Ecclesiology – What Does This Mean?

Last Things #14: The Missing Millennium

[Twenty-Third in a series of posts on Last Things]

Encore Post:

Called the “Jewish opinion” by the Lutheran Confessions, the belief in a Millennium comes from a face-value reading of Old Testament prophecy and poetry about the Church or about eternal life with God after the Second Advent. It also treats the Book of Revelation, written in a symbolic code called apocalyptic, in a similar way. By doing so, it uses difficult to understand passages to complicate the very clear words of Jesus, Peter, Paul, and other New Testament writers. It is the view of the Pharisees that caused them to rule out Jesus as the Messiah, because he would not battle the Romans — and so they missed that the Scriptures pointed to the birth, life, sufferings, death, and Resurrection of the Son of God.

The word itself comes from Revelation 20, where the reign of Christ through his church is described as 1000 years. This number is not a literal 1000 years, but is Jewish numerology. The number ten meant perfection to them, and ten multiplied by itself three times—three is the number of God—means everything is complete. It points to our times when the Gospel has reached every corner of the earth.

While it may seem harmless to believe such things, it detracts from what Christ has commanded us to do. It reads every event as a sign of Christ’s return. Instead, we should be ready, as Jesus instructs us, making disciples of all nations by baptizing and teaching them, knowing he is with us always.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Last Things #13: Come, Lord Jesus, Come!

[Twenty-Second in a series of posts on Last Things]

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Title: Come, Lord Jesus, Come!

They were ordinary days. The seaside resort of Pompeii was bustling with the daily activities of the luxurious retreat for the most affluent Romans, who escaped the pressures of the imperial capital of ancient Rome. That is, until Mount Vesuvius buried it in ash for 1700 years. It was a lazy Sunday morning in Hawaii, slower than usual for a navy base — until Japanese bombs shattered Pearl Harbor that December 7, 1941. On a bright, lovely September morning, a pastor drove from downtown Fort Wayne, practicing a sermon for chapel on the first regular day of classes for Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne — a sermon he rewrote on the ride in as he learned airplanes had destroyed the Twin Towers in New York City that September 11, 2001. Life was normal — until the world changed.

On another ordinary day, when people will go about their daily lives as usual, eating, drinking, marrying, working in the field and in businesses, Jesus will return from Heaven. (Matthew 24:37-41) He will appear in the sky with the angel armies of Heaven and the souls of his people with him. Every eye will see him. He will send his angels to gather both those who are saved to meet him and the damned to be judged. (Matthew 13:41, 49, Matthew 24:30-31) There will be no rapture, where Christ appears secretly to claim his own and leave the world in tribulation. This notion comes from the dispensationalists’ misunderstanding.

At that time, Jesus will break the seal of the grave forever. All people will rise from the dead in the great resurrection of the dead. All souls will be reunited with their bodies, and Christ’s own will be transformed to be just like him. (1 Thessalonians 4:14-17; Philippians 3:21) For all the dread that surrounds this day, it is for Christians the most joyful day of all, even with the next event — the Last Judgment — coming. For the goal of the suffering, death, and resurrection of our Lord is this day, when all is made right, we are restored to his image, and we will shine like the stars in his kingdom. So, the Church has always prayed: Come, Lord Jesus, come!

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

©2018-2026 Robert E. Smith. All rights reserved. Permission granted to copy, share, and display freely for non-commercial purposes. Direct all other rights and permissions inquiries to cosmithb@msn.com

Last Things #11: Rapture and Tribulation and Millennium — Oh My!

[Twentieth in a series of posts on Last Things]

Encore Post:

Many of our evangelical brothers and sisters are fascinated by Biblical prophecy. Seeing the evil around us, they are convinced that we are living in the very last years and months before Christ returns to raise the dead, bring an end to sin, death and the power of the devil, gather all in the final judgment, and begin the marriage feast of the Lamb that has no end. They are not alone — in every period, Christians were convinced they were living in such times — even St. Paul and Martin Luther!

What makes their view unique in the church’s history is that they accept a theological view called Dispensationalism, a Christian school of thought that was born in the 1800s. It adopted the ancient view that Christ would reign on earth literally for 1000 years after he returned in glory. It was set in the way of looking at history, inspired by the 19th-century cultural movement known as Romanticism. John Nelson Darby developed dispensationalism, D. L. Moody spread it, and C. I. Scofield set it in its standard form.

Dispensationalists believe God divided the world into seven dispensations (also called economies and administrations). In each age, God supposedly revealed himself in different ways. Salvation was offered according to different plans for each age (for example, in the classic scheme, under the Law of Moses, salvation was by works, but in the church age, by grace), and humans were held accountable to the rules of that age. They get to these views by treating prophecies written in figurative and symbolic language at face value and using the interpretations they discover to understand, in a complex way, the simple and clear words of Jesus and the apostles.

For them, this age will end when the events predicted in prophecy occur. They look to current events to fulfill these prophecies, treating the Bible as a giant algebra problem. Some have used such calculations to predict end-time events. These include the rapture, when all true Christians will suddenly be removed from the world, leaving only unbelievers; the Tribulation, when unbelievers are punished and those who come to faith amid these events are persecuted; and the Millennium, when Christ and the church will rule the world for a thousand years. Two problems with this: Christ promised he would return suddenly, and the last judgment follows immediately (so the Bible is not an algebra problem), and these versions of a rapture, a millennium, and a tribulation are not in the Bible.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Last Things 7G: Stay Awake! Don’t Close Your Eyes!

[Thirteenth in a series of posts on last things]

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Even with the effects of the fall, the world can be very sweet, pleasant, and beautiful. When God finished creating the world, he stood back, looked it all over, and said, “very good.” (Genesis 1:31) Even after sin entered the world, bringing death, sorrow, grief, pain, disease, and disaster, the hand of the Creator is present everywhere. Breathtaking sunrises and sunsets, seashore views and gentle, warm breezes, mountain valleys and peaks all speak to us of his majesty. Even cloud patterns before a storm cause us to admire his majesty. There is the pleasure of the presence of loved ones, holding your child or grandchild for the first time.

Life is very precious to us. It absorbs us in planning, working towards goals, saving, dreaming, and enjoying the many gifts God gives to us. We deal with life’s tragedies as best we can, but there are long stretches when we think it will never end. We forget that this world—and, more to the point, our world — is passing away. We go to sleep spiritually. The work that God calls us to do, especially to witness to the Good News of salvation in Jesus, doesn’t seem quite so important. When sports tournaments are held on Sunday, we skip worship to watch our kids compete. We put caring for the poor, contributing to the work of the church with our resources and time second; we put off uncomfortable conversations with loved ones who wander from the faith.

Yet it is very much at times like these that our Lord will return for us. He will do so suddenly, without warning, the way that the flood came in the day of Noah, the way the sudden attacks on Pearl Harbor Day and 9/11 came. It may be at the end of time or at the end of our time. It is why Jesus calls on us to stay awake! We remember he came at the fullness of time, lived the perfect life for us, suffered and died for us, rose again for us, and ascended to prepare a place for us. And so we set the watch, day and night, knowing that he is coming for us. In the meantime, we work for the day, and the time will come when we can no longer work. All the while, we pray: Come, Lord Jesus, come!

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Pentecost

[Ninety-Seventh in a series of posts on Bible Stories]

Encore Post:

The Feast of Pentecost is the Greek name (πεντηκοστή) for the Jewish Feast of Weeks (Shavuot, שָׁבוּעוֹת in Hebrew). The day celebrated the harvest of the barley crop and the planting of the wheat crop in Israel. God established this day of thanksgiving on the fiftieth day after Passover, and it was one of three feasts the Torah commanded Jews to celebrate in Jerusalem whenever possible. In the days after Jesus’ ascension into heaven, the city was still crowded with Jews from around the world who had remained after Passover to celebrate this feast in the Holy City.

The Christian Church remembers the day as a kind of birthday. On this day, God poured out the Holy Spirit on the whole Church in a public and powerful way rather than only on selected prophets and leaders.

Both the Hebrew and Greek words for spirit can also mean “wind.” The Holy Spirit, or Holy Wind, hovered over the chaos before God created the heavens and the earth. During the Exodus, the Holy Spirit appeared visibly as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. When Solomon built the temple in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit settled in the Holy of Holies as a cloud. When the Prophet Elijah fled to Mount Sinai, God sent a mighty wind, an earthquake, and a fire to get his attention. On Pentecost, the sound of a mighty rushing wind caught the crowd’s attention, and the wind and tongues of fire testified to the Holy Spirit’s presence.

The outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost fulfilled prophecy in the Old Testament (Joel 2:28-32), in the preaching of John the Baptist (Matthew 3:11), and in the promises of Jesus Himself (Acts 1:5). The Spirit enabled the apostles to proclaim God’s mighty works in languages they had never learned. Pilgrims from many nations heard the Gospel in their own tongues. On the day the Church was born, God showed that the message of salvation was intended for people of every nation, language, tribe, and people.

By baptizing His people with the Holy Spirit, Jesus gave them the power to witness to God’s love. He provided them with a Counselor to lead and guide them. Just as the prophets of old proclaimed God’s Word, every Christian now has the privilege of confessing Christ before the world. The same Holy Spirit who filled the apostles at Pentecost continues to call, gather, enlighten, and sanctify Christ’s Church today.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Matthias the Twelfth Apostle

[Ninety-sixth in a series of posts on Bible Stories]

Encore Post:

After Jesus ascended into Heaven, St. Peter gathered the eleven Apostles and the other disciples. The betrayal of Jesus by Judas and his suicide had left a vacancy among them. The number twelve was important. Israel had twelve tribes, and Jesus had chosen twelve Apostles to represent the new Israel, the Church. Before the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost and the Gospel began to spread throughout the world, the apostolic circle would be restored.

They chose two candidates: Joseph, called Barsabbas, and Matthias. Both had been with Jesus from the beginning of His ministry. Both had witnessed His teaching, His miracles, His death, His resurrection, and His ascension. The disciples prayed and then chose Matthias by lot, trusting God to guide their decision.

We know little about Matthias. He appears only once in Scripture, in Acts 1. We know he was a disciple of Jesus from the days of John the Baptist until the Ascension. Some early Church Fathers believed Matthias was one of the seventy-two disciples Jesus sent out two by two into towns and villages to announce that the Kingdom of Heaven had come near. Whether this is correct or not, Matthias clearly stayed with Jesus throughout His ministry. He witnessed His teaching, miracles, death, resurrection, and ascension. The other disciples respected him enough to nominate him for the apostolic office. We do not know with certainty what became of him later. Church tradition says he may have preached in northern Turkey, Ethiopia, or even returned to Jerusalem, where he died as a martyr.

We might think Matthias and other little-known disciples were unimportant. Yet God used them to build His Church. Most Christians can name Peter, John, and Paul, but few remember Matthias. Even so, God knew him, called him, and used him. The same is true today. No one is too small or unimportant in God’s eyes.

Soon the Holy Spirit would come at Pentecost. Matthias would join the other apostles in preaching the Gospel of Christ’s death and resurrection. God continues to work through ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things. He has a purpose for every Christian and uses each of us to serve our neighbor and bear witness to Jesus.

Originally posted at What Does This Mean? Blog: What Does This Mean?

The posts in the blog What Does This Mean? are now available at What Does This Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Jesus Loves the Little Children

[Seventy-sixth in a series of posts on Bible Stories]

Encore Post:

In the ancient world, many children died before reaching adulthood. In fact, childhood death was common until the twentieth century. Every couple could expect to bury at least one child during their lifetime. That is why the childhood prayer was taught to generations of young people: “Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. If I should live another day, I pray the Lord to guide my way.”

Children and young people, therefore, were kept at an emotional distance and paid little attention. Besides, the children were disruptive, especially when a rabbi was trying to teach. They did not understand abstract thought, so they looked for other ways to entertain themselves and get attention. They were expected to behave, to be just like the adults with them. So, they were pushed aside so that adults could attend to “important” business. Keep them out of sight and out of mind.

Jesus made two points by bringing a child before them. First, all people are important to God, no matter how small. He loves them, cares for them. In fact, Jesus came to die for them, too. They are not the future of the church — they are the church.

Second, children trust adults to take care of them, live humbly, and assume their love. In fact, they are better Christians than adults! To be Christians, after all, means to trust God to take care of us, to deny ourselves, knowing we are cared for, and to dedicate our lives to the service of others. This comes naturally to them. They are not bothered when they cannot understand something adults or God tell them. They accept the truth, rely on it, and build on it because they trust their parents, their teachers, and God. They may not know something, but they know someone. So, ironically, if we want to grow in faith, we need to become like them and trust the God who made us, loves us, died for us, cares for us, and will bring us home one day to be with him forever.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Jesus Calls His Disciples

[Sixty-First in a series of posts on Bible Stories]

Encore Post:

Rabbis in Jesus’ day often had students — disciples—who followed them, observed everything they did, memorized every word they taught, and imitated their actions. Most of the time, the students chose their teachers. Jesus turned that around when He chose his own disciples. Disciples often became rabbis themselves. When Jesus told Peter, James, and John they would “catch people,” his disciples would assume they were to train for that very occupation.

It is easy to think that Jesus just walked up to the disciples with no notice and ordered them to follow him, and they did. But that likely wasn’t the case for any of them. Simon, Andrew, James, and John already knew Jesus when he called them. Jesus had made Capernaum, the headquarters of their fishing business, his hometown. Before this event, Jesus had taught in their synagogue, healed Peter’s mother-in-law, cast out demons, healed a paralytic, the Roman centurion’s daughter, and many others. His brother Andrew and others were disciples of John the Baptist, who identified Jesus as the Lamb of God. Matthew was a toll collector at Capernaum before Jesus called him, but likely heard a lot about him.

Jesus selected twelve disciples to be his closest students. The number twelve reminded Jews of the twelve tribes of Israel. By doing this, he signaled he was re-establishing God’s chosen people. These twelve would eventually be commissioned as his apostles, on whom Jesus would build his church. These would become witnesses to his resurrection and take the gospel to the ends of the Roman world. All but two would die as martyrs — Judas, who betrayed him, and John, who lived a long life and whose own disciples would pass the faith on to new generations.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Jonah and the Unforgivable

[Thirty-Third in a series of posts on Bible Stories]

Encore Post:

Nineveh was the ancient capital of the Assyrian Empire, on the Tigris River in what is now modern Iraq. Our story takes place during the years when its power was growing, and several events caused the people to focus on serving their gods. About a century after the events of the Book of Jonah, the Assyrians invaded Israel and carried off all the people of the Northern Kingdom into exile.

Jonah is not a typical prophet. He came from a small town near Nazareth and hated the people of Nineveh for their legendary cruelty. Rather than take part in God’s plan to rescue the residents of the city from their sinful ways, he would rather go to the ends of the earth — literally. Tarshish was in Spain, which was the western edge of the known world at that time. As pagan sailors work to save his life, he seems unconcerned. When the fish swallows him, he comes to his senses and turns to God. Yet even then, he only preaches to Nineveh because God commands him to do so. He is even angrier with God when the people repent, and God spares them.

Before we criticize Jonah too much, consider how you’d react if God sent you to preach to people that you have no use for. Imagine being called to preach to members of murderous gangs, to Muslim terrorists, or even to those who rape or beat up children or women. It’s hard to have any sympathy for them, isn’t it?

Yet that is what we are called to do. American Lutheran pastor Henry Gerecke had volunteered as a chaplain in World War II. He served as a chaplain in an army unit and visited the Dachau death camp. When the Army asked him to be the chaplain for the Nazis on death row during the Nuremberg war crime trials, he volunteered. How do you minister to monsters? He approached the eleven Nazi leaders who conducted the Holocaust through their childhood faith. He did not gloss over their crimes. When they asked to be communed, he refused unless they truly repented and confessed faith in Jesus. It is not a surprise that seven did not. Yet four did. He prayed a childhood prayer with one of them as the Nazi went to the gallows.

We must never forget that we, too, are sinners and unworthy of God’s mercy. Yet God, in his love, sent Jesus to see and to save the lost — both respectable people and the monsters, too. He calls on us to rejoice, for he has found his lost sheep and brought them all home.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

©2018-2024 Robert E. Smith. All rights reserved. Permission granted to copy, share, and display freely for non-commercial purposes. Direct all other rights and permissions inquiries to cosmithb@msn.com.

Happy birthday, Lutheran Church!

Encore Post:

Most people think of October 31st, 1517, as the date of the founding of the Lutheran Church. However, Martin Luther and most Lutheran historians disagree. On the day that Martin Luther posted the 95 Theses, he was very much a Catholic. In fact, on this day, Luther was upset that people did not have to suffer enough for their sins and were being let off the hook way too easily. You could say he was more Catholic than the Pope. Considering the nature of Pope Leo X, he was.

On the first Reformation Day, the Reformation was just beginning. We only begin to recognize Luther’s complete theology in his writings from 1520 onward. And it really wasn’t until 1529 that the reformers and their princes thought of the Lutheran tradition as a separate faith.

Emperor Charles V had many problems in 1529. The Turkish Empire of Suleiman the Great had invaded Austria and laid siege to Vienna. France and the Pope were constantly challenging his authority in southern Europe. He badly wanted to unify his German territories under Roman Catholic control. So he called all the territories together at Augsburg for a meeting of the Holy Roman Empire.

Elector John of Saxony, Luther’s Prince, commissioned Luther and his friends to create a unified statement of the disputes between the Pope and the Lutheran territories. The result was a document called the Augsburg Confession. All the Lutheran princes who attended the Diet of Augsburg signed the document as their own faith.

On June 25th, 1530, the Augsburg Confession was presented to Charles V by the Lutheran princes. To this day, June 25th is known as the birthday of the Lutheran Church.

As time passed, the Augsburg Confession gained acceptance in Lutheran territories and among theologians. It became the standard for what we believe and confess, and it remained so. Today, every Lutheran Pastor pledges to teach according to the Augsburg Confession and the other documents in the Book of Concord of 1580.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana