Responding to Dispensationalism, Installation # 20: T.B. Baines

I haven't posted in my series on dispensationalism in some time, and I am not here making a commitment to reinstitute the frequensy of post with which I wrote rigorously in the past. Seeing that I have not finally concluded the writing project, whether you call it an essay or paper or something else, it only makes sense that more articles would follow at least until I have formally closed it in this format; that would in no way signify that I have exhausted all possible research and learning on the topic of contrary hermeneutical schemes.

Section Three:

Responding to the Arguments of Particular Dispensational Authors

T. B. Baines: Against Whom Does He Argue

I got the overwhelming sense that Baines was actually leveling his critique at full or hyper preterism. The position against which he argues in chapter 2, his section called “The Promises Not Fulfilled by Christ’s First Coming”, would be one against which I would also argue. Full preterism states that, all of the Old Testament prophesies have been fulfilled—including the prophesy of Christ’s coming in power and glory; this view is heterodox.

I get no sense that Baines is distinguishing the Amillennial opinion of the second coming of Christ, that the “1000 year reign” of Christ has already begun, being realized between the first and second comings of Christ. The evidence of the placement of his arguments are thus: “Most interpreters hold that the promise as to the land has already been fulfilled, and that the other promises either have been, or will be, fulfilled as the immediate or ultimate result of the first coming of Christ.” And this, “the interpretation which makes all the promises flow out of Christ’s first coming.” Another, but separate, misrepresentation of Amillennialism is exposed in this statement regarding Galatians 3, “The chapter does not name the promise given to the multitudinous seed, much less show the Church as taking this promise away from Israel.” Even hyper preterism does not claim to steal the promises away from Israel. If it is national Israel spoken of here, they never had the promise, but if it is the remnant spoken of here, then we gentiles are grafted in. It is this type of misunderstanding that has lead to such poor labels as “replacement theology”. Here Dr. Sam Waldron (whom I will also quote later) has appropriately addressed this issue.

“To speak of the Church replacing Israel is to forget that the Church is a reformed and expanded Israel. In a word, terminology like Replacement Theology or Supersessionism disguises the biblical fact that the Church is really the continuation of Israel. There is a genetic and even physical continuity between Israel and the Church that is essential to the biblical view of the relation of the Church and Israel. Such continuity, I would argue, is consistent with Covenant Theology. It is, additionally, not adequately represented by terminology like Supersessionism and Replacement Theology.”