Covenant Theology vs. Dispensationalsim

[CrowCross]

Are you sure that is what they do? Covenant theology is Reformed theology. Calvinism can be Covenant or Dispensational. If I am not mistaken, you consider yourself Calvinist or Calvinistic. So, for you to make such a claim is remarkable as sure you know how careful the Reformers were to get it right according to Scripture.

The book of Revelation is written with allegorical and figurative symbols. It makes perfect sense to interpret it just as it is written instead as though it were historical narrative.

Phew...wipes brow....good thing all the death is purely symbolic and lot literal.

The millennium (a thousand years) is logically a representative number for a number of reasons. Not the least of which is that no one is able to know the time of Christ's return except God himself, according to the scriptures. One thousand as a literal number is countable---not unlike dispensationalist counting all the numbers in Daniel to try and second guess God's decree and find out when the Christ will return.

Logically?
You do know Christ returns on the white horse prior to the 1,000 years. Then again maybe Revelations 19 and 20 isn't linear...or out of order.

I don't really think all the dispensationalist are running around with calendars and calculators.
Then again there were the CT'ers who used those numbers to determine the time between the decree to rebuild the temple and Christ death.

So where does CT look to find what 1000 is representing? Within the Bible itself for it uses numbers symbolically but in a literal way throughout. Sevens, threes, tens, twelves and multiples of these numbers.

In Scripture the number 10 represents divine completion and God's almighty power and government.

It is often used as a marker of time (waiting, duration, completion, or testing)

Dan 1:12-15--ten-day test
Rev 2:10 ten days of tribulation
Gen 25:55 Delay before departure etc. etc

Generations as a time span" Adam to Noah, Shem to Abram.

Ten times (repeated duration) Gen 31:7; Numbers 14:22

The broader biblical use of ten is a number of completion and accountability, especially in covenantal contexts.

Ten as a time measurement carries a theological significance rather than merely a mathematical significance. And in case you think this is unreasonable and unfounded, consider God himself. There is not one idle word or number in the historical account of redemption. It comes from a God who has no idleness or arbitrariness in anything. Everything counts for more than we can see on the surface. His use of numbers is never without theological significance. The number 10 functions as a symbol for completeness in testing, probation, and covenantal accountability---a full period determined by God, after which judgement or vindication follows.

It marks covenantal accountability. Ten is tied to law and covenant (ten commandments). When used in time, it indicates a moral evaluation period.

Why 1,000 is read symbolically.
Revelation is apocalyptic genre where numbers are symbolic.

• 7= divine completeness
• 10= completeness/fullness
• 12=covenant peoples
• 1,000=10x10x10 fullness raised to it highest intensity

Biblical precedent for symbolic "long time"

• Psalm 50:10 – “the cattle on a thousand hills”
• Psalm 90:4 – “a thousand years…as yesterday”
• 2 Peter 3:8 – “with the Lord one day is as a thousand years”

Eh...
1 Chron 12:34....Of Naphtali 1,000 commanders with whom were 37,000 men armed with shield and spear.......I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

Ezra 1:9.... This was the inventory: 30 gold dishes, 1,000 silver dishes, 29 silver utensils,.......I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

2 Chron 30:24....For Hezekiah king of Judah gave the assembly 1,000 bulls and 7,000 sheep for offerings, and the princes gave the assembly 1,000 bulls and 10,000 sheep. And the priests consecrated themselves in great numbers........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

Job 42:12 ...And the LORD blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning. And he had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 female donkeys.........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

1 Sam 13:2....Saul chose three thousand men of Israel. Two thousand were with Saul in Michmash and the hill country of Bethel, and a thousand were with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin. The rest of the people he sent home, every man to his tent..........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

Do you need more verses or will you continue to argue 1,000 is always a symbolic number? {Edit: Lettering reduced to normal size. No yelling. It is a form of insult}

The millennium is the period between the two advents.

Jesus teaches of to ages. This age (after first advent) and the age to come (arrives at his second coming). Matt 12:32; Mark 10:29-30; Luke 18:30.

Marriage belongs to this age. Resurrection life belongs to next age (Luke 20:34-36).

Harvest at the end of this age (Matt13:39-40,49).

The apostles teach two ages. (Eph 1:21; Gal 1:4; 1 Cor 4:4)

No intermediate age between resurrection and consummation is mentioned.

LOL...you are beginning to sound like a dispensationalist with all this mentioning of ages.

 

[CrowCross]

Absolutely we do not. That is not what this thread is about. Instead of refuting Covenant theology all you are doing is presenting the dispensational interpretation of certain events---- which we already know---and changing he subject by asking us to answer questions that have to do with those particular interpretations from Rev. That is like asking someone to prove something they do not believe. Nothing we will say, and nothing that has been said, in countless threads, will ever penetrate the wall and be considered as an answer.

How about you go deal with post #37 which shows how Covenant theology deals with revelation and refute it since you disagree with it, using a foundation on which to do so. That does not mean things like "This is not the thousand years, Look around." or "Christians leave here in the rapture." or "Jesus didn't leave on a white horse."

HUH???

I've shown that there is two returns...in the sky and once again on a white horse....That is what I call "refuting Covenant theology"....or at least that portion of it.

I have shown that 1,000 isn't always symbolic. Will you now continue INSISTING the 1,000 year reign isn't symbolic?
Oh, currently Satan isn't locked up...nor was he after Christ ascension as your CT theology requires.

There's more....

 

[Carbon]

Do you need more verses or will you continue to argue 1,000 is always a symbolic number?

Who said "always?"

 

[CrowCross]

Ummm, where did I say Jesus left on a white horse? Are you mixing me up with someone else?

I never said you did. In fact I don't know why anyone would say Jesus left on a white horse. Acts doesn't mention it.
Of course the bible mentions Jesus returning on a white horse....YET....Acts one tells us Jesus returns in the same fashion He left....and He didn't leave on a white horse. So, this means Jesus returns TWICE. The first time in the air...clouds.. at the rapture then a second time at the end of the time of Jacobs trouble tribulation.

These biblical facts seem to be quite a stumbling block for the CT'ers concerning eschatology......as they enter contradictions into their theories.

 

[CrowCross]

Who said "always?"

Not me.

My point was to a certain poster here who tried to demonstrate the 1,000 year reign was symbolic....then tried to back it up with 1,000 equals a large unspecified time period.....then I simply showed them 1,000 is often used literally.

The question is, why not concerning Revelation 20? I believe Barnabas understood that the 1,000 years to be literal.

The following is is from Barnabas...Take it for what it's worth. It may not be canonized but it shows Barnabas's mindset.
Barnabas 15:4
Give heed, children, what this meaneth; He ended in six days. He
meaneth this, that in six thousand years the Lord shall bring all
things to an end; for the day with Him signifyeth a thousand years;
and this He himself beareth me witness, saying; Behold, the day of
the Lord shall be as a thousand years. Therefore, children, in six
days, that is in six thousand years, everything shall come to an end.

Barnabas 15:5
And He rested on the seventh day. this He meaneth; when His Son
shall come, and shall abolish the time of the Lawless One, and shall
judge the ungodly, and shall change the sun and the moon and the
stars, then shall he truly rest on the seventh day.

If you use Usher's timeline you end up with a creation about 6,000 years ago...Which means we are near the end of the 6,000 years....with one day left of the Genesis creation days....the day of rest. The 7th day is the last 1,000 years or the millennial reign of Christ.

That is for each day of creation God allotted 1,000 years of mankind's history.

 

[Carbon]

I never said you did.

Okay, good, I must have misunderstood then. Sorry.

In fact I don't know why anyone would say Jesus left on a white horse. Acts doesn't mention it.

Me neither.

Of course the bible mentions Jesus returning on a white horse....

Not literally.

YET....Acts one tells us Jesus returns in the same fashion He left....and He didn't leave on a white horse.

Okay.

So, this means Jesus returns TWICE.

It means no such thing.

The first time in the air...clouds.. at the rapture then a second time at the end of the time of Jacobs trouble tribulation.

There is one Second Coming, not two. The rapture is at the second coming.

These biblical facts seem to be quite a stumbling block for the CT'ers concerning eschatology......as they enter contradictions into their theories.

I think it's the other way around; the dispensationalists have it all mixed up.

 

[Carbon]

Not me.

My point was to a certain poster here who tried to demonstrate the 1,000 year reign was symbolic....then tried to back it up with 1,000 equals a large unspecified time period.....then I simply showed them 1,000 is often used literally.

The question is, why not concerning Revelation 20? I believe Barnabas understood that the 1,000 years to be literal.

The following is is from Barnabas...Take it for what it's worth. It may not be canonized but it shows Barnabas's mindset.
Barnabas 15:4
Give heed, children, what this meaneth; He ended in six days. He
meaneth this, that in six thousand years the Lord shall bring all
things to an end; for the day with Him signifyeth a thousand years;
and this He himself beareth me witness, saying; Behold, the day of
the Lord shall be as a thousand years. Therefore, children, in six
days, that is in six thousand years, everything shall come to an end.

Barnabas 15:5
And He rested on the seventh day. this He meaneth; when His Son
shall come, and shall abolish the time of the Lawless One, and shall
judge the ungodly, and shall change the sun and the moon and the
stars, then shall he truly rest on the seventh day.

If you use Usher's timeline you end up with a creation about 6,000 years ago...Which means we are near the end of the 6,000 years....with one day left of the Genesis creation days....the day of rest. The 7th day is the last 1,000 years or the millennial reign of Christ.

That is for each day of creation God allotted 1,000 years of mankind's history.

The 1000 years in Rev 20 is symbolic.

 

[CrowCross]

Okay, good, I must have misunderstood then. Sorry.

Me neither.

Not literally.

It still doesn't matter if the white horse is literal or not. What ever the white horse"symbolically" represented Jesus didn't leave in that fashion.

Okay.

It means no such thing.

Sure it does. Are you now going to claim 1 Thes 4 and Rev 19 are the same event?
Because they are not the same event that means Jesus in the bible is mentioned returning twice.
I'm failing to see how you could post "it means no such thing".

There is one Second Coming, not two. The rapture is at the second coming.

Now we're playing with words.
The rapture is a coming but typically called the rapture while the white horse coming is considered as the second coming as Jesus is physically on the earth again.

I think it's the other way around; the dispensationalists have it all mixed up.

If the dispensationalist have it mixed up....then please explain the different narratives in the descriptions of the returns of Jesus.
As I have said the DC'ers have a problem with this.

Perhaps we can move on to the "days of Noah"...and why that isn't at the end of the tribulation.

 

[Arial]

I've shown that there is two returns...in the sky and once again on a white horse....That is what I call "refuting Covenant theology"....or at least that portion of it.

You may call that refuting Covenant theology BUT IT ISN'T.

How does just stating your view of two scriptures refuting the covenant interpretive method? The method is not the same thing as the interpretation of a passage.

Here is something to consider though. In dispensationalism it has two returns of Christ.
In Scripture it only ever mentions one return of Christ.

In dispensationalism it has Christ ruling on earth from Jerusalem and Israel as a nation state above all other nations.
In Scripture it has Christ ruling from heaven until the consummation when he returns in judgment and the fullness of the Covenant of Redemption.

In dispensationalism it has two distinct peoples being dealt with differently as to the plan of redemption.
In Scripture it has one redemptive plan for all nations.

In dispensationalism it has this age, the age to come, and a third age when Christ rules from Jerusalem for a 1000 years.
In Scripture it has this age and the age to come---no third age.

See Post #37.

I have shown that 1,000 isn't always symbolic. Will you now continue INSISTING the 1,000 year reign isn't symbolic?
Oh, currently Satan isn't locked up...nor was he after Christ ascension as your CT theology requires.

You have told me 1000 isn't always symbolic. If you have shown me, I must have missed it. Where is it? I have shown you in post #37 that there is not one number in scripture that doesn;t mean more than a mathematical figure or calculation, and how Covenant theology arrives at the symbolism of 1000 that makes it consistent with the rest of the Bible instead of adding things to it as dispensationalism does when it says the 1000 years is literal and presents a kingdom that is not mentioned in Scripture but only presupposed by dispensationalism.

 

[CrowCross]

The 1000 years in Rev 20 is symbolic.

Well then you have a lot of explaining to do.
lets start at verse 1 of Rev 20 and you can tell me if t's all symbolic or literal. If it's symbolic tell me what the symbolism means.

1Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. 2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, 3 and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.

The angel came down from heaven....literal or symbolic?
The key....literal or symbolic?
the bottomless pit.......literal or symbolic?
Dragon seized........literal or symbolic?
The Devil is Satan.......literal or symbolic?
Bound him.......literal or symbolic?
1,000 years .......literal or symbolic?
Thrown into the pit...........literal or symbolic?
Shut and sealed.......literal or symbolic?
Can no longer deceive the nations.......literal or symbolic?
1,000 years ends.......literal or symbolic?
Satan released..........literal or symbolic?
Little while.......literal or symbolic?

To be honest I think the CT'ers with their eschatology needs to get up to speed.
Now, I'm not saying that this is...but...consider this and tell me if it could be the literal event of Rev 8 rather than symbolic.

Rev 8:8 The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain, burning with fire, was thrown into the sea, and a third of the sea became blood. 9 A third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.

Could this Rev 8 event be the following?
Have you heard of the Asteroid Apophis? They say it will be a very close fly by near miss...or so they say...on April 13th 2029?

Why should I read Rev as some strictly symbolic book?

 

[CrowCross]

You may call that refuting Covenant theology BUT IT ISN'T.

How does just stating your view of two scriptures refuting the covenant interpretive method? The method is not the same thing as the interpretation of a passage.

Here is something to consider though. In dispensationalism it has two returns of Christ.
In Scripture it only ever mentions one return of Christ.

Yes, one return when Jesus steps on the earth again. You keep forgetting about 1 Thes 4:16ish.

In dispensationalism it has Christ ruling on earth from Jerusalem and Israel as a nation state above all other nations.
In Scripture it has Christ ruling from heaven until the consummation when he returns in judgment and the fullness of the Covenant of Redemption.

In dispensationalism it has two distinct peoples being dealt with differently as to the plan of redemption.
In Scripture it has one redemptive plan for all nations.

Dispensationalist agree with Heb 11. Do you?

In dispensationalism it has this age, the age to come, and a third age when Christ rules from Jerusalem for a 1000 years.
In Scripture it has this age and the age to come---no third age.

See Post #37.

You have told me 1000 isn't always symbolic. If you have shown me, I must have missed it. Where is it?

Here...post 61.

I have shown you in post #37 that there is not one number in scripture that means more than a mathematical figure or calculation, and how Covenant theology arrives at the symbolism of 1000 that makes it consistent with the rest of the Bible instead of adding things to it as dispensationalism does when it says the 1000 years is literal and presents a kingdom that is not mentioned in Scripture but only presupposed by dispensationalism.

I chuckle and say....Post 61 proves you wrong. 1000 is often quite literal.

I trust you stand corrected.

 

[Arial]

Phew...wipes brow....good thing all the death is purely symbolic and lot literal.

That has no relationship to the quote it is responding to. That is what is meant by not engaging with the posts of others. Just being a smart Alek instead. It really is not cute or witty.

You do know Christ returns on the white horse prior to the 1,000 years.

I know no such thing. I know that is what you say, and I think it is a mockery of God's word, and I am not talking about the white horse anymore. Stick to the subject.

Then again there were the CT'ers who used those numbers to determine the time between the decree to rebuild the temple and Christ death.

Is that supposed to prove a point?

1 Chron 12:34....Of Naphtali 1,000 commanders with whom were 37,000 men armed with shield and spear.......I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

1 Chron is historic narrative. But you can bet it was not circumstance or happenstance that there were 1,000. Surely as a Calvinist you don't think God is not the first cause of all that comes to pass. But once again, you are just presenting scriptures to contradict what I said about the methods of Covenant theology, rather than actually evaulating and refuting the method.

Ezra 1:9.... This was the inventory: 30 gold dishes, 1,000 silver dishes, 29 silver utensils,.......I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

2 Chron 30:24....For Hezekiah king of Judah gave the assembly 1,000 bulls and 7,000 sheep for offerings, and the princes gave the assembly 1,000 bulls and 10,000 sheep. And the priests consecrated themselves in great numbers........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

Job 42:12 ...And the LORD blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning. And he had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 female donkeys.........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

1 Sam 13:2....Saul chose three thousand men of Israel. Two thousand were with Saul in Michmash and the hill country of Bethel, and a thousand were with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin. The rest of the people he sent home, every man to his tent..........I suppose 1,000 wasn't a literal number?

See above. And ask yourself, why is that number 1,000 so often involved? Because it is signifying something. That does not make it not literal when it is used as literal in historic narrative. When it shows up in a genre that announces itself a one that signifies the material in it we shouldn't ready that book as histoic narrative. Hermeneutics 101.

Do you need more verses or will you continue to argue 1,000 is always a symbolic number?

I don't recall saying it always was. I said it always has significance beyond the mathematical number. That doesn't make it never literal.

LOL...you are beginning to sound like a dispensationalist with all this mentioning of ages.

Once again, that avoids engaging with the material given and opting instead for an attempt at witty and cute. It is neither. I don't mean the same thing by "ages" that you do. Now, Address the fact that only two ages are mentioned by Jesus and the apostles and nowhere is a third age mentioned.

 

[CrowCross]

That has no relationship to the quote it is responding to. That is what is meant by not engaging with the posts of others. Just being a smart Alek instead. It really is not cute or witty.

I know no such thing. I know that is what you say, and I think it is a mockery of God's word, and I am not talking about the white horse anymore. Stick to the subject.

Is that supposed to prove a point?

1 Chron is historic narrative. But you can bet it was not circumstance or happenstance that there were 1,000. Surely as a Calvinist you don't think God is not the first cause of all that comes to pass. But once again, you are just presenting scriptures to contradict what I said about the methods of Covenant theology, rather than actually evaulating and refuting the method.

See above. And ask yourself, why is that number 1,000 so often involved? Because it is signifying something. That does not make it not literal when it is used as literal in historic narrative. When it shows up in a genre that announces itself a one that signifies the material in it we shouldn't ready that book as histoic narrative. Hermeneutics 101.

I don't recall saying it always was. I said it always has significance beyond the mathematical number. That doesn't make it never literal.

Once again, that avoids engaging with the material given and opting instead for an attempt at witty and cute. It is neither. I don't mean the same thing by "ages" that you do. Now, Address the fact that only two ages are mentioned by Jesus and the apostles and nowhere is a third age mentioned.

Under your "theory" Jesus wasn't in the grave for 3 days....it's simply a symbolic number and means something.
Violation of 2.2. Misrepresenting a posters belliefs.
I believe I'm done discussing the literal and symbolic numbers with you.

 

[Carbon]

It still doesn't matter if the white horse is literal or not. What ever the white horse"symbolically" represented Jesus didn't leave in that fashion.

And who said he did?

 

[CrowCross]

And who said he did?

Those who say Jesus will return on a white horse....the same way he left...per their interpretation of Acts 1 do.

I really wish the millennialist would stop skirting around this issue.

9And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. 10And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, 11and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

 

[Carbon]

Sure it does.

No, sorry, my friend, it does not.

Are you now going to claim 1 Thes 4 and Rev 19 are the same event?

Well, you do believe Matthew 24:31 And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. and 1 Thess 4:16-17 are speaking of the same event? No, you probably do not.

 

[Carbon]

@CrowCross

And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Matt 24:31.

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 1 Thess 4:16-17.

Do you see the reference to the rapture of the church when Christ will send out his angels? And the elect will be gathered from the four corners of the earth?
Note the parallels between the Matthew 24:31 passage and 1 Thess 4:16-17. The descent of Christ, the sound of the trumpet, gathering the elect from the four winds. It seems quite clear that these two passages are describing the same event. There isnt even a hint of a pre-trib rapture.

Notice the rapture described in Matthew 24 follows the descent of Christ at his final second coming.

Not only is there not even a hint of a "pre-trib rapture," the rapture of the church is in fact described as coming after the great tribulation :29,

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

 

[Carbon]

@CrowCross

And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Matt 24:31.

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 1 Thess 4:16-17.

Do you see the reference to the rapture of the church when Christ will send out his angels? And the elect will be gathered from the four corners of the earth?
Note the parallels between the Matthew 24:31 passage and 1 Thess 4:16-17. The descent of Christ, the sound of the trumpet, gathering the elect from the four winds. It seems quite clear that these two passages are describing the same event. There isnt even a hint of a pre-trib rapture.

Notice the rapture described in Matthew 24 follows the descent of Christ at his final second coming.

Not only is there not even a hint of a "pre-trib rapture," the rapture of the church is in fact described as coming after the great tribulation :29,

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

@CrowCross
If you disagree, bro, you have some explaining to do.

After all, this rapture you speak of is for living Christians, right?
What's with this then? 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.

Mind explaining this (your) issue here?

There are many more issues, but let's just start with this. It can be overwhelming, I'm sure.

 

[Carbon]

@CrowCross
And for the record, there is no argument for a two-stage coming in scripture when discussing the Second Coming. Absolutely nothing!

 

[Arial]

I believe I'm done discussing the literal and symbolic numbers with you.

You never started discussing anything with me.