 
> Interestingly, the amil Lloyd-Jones once told the premil Carl Henry that we shouldn't bother with social justice because the Jews had just retaken Jerusalem and therefore the end was nigh.
> 
> Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk


Another good point, as some would indeed se a distinction made between jewish people and Gods dealing with them, and the state of israel itself...


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## Pilgrim

Dachaser said:


> Think that some reformed who hold to historical premil. like those that you mentioned, saw God still doing 'something" with national israel and the Jews still, correct?



Given the vagueness of "doing something," there are amils, postmils and historic premils who could agree with that since "something" might mean anything. I'd think that the only people who could truly deny it would be the ones who say that there is no ethnic Israel or Jewish person today in any sense, which is a view that evidently contradicts the Westminster Standards. (See Westminster Larger Catechism 191.) 

With regard to what has been termed "Christian Zionism," that is largely confined to dispensationalism today even though that wasn't the case years ago. It was generally held by those who were any form of premil as well as many postmils and was held by some of the historicist school as well as futurists. If I'm not mistaken, there is at least one postmil member here who says that the church is the new Israel yet believes that Israel is to be restored to the land.


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## JimmyH

Dachaser said:


> Another good point, as some would indeed se a distinction made between jewish people and Gods dealing with them, and the state of israel itself...


Perhaps I'm confused, but our Pastor, if I understood him correctly, preaching on Romans 9:6-7 and following, points out that 'Israel' is not ethnic, but the elect. 
6 Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel:

7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called.


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## RamistThomist

JimmyH said:


> Perhaps I'm confused, but our Pastor, if I understood him correctly, preaching on Romans 9:6-7 and following, points out that 'Israel' is not ethnic, but the elect.
> 6 Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel:
> 
> 7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called.



Some Reformed hold that view. It isn't necessarily mainstream but it's an acceptable view. The only problem is that it ends up reading "All the elect will be saved," which seems tautologous. Further, in Romans 9-11 Israel usually means Israel, especially in chapter 9


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## KMK

The identity of 'all Israel' would be a great topic for another thread. But, lets allow this discussion to be about FV and Dispensationalism.


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> Given the vagueness of "doing something," there are amils, postmils and historic premils who could agree with that since "something" might mean anything. I'd think that the only people who could truly deny it would be the ones who say that there is no ethnic Israel or Jewish person today in any sense, which is a view that evidently contradicts the Westminster Standards. (See Westminster Larger Catechism 191.)
> 
> With regard to what has been termed "Christian Zionism," that is largely confined to dispensationalism today even though that wasn't the case years ago. It was generally held by those who were any form of premil as well as many postmils and was held by some of the historicist school as well as futurists. If I'm not mistaken, there is at least one postmil member here who says that the church is the new Israel yet believes that Israel is to be restored to the land.


So the "big differences" between Dispensational and Reformed communities might not be as large as they once were in the past, especially under Scofieldism viewpoint?


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## Pilgrim

Dachaser said:


> So the "big differences" between Dispensational and Reformed communities might not be as large as they once were in the past, especially under Scofieldism viewpoint?



Well, that depends, but even some staunch covenantalists such as O. Palmer Robertson have said "yes" up to a point although the essential differences remain. I don't think "classic" Old Scofieldism/Chaferism (i.e. making statements that suggest that there was a different way of salvation in the OT, among other things that most Dispensationalists today repudiate) has a whole lot of adherents today, but I could be wrong. Regardless, it has a lot fewer than it did a generation or two ago. Ryrie and the men who followed (what some have termed "revised" or "normative" dispensationalism) certainly aren't acceptable from a confessional standpoint, but at least some have expressed appreciation for their clarification that they believe that salvation has always been by grace through faith and never through law-keeping. (Just how much the OT saints knew about Jesus Christ specifically (as opposed to somewhat vague promises of deliverance/salvation) is another point of contention between dispensationalists and other evangelicals, especially the Reformed.) 

The biggest issue is Israel and the Church (ecclesiology) and not just in relation to the timing of the rapture. All who are confessional in any sense would affirm that there is a "Spiritual Israel" in a sense that would also include elect gentiles as well as Jews. While a few Progressive Dispensationalists has spoken of Spiritual Israel, most are loath to use the term because they think it means that the church is the new Israel and such talk tends to obliterate the promises to national Israel that they believe are yet unfulfilled. Even historic premils of the past of the type that I've spoken of here (i.e. Zionists of a sort) have gone to some lengths to split hairs on verses like Gal. 6:16 all the while emphasizing that ultimately there is only one people of God. There is not a whole lot of difference between that form of covenant premil and progressive dispensationalism other than a formal affirmation of the unity of the covenant of grace and in some cases (but not all) the timing of the rapture. But I think it should also be apparent why men with those views couldn't easily coexist in a church like the OPC, even if they weren't technically dispensationalists, which meant Scofieldism in that day. 

As I noted earlier, a lot of newbies from a dispensational background are confused and think they can be confessionally Reformed and hold to something like MacArthur's eschatology and ecclesiology (WRT who is a part of the universal church). If you haven't already, compare the 1689 and the Grace Community Church/Masters Seminary doctrinal statement on the church and the difference is clear immediately, as I posted earlier. Either the OT saints are members of the church or they are not. (Some of the old Baptists who were more or less covenantal taught that Abraham, etc. were basically retroactively added to the church once it was inaugurated, which is something that dispensationalism denies.)

I haven't read extensively in progressive dispensationalism, so I don't know whether or not any of them would affirm that the OT saints are members of the church universal. If so, then I don't know what the difference is between that and covenant/historic premil. Maybe it's a dime's worth, or perhaps a little more than that for those confessional covenant premils who place a strong emphasis on perpetuity of the moral law (i.e all 10 commandments.)


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> Well, that depends, but even some staunch covenantalists such as O. Palmer Robertson have said "yes" up to a point although the essential differences remain. I don't think "classic" Old Scofieldism/Chaferism (i.e. making statements that suggest that there was a different way of salvation in the OT, among other things that most Dispensationalists today repudiate) has a whole lot of adherents today, but I could be wrong. Regardless, it has a lot fewer than it did a generation or two ago. Ryrie and the men who followed (what some have termed "revised" or "normative" dispensationalism) certainly aren't acceptable from a confessional standpoint, but at least some have expressed appreciation for their clarification that they believe that salvation has always been by grace through faith and never through law-keeping. (Just how much the OT saints knew about Jesus Christ specifically (as opposed to somewhat vague promises of deliverance/salvation) is another point of contention between dispensationalists and other evangelicals, especially the Reformed.)
> 
> The biggest issue is Israel and the Church (ecclesiology) and not just in relation to the timing of the rapture. All who are confessional in any sense would affirm that there is a "Spiritual Israel" in a sense that would also include elect gentiles as well as Jews. While a few Progressive Dispensationalists has spoken of Spiritual Israel, most are loath to use the term because they think it means that the church is the new Israel and such talk tends to obliterate the promises to national Israel that they believe are yet unfulfilled. Even historic premils of the past of the type that I've spoken of here (i.e. Zionists of a sort) have gone to some lengths to split hairs on verses like Gal. 6:16 all the while emphasizing that ultimately there is only one people of God. There is not a whole lot of difference between that form of covenant premil and progressive dispensationalism other than a formal affirmation of the unity of the covenant of grace and in some cases (but not all) the timing of the rapture. But I think it should also be apparent why men with those views couldn't easily coexist in a church like the OPC, even if they weren't technically dispensationalists, which meant Scofieldism in that day.
> 
> As I noted earlier, a lot of newbies from a dispensational background are confused and think they can be confessionally Reformed and hold to something like MacArthur's eschatology and ecclesiology (WRT who is a part of the universal church). If you haven't already, compare the 1689 and the Grace Community Church/Masters Seminary doctrinal statement on the church and the difference is clear immediately, as I posted earlier. Either the OT saints are members of the church or they are not. (Some of the old Baptists who were more or less covenantal taught that Abraham, etc. were basically retroactively added to the church once it was inaugurated, which is something that dispensationalism denies.)
> 
> I haven't read extensively in progressive dispensationalism, so I don't know whether or not any of them would affirm that the OT saints are members of the church universal. If so, then I don't know what the difference is between that and covenant/historic premil. Maybe it's a dime's worth, or perhaps a little more than that for those confessional covenant premils who place a strong emphasis on perpetuity of the moral law (i.e all 10 commandments.)


Think that the major difference between Covenant premil and progressive Dispensational would be that Dispensational still hold to a separate rapture, and tend to still see OT believers in some fashion separated from Body of Christ, the church.. They are getting pretty close together though it would seem!


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## Von

Some of you mention that you haven't actually met someone who holds to FV theology. Do you think this is due to:
1) People don't know they are holding to it
2) It's not as common (yet)


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## NaphtaliPress

Welcome to the board Von; please fix your signature in accord to board rules so we know you; see the instructions in the link in mine below.


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## Pilgrim

Dachaser said:


> Think that the major difference between Covenant premil and progressive Dispensational would be that Dispensational still hold to a separate rapture, and tend to still see OT believers in some fashion separated from Body of Christ, the church.. They are getting pretty close together though it would seem!



While we have to be careful with our definitions (and one can wrangle over that for a long time), this is generally true, although I don't know that there has really been much movement in the past 20-25 years. And there really can't be much more movement on Israel or PD will cease to be any kind of dispensationalism at all. I know that Bock (one of the fathers of prog. disp.) has basically said as much with regard to why he is still a dispensationalist as opposed to historic premil. Ladd had a lot of influence on prog. disp. with regard to the "Already, Not Yet" view of the kingdom as opposed to the totally postponed kingdom of the older dispensationalism. But again, much of the difference between what goes forth under the banner of "historic" premil today and PD is because Ladd and those he influenced basically embraced "replacement theology" in a way that older historic premils did not. The older historic premils and PD are not that far apart on what they believe(d) about Israel's future. But paradoxically given today's landscape, the older premils also were more covenantal in their view of the law, the Sabbath and so on. 

There are (and have been) diversities, but some would argue that they are the exceptions that prove the rule. There are progressive Dispensationalists who are pre-wrath, but that is still a separate rapture. Robert Gundry considers himself a Dispensational (because of what he believes about Israel as opposed to someone like Ladd) but he is post-trib. The Presbyterians Boice, Schaeffer and Buswell all held to a rapture that is separate from the second coming, either pre or mid-trib, yet they were covenantal. I think they believed in a separate rapture on exegetical grounds as opposed to sort of an _a priori_ commitment to keep Israel and the Church separate the way that dispensationalists have tended to do. Some have argued that covenantal pre-trib or mid-trib (or even post-trib when it is "Zionistic") is inherently unstable and that either you are going to end up more on the Dispensational side or more of a "historic" premil that basically reads OT prophecy the way that amils do (e.g. Ladd, Grudem.)

In general there has been a decline of even a loose covenant theology among evangelicals over the past century. Most baptistic people who have abandoned dispensationalism haven't adopted covenant theology, strictly speaking. In that sense, covenant premil and historic premil aren't exactly the same. (From what I understand, Ladd rejected covenant theology of the type taught in the 1689.) Dispensationalists tend to equate the two because to many of them, if you aren't dispensational, you're "covenantal" since they tend to erroneously reduce that down to the Israel/church issue. There's a lot more to covenant theology than "replacement theology." (I'm not wanting to discuss the propriety of using that term (which some covenantalists have indeed used in some sense, albeit a minority today) but am using it as a shorthand for the purposes of illustration.) 

There are fewer differences between progressive dispensationalism and a "historic" premillennialism that isn't tied to any form of confessional covenant theology, since many of them aren't really going to differ with progressive dispensationalists on the Law of God, etc. But among those who do embrace covenant theology, other differences include law and grace, what the OT saints knew and believed (i.e. the specific content of their faith) etc. The differences in soteriology aren't generally as wide as they are with Scofieldism, but there are still some differences.

But that kind of older covenant premil that I've alluded to seems to be almost extinct outside of things like the Sovereign Grace Advent Testimony (which seems to be dominated nowadays by men from the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster), some Sovereign Grace Baptists (the ones I'm thinking of that I've come across on SermonAudio are covenantal but also more or less Landmarker), and some FB groups. (All of the above are basically post-trib.) Some would argue that the reason why this theology is an "endangered species" because it is inherently unstable (as above) and others would say that it is partly due to a lack of emphasis on it by those who espouse it. More recent examples include Schaeffer and Boice, who focused on more fundamental issues such as inerrancy, worldview (Schaeffer) and the doctrines of grace (Boice). The same could even be said of Spurgeon and Ryle. Their views on the restoration and regathering of Israel were plain enough, but that's not what they're remembered for. Horatius Bonar (a covenant premil who held to views on Israel that would generally be put in the "Dispensational" pile today) edited a quarterly journal on prophecy for almost a quarter century, but that's not what he's remembered for. By contrast the likes of Walvoord are going to be remembered for their eschatology and little else. 

As I noted earlier, there have been covenant premils who are pre-trib and there are at least a few today. Unless he's changed his position, Dr. Michael Barrett of Puritan Reformed Seminary (formerly of the Free Presbyterian Church in North America, which is as much fundamentalist as it is Reformed) is premil and pre-trib but is nevertheless strongly opposed to dispensationalism. Also keep in mind that what he is refuting there (to my recollection) is Scofieldism, more or less, and that he was teaching within a fundamentalist context, albeit Presbyterian, and was closely associated with Bob Jones University. In that context, dispensationalism encompassed a lot more than pre-trib, and to some extent it still does. And he has said that he holds his views on eschatology somewhat loosely compared to his other convictions. But I think that many of his objections to dispensationalism would also apply to PD given his strong commitment to covenant theology, Puritan spirituality (which most Dispensationalists of any stripe would consider to be legalist), his objection to the novelty of dispensationalism, and so on.

Reactions: Like 1


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## RamistThomist

Von said:


> Some of you mention that you haven't actually met someone who holds to FV theology. Do you think this is due to:
> 1) People don't know they are holding to it
> 2) It's not as common (yet)



FV is small. While it won some judicial victories (or at least forced a stalemate) in some PCA courts, it is still a minority within a minority (Reformed people) in America.


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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> While we have to be careful with our definitions (and one can wrangle over that for a long time), this is generally true, although I don't know that there has really been much movement in the past 20-25 years. And there really can't be much more movement on Israel or PD will cease to be any kind of dispensationalism at all. I know that Bock (one of the fathers of prog. disp.) has basically said as much with regard to why he is still a dispensationalist as opposed to historic premil. Ladd had a lot of influence on prog. disp. with regard to the "Already, Not Yet" view of the kingdom as opposed to the totally postponed kingdom of the older dispensationalism. But again, much of the difference between what goes forth under the banner of "historic" premil today and PD is because Ladd and those he influenced basically embraced "replacement theology" in a way that older historic premils did not. The older historic premils and PD are not that far apart on what they believe(d) about Israel's future. But paradoxically given today's landscape, the older premils also were more covenantal in their view of the law, the Sabbath and so on.
> 
> There are (and have been) diversities, but some would argue that they are the exceptions that prove the rule. There are progressive Dispensationalists who are pre-wrath, but that is still a separate rapture. Robert Gundry considers himself a Dispensational (because of what he believes about Israel as opposed to someone like Ladd) but he is post-trib. The Presbyterians Boice, Schaeffer and Buswell all held to a rapture that is separate from the second coming, either pre or mid-trib, yet they were covenantal. I think they believed in a separate rapture on exegetical grounds as opposed to sort of an _a priori_ commitment to keep Israel and the Church separate the way that dispensationalists have tended to do. Some have argued that covenantal pre-trib or mid-trib (or even post-trib when it is "Zionistic") is inherently unstable and that either you are going to end up more on the Dispensational side or more of a "historic" premil that basically reads OT prophecy the way that amils do (e.g. Ladd, Grudem.)
> 
> In general there has been a decline of even a loose covenant theology among evangelicals over the past century. Most baptistic people who have abandoned dispensationalism haven't adopted covenant theology, strictly speaking. In that sense, covenant premil and historic premil aren't exactly the same. (From what I understand, Ladd rejected covenant theology of the type taught in the 1689.) Dispensationalists tend to equate the two because to many of them, if you aren't dispensational, you're "covenantal" since they tend to erroneously reduce that down to the Israel/church issue. There's a lot more to covenant theology than "replacement theology." (I'm not wanting to discuss the propriety of using that term (which some covenantalists have indeed used in some sense, albeit a minority today) but am using it as a shorthand for the purposes of illustration.)
> 
> There are fewer differences between progressive dispensationalism and a "historic" premillennialism that isn't tied to any form of confessional covenant theology, since many of them aren't really going to differ with progressive dispensationalists on the Law of God, etc. But among those who do embrace covenant theology, other differences include law and grace, what the OT saints knew and believed (i.e. the specific content of their faith) etc. The differences in soteriology aren't generally as wide as they are with Scofieldism, but there are still some differences.
> 
> But that kind of older covenant premil that I've alluded to seems to be almost extinct outside of things like the Sovereign Grace Advent Testimony (which seems to be dominated nowadays by men from the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster), some Sovereign Grace Baptists (the ones I'm thinking of that I've come across on SermonAudio are covenantal but also more or less Landmarker), and some FB groups. (All of the above are basically post-trib.) Some would argue that the reason why this theology is an "endangered species" because it is inherently unstable (as above) and others would say that it is partly due to a lack of emphasis on it by those who espouse it. More recent examples include Schaeffer and Boice, who focused on more fundamental issues such as inerrancy, worldview (Schaeffer) and the doctrines of grace (Boice). The same could even be said of Spurgeon and Ryle. Their views on the restoration and regathering of Israel were plain enough, but that's not what they're remembered for. Horatius Bonar (a covenant premil who held to views on Israel that would generally be put in the "Dispensational" pile today) edited a quarterly journal on prophecy for almost a quarter century, but that's not what he's remembered for. By contrast the likes of Walvoord are going to be remembered for their eschatology and little else.
> 
> As I noted earlier, there have been covenant premils who are pre-trib and there are at least a few today. Unless he's changed his position, Dr. Michael Barrett of Puritan Reformed Seminary (formerly of the Free Presbyterian Church in North America, which is as much fundamentalist as it is Reformed) is premil and pre-trib but is nevertheless strongly opposed to dispensationalism. Also keep in mind that what he is refuting there (to my recollection) is Scofieldism, more or less, and that he was teaching within a fundamentalist context, albeit Presbyterian, and was closely associated with Bob Jones University. In that context, dispensationalism encompassed a lot more than pre-trib, and to some extent it still does. And he has said that he holds his views on eschatology somewhat loosely compared to his other convictions. But I think that many of his objections to dispensationalism would also apply to PD given his strong commitment to covenant theology, Puritan spirituality (which most Dispensationalists of any stripe would consider to be legalist), his objection to the novelty of dispensationalism, and so on.


I did not realize that one could be holding with Covenant theology and still be pre mil and pre trib Rature, as thought the seperate rapture was denied?


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## arapahoepark

Pilgrim said:


> While we have to be careful with our definitions (and one can wrangle over that for a long time), this is generally true, although I don't know that there has really been much movement in the past 20-25 years. And there really can't be much more movement on Israel or PD will cease to be any kind of dispensationalism at all. I know that Bock (one of the fathers of prog. disp.) has basically said as much with regard to why he is still a dispensationalist as opposed to historic premil. Ladd had a lot of influence on prog. disp. with regard to the "Already, Not Yet" view of the kingdom as opposed to the totally postponed kingdom of the older dispensationalism. But again, much of the difference between what goes forth under the banner of "historic" premil today and PD is because Ladd and those he influenced basically embraced "replacement theology" in a way that older historic premils did not. The older historic premils and PD are not that far apart on what they believe(d) about Israel's future. But paradoxically given today's landscape, the older premils also were more covenantal in their view of the law, the Sabbath and so on.
> 
> There are (and have been) diversities, but some would argue that they are the exceptions that prove the rule. There are progressive Dispensationalists who are pre-wrath, but that is still a separate rapture. Robert Gundry considers himself a Dispensational (because of what he believes about Israel as opposed to someone like Ladd) but he is post-trib. The Presbyterians Boice, Schaeffer and Buswell all held to a rapture that is separate from the second coming, either pre or mid-trib, yet they were covenantal. I think they believed in a separate rapture on exegetical grounds as opposed to sort of an _a priori_ commitment to keep Israel and the Church separate the way that dispensationalists have tended to do. Some have argued that covenantal pre-trib or mid-trib (or even post-trib when it is "Zionistic") is inherently unstable and that either you are going to end up more on the Dispensational side or more of a "historic" premil that basically reads OT prophecy the way that amils do (e.g. Ladd, Grudem.)
> 
> In general there has been a decline of even a loose covenant theology among evangelicals over the past century. Most baptistic people who have abandoned dispensationalism haven't adopted covenant theology, strictly speaking. In that sense, covenant premil and historic premil aren't exactly the same. (From what I understand, Ladd rejected covenant theology of the type taught in the 1689.) Dispensationalists tend to equate the two because to many of them, if you aren't dispensational, you're "covenantal" since they tend to erroneously reduce that down to the Israel/church issue. There's a lot more to covenant theology than "replacement theology." (I'm not wanting to discuss the propriety of using that term (which some covenantalists have indeed used in some sense, albeit a minority today) but am using it as a shorthand for the purposes of illustration.)
> 
> There are fewer differences between progressive dispensationalism and a "historic" premillennialism that isn't tied to any form of confessional covenant theology, since many of them aren't really going to differ with progressive dispensationalists on the Law of God, etc. But among those who do embrace covenant theology, other differences include law and grace, what the OT saints knew and believed (i.e. the specific content of their faith) etc. The differences in soteriology aren't generally as wide as they are with Scofieldism, but there are still some differences.
> 
> But that kind of older covenant premil that I've alluded to seems to be almost extinct outside of things like the Sovereign Grace Advent Testimony (which seems to be dominated nowadays by men from the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster), some Sovereign Grace Baptists (the ones I'm thinking of that I've come across on SermonAudio are covenantal but also more or less Landmarker), and some FB groups. (All of the above are basically post-trib.) Some would argue that the reason why this theology is an "endangered species" because it is inherently unstable (as above) and others would say that it is partly due to a lack of emphasis on it by those who espouse it. More recent examples include Schaeffer and Boice, who focused on more fundamental issues such as inerrancy, worldview (Schaeffer) and the doctrines of grace (Boice). The same could even be said of Spurgeon and Ryle. Their views on the restoration and regathering of Israel were plain enough, but that's not what they're remembered for. Horatius Bonar (a covenant premil who held to views on Israel that would generally be put in the "Dispensational" pile today) edited a quarterly journal on prophecy for almost a quarter century, but that's not what he's remembered for. By contrast the likes of Walvoord are going to be remembered for their eschatology and little else.
> 
> As I noted earlier, there have been covenant premils who are pre-trib and there are at least a few today. Unless he's changed his position, Dr. Michael Barrett of Puritan Reformed Seminary (formerly of the Free Presbyterian Church in North America, which is as much fundamentalist as it is Reformed) is premil and pre-trib but is nevertheless strongly opposed to dispensationalism. Also keep in mind that what he is refuting there (to my recollection) is Scofieldism, more or less, and that he was teaching within a fundamentalist context, albeit Presbyterian, and was closely associated with Bob Jones University. In that context, dispensationalism encompassed a lot more than pre-trib, and to some extent it still does. And he has said that he holds his views on eschatology somewhat loosely compared to his other convictions. But I think that many of his objections to dispensationalism would also apply to PD given his strong commitment to covenant theology, Puritan spirituality (which most Dispensationalists of any stripe would consider to be legalist), his objection to the novelty of dispensationalism, and so on.


I suppose being a former dispensationalist not of the Scofield or Chafer variety, I see the idea of a Pre-trib or any sort of 'rapture' during some sort future seven year tribulation as inherently bound up with dispensationalism. I consider it one of the main reasons why it is still dangerous. It takes some exegetical leaps that are indefensible. I read every article at the Pre Trib Research center back in those days and found them all wanting because I wanted to know how in the world they got to that view as other reading challenged such an idea. I desparately wanted to defend it. Now look where I ended up. I find it disheartening that those who are covenantal can hold to such a view.


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## Pilgrim

Dachaser said:


> I did not realize that one could be holding with Covenant theology and still be pre mil and pre trib Rature, as thought the seperate rapture was denied?



Well, I think most people here (and confessional Reformed folk generally) would agree with you. But there have been some, especially 50+ years ago, who held to both whatever we may think of that combo. This was one of the reasons why the Bible Presbyterian Church split from the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in the late 30s. But my guess is that they would have ended up splitting even if all of the fundamentalists (as opposed to confessionalists) had been post-trib.


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## Pilgrim

arapahoepark said:


> I suppose being a former dispensationalist not of the Scofield or Chafer variety, I see the idea of a Pre-trib or any sort of 'rapture' during some sort future seven year tribulation as inherently bound up with dispensationalism. I consider it one of the main reasons why it is still dangerous. It takes some exegetical leaps that are indefensible. I read every article at the Pre Trib Research center back in those days and found them all wanting. I find it disheartening that those who are covenantal can hold to such a view.



Few do today, especially outside of the Bible Presbyterian Church. And it seems that it may be on the wane in what is left of the BPC. I've come across one or more of their pastors on SermonAudio who is a partial preterist, If I recall correctly. That would have been unthinkable in the past when even post-trib premil could be controversial. (I'm certainly no expert on the BPC, but I think you're probably more likely to find pre-trib in the group that split from the BPC in recent years over the BPC's new friendly stance toward the OPC. (That's the church that Carl Mcintire pastored for many years.))


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## arapahoepark

Pilgrim said:


> Few do today, especially outside of the Bible Presbyterian Church. And it seems that it may be on the wane in what is left of the BPC. I've come across one or more of their pastors on SermonAudio who is a partial preterist, If I recall correctly. That would have been unthinkable in the past when even post-trib premil could be controversial.


Makes sense regarding the Bible Presbyterians since dispensationalism filled a vacuum during the Fundamentalist controversy. In many ways all three of those groups were bound up at one time now that I think about it.


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## Pilgrim

Von said:


> Some of you mention that you haven't actually met someone who holds to FV theology. Do you think this is due to:
> 1) People don't know they are holding to it
> 2) It's not as common (yet)



Were it not for the popularity of Douglas Wilson's books on the family and his influence on the homeschool and classical Christian education movements, I doubt it would have become as prevalent as it has. It also came out of theonomic circles, and most Presbyterians probably haven't met a theonomist, at least to their knowledge. (Some theonomists and similar folk strongly opposed it, but the seeds of FV may have been present in theonomic circles even in the early 80s, if not before.) In a nutshell, it emanated from certain ministries and churches. If one is in circles where those ministries had very little to no influence, then more likely than not one has never met a FVer. But it was a big enough problem for most if not all NAPARC denominations to issue reports against it. 

Some who are basically FV abandoned Presbyterianism for Anglicanism also.


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## KMK

Chances are, if you 'know' any FVers, Hyper-preterists, Kinists, Furries, Flat-earthers, etc, it is because you spend time searching the internet. The chances of you ever meeting one, and having a lengthy enough conversation to discover these things about someone, doesn't usually happen IRL.

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## Dachaser

Pilgrim said:


> Well, I think most people here (and confessional Reformed folk generally) would agree with you. But there have been some, especially 50+ years ago, who held to both whatever we may think of that combo. This was one of the reasons why the Bible Presbyterian Church split from the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in the late 30s. But my guess is that they would have ended up splitting even if all of the fundamentalists (as opposed to confessionalists) had been post-trib.


This is interesting to me, as it seems that the group that would advocate for the Pre trib pre mil views would be Presbyterian Reformed, while those who support it from the Baptist side would be Dispensational like Dr Macarthur then?


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## Semper Fidelis

Pilgrim said:


> It seems to me that the biggest danger now is probably the various forms of progressivism in the PCA (and elsewhere) that some have raised the alarm about. But that could also be a vehicle for more openness to FV since they are "conservative" after all. That's how many have been drawn to Roman Catholicism.


Maybe but I'm not sure. There's sort of always a "middle" that seems to go along with whatever side of the conversation predominates. I think we're awash in a sea of sociological "givens" by some who are so focused on racial reconciliation and "racial justice" (I still don't know exactly what it means) that they may have an outsized voice to the actual concerns of day-to-day ministry. Don't get me wrong, I think the issues of race and culture are important but I was reflecting upon this today. My day-to-day thoughts about ministry and life span a wide swath of technical, religious, theological, political, economic, and many other issues. Even when I'm thinking about the Church my interests and concerns range across many issues impacting the broader Church as well as my local context where I serve as and Elder.

I think there are many in a new focus on these issues who really spend far too much time seeing everything through a single lens. I think it actually tends to make the more illiberal than liberal because they conceive of everybody as either caring as much about their issue or not at all. There is sort of "new orthodoxy" with some that you actually have to accept notions of white privilege (and use the term) and other terms borrowed from sociology that have been baptized for supposed Christian use but don't have very clear definitions. If you don't use them then you're viewed as not taking seriously the plight of others. My closest comparison is the hard corps theonomists who want to turn every conversation in the direction of having a full-orbed worldview that corresponds to their particular version of a "truth project" edifice where you either accept their economic and political theories and applying God's Laws to them or you're not really a serious Christian. In other words, the political and sociological theories are "take it or you're against me" on both sides - the hard-corps theonomist or the "you must believe in white privilege or you cannot minister to minorities" racial justice folks. Honestly, I don't want to take sides on the issue but want to maintain friendships and be able to partner and let them have their particular convictions but the fervor makes it really hard to just "get along".

I guess what I'm getting at is that most people don't have the same amount of zeal and so the "true believers" end up accusing everyone of incrementalism and get fed up and leave. I think that would be sad for the Church as people need to learn to be challenged with their views and recognize that sanctification is a winding road but some are so focused on it (and really write or talk about little else) that they're sort of in a bubble of the like-minded and can't see that the rest are not really moving with them nor can they understand how to just talk to normal folk who don't have the time (or even education) to understand how race theory really blends with Christianity and, after all, is this really what is most pressing for the American Church?

Sorry if I'm unclear but I sometimes think that these issues (though concerning) may not have the long-term legs we are concerned about at the moment because the proponents end up burning too hotly and cannot sustain that amount of energy and frustration in the long run. I think that's why FV has fizzled out in many places as well. Maybe a lot of it has to do with the fact that their own children are not taking up the mantle of the "cause".

I also think we'll be in for some debates over "sexual identity" and see whether folks will be able to resist the culture or keep coming up with creative ways to avoid the notion that our corruption is actual sin and not some sort of "natural evil" where we can, like blindness, chalk things up to being "born that way" but "to the glory of God" and that we just have to love who we are (or they are) and...well we'll see.

Again, I'm not a prophet but I think some will lose patience. Let's just leave it at that.




MW said:


> I hope so; but recoil from antinomianism has a tendency to lead towards neonomianism and vice versa, so these concepts have manifested themselves on a recurring basis.



True. I think there are always dangers. The fact that FV is sort of teeny tiny doesn't mean it's not dangerous for those who are buying into it. Correspondingly, just because we're not in danger of buying into the FV wholesale doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of antinomianism either. I see a lot of versions of Tullian's theology in many corners.



ReformedReidian said:


> FV is small. While it won some judicial victories (or at least forced a stalemate) in some PCA courts, it is still a minority within a minority (Reformed people) in America.


I agree. Given what I noted about some of the things that are occupying the PCA's attention, we're certainly not seeing much from FV types.

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## RamistThomist

Semper Fidelis said:


> I agree. Given what I noted about some of the things that are occupying the PCA's attention, we're certainly not seeing much from FV types.



I almost wonder if the CREC functioned as kind of a release-valve. True, it's horrible teaching and I would hate to be a female in the CREC, but it did take a lot of pressure off the PCA. That's good. I don't think the PCA could fight a two-front war against the SJW-Cultural Marxists AND the FV.

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## arapahoepark

ReformedReidian said:


> I almost wonder if the CREC functioned as kind of a release-valve. True, it's horrible teaching and I would hate to be a female in the CREC, but it did take a lot of pressure off the PCA. That's good. I don't think the PCA could fight a two-front war against the SJW-Cultural Marxists AND the FV.


I thought they were and have lost some in some theaters of the war with FV? PNW °cough*


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## RamistThomist

arapahoepark said:


> I thought they were and have lost some in some theaters of the war with FV? PNW °cough*



They did, but the FV knew that the PNW was all the territory they could really take at the moment. For a while it looked like the St Louis area would fall to the armies of FV (to continue the apt metaphor), but it seemed like the Social Justice crowd came on the scene and pushed FV out.


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## MW

KMK said:


> Chances are, if you 'know' any FVers, Hyper-preterists, Kinists, Furries, Flat-earthers, etc, it is because you spend time searching the internet. The chances of you ever meeting one, and having a lengthy enough conversation to discover these things about someone, doesn't usually happen IRL.



The people searching the internet bring their ideas to church with them. The Federal Vision is a vision for the church. The other ideas work with separatists, and in some cases they are the catalyst for their separation. I would say the tendency towards neonomianism is more present in the church than appears at first glance; and so far as the ecclesiastical elements of the FV are concerned, there is a natural bent within sinners to turn the means of grace into grace itself. The evangelical pulpit has regularly issued warnings against ritual and nominal resting in the means.


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## Edward

Semper Fidelis said:


> There is sort of "new orthodoxy" with some that you actually have to accept notions of white privilege (and use the term)



I haven't had an opportunity to do so yet, but if I run across any 'white privilege' talk, I think I'll say, "It's a burden, not a privilege" and start talking about "The White Man's Burden" and Kipling's educational poem of that name. 

Remember Edward's Rules of Debate:

Never let the other side set the ground rules. Never let the other side constrain your arguments. And move the middle ground.

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## Von

Pilgrim said:


> Were it not for the popularity of Douglas Wilson's books on the family and his influence on the homeschool and classical Christian education movements, I doubt it would have become as prevalent as it has.


I see Douglas Wilson recanted. https://dougwils.com/s16-theology/federal-vision-no-mas.html
Well sort of... 
Or not...
It just shows you that as soon as an idea is public property, it's not your idea anymore and it takes on a life of its own.


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## UserGone221

I don't understand FV and I don't understand why they got involved in something that became so divisive. They began with respect of the historical confessions.
I watched over years as snark became snarkier and irony became nasty and nastier. The race to see who could insult the deepest became the Tour de Idaho as if walking away with a smug feeling was the chief end, itself.

Among followers, the priority of the language became the ability to argue rather than Christ, Himself, as they posted wilsonish insults. 

I got lost trying to grasp the point when "neo" was added to "neo" one too many times.


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