Preterists are people who believe that all bible prophecy was fulfilled by or before the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish temple by the Roman general Titus. They are sometimes accused of having spiritualized certain Bible verses concerning Israel’s end time in order to make them conform to an A.D. 70 time of fulfillment. Thus they believe that the return of Jesus is not in the future of today’s believers, but solidly in their past. To that, this preterist responds, "Yes, those Scriptures must be understood spiritually." May I offer a few biblical explanations as to why?

Let’s begin at the beginning, with a brief look at the death that Adam died. Was the nature of that death physical, as we normally regard death, or was it something else? Let us examine the testimony of God. Before Adam’s fall, God had warned,

I simply do not know how God could have made His meaning more clear. He said "in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Do you suppose Adam believed that he would surely die "in the day" that he ate of it? I think so, for, on the same day that he ate of the forbidden tree, we find him hiding from God. Why would he do that unless he believed that God would surely require his life on that day of his disobedience?

But Adam did not surely die on that day, at least not physically, as he might have expected. He was certainly punished on that day, however, for God cursed the ground because of him. Thereafter he would have to produce his food through hard labor and sweat. But Adam’s punishment, as stern as it was, fell short of physical death, and, in order that God be true, Adam had to have surely died that day. We ask, then, if it were possible that Adam surely died in some way other than physically on the day of his transgression. I believe that he did. Here is what God said:

Driven from Eden, Adam no longer enjoyed the fellowship of his Creator. And, with Cherubims and a flaming sword guarding access to the tree of life, Adam was no longer permitted to eat of it and live forever [Gen. 3:22]. Is that not descriptive of spiritual death, a man separated from God’s fellowship and denied access to eternal life? If not, how would you describe it? So then, Adam did surely die in the day that he sinned, and God was faithful to what He had said. But it was a spiritual death that Adam died.

Now here is my point: If Adam died a spiritual death (and we have just seen that he did), why would we expect that his resurrection to life would be anything other than spiritual? Does not a spiritual death demand a spiritual resurrection to life? In other words, should not Adam’s resurrection to life correspond in nature to the death that he died? I believe that it must. If not, why not?

But someone may quibble: Yes, Adison, but Adam also died physically. Wouldn’t his physical death demand a physical resurrection to life? And I answer, "Possibly, but the body that was raised up would have to correspond to the one that had died, and why would Adam, or anyone else, want that?" Adam had lived nine hundred and thirty years before he died [Gen. 5:5]. By that time, do you suppose that his body was old and worn out? If he was in good health at that age, then why did he die? And if he was in poor health, then why would he want to someday be resurrected to life in that frail old physical body? That doesn’t make sense, does it? But that is what it would be, for, if you argue that the resurrection to life involves a resurrection to life in a rejuvenated, immortal body, then you are, in reality, arguing for a spiritual resurrection to life. Here is how the apostle Paul said it,

Was the trump a spiritual or literal thing?

In First Corinthians Fifteen, Paul was discussing the same resurrection to life that was so prominent in "new testament" doctrine. Yet some of the Corinthians were denying it [v- 12]. It would occur at the final trump when corruption put on incorruption; when mortal put on immortality. And not all of them, wrote Paul, would die before it came to pass. But the living would undergo a change. When corruption put on incorruption and mortality put on immortality; when the living were "changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump" (which some of the Corinthians lived to undergo), was that not a resurrection to life? My friends, Paul’s writings spiritualized the resurrection, and that is what I believe occurred in the first century.

But to me there is another reason for believing in the spiritual fulfillment of end time things - the very nature of God demands it. At Jacob’s well at Sychar, a Samaritan city, Jesus instructed a certain woman about the nature of God. He said,

Could it be that people have an incorrect perception of God? I believe that to be true, and that Scripture backs up that opinion. Soon after the exodus from Egypt, the Israelites seemed to forget that it was God, not Moses, who had delivered them from Pharaoh and bondage. When Moses was atop Sinai receiving the Law from God, the people came to Aaron and said,

Did Moses, with Aaron as his spokesman, really bring up the Israelites from their harsh bondage in Egypt? Did he by his own power defeat the Egyptian army at the Red Sea [Ex. 14:11-14]? Did Moses provide the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night in order to lead the Israelites [Ex. 13:21, 22]? That seems to have been the belief of his countrymen, perhaps because they could not visually see God. But no one was able to see God and live [Ex. 33:19-23]. Could that be because people who are alive and in physical bodies, cannot comprehend a Spirit (as God is), or other spiritual things? That may be true, based on Jesus’ message to the Samaritan woman at the well. He told her, "Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews" [John 4:22]. In any case, things that are of the Spirit of God, in order to be known, must be spiritually discerned [1 Cor. 2:14].

Since God is Spirit, must He not be spiritually discerned? And, since God’s motive in redemptive history was to resurrect fallen Adam and his race, which, as we have already noted, was a spiritual resurrection, should we not expect that things pertaining to it must be spiritually discerned? And since the resurrection was to occur at the last trump, which, Paul wrote, that some of the Corinthians would be alive to see, must it not be spiritually discerned? I believe that the answer to all three questions is "Yes." It is not preterists, therefore, but the God who inspired the bible, that spiritualized its content pertaining to the fulfillment of end time prophecies and the resurrection. Must we not, then, discern them spiritually?

My final point is, almost two thousand years ago, Jesus "came unto his own, and his own received him not" [John 1:11]. They demanded a miraculous sign, perhaps something that they could see or touch. Jesus healed the sick, cleansed the lepers and gave sight to the blind. He even raised some dead people [Mark 5:41, 42; John 11:43]. He worked many good works among them [John 10:32], still, the people were not satisfied. It seems that they wanted more; they wanted a sign like manna from heaven, which their fathers had eaten so many generations before them. They said:

The people wanted material things; things that they could see, hold, handle, taste and eat. Then they would believe on him. At least, that was their argument.

Jesus offered them spiritual bread from heaven, by which he meant himself. Now read how Jesus answered his people:

The Jews wanted Jesus to give them a miraculous sign, like manna, but Jesus reminded his people that their fathers had eaten manna, and that they had ultimately died. Jesus offered them himself, his flesh and blood, in reality, his life, as the true living bread that came down from heaven, offering everlasting life to any man who ate of him life. The Jewish hope was materialistic, never promised by God, and consequently, destined never to occur. Jesus offered them a spiritual alternative that led to eternal life.

Everywhere that Jesus went, he encountered countrymen whose hearts were hard and set, and whose minds were shut tight against the truth. They had eyes, he said, with which they saw not, and ears with which they could not hear [Matt. 13:15]. Could their problem have been caused by materialism? Is it possible that those people failed to correctly discern spiritual things because they were intellectually locked into a "this world" process of thinking? Did not materialism provide occasion for Jesus’ rebuke of the Sadducees and the Pharisees [Matt. 16:1-4]? Is it not at least likely that some believers today, believers who cling to a future fulfillment of end time Scripture, do so because they have filtered their hope through their material viewpoints?

Having such different end time views, should the futurist and the preterist believers call each other names and divide from each other? Certainly not! Instead, here is a novel approach to use as we openly discuss our differences of understanding: "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God" [1 John 4:7].