The Argument Full Preterism Leads With, and Where Each Link Breaks (1 of 2)

One argument remains to be met head-on, because full preterists lead with it and return to it when pressed, and an essay that never named it would look as though it were avoiding it. Edward Stevens states it in print, in the same foreword quoted in Seams Two and Four. "Everything crucial to Christianity is at risk. The Deity of Christ, the integrity of the apostles and prophets, and the inspiration of the New Testament is at stake." The reason, he writes, is that Jesus and the apostles made time-restricted predictions of His return, and critics use them to discredit Him: "Christianity is totally discredited if those predictions failed to materialize exactly as they prophesied."⁸²

As a chain, it runs like this. Jesus and the apostles promised that the return, the resurrection, and the judgment would all arrive within that generation. Those promises are one package. If any part of the package was late, Jesus was a false prophet, and the faith is empty. Four links hold the chain together, and each breaks at a specific place.

The first link says it was all one promise. Jesus did not say so. In one speech He dates one set of events to a deadline: "I tell you the truth, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place" (Matthew 24:34, NET). Two verses later He turns to something else:

"But as for that day and hour no one knows it—not even the angels in heaven—except the Father alone. For just like the days of Noah were, so the coming of the Son of Man will be. For in those days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark. And they knew nothing until the flood came and took them all away. It will be the same at the coming of the Son of Man."⁸⁹

— Matthew 24:36-39 (NET)

Look at what each part is given. The generation is given a sign to act on: "when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near" (Luke 21:20, NET). The day is given no sign at all. It arrives as Noah's flood did, with people eating and drinking and marrying, and they "knew nothing until the flood came." A day announced by armies at the city gate is not a day that comes like Noah's flood. These are two promises, one with a sign and a deadline, one with neither. Brad Baker's own article draws the same line. He lists the war among "the visible signs": "The visible signs included the war, the Abomination of Desolation, the Great Tribulation, the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, and the shattering of the power of the holy people."⁸⁰ That is the division the chain needs to erase, drawn by one of its own defenders. AD 70 is the event that came with signs.

The second link says the faith rests on Jesus being a reliable prophet. The one who says what a useless faith depends on is Paul, and he does not name a date:

"But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is futile and your faith is empty."

— 1 Corinthians 15:13-14 (NET)

A few lines later he says it again: "your faith is useless; you are still in your sins" (1 Corinthians 15:17, NET). Paul's condition is whether Christ was raised. That is an accomplished event, and it is the one the Gospel stands on. He does not say faith is useless if the parousia did not arrive within forty years. The chain swaps the test Paul gave for one he did not.

The third link is never stated, and it is where the chain fails. It applies Moses's test for a false prophet to Jesus. The test is real, and Jesus is the prophet Moses promised. Peter, preaching "the Messiah appointed for you—that is, Jesus" (Acts 3:20, NET), quotes Moses: "The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers" (Acts 3:22, NET).⁹⁴ Here is the test:

"But if any prophet presumes to speak anything in my name that I have not authorized him to speak, or speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet must die. Now if you say to yourselves, 'How can we tell that a message is not from the Lord?'— whenever a prophet speaks in my name and the prediction is not fulfilled, then I have not spoken it; the prophet has presumed to speak it, so you need not fear him."

— Deuteronomy 18:20-22 (NET)