Brief Thoughts On Postmillennialism

As of late I have been learning about Postmillennialism and it has excited me. Not simply the concept, but seeing the exposition of the Scripture be solid. I am no expert in this field, and if that’s what you want there are far better men I would point you to other than me. For starters, Dr. Ken Gentry’s exposition is unmatched. Gary Demar also communicates the subject well, along with the polarizing Douglas Wilson. But I admit, it was Pastor Jeff Durbin who started me on this path along with his recommendation of R. C. Sproul’s book, The Last Days According to Jesus. 

Nevertheless I have decided that since I am excited about what I am learning about, why not share that with whoever wants to listen? I need not offer unique contributions to the field to share what I’ve learned. This may or may not end up being a running theme on the blog for a while.

Before I ever began to study the specific Postmillennial passages, I first had to learn to appropriately understand various prophetic passage of Scripture that stand in the way of Postmillennialism (at least to some degree). This is certainly not to say we are to understand the Scripture differently in order to get to Postmillennialism; it is to say that when we understand the Scripture correctly, we get to Postmillennialism.

The premier text to begin with is Matthew 24, then the book of Revelation as a whole on down the road. R. C. Sproul deals extensively with this passage in his book, along with a book called An Eschatology of Victory by J. Marcellus Kik, both of which I would recommend. Sproul’s book is far more about Matthew 24 and the subject of partial preterism than about the grand ideas of Postmillennialism.

Before I go much farther, for those who are new to the subject, Postmillennialism is a historic, orthodox view of eschatology (the study of the last things, or the end of history) that teaches the Kingdom of God will grow and advance throughout the world as we near the second coming of Christ. It takes seriously many of the promises in Scripture that are simply overlooked or over-spiritualized such as Habakkuk 2:14, Isaiah 2:1-5, Micah 4, 1 Corinthians 15:5, and Psalm 72.

The final thing I will say in this post is that, like the other eschatological views, the term Postmillennialism comes from where it places the return of Christ in relation to the millennial reign of Christ in Revelation 20. In short, Postmillennials believe (for many scriptural reasons) that Christ is currently reigning as He is seated at the right hand of God, thus His return will come after the millennial reign. Christ is King. More to come here on the blog, Lord willing.