The End Time is a subject for which there is widespread appetite and attempts to satisfy that appetite are many. This is to be expected, given the complexity of the subject.But those interpreters who seek to simplify by harmonizing the many voices in Scripture do not render us a service, joining the last judgment of Matthew, the rapture of First Thessalonians, the Antichrist of First John, the millennium of Revelation, and the dying and being with Christ of Philippians. It is important on this as on any subject to honor each voice in Scripture. We have not outgrown the practice of asking who is writing to whom about what.
I suggest we begin with “about what?” What is the End Time? There is the personal, experiential End Time, the end of one’s life. There is historical End Time, the end of history, a subject important to both Judaism and Christianity. And there is the cosmic End Time, the grand visions of God’s final victory. These three perspectives provide a framework for these discussions on how one may preach the End Time.
