I have asked this question elsewhere, but here it is again.
Can our prophetic interpretation influence or condition our understanding of salvation by faith?
ABSOLUTELY!
There are two chief avenues of effect. The first has to do with the way we now live our lives and the seond has to do with our doctrine of salvation.
An example of the first influence can be summarized in the simple state, "
The way you believe the world will end has an effect on how you now live your life." If, on one hand you believe God is sovereign and
now ruling on earth over the earth and do not create false dichotomies between Jesus needing to be "
physically" on the earth in order to rule (an anthropomorphized version of "physical"),
and understand Christ's sovereignty applies to the saints, then you step outside your door each morning proactively seeking to subdue the earth and rule over it, making disciples of all the nations and teaching Christ's commands with corresponding confidence as a royal priest bade on the guidance and empowerment God has provided your knowledge that morning's devotional time. If, on the other hand, you believe the world is going to hell in a hand basket, or will do so any day now, then it is incumbent upon you to believe in a manner consistent with that belief. Long term investments would be a poor use of material blessings, like the servant who buried his talent in the ground..... exactly where an earthquake opens up the earth and that wealth falls into a chasm - never to be retrieved again. It's a total loss. While investing fruitlessly you'll continue to tell everyone all your speculations about the never-coming imminent danger of being left behind making yourself a false prophet who most Christians grow to distrust because nothing you "teach" eschatologically ever comes true. In other words, to the degree that salvation is for good works that God has planned in advance for us to perform, on example zealously embraces that role with confidence and success while the other may or may not do so but it's ultimately inconsistent with his or her eschatology. Those two examples do nothing for the Christian how believes works are causal in salvation
.
Doctrinally speaking,
if the Jews must first regain their land, build a temple, reconstitute the Levitical priesthood, and/or re-establish animal sacrifices and an earthly monarchy where Jesus sits on a physical throne made by some man who followed the Old Testament guidelines before the Jews will come to salvation..... then that is a works-based salvation and the subscriber holds to two means of salvation (one by grace alone and the other by grace-plus-works).
So.... two different ways eschatology can (and does) affect soteriology.
Doesn’t each eschatological system have its own form of hermeneutical methods?
No.
Or perhaps it is best to say, not necessarily. Dispensational Premillennialism (DP), for example, teaches to use the grammatical-historical hermeneutic.
Anyone can use that hermeneutic, regardless of their eschatology or soteriology. In point of fact the difference between DP ism and
everyone else is that the DPists do so because their theology dictates it (cart before the horse) while everyone else derives their theology from the use of hermeneutics. Everyone else is, therefore, also at liberty to use other hermeneutical models, such as a redemptive-historical model. The chief difference between one groups use of a given hermeneutic and another group's use of the same model is
consistency. For example, DPism teaches a literal reading of scripture but in practice that is not done with much consistency and the result is a literalistic reading, not a literal reading. Most Christians accept the validity of a multiple approaches model, considering literal, allegory, anagogical, and other ways of reading scripture ALL correct
as determined 1) by the text itself and 2) the precedent set by the authors of scripture.
I believe they do and effect how we understand scripture in general. Can our view affect the way we view and understand God’s wrath on Christ on the cross?
Yes, but I think that question needs clarification to be addressed correctly relevant to eschatology's effect on one's doctrine of salvation.
