Smoodock's Blog

It is interesting how futurists continually misinterpret the text. It reminds me of myself, before I understood a particular scripture. The truth was hidden from me, as long as I thought I already understood a matter in the word of God. For example, I remember when I had trouble with fractions as a young boy. I simply couldn’t understand how one eighth could be smaller than one fourth. Isn’t the number ‘8’ larger than the number ‘4’? At least, this is what I had been taught, and this is how I understood the matter. However, when I understood that 8 referred to the number of pieces of pie, as opposed to the same pie being cut into 4 pieces, then the mystery vanished. There may have been more pieces in eight equal parts, but the pieces are larger, if the pie were cut into four equal parts. The same sort of thing is true when it comes to understanding the Bible, and in the context of our study of Paul’s eschatology in 1Thessalonians chapter five, many folks stumble over and miss the truth, because they assume they already understand what Paul is saying, when they don’t.

Futurists try to tell everyone that because Paul tells the Thessalonians that they already know that Jesus would come as a thief in the night, no one could possibly know anything about the times or the seasons (1Thessalonians 5:1-2; cp. Acts 1:7). What they fail to recognize in Paul’s epistle is that that statement about the thief in the night concerns unbelievers (1Thessalonians 5:3), not believers. According to Paul believers are not of the night. That is, believers don’t dwell in darkness, but in the light. Therefore, the Day of the Lord won’t catch them unexpectedly. First of all, they already know it would come, while they (or most of them) would be alive (1Thessalonians 4:17). That’s important knowledge, because those who don’t believe judgment is coming, keep on thinking “peace and safety” belong to them. Therefore, upon **them** will come sudden destruction (1Thessalonians 5:3)!

What pregnant woman wouldn’t know the time of her delivery had arrived, when she has birth pains and her water just broke? Do you see how ridiculous it is for folks to believe one cannot know the times or the seasons, because they will come on the world like the birth pains of a woman? What are the birth pains in the context of Paul’s letter? Wouldn’t they be a simile for persecution? Unbelievers didn’t understand that the persecution of the righteous was the travail of the woman with child. The Church was ready to deliver, but unbelievers didn’t see it. Do you suppose the Church knew they had birth pains, and do you think they knew what those birth pains indicated? It is simply amazing what folks will believe about a coming of the Lord, 2000 years after it occurred, because they simply miss the truth by believing they already know the truth.

The concept of the thief in the night has absolutely nothing to do with the nearness of the return of Christ. That concept was known in that he would return in the lifetime of the believers at Thessalonica (1Thessalonians 4:17). The thief in the night points to the suddenness of the event, not the time of the event. While its suddenness could be a problem for unbelievers, it wouldn’t be a problem for believers who kept watch (Matthew 24:42-51). So, audience relevance is important. The difference between judgment and blessing is knowing the times and the seasons and watching.

In closing notice the personal pronouns in part of Jesus’ warning to the church of Sardis:

Remember then how you have received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you (Revelation 3:3)

The believers at Sardis needed think about how they have received and heard the truth and hold that fast. They needed to watch (Matthew 24:42), because if they didn’t the Day of the Lord would have overtaken them as a thief. That is, it would have been as though they had been unbelievers! They wouldn’t know what hour the Lord would come, implying, if they had watched, they would have known. Audience relevance is important, and these things in both Paul’s epistles and the Apocalypse were written to specific churches, and the context is that the Lord was to return in their lifetimes, i.e. in the first century AD. What evidence do we have to say that isn’t so?

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