Hi Guys.
I'm premillennial. However eschatology is my weakest area. I was raised amillennial but I don't believe Riddlebargers arguments make much sense anymore compared with what scripture actually says. I believe it must literal not symbolic or it just doesn't make sense.
Are any of you strong premillenialists who can share some good resources with me? My primary resources right now are John Macarthur and the post apostolic fathers.
While I have a lot of respect for Dr. Riddlebarger, I have to agree. Several years ago I attended a conference in our area in which he spoke on prophecy. Ultimately I was unconvinced and moved into the premil camp. But I can say that I went to an amil prophecy conference, something that many have never heard of, much less actually experienced!
Hopefully this won't get me into too much trouble, but I agree that
some of MacArthur's teaching on some passages can indeed be read with profit and can be embraced by most any premillennialist (especially "strong" ones) since not all of it relates to pretribulationism/dispensationalism specifically. And he basically makes no mention of dispensations at all, particularly in the Study Bible. But as noted by several other posters in this thread, he's certainly not covenantal. He continues to make a distinction between the Church and Israel that Spurgeon et. al. rejected in the strongest terms and is unconfessional even in the broadest sense of the term due to his dispensationalism. It's certainly not a choice between his "leaky dispensationalism" (his term) and amil, although that's basically what I thought at one time when I was just starting to study theology.
Simply affirming TULIP is not enough to be deemed confessional or Reformed by the standards of this board or by any reasonable standard at all (at least not without redefining what it has historically meant) no matter what the Young, Restless and Reformed, T4G or the Gospel Coalition may say. Some of them have little use for historic confessions anyway while others are quite confessional. But I've found that the latter is a rarity in the SBC or any of the other above named camps where one is deemed Reformed or Calvinist simply because TULIP is affirmed but where wide latitude is granted otherwise. I am not out to slam the SBC or any of the other above named camps but am simply pointing out some differences between many Calvinistic men within broader evangelical circles and the more confessional mindset that you will find here.
As has been pointed out in previous posts, there is a Baptist version of covenant theology that is embodied in the 1689 London Confession and in many historic and Reformed Baptist books in case you are under the impression that affirming covenant theology necessitates paedobaptism or are unfamiliar with it in general. Read the confession, particularly the chapters on the Covenant and the Law and maybe even the church and I think you'll see the difference between that and MacArthur et al. If you don't see that, then you either haven't read Mac or the confession closely enough. There is a doctrinal statement in the back of the MacArthur Study Bible that should be an accurate representation of his views.
Now to finally get to what you asked for. It is good that you're asking for other resources. I wish that I had availed myself of a wider variety of resources early in my sojourn and would have closely studied the pertinent biblical passages. I am convinced that I was amil for a long time because I really didn't seriously study the issue and because amil in general seems to be simpler than the other views. I accepted it immediately the first time I heard it presented in a sermon, even though I had not studied Last Things in any depth. It was also because I had very little exposure to historic premil views and had not read Reformed premil writers. I had not really read any dispensational writers in any detail either and didn't have a firm grasp on what they believed until the past few of years.
Since you are SBC you may be aware that a good many SBC pastors and professors today, particularly Calvinistic ones, identify with the historic premil camp. But in my experience that simply means they are not amil and aren't dispensational and in many cases haven't really studied the issue in detail. We don't want to go to seed on prophecy the way many in the past two centuries tended to do, but despite the likes of Lindsey, Van Impe and LaHaye it shouldn't be neglected either, especially considering the huge amount of prophecy we find in both testaments.
I've recently discovered the
Sovereign Grace Advent Testimony, which is dedicated to publishing older premil material by Reformed men as well as non-pretrib Brethren writers who rejected Darby's scheme, most notably B.W. Newton. There seems to be a good deal of Free Presbyterian Church (Northern Island and perhaps those in the USA as well) involvement in the SGAT. (I think most if not all of the Free Pres. pastors are on Sermon Audio. Apparently a fair number of them are premil, so they would be worth investigating.) Since the SGAT are based in the UK, I doubt it would be worth trying to order any of their publications unless you can't get it anywhere else, and I don't know if they ship to the USA anyway. (If anyone is aware of USA distribution of any of that material, I would be overjoyed.) But most of their available titles are in the public domain and many can be found online elsewhere. I found some of them
here and
here. You could check Google Books as well.
I've also had good results searching for key words on Sermon Audio. Recently I found a series of messages on Premillennialism by
Dr. Hamp Linehan, a Reformed Baptist pastor who has posted here in the past. I think he was involved in the thread involving Rev. Winzer that was noted earlier in this discussion. Apparently Dr. Linehan was not persuaded by the assertion that nobody but fanatics were premil! So far I've only listened to the first message in which he stated that in his judgment that there are several passages that he thinks necessitates a premil interpretation, but I would imagine the other two are helpful as well.
Another good resource is
Barry Horner's site. He seems to be somewhere in between New Covenant Theology and Progressive Dispensationalism (I think he may be up in the air on the timing of the rapture, no pun intended) but he has a lot of material by Horatius Bonar posted, who was a 19th Century covenantal premil minister. Bonar is best known as a hymn writer today but he was a voluminous writer who wrote on a wide range of subjects, including eschatology. Horner has posted some material by Ryle and Spurgeon as well. Horner's book is worthwhile as well, in my judgment, although as with everything it should be read with discernment. A lot of what he writes on his site and in his book could be written by a covenantal premillenarian. I do think he overplays the anti-Judaism angle somewhat (particularly in leading with it) although he does make some good points with regard to older amil writers like Pieters (not to mention Luther's anti-semitic writings. Waldron says the problem was sacralism and not amillennialism and that is a valid point as well in my opinion.) Horner also helpfully exposes what amounts to Palestinianism (as opposed to Zionism) on the part of some anti-Zionist writers. But it should be noted that rhetoric like Pieters in general is no more representative of Reformed amils today than Chafer's system is of most contemporary dispensationalists.
Another excellent resource, although also non-covenantal, is the
SLJ Institute. Unlike MacArthur, who to me at times is particularly egregious in broad-brushing and failing to accurately and charitably represent opposing views, Dr. Johnson (a longtime Dallas Seminary professor who had to leave due to his conversion to Five Point Calvinism) made a concerted effort to study and understand covenant theology and tried to represent it accurately, particularly in his lengthy series "The Divine Purpose." In the series
The Divine Purpose he seemed to me to be moving away from normative dispensationalism and at the end stated that he did not see very much evidence (if any, it's been a while since I listened so I can't remember his statement exactly) for a pretrib rapture. At any rate, it along with other messages there are helpful in exploring relevant passages whether one agrees or disagrees. Bruce Waltke, a theologian who was a dispensationalist who later turned amil, said Dr. Johnson was the best expository preacher of the 20th Century. I add that not to say I think that's necessarily right, but to note the esteem in which he was held even by peers who had strong disagreements with him.
For strong and robust Reformed covenantal premil presentations, I think the 19th and maybe early-mid 20th Century writers and preachers may be the best option. Men like Ryle and Spurgeon set forth their convictions and are very good and quite accessible examples of that school of thought, but I think
Bonar may be more helpful in the long run as he spent much more time engaging opposing views in his Quarterly Journal of Prophecy and elsewhere.
Nathaniel West was a 19th Century Presbyterian premillennialist of note who rejected dispensationalism as well but I don't know if any of his work is currently in print. I tried to find it on Google Books but I don't remember finding any of it with previews available.
I don't know what his denominational/confessional affiliation was but I have read good things about David Baron's books and commentaries.
Alexander Reese was a 20th Century Presbyterian missionary. His
Approaching Advent of Christ is a notable mid 20th Century historic premil refutation of dispensationalism. (I'd be curious to know which Presbyterian denomination Reese was affiliated with. My guess is UPCUSA or PCUS. Perhaps our resident PCA Historian could weigh in?)
Robert Duncan Culver is said to be another excellent resource, both his Systematic Theology and his
Daniel and the Latter Days, both of which I hope to acquire soon. I think the latter book is out of print but doesn't seem to be too hard to find at a reasonable price on Amazon and elsewhere. I don't think Culver is a covenant theologian, but neither are Schreiner, Ladd and Blomberg and they've all been recommended by moderators in this thread.
I'm not sure what Culver's view on the rapture is (he does not reveal his view in his systematic, referring the reader to other works of his) but I recently saw a dispensationalist review his systematic who concluded that Culver could not be called a dispensationalist.
I don't know if Blomberg and the other contributors to that book are even 5 pointers. Consistent with the sad downgrade at Fuller in his day, Ladd did not even affirm inerrancy. (That's not to say their works are wholly without merit but that in my opinion taken as a whole they are really not any more confessional than MacArthur.)
Regardless, Ladd's writings on eschatology and his application of the Already/Not Yet principle have been highly influential among evangelicals, even to the point of having a significant influence on more recent developments in the amil camp, probably most notably with Anthony Hoekema's work. I would think
The Blessed Hope would be the place to start reading Ladd. (Already/Not Yet appears to me to have been applied in other areas of theology in potentially disastrous ways but that is beyond the scope of our discussion here.)
I think you also may find Millard Erickson's work to be of service. His
Basic Guide to Eschatology may be a good place for you to begin your study. He is post tribulational but I believe largely keeps his own views out of the book. Unfortunately I'm not familiar with his systematic text.
Here is a helpful article by the Presbyterian Wick Broomall that reveals important differences between historic (or older) premillennialism and dispensationalism. I'd be interested to see the book it was excerpted from but I think it has been long out of print. His statement that most dispensationalists hold to seven dispensations however is somewhat dated (my guess is that the book dates from about the 70's) as it appears that most younger dispensationalists today, even at Dallas Seminary, embrace some form of progressive dispensationalism and aren't likely to hold to that rigid Scofieldian scheme of seven dispensations with each including a test. But it is still popular in IFB circles and on the lay level in some independent Bible churches, and probably among a fair number of Southern Baptists as well, particularly older ones. Not long ago in an independent Bible church Sunday School class which I attended a man quite confidently stated that there was a different plan of salvation for the OT saints compared with the present church age.
Speaking of premil Presbyterians, there is J. Barton Payne's massive tome,
The Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy. There is J. Oliver Buswell's Systematic as well. Both appear to be out of print. Both were on the faculty at the PCA's Covenant Seminary, but that was back when it was a RPCES school. Premil Presbyterians of any stripe appear to be an endangered species outside of the Bible Presbyterian Church.
Francis Schaeffer was premil too. There is a sermon on Revelation in
No Little People in which he states that the events of Rev. 4ff are future but I don't know what else he wrote or taught on the subject. Gordon H. Clark has a short defense of his historic premil views in his book on the Westminster Confession and recommends Alexander Reese's book as a premil refutation of dispensationalism.
Douglas Moo is another post-trib premillennialist. All of the professors at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School are premillennial (or at least they are supposed to be according to the doctrinal statement!) I don't know if any are covenantal, but again, I don't think any of the other writers that were previously recommended in this thread are either with the possible exception of Grudem. I have an essay of Moo's in which he explains why he is post-trib that I can send you if you want, along with a good number of other PDFs and Word files from various other theologians on this subject that I've collected over the years.
I understand that John Gill was premillennial as well, although I have to confess to having little knowledge of his particular eschatological views beyond that.
Monergism is always a good resource, although some of the links on their
Historic Premillennialism site appear to be miscategorized. I'm thinking particularly of the links to Historicism, which are most likely going to teach postmillennialism of the variety that was popular around the time the WCF was published. Some historic or covenant premils are probably much more futurist than they are historicist.
Thanks to Kerry Gilliard for the link to the Messiah's Kingdom site. I don't recall ever having come across that website before and it appears to have some helpful information while also appearing to be a work in progress.
. Let's just say we don't act like we just discovered eschatology 60 years ago.
