A roundup of mysterious, paranormal and strange news stories from the past week.

“Only fools and madmen are positive in their interpretation of the Apocalypse.” Charles Spurgeon’s warning came amid a boom in mid-19th-century speculation about the details of Christ’s second coming. It remains a helpful caution. Believers have often been tempted to trace the precise ordering of “the things that must soon take place” (Rev. 1:1) in clearer outlines than Scripture provides. The bumpy history of postmillennialism—the belief that Christ will return after a millennial (1,000-year) period of gospel expansion, mass conversion, and human flourishing—offers a telling illustration of this tendency. It provides an opportunity to reflect on how personal and historical circumstances can subtly influence our understanding of what Scripture says about the consummation of redemptive history. Postmillennial Problem? While Christians have always been united in the belief that Christ “will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end,” various perspectives on the “last things” have developed within those broad biblical boundaries. Three views have come to define modern discussions of eschatology: postmillennialism, amillennialism, and premillennialism. Each represents a different conviction about the timing of Christ’s return in relation to his millennial reign described in Revelation 20:1–4. Postmillennialism was especially influential in the 19th century and helped fuel early evangelical revivalist movements. Its influence began to wane around the American Civil War (c. 1861–65) and declined sharply through the early 20th century. While it experienced a slight resurgence in the late 20th century and remains a potent force in some corners of evangelicalism, postmillennialism has yet to regain the popularity it once enjoyed. Postmillennialism was especially influential in the 19th century and helped fuel early evangelical revivalist movements. A certain eschatological optimism sets postmillennialism apart from both amillennialism and premillennialism. Because it anticipates an upward arc of gospel progress and temporal prosperity before Christ’s return, its popularity has often ebbed and flowed in step with world events. But this phenomenon isn’t unique to postmillennialism. The trajectories of all eschatological views have reflected, to one degree or another, the course of history. Still, postmillennialism’s positive outlook makes the imprint of historical influence especially visible. Rise and Decline Some of its earliest seeds were sown in the millenarian fervor of 17th-century England. While Augustine’s figurative reading of Revelation 20 had shaped the church’s understanding from the fifth century through the Reformation, by the early 1600s some Reformed theologians had begun to offer different interpretations. English churchmen like Thomas Brightman (1562–1607) and Joseph Mede (1586–1638), for example, made the case for a future-oriented millennium. Influential Puritans like William Perkins (1558–1602) also began to lend support to historicist readings of prophecy and express growing confidence in the church’s future. Puritan eschatology in this period came to emphasize two related themes: the conversion of the Jews and the global triumph of the gospel. The former, derived from Paul’s words in Romans 11, was probably, as Iain Murray has noted, the “dominant” hope through the 1640s. Thereafter, it remained a common thread drawing loosely together a good deal of the beliefs that emerged in this period. In a century marked by civil war and religious and political upheaval, millenarian expectation became widespread as many saw in current events signs of Christ’s advancing kingdom. Elements of today’s three main eschatological positions were certainly present in this excitement. But because these terms are of relatively recent vintage (“postmillennialism” likely emerged in the mid-1800s), they resist being mapped neatly onto a period that witnessed the development of staggeringly diverse views. Yet the basic elements of what we now call postmillennialism were coming together. And despite Puritanism’s failure to secure a lasting foothold in the Church of England after 1662, these convictions endured into early 18th-century evangelicalism. This was especially the case in America. Jonathan Edwards, for example, though somewhat cautious in his public pronouncements, was bullish about the prospects for revival and the advancement of Christ’s kingdom before his return. Privately, he paid close attention to current events, ever ready to slot them into a chronological framework derived from his reading of Revelation. Unsurprisingly, too, the First and Second Great Awakenings sparked the kind of conversionist expectation that has since come to mark postmillennialism. As it developed into a more coherent and distinct theological position, postmillennialism soon became intertwined with the activist spirit of 19th-century evangelicalism, offering theological justification for sweeping social reform. It also resonated with Enlightenment ideals of progress and shaped responses to a dynamic age of revolution, industrialization, and scientific discovery. In turn, a secularizing form of postmillennialism emerged alongside its evangelical cousin, shaped by different assumptions but animated in part by similar visions of positive historical transformation. Postmillennialism’s subsequent decline was a fruit of the cultural soil that spurred its growth. Scientific progress and increased secularization in the late 19th and early 20th centuries challenged the biblical foundations of postmillennialism. Additionally, with the rise of German biblical criticism, scholars began to cast a skeptical eye over the Bible’s historical veracity, as well as the very notion of a divinely ordained historical trajectory. The tumult of the 20th century—with its economic depressions, world wars, totalitarian regimes, and nuclear arms race—further eroded confidence in the idea of inevitable progress. Premillennialism, Modernity, and Renewal The rise of dispensational premillennialism in the 19th century, with its emphasis on Christ’s imminent return and a period of tribulation before the millennium, offered a stark alternative to postmillennialism. Popularized by figures like John Nelson Darby and D. L. Moody in the 19th century and C. I. Scofield, Hal Lindsey, Jerry B. Jenkins, and Tim LaHaye in the 20th, it helped people come to terms with a perceived decline in Western civilization and a growing hostility to Christianity. The promise of escape from a world that appeared to be spiraling toward destruction resonated with many evangelicals who felt increasingly marginalized by a rampantly secularizing modern culture. Postmillennialism’s decline was a fruit of the cultural soil that spurred its growth. Yet postmillennialism has made something of a comeback. In the mid-20th century, R. J. Rushdoony spearheaded a revival of postmillennial thought, albeit one that put a sharper point on its earlier iterations. This postmillennialism emphasized the application of Old Testament law to all areas of life, advocating for a radical transformation of society. While controversial, his ideas found a receptive audience among evangelicals concerned about the erosion of morality and the supposed acquiescence of dispensational premillennialism in the face of this sort of societal degradation. Similarly, the influence of Douglas Wilson, Christ Church Moscow (Idaho), and New Saint Andrews College on a reinvigorated postmillennialism with a social, cultural, and political leading edge is hard to overstate. In this renewed form, postmillennialism may be gaining back some ground, even if it lacks the preeminence it enjoyed among evangelicals over a century ago. What Ultimately Matters Today, the eschatological landscape within evangelicalism remains diverse. Though diminished, postmillennialism endures, and its history is instructive. Its rise during eras of revival and reform, and its subsequent decline as rationalism, secularization, and war reshaped the Western world, ought to remind us to remain wary of allowing our eschatology to be overly influenced by our contexts. As Spurgeon implied, we must be careful to keep our views of Revelation within biblical bounds. We must stay alert to how context can shape our reading of God’s Word. We must also seek the kind of interpretive balance on these issues that Christ illustrates for us in Matthew 24. For most of that chapter, he gives us specific markers of his return, while making clear that “no one” except “the Father only” knows when these events will take place (v. 36). He then shifts our attention at the end of the chapter to what ultimately matters: spiritual readiness. As the apostle Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 5:6, we must “not sleep, as others do” but “keep awake,” carrying out the work of the Great Commission and living sanctified—and sanctifying—godly lives, for “God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ” (v. 9). In the end, this truth should cause us to say with joyful expectation, and as the apostle John concludes Revelation, “Come, Lord Jesus!” (22:20).

Huddled with his disciples in the upper room, Jesus named a critical problem they’d soon face: “Yet a little while and the world will see me no more” (John 14:19). The trouble of that news was clear, and it confounded the disciples. After three years witnessing his miracles and soaking up his teaching, in a matter of days the world would no longer see Jesus. With this warning of his imminent departure, Jesus made a breathtaking promise: “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth. . . . He dwells with you and will be in you” (vv. 16–17). Jesus provides a solution that more than addresses the problem of his departure. When Jesus leaves, the disciples won’t be alone; rather, the third person of the Trinity will descend on them like fire and smoke on Sinai ages before. In fact, Jesus says, it’s better for him to go than to stay (16:7). How could that be possible? When Jesus ministered in the flesh, he exhorted, rebuked, and encouraged, but teaching alone—even divine teaching—wasn’t enough to pierce hearts hardened by the fall. If Jesus stayed, even the Sermon on the Mount would be no more efficacious than the law given on Sinai. For his disciples to have a lasting faith, they needed God’s indwelling presence to help them see the unseen. The Spirit’s Threefold Work At the pinnacle of Jesus’s ministry, when he appeared in his resurrected form to his disciples, he asked, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (20:29). These words anticipated the Spirit’s work. By granting faith, changing hearts, and empowering God’s mission, the Spirit leads believers to see what we can’t see apart from him. 1. Creating Faith Faith, by definition, is the conviction of things unseen (Heb. 11:1)—but from where does this conviction come? God’s Spirit. His central work is to magnify Jesus, to make the crucified and resurrected Son of God beautiful before our souls’ eyes. The church’s great theologians have stressed this point. Augustine held that the Spirit prepares the mind to grasp God’s revelation, and John Calvin elaborated on illumination: “Now we shall possess a right definition of faith if we call it a firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise of Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.” When Jesus leaves, the disciples won’t be alone; rather, the third person of the Trinity will descend on them like fire and smoke on Sinai ages before. When the Spirit is sent to dwell not just with but within God’s people, we gain the help of God’s own Spirit to lead us into trusting and obeying God’s own Son. As J. I. Packer has written, “The Spirit’s message to us is never, ‘Look at me; listen to me; come to me; get to know me,’ but always, ‘Look at him, and see his glory; listen to him, and hear his word; go to him, and have life; get to know him, and taste his gift of joy and peace.’” The Spirit prepares the heart and mind to receive God’s Word. He then further imparts the Word by focusing believing eyes on Christ. Moreover, the Spirit provides assurance that God’s Word for us is immovable: “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Rom. 8:16). From faith’s inception to its eternal end, the Spirit strengthens our conviction by helping us see the unseen. 2. Effecting Change An underrealized pneumatology can put the burden of change on the self. If we’re not relying on the Spirit, we can begin to think (at least functionally) that God provides faith at the beginning of the Christian life but offers nothing more for sanctification thereafter. Contrast that perspective with 2 Corinthians 3:18: “We all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” Quotations often end there, but Paul’s thought isn’t finished. He continues, “For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” God doesn’t promise us transformation and then leave us alone to be the primary agents effecting that change. The gospel is less than good news if we must achieve its benefits ourselves. Thankfully, the Spirit is active at every stage—illuminating the Word, helping us hate and turn from our sin, and deepening our vision of the Savior. God gives faith, and he grows faith. In his Small Catechism, Martin Luther noted, “I believe that I cannot by my own understanding or effort believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him. But the Holy Spirit has called me through the gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, and sanctified and kept me in true faith” (emphasis added). The Spirit testifies to our adoption, continues convicting us of sin, and illuminates the fullness of Jesus’s beauty. He unites us to Christ and enables us to grow in his likeness. The fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22–23) isn’t a list of worthy attributes to acquire in our own strength. It’s the character of Jesus himself, and it’s displayed in us because he lives in us. We can’t have faith without the Spirit, and we can’t be transformed in faith without him either (Gal. 3:3). 3. Empowering Mission Let’s return to the upper room. “It is to your advantage that I go away,” Jesus said to his shocked and dismayed followers (John 16:7). As long as the One with power over wind and waves, with power over sin and death, was among them, their fears were tempered. But at the announcement of his departure, the disciples wondered how they’d face what was coming. How would they take the gospel to the world when the One that gospel witnessed to could no longer be seen? When Jesus was on earth, people experienced his physical presence “in the flesh.” If you’d lived in first-century Capernaum, and you were home the exact moment Jesus passed through, you might have heard a parable conceived in God’s mind, you may have witnessed heaven’s power on display, or you may have even been touched by his healing power. All that could have been yours if you were in the right place at the right time. By granting faith, changing hearts, and empowering God’s mission, the Spirit leads believers to see what we can’t see apart from him. But after Jesus goes to the cross, dies, resurrects, and ascends, he gives his own Spirit to every believer. Then, Christ’s mission is unbound and advances exponentially. The world now sees Christ’s body wherever his church is found. Imbued with the gifts of heaven, the church puts Jesus’s manifold glory on display (Rom. 12:3–8; 1 Cor. 12:7–11; Eph. 4:11–13). Where the church is, there the Spirit makes Christ visible, full of grace and truth. A biblical pneumatology helps us both to see the Spirit’s work in our lives and to bear even greater witness to what Paul calls “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor. 1:24). Faith is the conviction of what cannot be seen. The difficulty of that truth is great, but God’s answer is greater still. The Holy Spirit has already manifested and remains at work manifesting the unseen. Blessed indeed are those who haven’t seen and yet have believed.

Cultural apologetics involves understanding and addressing cultural narratives and longings, rather than just intellectual arguments. In this panel discussion recorded at TGC25, Trevin Wax, Keith Plummer, Andrew Wilson, and Rebecca McLaughlin discuss how to effectively use cultural apologetics as a tool for discipleship and evangelism.

Political streamer Destiny, whose given name is Steven Bonnell II, recently appeared on “Piers Morgan Uncensored,” where he not only refused to condemn the assassination of Charlie Kirk, but openly mocked Erika Kirk for mourning her husband.“I don’t understand you, Destiny. You have so much hatred in your heart,” Ana Kasparian said on the panel of “Piers Morgan Uncensored.”“It’s such a simple thing,” Destiny responded. “If you’re going to weaponize somebody’s grief against the other party, well, then of course people have a right to fight back against it. I think that she has every right to grieve in whatever way she wants.”“But when that grief is going to be weaponized to do recruitment, political recruitment and further radicalization of the other side, then of course you not only have the ability to mock, I think you have the obligation to mock it. It’s insane,” he added.“If someone assassinated my husband,” Kasparian responds in disbelief, “I would not be able to have the level of composure she had during that speech. I would be out for blood. I understand why she’s angry and why she said the things that she said. Okay? You need to understand what being a human is.”“Ana Kasparian,” BlazeTV host Alex Stein says on “Prime Time with Alex Stein,” “she nailed it.”However, that’s not even the worst of the panel’s interactions with Destiny.Jack Posobiec, who lost a best friend when he lost Charlie, spoke of one of the shooter’s bullets that said, “Hey fascist, catch,” before Destiny erupted.“That’s not even the bullet that was fired. How are you lying about this?” Destiny said.“Shut up, Destiny,” Posobiec says, clearly frustrated.“You’re so shameless, dude. Oh my God. ... You’re such a disgusting piece of s**t,” Destiny shouted.“That’s what Destiny does. He wants to argue semantics. Like, he’s trying to call Jack Posobiec a liar for not describing the exact bullet, even though we know all four bullets had all of these weird messages on them. So, I mean, regardless of the bullet that went in him, every bullet had a message,” Stein says, disgusted.“He’s an evil, sick, sick, disgusting person,” he adds.Want more from Alex Stein?To enjoy more of Alex's culture jamming, comedic monologues, skits, and street segments, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

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