Dr. Tom Nettles describes James’ view of the “last days” and the coming of the Lord in his foreword to my book:
“Behold the judge is standing at the door” (James 5:9). I read these verses today and considered seriously the possibility that James, the pastor of Christians in Jerusalem, was reminding his hearers of the presence of Christ to judge the unbelieving Jews and bring the Mosaic Age to an end. Soon, Jesus, by the hand of the Romans would destroy the temple and bring great tribulation on those who had rejected his Messiahship even in the presence of his having fulfilled the prophetic word. They were to realize it was very near, for Jesus had said that these things would happen within this generation. Certainly, extended implications for every age reside within that sobering reminder of James, but perhaps he had in mind the final gasps of the Mosaic Age and the fruition of the Messianic Age in that dramatic display of the reigning presence of Jesus. I deduce that such would be the interpretive gravity of an “inmillennial” view of those words.1
This analysis of inmillennialism is accurate.
James accuses the rich in his day of “[heaping] up treasure in the last days” (Jam 5:3). They were not accumulating treasure in AD 47–482 for the “last days” of planet earth, or the “last days” of the messianic (church) age. For James and the other apostles, the term last days referred to the last period of the Mosaic era, from John the Baptist to the temple’s fall in AD 70.
So, these wicked people had hoarded riches that would soon perish. According to the inmillennial view of prophecy, this passage is about the evil Jews of Jesus’ generation. James says to them,
You have lived on the earth (or land) in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you. (Jam 5:5–6)
These wicked acts fulfilled Jesus’ prophecy against apostate Israel:
You are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell? Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. (Matt 23:31–36)
They had murdered the just and the Just, but their “day of slaughter” was at hand (Jas 5:5).
James’ language resembles Zephaniah’s when he foretold a previous judgment of Israel (Zeph 1:14–18). The prophet says, “Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD’S wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land” (Zeph 1:18).
But we have additional evidence that James is speaking of God’s judgment of Israel. He encourages the twelve tribes (i.e., Christians, cp. Jas 1:1) to “be patient … until the coming (Gk. parousia) of the Lord” (Jas 5:7; cp. Jas 5:8).
Jesus had connected His parousia to the temple’s fall and the “great tribulation” (Matt 24:1–3, 21, 27, 37, 39). He said all these things would occur in His generation (Matt 24:34), in the “last days” of the Mosaic age. The parousia (presence) of Christ with His people would endure into the messianic age that followed the temple’s fall.
So, James comforts his persecuted readers with these words: “Behold, the Judge is standing right at the door” (Jas 5:9 NASB), ready to judge Israel, destroy the temple, and avenge His elect (cp. Luke 18:7).
The prophets had used similar language to described God’s previous judgment of Jerusalem. Micah, for example, had said, “Her wound is incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem” (Mic 1:9).3 Regarding this verse, John Gill says,
The calamity has reached the land of Judah; it stopped not with Israel or the ten tribes, but spread itself into the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin; for the Assyrian army, having taken Samaria, and carried Israel captive, in a short time, about seven or eight years, invaded Judea, and took the fenced cities of Judah in Hezekiah’s time, in which Micah prophesied. He is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem; Sennacherib, king of Assyria, having taken the fenced cities, came up to the very gates of Jerusalem, and besieged it, where the courts of judicature were kept, and the people resorted to, to have justice done them; and Micah, being of the tribe of Judah, calls them his people, and was the more affected with their distress.4
For James to say the Judge was at the door meant judgment was coming soon. Within twenty-five years, as it turned out, Christ used the Romans to destroy the temple and level Jerusalem.
Conclusion
We must apply James’ lessons to ourselves, but we should understand that he made prophetic statements in a unique historical situation—during the “last days” of the Mosaic age.
For comparison, consider God’s judgment of Egypt in the Exodus around 1500 BC. That judgment taught Israel redemptive lessons that they applied from that time onward, and it continues to instruct spiritual Israel today. Likewise, God’s judgment of apostate Israel (i.e., Israel after the flesh) in Jesus’ generation continues to bless God’s people because that event marked the complete transition into the superior messianic (kingdom) age (cp. Matt 11:11).
This perspective does not negate God’s final judgment of the wicked (cp. Matt 25:31–46). But we should not distort James’ statements; when he wrote, “the coming (Gk. parousia) of the Lord” was nigh, and “the Judge [was] standing right at the door,” he was speaking of events in his near future.
Inmillennialism preserves this perspective.
Footnotes
- Michael A. Rogers, Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days (Tullahoma, TN: McGahan Publishing House, 2020), xii–xvii. The book contains a full-length account of this prophetic model. It is available here. For a summary, see the free PDF here.
- The probable date James wrote this epistle per John A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Pub, 2000), 352.
- The image in this post is the cast of a rock relief of Sennacherib from the foot of Cudi Dağı, near Cizre. The cast is exhibited in Landshut, Germany. This file (here) is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
- John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 9 vols. (1809–10; repr., Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1989), 6:555.
2 comments
Again, nice stuff Mike. Thank you. Useful for me –our home church is doing studies in James right now.
Thank you, brother! I’m glad these are timely for you.