Expert: Dr. Ronald E. Shultz - 3/8/2004

Question
Would you be kind enough to explain your own views on how one should study Scripture and how this methodology influences the issues of both millennialism and covenant?
Also how should an interpreter handle figurative language in the Bible? (i.e. when an expression is literal and when it is figurative and how one knows)

Due to the nature of these questions, I do not expect a quick reply. Your answers always reveal much thought, careful research, and attention to detail and the truth. Thanks.

Answer
Thank you for your kind words, Earl.  I am starting to feel like I know you.  ;-)  My supervisor at my full time job is married to a Maurice Bunch.  Kin?  

Not knowing your background if I define what you already know please do not be insulted. I try to stick to a verbal-plenary inspiration and a historical-grammatical interpretation of the Word.  Verbal-plenary means that God wanted each and every word in the fulness of its meaning written and preserved until the end of time, which is why I stick to the Textus Receptus.  The modern versions have been based upon texts that are clearly bogus to even a fairly untrained eye.  This bothers me as men who are supposed to be more scholarly than I have not seen this.  

Anyway, back to the subject at hand.  Verbal-plenary being the fact we must then use the historical-grammatical interpretation to ensure that we get that fullness of meaning. What did the word mean in the time frame of its use? As the argument for the newer translations goes, words change with time and culture. That is true, but we must first understand what the words meant at the time before we try and "update" them. At one time the word silly had a connotation of being holy so that if we saw a poem of that time referring to a procession of silly monks we would know that it was not a derogatory statement.  As dislike for the monks increased (possibly during the time of the Reformation) the term silly took on a different connotation of being foolish or stupid so that a poem in that time using the phrase silly monks would mean something totally different.  

Let's take for example the word modest.  In our culture, if very little skin is shown the garment can be tight enough and even sheer enough to reveal dimples, moles and sadly cracks at all levels and still be considered modest for the skin does not show.  Yet the word in Paul's time meant

2887  kosmios (kos'-mee-os);
from 2889 (in its primary sense); orderly, i.e. decorous:
KJV-- of good behaviour, modest. (1 Tim 2:9)

It is the word we get cosmetics from but cosmetics in those days for a Christian woman would have meant to organize what you got not load up on braids, jewelry and paint. (1 Peter 3:3,4)

Modest clothing would not show clearly that the woman was a 38C and a size 6 panty.  See Adam Clarkes' commentary on 1 Tim 2:9.  He even speaks to the slit dress style before it was popular here in the states.  We can know a lot things that folks want to make gray areas by studying the history and the grammar.

I was taught that if it makes common sense seek no other sense.  Hence if it says the rock was red than the rock was red not pink or purple.  You would be surprised how that messes up some folks like the Catholics that teach that the Word has a body, soul and spirit. Hence the common man can understand the body and a saint might get the soul but only the priest can truly understand the spirit of the Word.  Oddly, the body of the Word clearly states that unless you are lost you have the Spirit of God within you and He was sent to teach you all things so since He was used to write the Word He should be more than apt to teach you the spirit of the Word.

Context plays a great role in meaning.  Clearly when Jesus said He was the Door He did not mean He swung on hinges or was made of wood for indeed the doorway He spoke of did not have hinged doors but was just an opening until the shepherd laid down at the opening making himself literally the door of the sheephold.  

We know that the Poetic books use great imagery and when it says the mountains danced or the trees of the fields clapped their hands that this is imagery and needs to be taken as such.

Comparing Scripture with Scripture keeps us out of trouble as well. The Scripture is a great commentary of itself.  If you read John 6 and see the clear imagery used when Christ spoke of His body and blood then you do not have a problem with the Last Supper and the symbolism He was conveying and do not become Catholics needing the wine and the bread to become literal blood and flesh thus recrucifying Christ which Paul says in Hebrews 6 would be a shame unto Him and in essence a blasphemous act.  Nor do you need to be Lutherans and have a mystical surrounding of the elements when the Godhead is omnipresent and fills all things and by Him all things consist or are held together. It is clearly symbolic and a memorial not a sacrament or means of obtaining saving grace.

Nor do you have much trouble with Peter not being the rock upon which the church is built because it is easy to see Christ pointing to Peter a stone (petros) and then back to Himself as the rock (petra) when you look at 2 Samuel 22:32 when it is written "Who is a rock, save our God?"  A tsur was a cliff like the Rock of Gibralter. The disciples would have understood the reference and note they did not say He was blaspheming making Himself God.

If we see the Church as being in an embyronic state since Christ said upon Himself He WOULD build His church while teaching about it during the Gospels but yet not truly birthed or presented to the world in Acts 2 then we do not have a problem with Matt 24 and have the Church going through the Tribulation. The disciples were just that until Acts 2 when the Spirit indwelled them and then they became apostles of the Church.  They were not sent until they had received power/authority and they could not receive that until after Christ died for the Church thus the Church could not be born or become the engaged Bride until the redemption price was paid.  Besides do we count a child's birthday from conception or from the day he is presented to the world?

Having that in mind is it so hard to see the Bride taken out in Rev 4 before the Trib while Israel is purged in the Trib to prepare them for their King and the kingdom as promised and indeed the type of King they have wanted for the last 2000 years?  They won't get Him before they realize that He was first the sacrificed Lamb, but they will get their conguering King.

Having said all that, the Scripture clearly teaches a new covenant so we are not part of the old. If we are not part of it then how can we hang on to the various rituals and things of that covenant? Christ said that you cannot put new wine into old bottles or else the wine would burst the bottle and both would be lost (by the way that militates against wine being grape juice since fermentation is what causes the swelling and bursting of the old dried out bottle).  

So, the Church is a whole new thing.  The Old Covenant is for the Jews and all promises will be fulfilled.  Millennialism is the only logical way that can happen.  We are in the age of the Gentiles.  The OT is the age of the Jews and Gentiles were supposed to be converted to Judaism.  In the NT, Gentiles are the main keepers of that covenant and the Jews are to be converted to it.  

Neither one of us did a very good job.  Jews became vain and considered the Gentiles dogs and false Christianity has sent many Jews to Hell because they called them Christ killers making it hard for true Christians to reach them but honestly few of us tried.  God is faithful to the Gentiles in that He grafted them into the promise and He is faithful to the Jews because He will fulfill all their promises as well.  In each covenant, both were to be included and both will have remnants saved.  

Take in mind also that dispensationalism is only a tool to try and help us understand the flow of God through history and prepare us for the future.  It gives us a rough draft so to speak but the Scriptures supply the details.

I also let dead theologians rest.  We rely too much upon Calvin, Knox and Arminius. They were not perfect or else they would have left much of the dead ritual of the RCs behind them.  They couldn't do it because like the rest of us we are creatures of habit and it was all those lads could do to get out of works mode and into grace and faith.  

We should have taken their work and gone on to the next level and beyond but instead we argue about what they meant and said.  It is time for a second Reformation and honor their work but take off their glasses and ask God for new illumination.  We are not far from Catholic saint worship when quote Calvin and Knox more that Paul and Peter and better yet Christ.  

Hopefully, this has been some help.  Holler if you need clarification on anything.  Here is a poem I wrote as sort of a shorter version of what I just wrote.  ;-)  Blessings unto.  Stay in the Word!!!

Aug 8, 1997   K. I. S. S. Theology

You know you've got to keep it simple, Saint.
Don't try and make it what it ain't.
God said to accept Him like a child
And not let your doctrines run hog wild.

Just preach Jesus, for us crucified
And  that will keep folks from being fried.
Rejoice in that fact that He has risen
And forget about this and that ism.

God won't care where you got your degree.
He'll only ask, "What did you do with Me?"
Cling to him and not your denomination
If you want to escape eternal damnation.

Some will argue loud until they faint,
But you've got to keep it simple, Saint.
Your theology may be grand and swell,
But lots of theologians end up in Hell.

So go on, get up, get out, and go
To tell the ones who do not know.
Remember, unless you want to be considered nuts or quaint,
You've got to keep it simple, Saint!