From the Pages of the Unpreterist
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Answering Some Questions Before I Move On
1. I JUST renounced a 15 year belief. Please give me time to see where this is taking me. Some people have accused me of doing this to get attention. Really? Am I getting positive attention? I have gotten more rude emails & unposted comments from friends & foes than ever before – making accusations against me that I can’t believe I’m hearing. Also, though I appreciate the encouragement from people like Dee Dee Warren, what would it look like if suddenly tomorrow I started writing articles on her website & hobnobbing with every former “opponent”? Again, please give me time.
2. Some Full Preterists are upset because they say I’m unfairly “lumping” them together with “a few rotten apples” — Well as much as I am disheartened to cause hurt to some folks, the “lumping” in comes from the fact that I’m NOT talking about some “few” or a “splinter group” within Full Preterism – I’m talking about the main advocates. For instance, where do most of the main advocates of preterism go when they want to post an article or make an announcement? Where do these same advocates go when they want to speak at a conference? – THAT is the place that is really the main representation & mouthpiece of Full Preterism. I think if you find that place you’ll soon see why you are being “lumped” together. Do you have any power to not be lumped together with that main group??? Let me tell you what the administrator of that main group has said:
we will put a new face on Preterism, whether our critics like it or not. We will drag them kicking and screaming, and confidently we will reassert that Preterism is about the Kingdom, not about being right on eschatology; (Virgil Vaduva – see source)
We are the new proud and confident face of Preterism, so learn to live with us; it is not a demand, it is simply a fact. (Virgil Vaduva – see source)source: http://planetpreterist.com/news-2765.html (The guy who said these things so much doesn’t want people to see them that he has redirected the link to some other site if you try to click it from here. This is just another example of the poor & immature character of the main advocates among Full Preterism. Just copy & paste it into your browser-bar if you want to view it (until he removes it altogether)
So, you see theses guys don’t think you people are driving this boat – they think they are & they arrogantly tell everyone that they will “drag” others even “kicking & screaming” along THEIR version & if you don’t like it, tough is what they say – they are running the show, not you. So, you are “lumped” together whether you like it or not. You might think you can be a “Full Preterist” over in your own little corner undefined by guys like the one I quoted above but you are only fooling yourselves.
3. Some Full Preterists have been saying my opposition is only on the basis of the poor characters I reference – That is not true. I also have great opposition to many main tenets of Full/hyper-preterism, the first being the common position that the “Law was destroyed” — this is emphatically untrue, Jesus says specifically that He came not to destroy the Law but to fulfill it – this is something much different than what these people are advocating. (Matthew 5:17)
Again, I will outline more specific doctrine disputes I have as I go along.
4. Some Full Preterists are confused by what they see as a sudden shift by me – yet if they had been paying attention they would know full well it isn’t sudden but has been coming along for over 5 years now. Perhaps it first started with the influx of universalism that swept Full Preterism a few years back, then the embracing of “Emergent/Postmodernism” & add to that the neglect by most of the prominent Full Preterists to speak against these issues – oh, but they would still show up at conferences sponsored by supporters of these corruptions — & typically NOT to speak against these things but just to pat-backs & shake hands with their “dear brothers”. Folks, if a group cannot even police itself then something is terribly wrong. Look again at the 1 Cor 5 Church & you will see what happens when people think their “loving tolerance” of corruption is a noble thing to be proud of. This reflects poorly upon ALL persons in the group whether they like it or not – silence is affirmation.
So again, give me time to work through some of this – if you are a full preterist & you just want to ignore what I’m doing, what I’m writing so be it. But just know that for those who have been telling me that all of this should have been an “in-house” discussion & is only giving ammo to the “futurists” — you’d better believe it. The opportunity for an “in-house” discussion is past – there were too many years of hearing people tell me to shut up & go away, so now this discussion will take place outside & I hope it does give as much ammo as possible to take down every corrupt element of Full Preterism that there is, both corrupt character & doctrine.
Lastly, let me say to those who consider themselves “historic” or partial-preterists who fear what I am doing will even give ammo for futurists to attack their position – be assured I doubt that.
To conclude, I will say, it is not I who has betrayed Full Preterism but Full Preterism betrayed me.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Unpreterizing Yourself: How did you get here?
As with any complex & precarious situation in which you might find yourself, one of the first things to help undo the situation is to determine how you might have gotten into it in the first place.
Modern “Full Preterism” has its roots within the denomination of “Churches of Christ” (CoC) which by nature is a very “rejected” denomination by most of mainline Christianity. Keep in mind, I am not saying this as an “attack” on or insult toward CoC people as I count many CoC people as friends – but it is just a matter of fact that CoC (originally called “Campbellites” by its detractors) is often considered almost a “cult” by mainline Christianity since CoC grew out of the “Restoration Movement” as did other cults like Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, & Pentecostalism. If you doubt this or it enrages you, please see these sources: (source #1, source #2)
An ironic side effect of this rejection syndrome from which most all preterists suffer is their tendency to become even more combative. I say it is ironic because for all their talk of being “victorious” & preaching some extensive end of Death & Satan they tend to live a life of victim-hood – much the same as an injured & cornered animal, such as a family pet will lash out irrationally against even people that are attempting to help, so too do most hyper-preterists when people reach out to bring them back from their errors. They are anything but “victorious”.
As I conclude, I don’t want anyone to misconstrue that I am advocating creeds & confessions over Scripture – it should be obvious that I am a strong advocate for Sola Scriptura but Sola Scriptura is not SOLO Scriptura – that is, Scripture has NEVER operated in a vacuum, it is true because it is true when presented in any environment. A creed & a confession is simply a collection of “I believe…” statements. The point is, that our “belief statements” should reflect & accord with Scripture thus EVERY person who calls themselves a Christian follows a creed or/& a confession but at issue is whether it is a personal/vague creed of their own making, a new innovation that departs from sound doctrine, or if it is a biblically-tested, time-tested, Church-tested (as in tested by the whole of Christian peers) belief?
There may be times & points at which to diverge from the majority of Christianity & from the historical Church but those times must be approached with the utmost care & even “fear”. It is no light thing to find yourself against the weight of Christian history. To say it has failed at some point does do harm to the Sovereignty of God & His ability to bring about His Will. This is one reason why the Restoration Movement was so odorous to mainline Protestants – the groups that were coming from the Restoration Movement were actually saying the Church & the Gospel had been “lost” & needed to be “restored”. Oh, what a charge against God who said that even the gates of hades would not prevail against the Church. (Mt 16:18)
Hyper-preterists are certainly not approaching with care & caution with their serious claim of being “reformers” & “restorers” of the Church. They too often blithely talk about “paradigm shifts” as they go about not just uprooting hay, wood, & stubble but actually attempting to pry up the very foundations of historic Christianity & putting in its place their “new kind of Christianity” which is completely disconnected from anything that came before.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Hyper-Preterism: The Root of Death
