End Times Events

[TMC]

Not sure how this thread drifted into yet ANOTHER thread about the status of Jews, but to return to the actual topic:

We are not seeing signs of the end times, or at least there is no reason to think that we are. Literally every generation thinks that they are in the end times. Events in every age are touted as “evidence” of that. It is a form of hubris, IMO, and this age shares it with every age that has passed, and probably every age to come.

 

[Crusader13]

As far as I can see, the destruction of the Jewish people, including their leaders, has NOT been sealed, and neither has the Old Covenant been destroyed.

Well of course we are going to disagree on that point. It’s hard to accept the new covenant and Jesus as being necessary for salvation, when it directly conflicts with one’s own belief.

You’re arguing from a Jewish standpoint, so nothing in the NT is going to prove my argument if someone doesn’t accept the NT. That’s a completely different topic.

 

[Crusader13]

If what you mean to say is that Paul taught that all who are saved are saved through Christ, we can agree on that. But Paul did NOT teach that the coming of Jesus, or the Crucifixion, or anything else demeaned Jews to some lower status than they previously held.

I never said anything about a lower status, I’m not sure exactly what you are talking about.

I quoted Matthew 21: versus 40-43, the parable of the wicked vine growers and the return of the owner.

Israel as a nation and a people, directly set apart from others because of their being chosen by God as His bride, that was removed. The church became the new nation and the new bride to where there was no longer any distinction between Jews and Gentiles. Because now we are all one as members of the Church.

The Jews were broken off from the tree and the Gentiles were grafted in. Romans 11 talks about this very thing. This is the teaching and the belief of scripture in the Catholic Church for centuries. You’re not arguing against the scripture verses I quoted you’re trying to argue against a position I’m not even advocating.

 

[TMC]

I never said anything about a lower status, I’m not sure exactly what you are talking about.

I thought you were referring to Galatians and saying that Paul, in saying there is no longer Jew nor Greek, was saying that Judaism is no longer salvific. I do not believe that is the meaning of Galatians, but maybe that is not what you meant and we are merely misunderstanding one another.

 

[meltzerboy2]

Fair enough. However, I don’t think that even the Church believes in some of the things you are saying, as other posters have noted.

 

[meltzerboy2]

Here is a case in point: “The Jews were broken off from the tree…” Does the Church believe this? If so, how can the Gentiles be grafted in if the Jews were broken off? What does grafted in mean in this sense? Doesn’t Gd maintain ALL His covenants from the perspective of the Church?

 

[Dan_Defender]

OP, there are not going to be obvious signs. So we are called to be always prepared, for the Lord comes like the thief in the middle of the night, when nobody is expecting him. When Jesus predicted the total destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, he pointed out some general signs but no specifics. Everything seemed calm and comfortable in 67 AD and then all of a sudden, the city was under siege with no possibility of escape.

 

[Crusader13]

Well all the covenants were made with God’s chosen people. Each covenant was a continuation of His desire to turn His people from their idolatries and adultery with the pagan nations.

The New covenant is a continuation with the true Israel, but now it is manifested in the Church.

For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. Peace and mercy be upon all who walk by this rule, upon the Israel of God.
Galatians 6:15-16

As members of the new covenant, we are that new creation. The Israel of God is no longer just ethnic Israel, but all believers in Christ.

The imagery of the grafting in of the Gentiles was taken from Romans 11: 17-22

But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, a wild olive shoot, were grafted in their place to share the richness of the olive tree, do not boast over the branches. If you do boast, remember it is not you that support the root, but the root that supports you. That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast only through faith. So do not become proud, but stand in awe. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you.
Romans 11:17-18,20,21

This explains that as Gentiles we are not to boast of our place among the tree, because if the Jews denied their own Lord, as His chosen people and were still broken off from the tree, He will certainly do the same to the Gentiles, that were just grafted in, if they forsake their faith and become unbelievers.

Take care, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we share in Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end,
Hebrews 3:12-14

 

[Crusader13]

However, ethnic Israel is not cut off from the tree forever. As I just noted above

And even the others, if they do not persist in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again. For if you have been cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these natural branches be grafted back into their own olive tree.
Romans 11:23-24

They will be brought back into the tree when the fullness of the Gentiles has been fulfilled.

Lest you be wise in your own conceits, I want you to understand this mystery, brethren: a hardening has come upon part of Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles come in, and so all Israel will be saved; as it is written, “The Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness from Jacob”; “and this will be my covenant with them when I take away their sins.”
Romans 11:25-27

That is why the Church has always sought to evangelize the nations, because as Gentiles the Church is seeking to bring them into Salvation, at which point those Jews, with a hardening of their heart, will return once again.

 

[Mrchatsworth]

Since the vast majority of Christians will experience their own personal end times before the collective end times I’ve always wondered why people don’t ask about good websites to go to regarding their own death.

 

[JSRG]

Can someone explain or point me in the direction of a site that can of the events that are to happen in the end times according to the Catholic Church.

I do not think the Catholic Church has much in the way of “official” teachings regarding the events of the End Times outside of “the Second Coming will happen at some point in the future.” If they did, I expect I would’ve seen either preterist or futurist Catholics point to them as verification of their position–the fact neither of these positions has done so is an indication to me there is no “according to the Catholic Church” when it comes to the positions of the end times. Other than, again, that the second coming is going to happen at some point in the future.

 

[TMC]

I do not think the Catholic Church has much in the way of “official” teachings regarding the events of the End Times outside of “the Second Coming will happen at some point in the future.”

The fascination with “end times,” and particularly the use of the Apocalypse of John as a kind of theological Nostradamus, is really a modern phenomenon that arose at the same time as fundamentalism, and from many of the same sources.

 

[MountainCruiser]

I more interested in specific end time events. Like the tearing down of the temple in Jerusalem and rebuilding it where the anti-christ will be revealed. Stuff like that. Does Catholicism speak of that?