Jesus said: "Watch therefore, and pray always that you
may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to
stand before the Son of Man." Luke 21:37
Jesus said: "Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth." Revelation 3:10
But
concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I should
write to you. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord
so comes as a thief in the night. For when they say, “Peace and safety!” then
sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. And
they shall not escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day
should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day.
We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore let
us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober. For those who sleep,
sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But let us who are
of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a
helmet the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to
obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we
wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. 1 Thessalonians 5:1-10
What Age Does the Church Exist In?
Dispensationalists
do not believe that the Church existed in the Old Testament, but its existence
is unique to this age. First, is the citation of Matthew 16:18 where Jesus
declared, I will build my church. The use of the future tense shows that
the Church itself was still future as of Matthew 16. Jesus did not say that He
would continue to add to something already in existence, which would have been
the case if Covenant Theology is correct. Second, according to Ephesians 1:20,
the resurrection was a prerequisite to the founding of the Church since the
Church could have no functioning Head until after the resurrection of Christ.
Third, the Church could not have been an operating entity without the presence
of the spiritual gifts and, according to Ephesians 4:7-12, these gifts only
became available after the ascension of Christ. The ascension was another
prerequisite to the birth of the Church. The fourth evidence concerns the
mystery character of the one body. The content of this mystery is that Gentiles
would be fellow heirs, fellow members of the body, fellow partakers of the
promise in Christ by the Gospel. The nature of a mystery is that of a secret,
and it includes the concept of a time when the secret was not known followed by
a time when it became known. The fact that the Gentiles would receive salvation
and spiritual blessings and were included in God's plan of redemption was
prophesied in the Old Testament, so this fact could not be a mystery. What was
not revealed is that there would be joint body in which Jews and gentiles would
share. This one body is also called the new man in Ephesians 2:15 and,
being new, this body cannot be a continuation or remaking of Israel. Covenant
Theologians always insist that there is only one people of God and also insist
on a singular continuity of the one people of God which is why they so
frequently insist that the Church is Israel. Such an insistence is a forced
interpretation on the text. There is continuity in that all the redeemed of all
ages are members of the family of God and their common destiny is heaven. There
is continuity simply because they are redeemed. There is discontinuity because
redeemed today are placed in the body of Christ and
not in some sort of Israel. This is the same as the discontinuity of the
redeemed before Abraham's day (like Enoch and Noah) who did not belong to
Israel. The saints today are members of the Church, which is a new man, a new
body, which was not known in other ages, but is not revealed. For this very
fact, the Church is distinct to this age. ISRAELOLOGY: The Missing Link in
Systematic Theology, pages 444-445.