Last Things

Eschatology is just anytime we are talking about "eschaton" or the "last things." It's actually an easy heading to use for all these ideas.

We study it because it's there. We have two means of figuring out its meaning: is it literal or is it figurative? It has to be one or the other and it can be both.

We view the eschaton through various optional interpretational grids; and if we buy into a certain grid, that is how we see it. That is how we put together our personal scriptural apologetic.

In other words, we construct the meaning of scripture (our arguments) based on our interpretation preference.

Over time ~ over the centuries ~ there have developed four basic ways of seeing the "last things": historicist, preterist, futurist, and idealist.

Here's how they break down in simple terms:

HISTORICIST ~ The "last days" are from the resurrection of Christ to the return, general resurrection, and judgment. The "millennium" is a metaphor for however long this timespan lasts.

PRETERIST ~ The "last days" refers to the end of the Jewish dispensation or period. The Preterist understands "millennium" much the same as the historicist. There are also two options for this aeonic millennium: amillennial and postmillennial (see below).

FUTURIST ~ The "last days" may refer to the Church dispensation but focuses on the last of the last days, that is, the time period just before Christ returns. This view tries to take Bible prophecy literally and tends to construct scenarios about future events based on what the prophetic passages sound like they are saying.

IDEALIST ~ This idealizes the eschaton. The Apocalypse is not a roadmap for theological understanding. It is all a metaphor for the conflict of God and Satan through all history. This interpretation stays outside of the other three: it doesn't suggest punctuations of time. This is a very general and kind of non-prophetic approach.

AMILLENNIAL ~ There is no literal millennium. Any interpretation that basically says all the time from Advent to Advent is the millennium.

POSTMILLENNIAL ~ Same as amillennial, but optimistic. The tendency is to view the Church as somehow swallowing up everything else, marching toward ultimate, complete victory.

PREMILLENNIAL ~ The millennium is literal and therefore future, since it hasn't occurred yet. The tendency here is to see Christ reigning on earth for an actual 1,000 years. That is the most literal possibility. However, "millennium" can also be a metaphor for all the ages to follow Christ's return.

That's it in a nutshell. I see a possibility here that all of this can be homogenized or combined. There are many areas where all these views intersect.

Preterist ~ the Kingdom was set up in men's hearts in the initial years of transition from Jewish paradigm to Christian. Historicist ~ the Kingdom has proceeded throughout the millennia since the paradigm shift. Futurist ~ the Kingdom is going to culminate in future closure. Idealist ~ the Kingdom is the story of it all, from beginning to end.

So eschatology does not have to be a battleground of opposing ideas and one-upmanship. Get that Modernist impulse out of your head. This is not just end-times science and may the best man win. This is a composite picture of the work of God through Christ. We're all tracking on this.