Premillenialism, the Westminster Confession and the Three Forms of Unity

[MichaelNZ]

I've downloaded a sermon series by John MacArthur entitled "Why Every Calvinist Should Be A Premillennialist". I've only listened to a short portion of the first sermon but his arguments do seem to be quite good regarding God's promises to Israel.

So I'm wondering: is it possible to be a premillennialist while holding to both the Three Forms of Unity and the Westminster Confession? Or is there something in any of these documents that requires a postmillennialist or amillennialist view?

 

[Leslie]

Are you suggesting that if the confessions say something inconsistent with premillenialism, that ipso facto rules out embracing it? What ever happened to sola scriptura? Or am I misunderstanding you?

 

[Peairtach]

There are things in the Westminster Standards that point away from premillennialism, but that hasn't prevented premillennialists from subscribing to them.

You can be a Postmillennialist or Amillennialist and see the Jewish nation having promises to it fulfilled in the NT. See e.g. John Murray (postmil) on Romans, or Iain Murray's "The Puritans Hope". Jews always make up part of the Church (Rom11)so the idea that the Jewish nation is ever completely excluded from enjoying the fulfilment of the OT promises in Christ is ridiculous.

Sent from my HTC Wildfire using Tapatalk 2

 

[Tirian]

So I'm wondering: is it possible to be a premillennialist while holding to both the Three Forms of Unity and the Westminster Confession?

Any insight into why one would want to be a premillenialist whilst holding to the confessions?

 

[Covenant Joel]

I wrote up some time back an examination of that sermon series from MacArthur:

MacArthur, Calvinism, and (Dispensational) Premillennialism: Part 1 | joelws.com
MacArthur, Calvinism, and (Dispensational) Premillennialism: Part 2 | joelws.com
MacArthur, Calvinism, and (Dispensational) Premillennialism: Part 3 | joelws.com
MacArthur, Calvinism, and (Dispensational) Premillennialism: Part 4 | joelws.com

Sam Waldron also wrote a short book essentially responding to MacArthur's claims, I believe.

 

[RamistThomist]

The best way to say it is the WCF leans away from premillennialism. To go any further than that is to question the integrity (and quite frankly, intelligence) of guys like William Twisse. While I am a premillennialist, I think if you push both the WCF and premil hard enough, the two are incompatible with one another. However, since I don't think WCF moderators like Twisse intended that, I don't push.

 

[Gavin]

Slightly off topic, but I'm not so sure our Reformed fathers would agree with dispensationalism:

Article 8: A Single Decree of Election:
This election is not of many kinds, but one and the same for all who were to be saved in the Old and the New Testament. For Scripture declares that there is a single good pleasure, purpose, and plan of God’s will, by which he chose us from eternity both to grace and to glory, both to salvation and to the way of salvation, which God prepared in advance for us to walk in.

Canons of Dordt 1st point of doctrine art 8

Canon XXIV:
But this later Covenant of Grace according to the diversity of times has also different dispensations. For when the Apostle speaks of the dispensation of the fullness of times, that is, the administration of the last time (Eph 1:10), he very clearly indicates that there had been another dispensation and administration until the times which the Father appointed. Yet in the dispensation of the Covenant of Grace the elect have not been saved in any other way than by the Angel of his presence (Isa 63:9), the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8), Christ Jesus, through the knowledge of that just Servant and faith in him and in the Father and his Spirit. For Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb 13:8). And by His grace we believe that we are saved in the same manner as the Fathers also were saved, and in both Testaments these statutes remain unchanged: "Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him," (the Son) (Ps 2:12); "He that believes in Him is not condemned, but he that does not believe is condemned already" (John 3:18). "You believe in God," even the Father, "believe also in me" (John 14:1). But if, moreover, the holy Fathers believed in Christ as their God, it follows that they also believed in the Holy Spirit, without whom no one can call Jesus Lord. Truly there are so many clearer exhibitions of this faith of the Fathers and of the necessity of such faith in either Covenant, that they can not escape any one unless one wills it. But though this saving knowledge of Christ and the Holy Trinity was necessarily derived, according to the dispensation of that time, both from thc promise and from shadows and figures and mysteries, with greater difficulty than in the NT. Yet it was a true knowledge, and, in proportion to the measure of divine Revelation, it was sufficient to procure salvation and peace of conscience for the elect, by the help of God's grace.

Canon XXV:
We disapprove therefore of the doctrine of those who fabricate for us three Covenants, (or seven in today's dispensationalist terms!) the Natural, the Legal, and the Gospel, different in their entire nature and essence, and in explaining these and assigning their differences, so intricately entangle themselves that they greatly obscure and even impair the nucleus of solid truth and piety. Nor do they hesitate at all, with regard to the necessity, under the OT dispensation, of knowledge of Christ and faith in him and his satisfaction and in the whole sacred Trinity, to speculate much too loosely and dangerously.

The Formula Consensus Helvetica (1675)

 

[Logan]

Michael,

I listened to MacArthur's sermon series (and the initial Shepherd's Conference sermon) when they first came out and honestly I think they were a little disappointing. They are convincing if you are mainly familiar with a premillennialist (dispensational) view, but if you are familiar with post- or amillennialism then you start to realize that there are a lot of straw-man arguments being used.

The best response I found was from Kim Riddlebarger, who was very gracious in his disagreement with MacArthur.

My biggest complaint was when MacArthur said something to the effect that a non-dispensational-premillennialist has a lessened witness to a Jew because we would have to say "Hey, you know all those promises God made to Israel? Well, um, you don't get them now, that really means the church." Wouldn't our witness start with the gospel? Does anyone's witness rely upon Jews inheriting a small physical land? Isn't the promise of the entire earth even better?

 

[Guido's Brother]

I think the TFU definitely excludes the dispensationalist form of the premill position. BC 27 states that "This church has existed from the beginning of the world and will be to the end, for Christ is an eternal king who cannot be without subjects." Wouldn't that preclude any notion of the church as "plan B" or a distinction between Israel and the church?

BC 37 has this eschatological sequence: the number of the elect is complete, Christ returns bodily and visibly, the resurrection of the just and the unjust, Christ judges all, the wicked go to eternal punishment of body and soul/the righteous go to eternal glory.

 

[Scott1]

This is my researched understanding of "premillennialism" and the Westminster Standards.

Modern dispensational premillennialism differs fundamentally from the Westminster Standards and in no way can be reconciled with it.
Historic premillennialism differs significantly in a couple of ways, requiring at least one or two exceptions to the Westminster Standards, and further evaluation of implicated beliefs.

Remember, both views hold to a rule like David's or Solomon's rule by our Lord for 1,000 years (on the Julian Calendar) from Jerusalem.

Historic premillennialism is far less egregious than modern dispensational premillennialism in that it does not hold to two returns of our Lord, nor does it hold the church will not go through "the" tribulation. But the historic premill view does not hold the unified resurrection of the just and unjust, both together, at the final judgment. That's a big difference. Nor does it account for sin and judgment during 1,000 years.

There's another big difference even with historic premill.
The millennium is about "Israel," a political Israel rather than the Israel of God defined in Galatians 6.
Amill and Premill hold, in accordance with the Westminster Standards, hold to a Christ centered millennium vs. a man centered (political) one.

 

[Hamalas]

Are you suggesting that if the confessions say something inconsistent with premillenialism, that ipso facto rules out embracing it? What ever happened to sola scriptura? Or am I misunderstanding you?

Michael can correct me if I'm wrong, but this seems to be an ungenerous reading of his OP. If I came across a view that seemed, at first glance, to have merit only to find that it had been rejected or excluded by the church through her confessional documents that would rightly give me pause. Now, ultimately, we must follow Scripture and if diligent study, mature reflection, and faithful prayer convinced me of a non-confessional position then I would have to say "Here I stand, I can do no other". However, the Reformers would have been the first men to caution us not to reject the wisdom and tradition of the church lightly. As Spurgeon put it so well, "It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others."

 

[Scott1]

Are you suggesting that if the confessions say something inconsistent with premillenialism, that ipso facto rules out embracing it? What ever happened to sola scriptura? Or am I misunderstanding you?

The Westminster Confession is taken as a faithful summary of the doctrine of Scripture to which it speaks.

Sola scriptura is not pitted in opposition to the Confessions, but rather, the Westminster Standards establish that as the key hermeneutic for the system of doctrine.

Every member of this Board represents they hold to an historic Confession. That's what it means to be a confessional board.

 

[VictorBravo]

Canon XXV:
We disapprove therefore of the doctrine of those who fabricate for us three Covenants, (or seven in today's dispensationalist terms!) the Natural, the Legal, and the Gospel, different in their entire nature and essence, and in explaining these and assigning their differences, so intricately entangle themselves that they greatly obscure and even impair the nucleus of solid truth and piety.

Interesting, I've missed that before. I wonder how the doctrine this was speaking against compares to modern New Covenant Theology.

 

[Leslie]

Are you suggesting that if the confessions say something inconsistent with premillenialism, that ipso facto rules out embracing it? What ever happened to sola scriptura? Or am I misunderstanding you?

Michael can correct me if I'm wrong, but this seems to be an ungenerous reading of his OP. If I came across a view that seemed, at first glance, to have merit only to find that it had been rejected or excluded by the church through her confessional documents that would rightly give me pause. Now, ultimately, we must follow Scripture and if diligent study, mature reflection, and faithful prayer convinced me of a non-confessional position then I would have to say "Here I stand, I can do no other". However, the Reformers would have been the first men to caution us not to reject the wisdom and tradition of the church lightly. As Spurgeon put it so well, "It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others."

My post was badly worded. Sorry. I do agree that we must seriously consider the understanding of bygone ages.

 

[RamistThomist]

This is my researched understanding of "premillennialism" and the Westminster Standards.

Modern dispensational premillennialism differs fundamentally from the Westminster Standards and in no way can be reconciled with it.
Historic premillennialism differs significantly in a couple of ways, requiring at least one or two exceptions to the Westminster Standards, and further evaluation of implicated beliefs.

Remember, both views hold to a rule like David's or Solomon's rule by our Lord for 1,000 years (on the Julian Calendar) from Jerusalem.

Historic premillennialism is far less egregious than modern dispensational premillennialism in that it does not hold to two returns of our Lord, nor does it hold the church will not go through "the" tribulation. But the historic premill view does not hold the unified resurrection of the just and unjust, both together, at the final judgment. That's a big difference. Nor does it account for sin and judgment during 1,000 years.

There's another big difference even with historic premill.
The millennium is about "Israel," a political Israel rather than the Israel of God defined in Galatians 6.
Amill and Premill hold, in accordance with the Westminster Standards, hold to a Christ centered millennium vs. a man centered (political) one.

This is a good post. Most people who attack premillennialism, even if they know what hist. premil is, tend to think everyone who is Premil is Hal Lindsey's view. While I hold to an earthly reign, pace the Dispensationalists, I believe Jesus of Nazareth mediates the blessings, not Israel. That's a huge difference.

Plus, most Dispensationalists simply write us off as closet amillennialists.