Strange Doctrines Within Hyper Preterism

  Throughout the history of Christendom there have many denominations spring to life and fade away. Some of those are still with us. Thousands of personal ministries and their branches have exponentially exploded onto the scene in the twentieth and twenty first centuries. These are not simply churches being planted by the preaching of the gospel as it is being spread. These are ministries that began very small but grew into mega ministries most of which disappear but some refuse to vanish and go away. The damage these ministries do to the name of Christ and His Church can be devastating.

 Harold Camping is one example out of thousands. Camping was an adult class teacher at Alameda Christian Reformed Church for several years. He also had a radio program called Family Radio which drew in millions of listeners from around the world. According to Westminster Seminary the elders at Alameda finally put an end to it and so Camping and his followers left Alameda and formed their own Christian Reformed Church. (see at the end for link to Westminster) Camping is most famous for his failed “end of the world” prophecies. His latest, before he died, the end was supposed to come in 2011. Camping used math and some weird form of biblical numerology to calculate his dates. Camping was not an ignorant man when it comes to mathematics. He earned a B.S. degree in civil engineering from University of California, Berkeley 1n 1942 and worked as an engineer for a US government contractor during the war.

 The knowledge of mathematics helped Harold Camping formulate his end times date setting. Never mind he was always wrong, he insisted the Bible contained hidden mathematical formulas he and other could find to know for certain when the Lord’s return and the end of the world would come. Camping passed away in 2013 and his CRC is vanishing away. We don’t hear anymore from his prophetic books or writings or sermons because they all, each and every one of them, failed. But believe it or not he still has a small following and his CRC is still with us to this day. Harold Camping could have used his intelligence and education for good. He knew the Bible very well and yet he used his knowledge and his ability to manipulate numbers and twist the scriptures for his own benefit, he did much damage in causing blasphemy against the Church. As Westminster pointed out in their 1st article on Camping, His education guided his way of understanding the scriptures. He read the scriptures as a mathematical or scientific textbook, and it came out in his failed prophecies. Harold Camping led many well educated people away from the gospel of Christ because of his obsession with convincing the world when Christ would come. His life’s work will forever be known as one failed prophecy after another. The prophets of God were 100% correct. Harold Camping’s prophecies were 100% wrong. Biblical Christians knew Camping was a fraud and a huckster, but Biblically knowledgeable Christians never were his target audience. He depended on his audience being scripturally illiterate and intellectually lazy. He felt that his audience and followers should leave theology up to him and he would even do the math.

  That brings me to the strange doctrines coming from other weird figures in the Hyper Preterist, Max King movement. Remember how Harold Camping believed the Lord is coming soon and it is up to us to decipher when? In similar fashion the Hyper Preterists believe the Lord came in A.D. 70 and it’s up to Christianity to reinterpret the scriptures in a way the Church never has so that the new and improved interpretations align with the A.D. 70 doctrine. The Resurrection for example. Forget everything you thought you knew when you read 1 Corinthians 15. Don K Preston will tell you everything you knew about the future resurrection is Wrong! You and I were not around for the resurrection and therefore we are not part of it. And since we missed the resurrection, we also missed the judgment. But let’s stay on the topic of the resurrection for now. As Hyper Preterists teach it, the resurrection is not the individual immortal glorified body as we thought Paul was teaching, but is a resurrected Israel, a corporate body. The Hyper Preterists claim it is Israel who was resurrected, and is not meant to be interpreted as the resurrection of fallen humankind on the day of judgment.

 Let’s take a look at 1 Corinthians 15, the most notable chapter in the bible concerning the resurrection although this is not the only bible passages concerning the resurrection. And when I use the term “the resurrection” I am using the term in context of how the bible uses “the” resurrection as the last resurrection before the judgment. Paul writes this in verses 1 through 6,

“Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand,

by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.

For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,

and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,

and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve.

After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep.”

Paul says he preached to them what he called “the gospel”. He goes on to say that the gospel he delivered to them is the same gospel he received. That gospel he said he delivered to those at Corinth at the first was that Christ died for our sins and was buried and rose again the third day according to the scriptures. Then Paul goes on to say after Jesus’ resurrection He was seen by others such as Cephas, the Apostles and after that Jesus was seen by over 500 people, some of which were still living. Last of all who saw Christ was Paul who Acts records Paul seeing Christ on his way to Damascus. The difference with Paul was he saw Christ after the ascension. In Acts 22 verses 7 through 8 Paul recounts how he asked “Who are you lord?” Jesus said “I am Jesus of Nazareth whom you are persecuting”.

 So, we see Paul is establishing what kind of death and resurrection he is about to teach them concerning themselves. Keep in mind, Paul reminds them the gospel they believed is that by which they are saved, if they hold fast to it or else, they believed in vain. That is very important to remember when dealing with Hyper Preterist’s doctrine of the resurrection being already fulfilled. What fundamentals of the gospel was preached to all of us who believe? Christ died for our sins, rose from the dead on the third day, and ascended to Heaven to reign with the Father at His right hand. The very first sermon Peter preached is what was first preached to the Corinthians and we can verify that by reading Acts chapter 2. Jesus was bodily beaten and crucified. His body was cleaned and buried. He rose from the grave bodily. He bodily walked with, taught, and gave commands to the apostles for 40 days after the resurrection. All four gospels record these happenings. Read all four to get the complete story.

 Paul reminded the Corinthians of the gospel he first preached to them and was leading up to the resurrection not only of Christ but of all of them as well as those who had died before them. There are debates and argument about the body Jesus had once He was resurrected. Luke 24 for example has Jesus walking with the disciples after the resurrection and they did not recognize Him. They were amazed that this man didn’t know what had happened recently and they told Him about Jesus and how He was crucified and how they expected Him to redeem Israel.  Jesus went with them to abide with them and eat and as He broke bread their eyes were opened and they recognized Him. And then He disappeared. Another account in John 20 we read of Thomas demanding to put his finger in the print of the nails and lay his hand on Jesus side he would not believe Jesus had risen. So Jesus told Thomas to put his finger in the nail holes in His hands and put Thomas’s hand in His side. Thomas then called him “My Lord and my God!” So whatever we want to believe about His glorified body, it was a body able to be seen, be touched, eat, and somehow able to be unrecognizable and simply vanish. Remember what John tells us in 1 John 3:2 that it has not yet been revealed what we shall be but when He is revealed we will be like Him. The doctrine of the hyper preterists claim He was revealed in A.D.70. He was in the likeness of Titus and the Roman armies that surrounded Jerusalem for about four years in Judgment against Jerusalem. After years of battle and the walls finally falling and at last the Temple fell, then in a twinkling of an eye the resurrection, judgment, and the Kingdom of God was established over all the world. Never mind the Church at Corinth wouldn’t learn of this fall of Jerusalem for weeks or months. The Church at Corinth was established for this and they were changed in a twinkling of an eye and finally revealed and were just like Christ in His glorified resurrected body. Not only that they were judged and those not true Christians, but were tares, were cast into the lake of fire where Satan and his angels were cast. 

   The fire burns eternally and the Church at Corinth in the 1st century, who Paul wrote to, lives forever and ever in Heaven because there is no more death, no more sin, no more pain and dogs are outside the gates and cannot enter Heaven. The judgment happened in A.D. 70. If you were not there for the resurrection and judgment, sorry. There is nothing after the judgment. Never mind Hebrews 9:27, which was written to first century Jew/Christians at a time the two covenants were valid at the same time. Yes, hyper preterists actually teach God had two covenants valid and ongoing after the cross. When those Christians were baptized into Christ to put on Christ apparently His blood wasn’t powerful enough to overcome the disobedient and unbelieving Jews who remained under the law and were justified up until Titus and the Roman army destroyed the temple. It was only until then that the blood of bulls and goats became insufficient. That’s when Satan was finally defeated and thrown into the eternal lake of fire along with death and hades, the realm of the dead. But as long as they were a keeper of the law up until that time, they were safe in their unbelief that Christ was the Messiah. Along with that hyper preterists tell us after A.D. 70 there is no such thing as a Jew. John Watson has made that claim in more than one sermon.     Which brings me to another strange doctrine of hyper preterism. Many of them teach that Satan who tempted Eve in the garden, and during the time of Jesus and the Apostles, is not talking about a created spiritual being but is a ruler or authority of law on earth. I was told by more than one that Satan was not a serpent more cunning than any beast of the field as Genesis 3:1 describes, but his cunning is his ability to manipulate the law. The only law I could find concerning how the serpent manipulated it was the command to not eat of the tree lest you die. Yes I know God had given them more commands, but the serpent used the one command to not eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil in Genesis 2:17. Hyper preterists claim this serpent was allegory for a ruler similar to the High Priest. Which brings us to Jesus being tempted by Satan. Hyper preterists claim like the ruler who tempted Eve, the High Priest tempted Jesus and not a spiritual being we call Satan. At the time of Jesus the tempter called Satan would be Joseph Caiaphas. In Luke’s account in chapter 4 the tempter is referred to as the devil. The devil took Jesus to a high mountain and showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and said they would be His if Jesus would worship him. Jesus told the devil “Get behind me Satan”! Mark’s account calls the tempter Satan from the start in Mark chapter 1. Hyper preterists claim since Jesus told Peter “Get behind me Satan”, calling Peter Satan in Mark 16 proves Satan can be anyone. No, it doesn’t. It proves Satan can tempt anyone but Jesus has power over Satan. Peter also talked about Satan as a roaring lion in 1st Peter 5:8 seeking whom he may devour. Read it in context. Peter is telling us to be sober and vigilant because our adversary the devil is seeking out those he can devour. Peter is not talking about Joseph Caiaphas walking the earth as a roaring lion. Remember above Satan showed Jesus the kingdoms of the world and how he would give them over to Jesus if he would worship him? The High Priest only had authority over the children of Israel! The kingdoms of the world couldn’t have cared less who or what the Jewish High Priest was! Yet the hyper preterists in their quest to spread a false doctrine want people to believe the High Priest could give authority to the son of God over the whole world!? 

 The Hyper Preterist doctrine leads to many more strange and actually ridiculous doctrines which in turn lead to more and more strange and ridiculous doctrines. When they tell you for example “The New Testament was written to the first century Christians” of course that’s true. But remember there’s a more sinister motive behind it. They mean “It’s all fulfilled and there is no resurrection or judgment ahead”. Just think of the consequences of a world of sin and death lasting for eternity and no end ever and yet this is the eternal purpose of the God of the Bible you grew up studying and believing. And if their doctrine was consistent, and it’s not, you would die and that’s that. Nothingness forever and ever because as Revelation 22 tells us and hyper preterists teach, Heaven received her citizens in A.D.70 and everyone else were either cast into the lake of fire then or are dogs outside the gates since A.D.70. But we know their doctrine is false and deadly. And those following it need to repent and turn to God that He might give them salvation.

Harold Camping and the End of the Word: Part 3 (wscal.edu)

William Bell All Things Fulfilled - YouTube

MrDonPreston - YouTube