I am continuing my response to Pastor Bob DeWaay. He asserts:
“Prophecy is not given in chronological order in the Bible. You need to know that.”
The Apostle Paul would take issue to DeWaay’s assertion, since Paul wrote two Thessalonian epistles with the thrust being a chronological order. There was confusion in the Thessalonian church about the connection between the Coming (parousia) of Christ for the believers who would be alive and the resurrection of the dead in Christ. Paul assures and comforts them by informing them that the resurrection is not disconnected from the Coming. How does Paul specifically clarify their confusion? By couching it in explicit chronological language. Observe:
“For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. (16) For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. (17) Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.” (1 Thess 4:15-17).
After the clarity of his teaching, a few months later Paul receives word back that the Thessalonians are confused because there are some who are trying to teach them that the resurrection and Day of the Lord has already happened. Accordingly, Paul writes back in no uncertain terms that not only has the resurrection and Day of the Lord not occurred yet, but as proof of this he tells them that two pivotal events must occur first: the revelation of Antichrist, and a definitive rebellion (apostasy). In other words, since these two events have not occurred yet, the Thessalonians can know that the resurrection and Day of the Lord has not happened. Paul again couches his prophecy in explicit chronological language:
“Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, (2) not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. (3) Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, (4) who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. (5) Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? (6) And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. (7) For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. (8) And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. (9) The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, (10) and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.” (2 Thess 2:1-10).
To deny this chronological language is simply an indication of a Tradition getting in the way of this teaching.
