I’ve had several conversations with friends over the years about eschatology. And in some cases I’ve responded in writing to specific objections at length. And in one case I was asked to do a series on the topic. In another case, I’ve encountered legitimate concerns, but concerns that I don’t think spring from my understanding of postmillennialism, at least. And since I’m already putting so much of my thinking on this topic into writing, I figured I would go ahead and do a series on it. My beliefs on eschatology were shaped by specific texts, and we will eventually get to those texts, as they are at the heart of the matter. I wasn’t convinced of it because of larger narratives associated with postmil. I was convinced of it because of what the Bible was saying in many specific passages. But I need to spend some time making preliminary remarks that are more broad in nature, and offer a brief overview that doesn’t zoom in on those specific passages just yet. Instead, I want to offer some of the overarching reasons for my being postmillennial.

Increasing Unity

There is a sense in which all eschatologies are converging together. Greater dialogue between differing schools is refining thought on the subject, and bringing all eschatologies into increasing overlap. For example, most postmillennialists, like myself, do not believe in a literal thousand year reign of Christ. We believe that number is figurative, to indicate a long era, or significant amount, like the Lord owning the cattle on a thousand hills. Sam Storms has said that there is not one instance of the number “one thousand” in Scripture being literal. We still speak this way today. His alarm clock went off a thousand times. But my point is that on this specific question: what is the millennium, most postmillennialists are amillennial. And so amillennialists and postmillennialists have converged in their understanding on this point. They also both share in common that we are in the millennium now. That Christ is reigning now. We see overlap with some premillenialists who have come to concede the partial-preterist interpretation of certain passages. And so they hold to a double fulfillment view. That certain prophecies which have already happened will happen in a greater way in the future. On this point I am sympathetic, and hold open the possibility of double or multiple fulfillments. For example, the passages prophesying the destruction of Jerusalem could very well have another sense to them which includes something prophetic about events in our future. So, here is another convergence of thought. That as a postmillennialists, I would affirm as a possibility something that some premillennialists also hold to: double fulfillment of prophesy. And I have seen amillennialists, like Sam Storms, also state that he believes this to be a possibility. Another example would be the role of Israel according the flesh plays in redemptive history. I am not a dispensationalists, but I would affirm that Israel according to the flesh is still significant in our time, and that the promises made to them as a people are still binding in some way. So, there is convergence of thought between myself, a postmillennialists and dispensationalists regarding Israel. This is not a weird eccentricity of my own, but something the Puritans, who were postmillennial, also believed. So, I want to point out that there is often a lot of overlap between varying eschatological views and that recently we have seen increasing overlap of understanding in multiple areas. And if I could make a semi-serious, semi-jesting point about the trend here, this growing unity concerning last things is very postmillennial.

Secondary Doctrine

In some ways, I have to acknowledge that eschatology is a secondary matter. That our understanding of these issues are not significant enough in most cases to warrant dis-fellowship. Someone who adheres to full preterism would likely warrant discipline or dis-fellowship. But with respect to the four main eschatologies, postmil, amil, premil, dispy, the Scriptures are not clear enough to make any particular understanding a dogma. And it’s important to keep in mind that all schools are united in the fundamental belief of Christ’s final return, the resurrection of the body, and last judgment.

However, for me, I am just as confident the Bible teaches postmillennialism as some are about justification by faith alone or Calvinistic soteriological formulations of the doctrines of grace. With some of these doctrines Christians are willing to anathematize their brothers in Christ for not having a Lutheran view of justification or a Calvinistic view of predestination. I am just as convinced of postmillennialism, but I am not going to anathematize anyone for not holding a postmillennial eschatology.

Definitions

Defining postmillennialism is tough. Labels are tough. Choose a label and you are constantly having to work your way through regular misunderstandings. But labels are arguably inescapable. And so I’m fine with using the label postmillennial to name my view on last things.

I would define postmillennialism as the belief that the gospel of Jesus Christ and His Kingdom has, is, and will continue to manifest truly and successfully on earth prior to Christ’s final return in judgment. Beyond this, I am fine identifying as postmil because I am in significantly more agreement with other Christians who identify as postmillennial, even if I differ from them on some points. So, if you present a taxonomy of the various schools and I had to pick, I would say I am in the postmil group.

Partial Preterism

I began a focused study on eschatology in 2012. At the time, I decided I was going to become a minister and I needed to know where I stood on some secondary and tertiary issues. I was raised with basically a dispensational premillennial understanding, but also some postmillennial assumptions and practice, which I will likely discuss in a later installment. But my parents and pastors would have never identified themselves or their teachings as postmillennial. I was raised watching The Left Behind series, and that was the eschatology we believed on paper. It’s what most evangelicals and pentecostals have believed for the past century. And I am an evangelical and a pentecostal. Evangelical because I believe the Bible is the highest authority for doctrine. Pentecostal because I believe and practice the gifts of the Spirit.

When I began studying eschatology there was one factor that really changed the game for me. Partial preterism. I can not overstate how much this shifted my thinking. I had read the Bible from cover to cover multiple times before doing a study on eschatology. And there were so many passages in the New Testament that were enigmatic to me. They were the New Testament passages about the coming of the Lord, the end of the age, the last days, etc. All the writers were writing in such a way that seemed to suggest Jesus was going to return soon. Were they mistaken? Why did Jesus say the generation he was speaking to would witness all those things about the end of the world? Why does John say in the first sentence of Revelation that the things in that book would shortly take place? As with many puzzling things in Scripture, we accept them all as true, even if we don’t understand them fully. But there was this growing unease and disconnect between the assumptions I had about these passages and what the passages were actually saying.

And then I discovered interpretations that viewed these enigmatic passages as already having occurred. That Jesus did return soon, in judgment on Jerusalem in AD 70. I didn’t even know Jerusalem was destroyed in AD 70. I began looking up the preterist interpretation of all of these passages that had been enigmatic to me. And once I began going down that rabbit hole, the further I went, the more relief I felt, the more clarity was provided to these passages. The more coherent the Bible became to me. It was a breath of fresh air. It was exciting to see the word of God affirmed in history, rather than being used for failed prediction after failed prediction of the end of the world in our day.

What made these interpretations even more appealing was that they weren’t interpretations that involved speculation about things that might occur in our future, or that involved speculation about things that were happening in the news in 1999. They were interpretations that used the Bible to interpret the Bible. That the language Jesus used in the Olivet discourse was the same language the prophets used in their prophecies against specific nations and cities, which were also destroyed in our past. This, I would argue, is one of the strongest aspects of postmil and partial-preterist understandings of New Testament prophecies, which is often shared by amillennialists, too. That the Bible is used to interpret the Bible. That we use the imagery and symbolism and language of previous prophecy to interpret later prophecy. It truly is remarkable to me how dismissive people are of postmillennialism, because the postmil interpretation is so frequently and heavily using the Bible’s own language to interpret the Bible’s own language. I don’t say this lightly or to be mean, but it seems to me that the premillennial interpretations eisegete many texts. They unwittingly import a lot of assumptions into various texts, while not giving due consideration to how the language in those texts have been used elsewhere in Scripture.

It also made the prophecies relevant to the hearers. That there wasn’t these weird, disruptive, interjections about things that would take place 2,000 years later, but things that would take place in the lifetime of the hearers. That Paul wasn’t writing an intimately pastoral letter to Timothy concerning real people in front of him that he knew and interacted with and oversaw the well-being of their souls, and then decided to tell him that in 2,000 years people are going to be exceedingly wicked. Why would Paul warn him of that? Makes much more sense to me that he was warning Timothy of increasing wickedness that he himself was going to witness and needed to be aware of as a pastor in Ephesus. This is just one example of this kind of thing. That sometimes we become solipsistic in our reading of Scripture. This is born out of a true and good instinct. That all of Scripture is written for our benefit and can be applied to us, but it becomes solipsistic when we sometimes don’t give due consideration to what these texts meant for those who were initially hearing and reading them.

History

Partial preterism, reading many of the New Testament end times prophecies as having been fulfilled in AD 70 was the primary means of shifting my paradigm. It truly was a paradigm shift. It changes the way you read the New Testament, that to my mind, makes it much more understandable, coherent, and avoids doing violence to texts that are plain rather than symbolic. That we can simply say, “Yeah, that generation really did witness all those things.” Or, “Yeah, when Jesus says he is coming soon in Revelation, he really meant it, and he did come soon.” We don’t have to make those things mean something else other than what they naturally mean. Other views reverse this. They make the plain passages mean something symbolic, and the symbolic passages mean something plain.

But the other factor that reinforced my postmil understanding, and is one of the reasons that I will likely never change my mind on the issue is the history of the world. From the beginning of time until now, and especially from Christ until now, the events of history have happened and are facts. In that sense we could say history is infallible. Facts are stubborn things. And when I look at the stubborn facts of history from Christ until now, I don’t know how anyone could be anything other than postmillennial.

The past 2,000 years of history are giant monuments to postmillennial eschatology. Many of the things that the prophets and Jesus predicted and proclaimed have happened, are happening, and will continue to happen. The Bible itself tells us the gospel was preached to all the nations, to all the world, to every creature under heaven in the Apostolic age. In the Bible, we are told it happened already. In the span of 40 years from Christ’s ascension to the destruction of Jerusalem. Wild, explosive, successful growth of the kingdom by the time Paul is writing Romans. In the New Testament, we are told that the whole world was hearing the gospel (Romans 1:8, Colossians 1:6, Colossians 1:23, 1 Thessalonians 1:8, Romans 16:25-26).

For most American Christians, history doesn’t exist until the revivals of the 18th and 19th centuries, or maybe even the Billy Graham crusades. And there is this underlying view that takes for granted the world in which the gospel has already transformed. But the gospel has been transforming for the world in countless ways since the beginning of time, but especially since the advent of Christ. After the Apostolic era, The Roman Empire becomes Christian. The Emperor becomes Christian. Then Rome falls, and barbarians take over. But then those barbarians become Christian. And the pagan idolators of Europe become Christian. And the middle ages sees a flourishing of Christianity. Then that falls. They see another last days. And God’s Spirit brings about the Reformation. And the Reformation flourishes. And Christians then come to America and turn an entire continent of pagan idolators and human sacrificers into a Christian nation, which then becomes the wealthiest and most powerful nation the world has ever seen. America had been discovered and inhabited by pagans before. Christians weren’t the first ones to arrive in America. Why was it Christians who turned America into the wealthiest and most powerful nation in history?

Take a further step back. Step back far enough so you can see the entire history of the world. We go from a handful of men calling on the name of the Lord for the first 1,000 years. Then one family, Noah’s family, preserved through the flood. Then 400 more years and we have Abraham and his household. And his great-grandson blessing the nation of Egypt with material wealth, preserving them with food through a drought. Then things get real bad after another 400 years. Then God makes Abraham’s children into a nation. That nation then invades and occupies the land of Canaan. Then a series of falling away and reformations and revivals in the time of the judges occur. Then they grow into a kingdom. A kingdom that gets the attention of other kingdoms under Solomon. Solomon’s kingdom exceeded all the kingdoms of the earth in wealth and wisdom. And then the kingdom falls away and is scattered into the nations. And even in the punishment of that unfaithful kingdom, God uses the diaspora of the Jews to influence the nations that held them captive. And some of the kings of these nations become God-fearers. Then the long awaited King of kings comes, the Messiah, inaugurating His new covenant Kingdom, and sends out Apostles to the nations, to expand His Kingdom. And those nations convert and are brought into this new worldwide kingdom. Taking over the Roman Empire. Then Europe. Then America. Ridding the world of rank idolatry, demon worship, human sacrifice, spreading the name of the Lord everywhere. Not entirely ridding the world of these things, but significantly vanquishing these things. Deeply and fundamentally transforming the world in such profound ways that we simply just take for granted now. All of this is marked with suffering, destruction, judgments, crumblings, persecutions, apostasies, and yet it is nothing other than the kingdom of God expanding and advancing. How is it not? I don’t know how you can read the story of history any other way. Two steps forward. One step back. Five steps forward. Three steps back. Three more steps back. Then five more steps back. Then we have twenty steps forward. To me, this whole trajectory is postmillennial. The Bible says this will happen all over the place. And it has happened, is happening, and will continue to happen. I am simply unconvinced that we will see a reversal in the long-term of this general ascent to Mount Zion.

This is just a brief sketch. I am only touching on some of the things that we will dive deeper into. But I want to give some of the main reasons for what caused me to change my mind on eschatology. God’s people, the Jews, in the first century, many of them missed and misunderstood the coming of the Messiah. They were expecting something different. We live in a time where many of God’s people now, Christians, I believe, miss and misunderstand the coming of the Kingdom. They are expecting something different. And yet it’s right there in our history books and in our Scriptures. But we get caught up in the present last days that we are in, and think it’s game over. History considered broadly is nothing other than the expansion and ultimate success of God making a new creation, ushering in His Kingdom on Earth as it is in Heaven.

I truly believe many Christians are missing out some very precious and valuable truths in Scripture regarding the Kingdom and our King. And that a postmillennial understanding is a difficult paradigm shift to make. Paradigms and traditions are very hard things to step outside of. And I think that most Christians, even the most godly and intellectually sharp among us, have entrenched traditions in their thinking that they aren’t even aware of. And this has hindered them from soberly reading certain texts and have subsequently left us with an impoverished eschatology, among other things. For me, stepping outside of our traditions on eschatology has only increased my faith in the word of God. It has filled me with electric excitement about the power of God and his working in the world. It has filled me with awe and wonder at his faithfulness to his word, which makes sense because that is what His word does to those who hear it.