The Last Disciple
Hank Hanegraaff & Sigmund Brouwer
© 2004 — Pages 393 - 395

 

AFTERWORD

The Last Disciple presents an alternative to the Left Behind understanding of end-times events based on a methodology called Exegetical Eschatology (E2). I coined the phrase Exegetical Eschatology to underscore the fact that above all else I am deeply committed to a proper method of biblical interpretation rather than to any particular model of eschatology. Put another way, the plain and proper reading of a biblical passage must always take precedence over a particular eschatological presupposition or paradigm. (More on this in an upcoming book titled Exegetical Eschatology [Tyndale House].)

    For example, the pretribulational rapture model featured in the Left Behind series interprets Revelation 13 in a strictly literal fashion. Thus, Antichrist dies and resurrects himself physically in order to vindicate his claim to be god. The following passage from The Indwelling, volume 7 of the Left Behind series, communicates the point:

 

Carpathia catapulted himself to a standing position in the narrow end of his own coffin. He turned triumphantly to face the crowd, and David noticed makeup, putty, surgical staples, and stitches in the box where Nicolae's head had lain.

    Standing there before now deathly silence, Nicolae looked as if he had just stepped out of his closet where a valet had helped him into a crisp suit. Shoes gleaming, laces taut, socks smooth, suit unwrinkled, tie hanging just so, he stood broad-shouldered, fresh-faced, shaven, hair in place, no pallor. Fortunato and the seven were on their knees, hiding their faces, sobbing aloud.

    Nicolae raised his hands to shoulder height and said loudly enough for everyone to hear, without aid of a microphone, "Peace. Be still." With that the clouds ascended and vanished, and the sun reappeared in all its brilliance and heat. People squinted and covered their eyes.

    "Peace be unto you," he said. "My peace I give you. Please stand." He paused while everyone rose, eyes still locked on him, bodies rigid with fear. "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in me.

    Murmuring began. David heard people marveling that he was not using a microphone, but neither was he raising his voice. And yet everyone could hear.

    It was as if Carpathia read their minds. "You marvel that I speak directly to your hearts without amplification, yet you saw me raise myself from the dead. Who but the most high god has power over death? Who but god controls the earth and sky?"

(The Indwelling, 366-67).

 

    In sharp contrast, The Last Disciple series exegetes Revelation 13 in light of the whole of Scripture. Thus, Satan can parody the work of Christ through "all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders" (2 Thessalonians 2:9), but he cannot literally do what Christ did—namely, raise himself from the dead.

    What is at stake here is nothing less than the deity and resurrection of Christ. In a Christian worldview, only God has the power to raise the dead. If Antichrist could "raise [himself] from the dead" and control "the earth and sky," Christianity would lose the basis for believing that Christ's resurrection vindicates His claim to deity. Further, if Satan possesses the creative power of God, this would subvert the post-resurrection appearances of Christ in that Satan could have masqueraded as the resurrected Christ. Moreover, the notion that Satan can perform acts that are indistinguishable from genuine miracles suggests a dualistic worldview in which God and Satan are equal powers competing for dominance.

    The point here is not to call into question the orthodoxy of the Left Behind authors. We are committed to the same goals: reading the Bible for all its worth and inspiring hope in the Second Coming of Christ. Collegial debate in the interest of truth, however, is essential to the health of the church, while we adhere to the Christian maxim: "In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; in all things, charity." We must debate this issue, but we need not divide over it. The point is to demonstrate the dangers inherent in the interpretive method they and other dispensationalists employ.

    Such dangers are not solely theological. Placing the Beast in the twenty-first instead of the first century poses historical difficulties as well. For example, the apostle John tells his first-century audience that with "wisdom" and "insight" they can "calculate the number of the Beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666" (Revelation 13:18). No amount of wisdom and insight would have given them the ability to figure out the number of a Nicolae Carpathia character in the twenty-first century.

    Furthermore, while Daniel was instructed to seal up prophecy because the time of fulfillment was in the far future (Daniel 8:26; 12:4, 9; cf. 9:24), John was told not to seal up his prophecy because its fulfillment was fore future (Revelation 22:10). John’s repeated use of such words and phrases as soon and the time is near demonstrate conclusively that John could not have had the twenty-first century in mind.

    Finally, the horror of the Great Tribulation included not only the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple but the persecution of the apostles and prophets who penned the Scriptures and formed the foundation of the Christian church of which Christ Himself was the chief cornerstone. Thus, the Great Tribulation instigated by Nero is the antitype for every type and tribulation that follows before we experience the reality of our own resurrection at the Second Coming of Christ.

    For these and a host of other reasons The Last Disciple series places the Great Tribulation precisely where it belongs, in a first-century milieu in which "the last disciple" comforts believers in the throes of the mother of all persecutions.

 

Ø      Romans 13:11 “And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed.”

Ø      Romans 16:20a “And the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly.”

Ø      Acts 23:6b “Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee; concerning the hope and resurrection of the dead I am being judged!”

Ø      Acts 24:15 “I have hope in God, which they themselves also accept, that there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust.”

Ø      "The gospel …was proclaimed in all creation under heaven." (Col. 1:23; Compare Matt. 24:14; Rom. 10:18; 16:26; Col. 1:5-6; II Tim. 4:17; Rev. 14:6-7; cf. I Clement 5,7)

Ø      Colossians 2:16-17 “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”

Ø      Hosea 13:14 & 1 Cor. 15:55 “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. O Death, I will be your plagues! O Grave, I will be your destruction!  Pity is hidden from My eyes.”

Ø      1 Cor. 15:26 “The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.”

Ø      1 Cor 15:56 “The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.”

Ø      Mathew 10:23 “When they persecute you in this city, flee to another. For assuredly, I say to you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes.”

Ø      Matthew 24:3b “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

Ø      Matthew 5:17-18 “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.”

Ø      Luke 21:20-22 “But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her. For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.”