Addition thought on Mark Twain and the Jews

This would also make me think that prosperity could be a hardening

Remove far from me falsehood and lying; give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, lest I be full and deny you and say, “Who is the LORD?” or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God.  (Proverbs 30:8-9 ESV)

God also promises prosperity so it does make it confusing.  The case is made that wealth and prosperity is not always a sign of God's blessing.  When his people (the TRUE sons of Abraham) are blessed that is something different.  When physical blessings are added to existing spiritual blessing, that is fulfillment of God's promise.  That is what I don't see in the Jews as a whole.

Mark Twain, Jews, and the "End Times"

On the radio today, I heard this quoted:

”...If statistics are right, the Jews constitute but one percent of the human race. It suggests a nebulous dim puff of stardust lost in the blaze of the Milky way. properly, the Jew ought hardly to be heard of, but he is heard of, has always been heard of. He is as prominent on the planet as any other people, and his commercial importance is extravagantly out of proportion to the smallness of his bulk. His contributions to the world’s list of great names in literature, science, art, music, finance, medicine, and abstruse learning are also away out of proportion to the weakness of his numbers. He has made a marvelous fight in this world, in all the ages; and had done it with his hands tied behind him. He could be vain of himself, and be excused for it.

The preacher in question was going through Revelations (which is actually The Revelation) and pointing out five reason why we were living in the end times:

1. God always keeps his promises...I didn't get it either
2. God has blessed the Jews and quoted the above statement which is by Mark Twain who considered himself unbiased since "It is my hope that both the Christians and the Jews will be damned."
3. Then I had to go inside

So is that God's blessing on the Jews?  Seems an odd blessing to give them that and then send them to hell without Christ.  If all this "blessing" has not led them to Christ then it is part of the partial hardening.   After all

And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 

(Matthew 19:23-24 ESV)

What Paul was thinking....

...about the Thessalonians.

"Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness." 1 Thess 2:1-3

Is Paul laying out as eschatological principle for all time or is he writing a letter to the Thessalonians? Is the Bible written to us or for us? Reading Doug Wilson, I have taking his counsel to not immediately ask "How does this apply to me?" but what was Paul saying to the church? He was concerned about the church being shaken and alarmed by a certain teaching. He presents an argument to refute that teaching. He is actually reminding them of this argument which he presented in person (2 Thess 2:5), likely quoting Daniel to them. He is reminding them to be faithful to scripture and to wait for God to fulfill his promises, which include in this case, the Destruction of the (standing) temple.

What would they think?

So when Paul write the Thessalonians

"Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God."

and there is a standing temple, wouldn't they think that it is the existing temple of which Paul is speaking.

Futurist would say that we have not seen this yet, that it will take place in a temple yet to be built. So years later, did the Thessalonians, when they saw the destruction of the standing temple, release they hadn't seen this man of lawlessness. Did they reason "Well, we didn't see this guy so I guess God will build another temple at some point in the future. He did it in the past."

I doubt it. This was the temple that the Messiah was presented in, taught in, etc. I think this passage has application to the people to whom it was written.

It literally doesn't fit.

Trying to educate myself I came across some sites on Covenantalism and Dispensationalism . This site is quick and does list the weaknesses of each viewpoint:

Eschatology 1: Covenantalism & Dispensationalism
http://www.xenos.org/classes/principles/cpu1w7.htm

In their basic explanation they say

Dispensationalism is committed to a literal hermeneutic when interpreting biblical prophecy. They have aroused lots of interest in this area of biblical truth.

Which that is the standard argument, that Dispensationalism is more literal.

"That's right! Don't you believe the Bible?

So few of these things in theology are so simple. For one to claim the moral high ground kills the discussion. It is really a straw man. I do believe the Bible so I am trying to line up future prophesies in a way that make sense to me. Each man must study for himself and teach his family what he believes. Differing beliefs on these non-essential issues are part of the family idiosyncrasies that God created. In a worst case scenario, I may need to limit fellowship with an individual or family but that is within my realm of authority.

But anyway, back to literalism. Further down the page they quote Isaiah 65:17-25 to support a pre-millennial view. They make the following footnote:

"New heavens and new earth" here refer (according to the following context) to the millennial kingdom rather than the new universe of Rev. 21,22. In both Isaiah and Revelation the "new heavens and new earth" refer to a new era in God's dealing with humanity. It is not a specific term that relates to only a specific period of history.

So...the Gen 1:1 heavens and earth are literal, and the ones in Rev 21, 22 are but here they are not ....because they don't fit. The Heaven and Earth in Gen 1:1 were literal and refered to a new era. Using the context to justify saying something is not literal is exactly what this site claims "they" do. Reading the whole passage it does not fit the millennium at all. And since Peter tells us this world is going to be destroyed by fire, I hope there will be a literal heaven and earth somewhere since we'll need a place to park our new bodies.