Will Christ Give Up His Reign? Part 2

1st Corinthians 15:20-28 tells us of the resurrection of Jesus and how the end will come when He puts an end to all rule and authority. And verse 24 tells us “Then comes the end” when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father.

Hyper-preterists tell us Christ will never stop reigning an earthly reign since A.D.70. They claim A.D.70 was the time of the kingdom coming and they use verses like Isaiah 9:7 and Luke 1:33 which says, ”And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.” to claim “ the kingdom on earth and earth itself and all of this physical creation has no end. So, they make a big to do out of the word “deliver” and remind us “deliver” comes from the Greek word “paradidōmi” and tell us the word and meaning is the same as when Paul used it in 1st Corinthians 11:23 when he writes “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you:”

And so, William Bell claims the word “deliver” is used in the same context as words from the Lord being shared the way he shared the instructions for the Lord’ Supper. OK, what are we to do with verse 28 that states “the Son Himself will be subject to Him who put all things under Him”?

The Hyper-preterists are not going to answer that one because they can’t and maintain the kingdom of Christ will last forever and it will forever and ever be on earth and its increase will be through preaching the gospel. They like to claim their doctrine is “consistent eschatology”, but the fact is it is one of the most inconsistent doctrines ever. On one hand they admit the kingdom is spiritual yet on the other hand they claim it ends if heaven and earth pass away. So, they are forced to claim heaven and earth doesn’t mean physical heaven and earth and doesn’t mean “all the elements”. Jesus promised and Peter reaffirms in 2nd Peter chapter 3 that heaven and earth would pass away but His word would abide forever, Matthew 5 verse 18. Hyper-preterists claim that doesn’t mean anything physical. They will tell you the “elements” are the letter of the law of Moses.

Look at Numbers chapter 18 verses 8,


And the LORD spoke to Aaron: “Here, I Myself have also given you charge of My heave offerings, all the holy gifts of the children of Israel; I have given them as a portion to you and your sons, as an ordinance forever.

19,

All the heave offerings of the holy things, which the children of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and daughters with you as an ordinance forever; it is a covenant of salt forever before the LORD with you and your descendants with you.”

and 23.

“But the Levites shall perform the work of the tabernacle of meeting, and they shall bear their iniquity; it shall be a statute forever, throughout your generations, that among the children of Israel they shall have no inheritance.”

Now if these statutes with the Levites are forever then why are they no longer valid? Well, for one thing they were already under conditions. When we go back to Exodus 19 verses 5 through 8 we read,

Now if you obey Me fully and keep My covenant, then out of all nations you will be My treasured possession. Although the whole earth is Mine, you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. So Moses went back and summoned the elders of the people and set before them all the words the Lord had commanded him to speak. The people all responded together, “We will do everything the Lord has said.” So Moses brought their answer back to the Lord.

We know they did Not do everything the Lord had said and rather broke the covenant they had with Him. But I also want to remind everyone of another point. The various statutes were shadows and types of what was coming. Look at Ephesians 2 verses 10 through 13,

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands—

that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

Do you see that? The Gentiles were not part of the commonwealth of Israel and aliens of the covenants of promise. Some of these “covenants of promise” were made to the descendants of Aaron as we saw in Numbers 18. Those covenants of promise that were to last forever. God planned before hand the covenants of promise would include all who would belong to Christ! All Christians are priests, 1st Peter 2 verse 9.

But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;

God knew even before He made the covenant promises with the Levite tribe, those promises were literally fulfilled in Christ. They are forever because of Christ and Not because the Levites could keep His laws anyway. God has found All to fall short of His glory and has found All in sin, Romans 3 verse 23. The Passover, the Sabbath, all the ordinances and statues were all fulfilled in Christ and in one way or the other they are forever. 1 Corinthians 5 verse 7 tells us Jesus is our Sabbath and Hebrews chapter 4 tells us Jesus is our Passover, specifically verse 3 where it says “For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said:”

Colossians 2 reminds us that the law and it’s ordinances was not meant to be forever in this physical world and that they were shadows of good things to come and the substance of those shadows is Christ. “which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.” We can see the covenants of promise were made clearer to the coming of Christ and His gospel. Without the New and Better covenant, we would not know how a promise of “forever” to the Levites could be fulfilled and at the same time see the tribes disbanded and scattered for the last two thousand years.

 

I have more to add and will continue this with a part three. I won’t do as Don K Preston or his followers and stay on this topic for years. But I do want to keep this study going for a little longer and add more verses and try to end some confusion on why we do not have to twist the Bible to make it fit our wishes. I am going to get to the part of Jesus delivering up His reign to the Father and not avoid it like the Hyper-preterists do. But I want to establish a few things first. For example, as I pointed out the covenants of promise were forever, yet the tribe of Levi is not around. And as we see in scripture those promises are fulfilled in Christ.

 

More to come.

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