Preston writes a lame article here: https://donkpreston.com/short-shot-the-redemption-of-creation/?fbclid=IwAR3KQIxgS60gxpANLUDp-odLxUY8SUeg65f-EBiW2hUgJx4F2EBC0FDyfW4
We are going to refute this heretical piece by Don Preston because it is important that people understand the truth and Preston teaches none of that in this disgusting piece that belongs in the furnace along with the rest of his stupid books. Preston’s writings are here in bold and quotation marks.
Dealing with Don’s Heretical Ramblings
“All three futurist
eschatologies, Dispensational, Amillennial and Postmillennial, say that one day
God, through Christ will redeem physical creation. The earth will be purged by
fire (2 Peter 3) and all creation, including animals– or as I like to say, even
‘Bugs, slugs and mosquitoes’ will be manifested as ‘sons of God’. Interestingly
of course, when you begin pressing the details of the ‘redemption of creation’
asking of the blood of Christ is going to benefit mosquitoes, and turn them
into sons of God, you begin to get all sorts of equivocation and obfuscation.
Interestingly, I have had debate opponents openly state that yes, Jesus did die
to redeem the bugs, the slugs and the mosquitoes! When pressed to give
supporting scriptural proof, however, that is never forthcoming.”
Any orthodox eschaton (Please
note that this does not include dispensationalism as it is heresy and a novel
creation created in the late 1800s by John Nelson Darby and Scofield just as
full preterism is a heretical and novel creation of the 1900s) will have
the physical creation being redeemed at the 2nd Coming. God called
His creation good as Genesis says and creation is not inherently evil nor is
the material world something to be discarded of or destroyed. Preston teaching
otherwise is purely Gnosticism plain and simple. He claims all of these
eschatologies teach that the earth will be purged by fire and that bugs, slugs,
and mosquitos will be manifested as sons of God… There is not a single scholar
worth their salt in any area of Christendom that would claim such a stupid
statement. No one thinks that animals will become sons of God like the angels
and human beings are called in Scripture. This is nothing more than Preston
being a typical loser and misrepresenting the positions of his opponents which
is usual for this pathetic clown posing as a scholar with a fake honorary
degree from a paper mill. He claims he has had debate opponents openly state
that Jesus died to redeem the bugs, slugs, and mosquitos and that when pressed
to give support for this position, this mystery person, who he doesn’t name (cause
he is referring to me), gave nothing to support their position at all…
As I already said, this is a reference to me. In my debate
against Don over Romans 11, he tried to take me out of context when Romans 8
came up and claimed all these stupid things because I said God loves creation
and will redeem and renew and restore what was lost by the Fall. This naturally
includes all of creation so Don wants to mischaracterize and make hateful
comments to try to make this position look stupid and inferior when in fact, I
would argue Don Preston is just being hateful towards God who created all these
creatures and CALLED THEM GOOD before the Fall happened. That is correct! Even
the animals Don Preston hates and even the pests we all dislike are ALL called
GOOD by God. The “sons of God” are not animals and animals will never become
sons of God. The sons of God are a reference to angelic beings and is a term
used in scripture for human beings, not animals. Humans will be redeemed one
way and animals and the rest of creation to put it in simple terms will be experiencing
this reversal of the curse in a different way. As the first man ruined creation
through the Fall and brought all things into the Exile from Eden, the last man
Jesus Christ has, is currently, and will restore all of Creation through
Himself and the restoration from Exile will be complete at the 2nd
Coming. Sin ruins and distorts all that God called good. When Christ removes
sin from the picture, creation will be much different than it is today just as
it was different pre-Fall. I will deal with what Preston says and then give a
clear picture of Romans 8 and the redemption of Creation after that.
“Romans 8 is the key, foundational text of appeal that is offered as proof for a future ‘recreation’ of the material cosmos. I will not engage in an in-depth exegesis of that marvelous text, but let me offer a few key points to be considered as part of any proper exegesis- points often overlooked by the commentators: Paul posits the entire discussion in the context of the imminent vindication of the suffering of the first century martyrs– v. 18. This allows us- forces us- to place his discussion in the context of Matthew 23 and Jesus’ promise concerning the coming vindication of the martyrs. Paul places his discussion within the context of “the suffering of Christ” (Romans 8:17) a key eschatological concept. The early church had joined with Christ in his suffering and had to fill up the measure of that suffering before the parousia, i.e. the time of their vindication (Cf. Colossians 1:24f0. Paul uses a number of words that demand an imminent fulfillment of the “redemption of creation.” See my book, Like Father Like Son, On Clouds of Glory, for a full discussion. There is simply no way to escape the fact that Paul believed and taught that the redemption of creation– no matter what we moderns may perceive it to be– was to take place imminently and soon. Paul places the fulfillment of the promised redemption within the framework of the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit, which contrary many believers, was confined to the first century. The miraculous work of the Spirit was the guarantee (Ephesians 1:12f) of that coming redemption and resurrection (2 Corinthians 5:5). It is ironic and self contradictory for many believers to say that the charismata have ended-and they have- and yet, deny that the resurrection and redemption of creation are yet future. Those two concepts / realities are inseparably tied together. With these few (undeveloped) facts let me get to the meat of what I want to present about “the redemption of Creation.”
Gee I wonder why Preston won’t engage in any of that text in-depth… could it be because he is unable to and doing so would just show what a pseudo-scholar and clown school rejected con artist Don is? Paul does not in fact only posit the entire chapter of Romans 8 about vindication of martyrs but I digress. Matthew 23 is not forced into anything like some magic puzzle piece only Preston can solve. Preston mentions the Early Church but none of them ever once say that 70 AD was the 2nd Coming nor the resurrection of the dead so this is simply something Don has made up and pulled out of his rear end. Preston mentions his stupid book Like Father Like Son which I easily refute in my book Hope Resurrected that you can get for free if you ask me. Preston says there is no way to escape that Paul believed Christ would come back imminently and that creation would be redeemed but this is all a farce. The only one who believes this is inescapable are full preterists. No one else has this issue because no one else interprets the texts like a full preterist does. The only closest people you get who interpret the scriptures like this are atheist bible critics who have been refuted countless times much to Preston’s dismay since he loves atheist like Albert Schweitzer and Bart Erhman and others who have been refuted but people continue sharing their horse manure… like Don Preston does…
It also doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that
while 70 AD did have a lot of people be killed in the Jewish-Roman War that
took place then… that it didn’t vindicate or help the Christian Church one bit
really and actually as far as history shows us, the persecution of Christians
just got worse and Romans and Jews focused more hatred on this sect who worshipped
Christ. Fact is, Preston’s declaration that the Early Church got their
vindication from some Jews being slaughtered by Romans in 70 AD is nothing more
than a perversion of scriptures and Preston’s sick and twisted fantasy about
his disturbing and perverse god who promises to deal with the problem of evil
in scripture and then doesn’t do so.
“It needs to be understood first of all that whatever that anticipated redemption was, it was part and parcel of the hope of Israel. Paul is very clear that his resurrection doctrine was from ‘the law and the prophets’ (Acts 24:14f). Thus, since, for Paul, the source of his eschatology as the Tanakh I want to focus briefly on one key OT prophecy of the ‘redemption of creation’ specifically, ‘the restoration of the earth’.”
It needs to be understood that Preston is a perverter of
scripture. He wants to claim that this redemption promised in Romans 8 is
nothing real and is simply just some “spiritual” and non-material thing.
Nothing is really to change according to Preston. Preston doesn’t believe the
resurrection of the dead is a real thing. As we’ve shown however in our article
below Preston On Trial, you can see that Preston is dead wrong about the
resurrection of the dead. You can see quite clearly that Paul and the Early
Church ALL believed in a real and literal resurrection from the literal grave
that would involve the Holy Spirit really rising real people from the real and
literal grave. Dead bodies they believed would be revived and brought back to
eternal life by the Holy Spirit. Preston can deny this all he wants but in the
end he will simply have to answer to God for this perversion he has made of God’s
Holy Scriptures and face the consequences. We pray this heretic repents of his
wicked and perverse ways.
https://www.hoperesurrected.com/2020/10/preston-on-trial-refutation-review-of.html
We can skip Preston talking about 1 Corinthians 5 and Isaiah
49 as he simply takes it all out of context and perverts scripture as usual.
This is what I want to focus more on this sick and perverse statement of Don’s…
“Now, if we are going
to accept Paul’s emphatic, inspired declaration, it seems to me that it is time
to rethink the traditional concepts of the redemption of creation”.
How much more do we need to “rethink” and redefine to make
it fit this stupid AD70 doctrine? All for AD 70 Don has made Jesus strip
himself of his humanity at the ascension and become something akin to Yoda
becoming a Force ghost in Star Wars… He’s already got no resurrection of the
dead and thinks sin and physical decay and death go on forever and forever. He’s
already even perverted Satan calling Satan the Old Covenant… What else does
this moron need to redefine for the sake of his idol AD 70? What a perverted
son of Satan!
“It is empirically,
historically, experientially true that any kind of restoration of material
creation did not take place in Paul’s day, and is not taking place now. Trees
are not bigger and better today. Rocks are not softer. Rivers are not cleaner,
bigger, deeper, and wider than in Paul’s day– if cleaner, bigger, deeper and
wider rivers are entailed in the ‘redemption of creation’. Carnivorous animals
still key and eat their prey- including humans if given the chance. The sun is
not better, the moon is not prettier, and the stars are not ‘improved’. The
bugs, slugs and mosquitoes are still nasty little creatures and when you throw
in the virus ‘bugs’ that still rampage through humanity, it is undeniable that
the so called ‘redemption of the earth’ and ‘all creation’ did not and has not
taken place”.
Paul never said it would happen in his day and time. This is
Preston’s interpretation of scripture and Preston is a pervert of scripture. He
will do anything for money and say anything and redefine any word in the bible to
fit it into his perverted AD 70 fantasy. All that Preston says here is that he
hates God’s Creation. That must be why he stays in his home in Oklahoma making
stupid videos in his basement all day like a lunatic trying to sell stupid
books about why he’s a pervert of scripture. Don gives himself away actually
however in this statement. He says that trees are not bigger and better today…
wonder why that is? Is it because of the continued effects of the Fall? Is it
because humanity’s sin ruins everything it touches – like creation? Could it be
Creation actually is effected by OUR SINS? That’s a fact – it is. Rivers aren’t
cleaner or bigger or deeper or wider? Wonder why? Could it be that our sin has
effected the creation and made rivers worse? Carnivorous animals still kill,
key, and eat their prey? Wow! It’s almost like the Fall is still happening and
so the animals, aka part of creation effected by the Fall, still do things
because of the effects of the Fall… wow… what a shocker Don! The sun and moon
and stars aren’t improved, better or prettier? Wow… It’s almost like all of
creation was under the effect of the Fall by Adam’s sin… Imagine that? And
guess what? It all will be getting worse if Christ does not return and change
it one day. Don says that day has already come… what a perverted and stupid son
of Satan to suggest Christ would leave creation as is and let evil and sin and
death and all the things humanity perverted due to the Fall and their continued
sin to continue. Don then tells us he hates bugs, slugs, and mosquitos and
virus bugs and tries to paint the people who say God will redeem creation as
stupid people for suggesting that EVERYTHING, even the things we don’t like,
are actually called GOOD by God. Only a pervert like Don of Scripture would say
such stupid things to try to make God’s Creation out to be bad and something
God doesn’t care about or something to be discarded. Don proves he is a carnal
minded perverter of scripture who will stop at nothing to prop up his
disgusting perverted 70 AD idol.
“It will not do to
say, well, that physical redemption / transformation of the material world will
take place at the end of time. Paul was talking about the spiritual redemption
of mankind from sin. But wait! That concept is not to be found in Scripture! In
fact, it violates God’s standard modus operandi”.
Wrong. God promises the resurrection of the dead will be
literal and physical as Christ, Paul, and other apostles all contend. Don can
deny it all he wants but he is wrong and a pervert of scripture. You can read
Preston On Trial that I linked above to see why Preston is a bold faced liar
and a perverter of scripture.
Preston next perverts 1 Corinthians 15 which I have refuted
him about ad nauseam at this point and you can again read Preston On Trial to
see this.
“Paul quoted Isaiah
49 verbatim declaring that the Acceptable Time and the Day of Salvation was
present– 2000 years ago. It is undeniable that the restoration of material
creation, a transformation of bugs, slugs and mosquitoes, has not taken place
in 2000 years. It is not now taking place. This means that the promise of the ‘redemption
of creation’ was not a prediction of a literal, physical restoration and
transformation of physical creation. It was in fact, the very thing that Paul
worked for and said it was, the reconciliation between men, and men and God. It
is therefore, wrong to posit a yet future cosmological transformation to an
Edenic Utopia. That is an unrealistic and un-Biblical doctrine”.
Preston lies to his audience and perverts what Paul has
said. Paul does quote Isaiah 49 saying that the Day of Salvation is NOW and
says it is happening at the moment Paul speaks. In other words, Paul says it is
happening right now at that moment. Paul already has proven Preston is a bold
faced liar since Preston says the Day of Salvation is supposed to happen in 70
AD. Paul according to Preston’s perverse logic is off by about 15-30 years
after he wrote this in 2 Corinthians 6! In other words, Preston’s words are
empty meaningless words of a perverted son of Satan. If Preston were correct,
and he is not because he is nothing more than a perverted mouthpiece for his
perverse father Satan, then Paul would be a liar as would Jesus. Jesus and Paul
and the rest of the apostles ALL taught that creation would be redeemed and
really be changed one day at the 2nd Coming. They really taught that
the dead would actually physically be raised by the Holy Spirit from death and
sin would be no more. They found it to be a REALISTIC and BIBLICAL DOCTRINE and
so do I. I find Preston’s doctrine nothing more than a sick perverted fantasy
that he copied from Max King and find it nothing but a detestable Gnostic
materialist-hating pile of drivel that he mostly pulled out of his ass to try
and sell books to gullible people because he has no truth in him and is a
perverted son of Satan who lies and misrepresents and slanders his oppositions
all to peddle his AD 70 doctrine and sell more books and actively engages and does
ministries with active polygamists, active homosexuals, convicted pedophiles, active
drug addicts, wife-beaters, and more. What more needs to be said? We hope Don
will repent of his sins against God and stop perverting scriptures but should
he not, may God swiftly deal with him so he can’t pervert any more people and
take them to the lake of fire with him where he will sadly go if he doesn’t
repent of his sick and perverse heresies against God.
Now that this is out of the way here is the TRUTH about
Romans 8 and the Redemption of Creation and some actual ORTHODOX doctrine. If
you want to know more, I would recommend here on my blog reading my written
debate with Don Preston on Romans 11 where I cover a lot of this. You can find
it with a simple typing in Romans 11 in the search bar at the top. Now let us
begin here.
Romans 8: The Redemption of
Creation (Scripture is in bold)
This
will not be a full commentary on Romans 8. I will be bringing up a lot of
scriptures though. We already have proven that Preston is wrong about 1 Cor. 15
and other resurrection verses so this will just be a refresher here to keep
pouring on the refutation of this unrepentant heretical son of Satan and
apostate named Don K Preston.
I stress this to full preterist reading this. Christ hasn't returned. There's no evidence for FP. Preston's tried desperately to make it work but so far has done nothing but seen the train come off the rails and caused a major wreck and failure.
Adam is the man of soil. He corrupted the universe by His sin against God. It did not just effect the man of soil Adam alone. When Adam and Eve were cursed with mortality, they also cursed and effected the entire cosmos. Adam is the man of soil. Made from dust/soil. Who is the serpent in Revelation revealed as Satan in Revelation 12 constantly trying to devour? The Church in context, but those who were born in Adam and reborn in Christ. One could reference Genesis 3 obviously here.
Genesis 3:14-15 - The Lord God said to the
serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and
above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall
eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and
between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you
shall bruise his heel.”
To Eve, she's cursed with mortality as well as Adam but also is cursed with
pain, which is suffering in order to bring forth life. A prefigurement of sorts
of what we, all who are of the elect, must go through to inherit eternal life
in Christ as the Church.
Genesis 3:16 says To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your
pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall
be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.”
She's given this as her curse along with mortality as is clearly shown. Genesis 3:17-19 lastly, Adam’s curse. The curse on the man of the soil.
And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife
and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’
CURSED IS THE GROUND because of you; in PAIN you shall eat of it all the days
of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall
eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.”
It's quite evident that Adam is the man of soil and was made from dust. Just as
his body is cursed and now in opposition to him, the man of soil Adam also now,
because of his actions, has cursed the ground. It wasn't cursed before as a
result. It was blessed and now it's a curse. The ground is the land and the
land is a part of Creation. Creation therefore, logically, has been cursed as a
whole because of Adam and his actions. To deny this is absolutely absurd! It is
not something “spiritual”. It is a real curse being brought upon actual
creation.
Now catch the power of this next two verses in Genesis 3:22-24!
22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in
knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the
tree of life and eat, and LIVE FOREVER—” 23 therefore the Lord God sent him out
from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. 24 He drove
out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a
flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.
Question: Preston asserts all Adam’s death was is a spiritual death. Why
then does God all of a sudden have a tree of life that if Adam takes and eats
will make him live forever? It's because Adam's been corrupted by his sin. He's
had a spiritual death and has begun to die the death (he’s become mortal). He's
gone from incorruptible to corruptible. Immortality to mortality. And now he's
cursed with sinfulness. If Adam takes of the tree of life he'll live forever
and still be cursed eternally! What a tragedy it would've been! Therefore, God
in a sense blesses Adam and Eve by kicking them out of the Garden of Eden in
order to eventually redeem them through the Lord Jesus Christ and rid them of
sin, their bondage to Satan, and their inheritance of death! Since Adam's tied
to the Creation being made from it, he who's been cursed and has cursed what
he's been created from, the ground, shall also be redeemed from the curse. This
involves ALL of creation. For Preston to assert otherwise is absurd and betrays
the power of Christ.
Preston fails to realize that there was a creation by God in the beginning of
time, a special divine intervention in the Creation of Man. There was in this
the existence of the 1st Man Adam in a condition of friendship and perfection
and order with God. There was a Fall from that amazing beautiful condition and
eventually an increase in that separation between man and God brought about by
man’s sins, and succession after succession of natural catastrophes which man
suffered and still suffers from the consequences of sins that only Christ alone
can ever hope to change which He does and has promised to do!
God wasn't forced to create this universe. He chose to do so out of love. God
created everything and man was made IN HIS IMAGE! Not animals. Mankind.
“God saw it was good” (Gen 1:31) underscores the goodness of matter
and the whole created order, and God still does this even after the Fall! It's
something God loves and wishes to redeem! Why would He redeem it? Because of
love! Preston obviously doesn’t care about sacraments but this is a great basis
for understanding a basic sacramental world-view – that Creation isn't only
good, but is also a means for communing with God, by virtue of being created by
the All-Good God! Yes! Even those things we don’t like in creation God called
good and loves. They all serve a purpose before and after the Fall and will do
so after the 2nd Coming.
Genesis 2:17’s mention of “you shall surely die” isn't just about spiritual
death whatsoever. If you literally translate Genesis 2:17 it's Tree. Knowledge.
Good. Evil. Day eat (dying) die. The literal Hebrew's dying-die. It's two
different verb tenses (dying and die) which translates as “dying you will die”.
It's an ingressive statement culminating with physical death. At that point,
after they ate of the fruit, they died a spiritual death (this cannot be seen
by Genesis alone but rather with other texts that show it to be true later
beyond Genesis; in Genesis the only thing we see here is physical death
beginning to happen in man after he eats the fruit), but also began to die and
would return to dust. If they'd been meant to die right then instantaneously,
the text would only say muth once, meaning dead, died, or die and not
“beginning to die”, “surely die” or “dying you will die”. In other words, Adam
will become a mortal being and begin dying.
Preston wants to hate on me for believing God loves His Creation and will
redeem every animal He lovingly created and desired to create and DEEM GOOD?!?
Then let the idiot and hater of God hate me!
The answer is obviously and emphatically YES HE WILL and I'll scream it from the mountain tops for all the universe to hear and praise God for it! YES!! LET IT BE DONE! Let God’s Creation which He loves be redeemed from the curse when Christ returns physically in the 2nd Coming! Let all of Creation rejoice! The Savior will come! Every human, bug, slug, mosquito, microorganism, cockroach, mastodon, saber-tooth tiger that's ever lived and will live and died and will die and has and will go to the ground will celebrate the Lord as He delivers the universe in decay and dying from death; and He'll recreate and restore and redeem it into eternity out of His Divine Agape for mankind and Creation! Hallelujah! Preston’s feeble god can’t save material creation but the One True God can! Catch the power of that! Preston can repent or take all that hatred to the lake of fire with him! YEEHAW!!
Is Preston going to tell us that God doesn’t care about Creation? Has he never
looked into basic biology and not just been astounded by God’s Creation? God
put so much detail as the ultimate Iconographer into His artwork! It’s a shame
that Preston doesn’t think that God cares about Creation whatsoever one bit and
just will let it all decay into nothingness. Preston seems to believe that ex
nihilo means material creation has to go nihil ad or obliuionem decidet.
God commanded Adam to be a caretaker of the Garden of Eden! To name the
animals! It becomes more real when you put a name to it! More care is put into
it when you name it and in Adam’s case he has to take care of it! When we give
something a name we give God’s Creation more Being, more of an existence! We
make it more of a Reality! God cares about Creation even if Preston the Pervert
doesn’t and hates it.
Matthew 6:26-34 NKJV comes to mind!
26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather
into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than
they? 27 Which of you by worrying can add one [a]cubit to his [b]stature? 28
“So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they
grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in
all his glory was not [c]arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes
the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven,
will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 “Therefore do not
worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we
wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly
Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of
God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own
things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
It’s quite clear God cares about His Creation and loves it! If God didn’t,
He wouldn’t have bothered to become one of us as a human being in the
Incarnation, living, dying, and bleeding for us. He wouldn't've bothered to
come at all if He didn’t love and care about His Creation.
If corruption is the futility of physical corruptibility and mortality, and “all creation” as Romans 8 says is to be released from that, then this demands the resurrection of “all creation” that was ever subjected to that futility of physical corruption. YES! All of Creation will be redeemed and restored! Not just man but the entire Cosmos! All Creation!
In Romans 8:21 it uses the Greek word phthora. In context, phthora has in
general two definitions but one also has to take the sentence itself in the
verses into consideration when it is in usage in the NT.
One definition of phthora is: corruption, perishing, destruction.
a) That which is subject to corruption physically; what is perishable.
b) In the Christian sense, it can mean eternal misery.
Another 2nd definition of the word is that it can be used in a more ethical
sense for corruption or moral decay. Phthora is used in Romans 8:21, 1
Corinthians 15:42, 1 Corinthians 15:50, Galatians 6:8, Colossians 2:22, 2 Peter
1:4, 2 Peter 2:12, 2 Peter 2:19. For Romans 8:21 it means that which is corrupt
and it's physical.
I fully acknowledge phthora could be used in an ethical sense or moral decay but to clarify, in Romans 8:21 phthora isn't being used that way. It's instead being used to mean physical corruption and physical decay. And this is obvious if you just read the chapter… more specifically, starting at v. 18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that’s to be revealed to us”… This verse introduces the 3-fold testimony given to the Christian destiny, which is sharply contrasted with the sufferings just mentioned… “the glory to be revealed to us”: Paul reminds his readers that although suffering is a sign of the authentic Christian experience, it's only a transition to the assured glory that awaits them in the eschaton’s completion.
V. 19: “For the created universe waits with eager longing for the God’s
sons to be revealed”: Paul discloses his view of the created world, which in
its chaotic state manifests its cosmic striving toward the very goal set for
man himself. He affirms the solidarity of the human and subhuman world in its
share in the redemption of Christ. It recalls God’s promise to Noah of the
covenant to be made “between myself and you and every living creature” (Gen
9:12-13; Cf. Ps 135). The noun ktisis denotes “material creation” apart from
man (see v.23 if you’re confused). Created for man, it was cursed as a result
of Adam’s sin (Gen 3:17), and since then it has been in a state of abnormality
or frustration, according to Paul, being subject to corruption itself. And yet,
he sees it sharing in man’s destiny; for it too – through him – is somehow
redeemed, freed from its natural proclivity.
V.20-21: “For it was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but
because of him who subjected it, in hope that the created universe itself will
be set free from its bondage to decay/corruption and obtain the freedom of the
glory of the children of God”.
The frustration of material creation is its inability to realize its goal as it
should. Before Adam’s sin, material creation is depicted in Genesis as subject
to him, just as he was to God (Gen 1:28). But mans’ sin disrupted the
subordination and introduced abnormality and futility.
“But BY HIM who subjected it in [the] hope, that creation itself would be
freed from the bondage of decay””: Paul refers to God, who cursed the
ground because of Adam’s sin (Gen 3:17). “By him” (dia with the acc., as in Rom
3:25; John 6:57; Sirach 15:11) means God in this view. The “hope” (eph’elpidi,
“in, with hope”) expresses not God’s hope, but the hope given creation itself
by him who subjected it (referring to hypotaxanta of v.20). It also reads hoti
(that) instead of dioti at the beginning of v.21; this conjunction introduces
the hope given to creation.
This seems to be the most natural interpretation of this verse, despite the fact that the use of dia with an accusative is not common. Paul's saying here that God, though he cursed the ground because of Adam’s sin, still gives it hope of sharing in man’s redemption. Redeemed humanity will live in peace with God in a world transformed by His Spirit. Paul sees this condition as an aspiration of all creation. “decay”” not just moral corruption, but the law of physical decay found in nature, the reign of dissolution and death.
For Paul, the created physical universe isn't to be a mere spectator of man’s triumphant glory and freedom, but is to share in it. When the children of God are revealed in glory, death will have no more dominion over them, and the material world will also be emancipated from this “last enemy” (1 Cor 15:23-38). What Paul teaches here will be developed in his letters in captivity in his notions of the recapitulation of all things in Christ.
v. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the
pains of childbirth until now…
Paul adopts the image of the rebirth of nature to a woman’s travail to express
the tortous convulsions of a frustrated material creation, as he sees it. It
groans in hope and expectation but also in pain/suffering. There really is a
suffering bringing about glory going on here with Paul and it’s astounding! The
compound verb (synodinei) expresses the concerted agony of the universe in all
its parts.
V. 23 – And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits
of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we weait eagerly for adoption as sons, the
redemption of our bodies”.
“we ourselves”: Not only the material universe bears testimony to the Christian
destiny but Christians themselves do too also by the hope that they have – a
hope based on the gift of the Spirit already possessed! “Who have the
firstfruits of the Spirit: The Spirit has already been given to the Christians
as the principle of the new life. What a great promise of things to come thanks
to Christ who is already working this change in us through God the Holy Spirit!
Hallelujah!
Catch the power of that!
Paul uses phthora the same way in Romans 8:21 that he uses it in 1 Cor. 15:42…
Preston would never talk about this one or 1 Cor. 15:49 or 1 Cor. 15:50 because
if he did he would have to deal with Paul talking about actual dead people
rising from the literal grave and becoming immortal beings through the Holy
Spirit.
15:42 says “So also is the resurrection
of the dead. It is sown a corrupt body, it is raised an uncorrupted body”.
This is physical resurrection. You can also find Clement in agreement later in
1 Clement… but Preston will just call Clement (who is mentioned in the bible) a
liar because Preston thinks everyone post AD70 is an apostate until he, by
magic, came into this world and brought us all himself as God’s theological
gift to the world.
So what does 15:42’s use of phthora mean? Corruption… decaying body… Simple.
Our bodily physical existence is right now one of corruption, dishonor, and
weakness, and these things characterize this present age. Now, in this vale of
tears, all is illness, and loss, weakness, failure, and futility, the
humiliation of aging and death. We’ll one day end our earthly existence, being
“sown” like seeds in the earth in their state. But it'll be otherwise in the
future age to come as Christ hasn’t returned yet. Our bodily existence then at
that time will conform to the glory of that coming age and will be one of
“incorruption, non-decay, glory, and power”, as all these earthly things are
swallowed up in the endless triumph of Christ and His Resurrection and our
Resurrection! Now our “body” and existence is “soulish” (psuchikos), that which
is dominated by the soul (psuche) or the life of this age – hence, “worldly,
unspiritual”. James 3:15 uses the word to characterize the wisdom of this world
which is also “earthly and demonic”.
Our present bodily existence is characterized by the world of the senses, with
all its weakness and limitations. In the age to come, our bodily existence will
be “spiritual” (pneumatikos). That is, it'll be characterized by the boundless
energies of the Divine Spirit, being freed from preent limitations of this
sensual existence… recall what I’ve said about Romans 8:21 and it'll all be
clear!
This humble and earthly (psuchikos) aspect of our existence is expressed in
Scripture by Genesis 2:7 LXX that “the 1st man, Adam, became a living soul”
(psuche). Our way of life inherited from Adam, the originator of our race, is
characterized by his limits. He was “from the earth” and thus, “made of dust”
(choikos), sharing all the humble lowliness of the earth beneath his feet.
We're the same, “bearing the image of the one made of dust” sharing this age’s
humiliations. But, not forever, for the “soulish” will give place to the
spiritual in the age to come. We mustn’t expect the spiritual to come first! We
must wait! It'll come! In Christ, the fullness and fulfillment of the human
nature to its greatness will become for us in the last Adam the life-giving
spirit! Paul contrasts our 1st state, from Adam, with our final state, from
Christ. We shall all share the glory of Christ’s life of “heaven” bearing His
celestial “eikon” at the resurrection which will be visible because HE IS
CURRENTLY PHYSICAL.
Now to 1 Cor 15:50… What does 1 Cor 15:50’s use of phthora mean? We’ve found
what 1 Cor 15:42 meant without Preston even mentioning it for some odd reason!
Pretty simple. 1 Cor 15:50 says “Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood
cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the decay inherit the non-decay”.
It means corruption obviously. Physical decay. Because physical decay doesn't
inherit the Kingdom of God obviously. Romans 8 explains this as well. We and
creation shall be made free from the decay and 1 Cor 15 says we'll physically
be raised uncorrupt because Christ raised physically incorruptible.
Note also that when Paul says flesh and blood here he's specifically talking
about the works of the flesh and blood being what doesn’t inherit the kingdom
of God. We aren’t Gnostics. Your physical body and skin isn’t evil. It’s what
you do with your physical body and skin that can be profane and evil. That's
what will not inherit the Kingdom of God because it does nothing but corrupt if
you constantly use your body for evil instead of using it to glorify Christ.
With that, I think this is more than enough to show that Don Preston is debunked and shown to be nothing more than a worthless pseudo-scholar and perverter of scripture. Preston is debunked and his works belong in a furnace or to be used when you run out of toilet paper. May this perverted son of the devil repent or be dealt with swiftly by God so he can no longer blaspheme and destroy other people’s faith in God and lead people astray with him.
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