In his first letter to Timothy, Paul makes a statement that commentators have used to support their gloomy predictions for the church in history. The Apostle says,
Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. (1 Tim 4:1–5)
One writer says, “According to this teaching the situation will degenerate as Christ’s return approaches”1 in our future. Christians often apply these words to our day, saying we must be living in the last days because of the prevalence of evil things: many people abandon the church, plenty of hypocrites stay in the church, etc. Such observations seem to support the idea that things are getting worse and will continue to do so until the Lord returns.2
Such pessimism ignores an obvious fact: Paul speaks about a situation that existed in his day. “Paul sees Timothy and himself as being presently in the last times.… This is required by the context. The purpose of 1 Tim 4:1–5 is to show that the problems Timothy is currently experiencing are not unexpected.”3 Paul is writing to Timothy about his pastoral concerns, not things that will happen in our future.
But, you may ask, what about the future apostasy Paul mentions: “some will depart from the faith” (1 Tim 4:1)? Doesn’t that teach that a great falling away will occur in our future? No, “‘will apostatize,’ is future because Paul is probably looking at the prophecy from the perspective of the time it was originally given.”4
Inmillennialism5 teaches an optimistic future for the church in history (i.e., before the resurrection), even though sin still exists. “Such is the kingdom-vision that the Lord and his apostles bequeathed to his churches. It is an optimistic vision: in our age, ‘The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea’ (Isa 11:9).”6
These two views are mutually exclusive. Historical pessimism and optimism for the church cannot both be true at the same time and in the same relationships.
How can inmillennialism’s optimism be true in light of Paul’s letter to Timothy? For a start, we must recognize the meaning of his phrase “in latter times.” Some historical pessimists take it to mean a period in our future at the end of history, and others think Paul means the entire church age in which we are living.
As the subtitle to my book (Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days) suggests, I think we should take a different approach. In most cases, “in latter times” and similar expressions mean the final period of the Mosaic (law) age, the period from John the Baptist to the temple’s fall in AD 70. These terms usually do not refer to the end of history.
Let me provide a few examples to show what I mean.7 Here is the first occurrence of a term like this: “Jacob called his sons and said, ‘Gather together, that I may tell you what shall befall you in the last days’” (Gen 49:1). The Patriarch defines this term in his prophecy of Judah: “The scepter will not depart from Judah or the staff from between his feet until He whose right it is comes and the obedience of the peoples belongs to Him” (Gen 49:10). The “last days,” according to Jacob, would be the period of the Messiah’s coming. This coming happened about seventy-three years before the temple fell, not at the end of history.
My second example comes from a song God gave to Moses. It described the evil destined to fall on Israel “in the latter days” (Deut 31:29). Speaking of that time, God said: “I will move them (i.e., Israel) to jealousy with those which are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation” (Deut 32:21). Paul reports this came to pass in his generation (Rom 10:19). During this period, God brought calamity as he judged his people and unsheathed his “glittering sword” against them (Deut 32:41). These “latter days” culminated in the temple’s fall in AD 70. Moses did not use this term to refer to something in our future.
Third, Job said, “I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth” (Job 19:25). John Gill said Job knew the Redeemer would “appear in the world in human nature … in the last days.”8 This appearance happened in the final period of the Mosaic age, not at the end of time.
Fourth, Isaiah said, “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it” (Isa 2:2). This mountain-top glory is consistent with my thesis: God established the mountain of the Lord’s house in the “last days” of the temple, not in those of planet earth.
Fifth, through Daniel, God told “king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days” (Dan 2:28). He then referred to four kingdoms: after Babylon, Medio-Persia, Greece, and Rome would arise in succession. Speaking of the fourth, Daniel said: “in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever” (Dan 2:44). God set up this kingdom in the days of the Roman emperors, not at the end of the cosmos.
I will forbear extending this list further.
Conclusion
The apostasy in “the latter times” pertained to the “last days” of the Mosaic age, not to the ongoing messianic (kingdom) age. The Scriptures never give a pessimistic view of the kingdom in history; they show it growing, increasing in strength and influence, and finally exercising dominion over all the nations of the earth. Jesus must reign until He makes all His enemies His footstool (Ps 110:1; Matt 22:44; Mark 12:36; Luke 20:42–43; Acts 2:34–35; 1 Cor 15:25; Heb 1:13; et al.).
Paul’s words to Timothy describe the situation in their generation; they do not cast a pall of pessimism over the entire messianic age.
Amen.
Footnotes
- A. Duane Litfin, “1 Timothy,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 739.
- The image in this post is The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth by Jennie A. Brownscombe (1914). This file (here) is in the public domain (PD-US).
- William D. Mounce, Pastoral Epistles, vol. 46 of Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, 2000), 234.
- Mounce, Pastoral Epistles, 234.
- For a full-length account of this prophetic model, see Michael A. Rogers, Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days (Tullahoma, TN: McGahan Publishing House, 2020). It is available here. For a summary, see the free PDF here.
- Rogers, Inmillennialism, 251.
- These examples come from my previous post, The Last Days in Hebrews.
- John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 9 vols. (1809–10; repr., Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1989), 3:352.
