# Did the Apostle's expect the return of Christ in their



## Puritan Sailor (Mar 6, 2004)

This point was raised on the Art in Worship thread and I thought I would get your opinions. I disagree with this assertion. I think it is manifestly evident that the Apostles desired the return of Christ in their day but I don't think they expected it. What do you all think?


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## Puritan Sailor (Mar 6, 2004)

[quote:0d970b78cc][i:0d970b78cc]Originally posted by Paul manata[/i:0d970b78cc]
what return are you referring to. His comming in judgment in a.d. 70 (I'm a partial preterist...not dogmatically though), or the final advent. I would answer that they did expect the first...not the second of the above commings.
[/quote:0d970b78cc]
I would say the big bang, the 2nd Coming, not the destruction of Jerusalem.


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## heartoflesh (Mar 6, 2004)

They expected it as much as we expect it. I don't think you can say dogmatically that the Apostles believed it [b:06d2cbe86d]had[/b:06d2cbe86d] to occur during their lifetime, but they preached as if it were going to.


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## luvroftheWord (Mar 6, 2004)

Read Richard Pratt's article in the book on Hyper-preterism if you have access at all. It will help with this question.


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## Guest (Mar 6, 2004)

[quote:dd6096012c]
I would say the big bang, the 2nd Coming, not the destruction of Jerusalem. 
[/quote:dd6096012c]

What makes you think the Destruction in 70 A.D. was NOT the second coming ?

For us who embrace &quot;realized millenialism&quot; it certainly could have been.


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## luvroftheWord (Mar 6, 2004)

A.D. 70 could NOT have been the second coming because there was no resurrection of the dead. And also, how exactly do you define &quot;realized millennialism&quot;?

[Edited on 3-7-2004 by luvroftheWord]


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## Galahad (Mar 6, 2004)

Question: we see the coming in AD 70 as a partial fulfilment - but was that the fulfilment the Apostles and the early church expected? It seems as if we, who have the benefit of 2000 years can see where this doesn't fit all the prophecy, but can you say that they weren't expecting it to happen?

I don't have my Bible with me, perhaps somebody can find Jesus' statement where he implies that one of the Disciples might still be alive when he returns?
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Jeffrey Brannen


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## Guest (Mar 6, 2004)

[quote:5bcd64be15]
A.D. 70 could NOT have been the second coming because there was no resurrection of the dead. And also, how exactly do you define &quot;realized millennialism&quot;? 
[/quote:5bcd64be15]

You are seeing the Second Coming as a singular event. I am viewing it as something that takes place over time beginning in 70 A.D.

&quot;Realized Millenialism&quot; is the correct term for what is commonly and most absurdly called &quot;amillenialism&quot;.

I am a partial preterist with an escatological view of realized millennium, yet always secretly wishing the Post Millenialist were right.


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## Puritan Sailor (Mar 7, 2004)

[quote:6fecbb8aac]I don't have my Bible with me, perhaps somebody can find Jesus' statement where he implies that one of the Disciples might still be alive when he returns? [/quote:6fecbb8aac]
This passage has that reference but John clarifies exactly what that means. It was a challenge of Christ to Peter basically saying &quot;mind your own business, I do with my disciples what I see fit.&quot;

John 21:
20 Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following, who also had leaned on His breast at the supper, and said, &quot;Lord, who is the one who betrays You?&quot; 21Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, &quot;But Lord, what about this man?&quot; 
22Jesus said to him, &quot;If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow Me.&quot; 
23Then this saying went out among the brethren that this disciple would not die. [b:6fecbb8aac]Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, &quot;If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?&quot;[/b:6fecbb8aac] 
24This is the disciple who testifies of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true.


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## Galahad (Mar 7, 2004)

Circumstantial evidence, true - but we are looking for a mindset, right? Would this not indicate that at least among the Apostles, for some period of time, they believed that Christ would come back before John died?

Visigoth - I don't think this post is to determine when Christ came back, but rather to determine when the 1st century Christians thought Jesus would return.
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Jeffrey Brannen


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2004)

[quote:63a6cfc9c9]
Visigoth - I don't think this post is to determine when Christ came back, but rather to determine when the 1st century Christians thought Jesus would return.
[/quote:63a6cfc9c9]

They knew He would return. And in 70 A.D. they saw the beginning of that fulfilled.


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## Puritan Sailor (Mar 7, 2004)

[quote:7a5b37ce86][i:7a5b37ce86]Originally posted by Galahad[/i:7a5b37ce86]
Circumstantial evidence, true - but we are looking for a mindset, right? Would this not indicate that at least among the Apostles, for some period of time, they believed that Christ would come back before John died?
[/quote:7a5b37ce86]
Not with John correcting them about it. This hope, if it existed that long, was based on a falsehood and John was correcting it.


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## Galahad (Mar 7, 2004)

Agreed - John was correcting a falsely held belief. So, for the sake of argument, if he is correcting a falsely held belief that the Apostles had, would you not say that the people the Apostles taught would also have had this false notion (which would need then to be corrected)? 

Visigoth - perhaps we are talking past each other - do you think that when Christ began the fulfilling his return in AD 70, is this what they were expecting? I would equate this with the expected Messiah - they were expecting it, but when it materialized in their lifetime, it was not in the form or manner they were expecting?

Or, are you saying that they expected a necessary partial fulfilment in their lifetime (AD70) but that they REALLY expected the full return to be many generations later?


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## Puritan Sailor (Mar 7, 2004)

[quote:dba13c2a98][i:dba13c2a98]Originally posted by Galahad[/i:dba13c2a98]
Agreed - John was correcting a falsely held belief. So, for the sake of argument, if he is correcting a falsely held belief that the Apostles had, would you not say that the people the Apostles taught would also have had this false notion (which would need then to be corrected)? 
[/quote:dba13c2a98]
If they did, we have no evidence of it in any of the other NT writings. So I would guess that such a notion was snuffed out pretty quick.


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## Galahad (Mar 7, 2004)

Puritansailor,

&lt;nods&gt; A good deduction, I think. I guess the best way to determine that would be to know when the Gospel of John was written. That would at least give us a final date that the problem had been authoritatively dealt with.
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~Jeffrey Brannen


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## Puritan Sailor (Mar 7, 2004)

[quote:354fdb0a06][i:354fdb0a06]Originally posted by Galahad[/i:354fdb0a06]
Puritansailor,

&lt;nods&gt; A good deduction, I think. I guess the best way to determine that would be to know when the Gospel of John was written. That would at least give us a final date that the problem had been authoritatively dealt with.
[/quote:354fdb0a06]
Conservative scholars generally agree the Gospel of John was one of the later books completed in the NT. But even so, the proof that the apostles expected an immenent final advent would have been evidenced in the earliest epistles such as James or Mark, or even mentions of it in the early part of Acts. But there is no reference to it. I've heard that James was written in the 40's AD. If that's the case, then John would have snuffed out any incorrent final advent understanding within the first 10-15 years after Christ's death and resurrection, even though he may have documented that correction much later.


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## Guest (Mar 8, 2004)

I will agree with that Paul.


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## Galahad (Mar 8, 2004)

Good point.


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## Contra_Mundum (Mar 8, 2004)

[quote:4f8c96e250]This point was raised on the Art in Worship thread and I thought I would get your opinions. I disagree with this assertion. I think it is manifestly evident that the Apostles desired the return of Christ in their day but I don't think they expected it. What do you all think?[/quote:4f8c96e250] That there was misunderstanding among Christian converts concerning the Lord's Return is plain from Paul's corrective teaching in I Thess (and to some extent in II Thess. also). 
It doesn't seem just to attribute this and similar errors to poor or fuzzy teaching on the part of the apostles. They were promised the Spirit who would guide them into all truth (John 15:26-16:15; I Cor. 2:13; Mk 13:11). 

The Already-Not Yet dynamic was just getting underway, and the apostles were brim-full of the Spirit's revelation. All of this was soon (within the remaining lifetimes of the apostles) to be committed to writing. In the meantime it shouldn't surprise us that the glories of their Spirit-inspired vision was sometimes amalgamated in the wrong way by their hearers. (The same kind of thing happens today with the written Word.)

I agree with the contention that judgment upon Jerusalem was expected imminently (within a generation). I don't think the apostles understanding on that issue was mentally fused with their cosmic eschatology, so that they had to disentangle them in their own minds as the years rolled by and the world did not end (the Jewish apocalyptic vision that certain German liberals foisted on NT scholarship). 

The apostles, much like Christians through the ages, expected the end [i:4f8c96e250]could[/i:4f8c96e250] come in their lifetime, but I think they had no timetable expectation.
:wr50:


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