Sam Storms
Sam Storms is a scholarly pastor who moved from the pretribulational, premillennial, dispensational perspective to amillennialism. This is his argument for amillennialism being the more biblical approach.
For so many Christians, the pretribulational, premillennial viewpoint is the only option. It has been popularized by Hal Lindsey’s book The Late Great Planet Earth, the Left Behind series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins and so many other books and sermons. Just about all the Christian books on the topic found in the local Christian bookstore will be from the premillennial viewpoint.
For my part, I have never seriously looked at any other option. This is the first book on amillennialism that I have read.
Two things have predisposed me to be open to this viewpoint:
My growing realization the last couple of years that if the New Testament speaks of two separate events related to Christ’s coming, both the rapture and the second coming, it is certainly not very clear on that. On the surface of things, it certainly seems that the New Testament is looking at one event regarding Christ’s coming, not two.
So many writers, both past and present, that I respect so highly hold to the amillennial viewpoint rather than the premillennial viewpoint.
What matters of course, is not what anyone else thinks, what one’s tradition is, but what does God’s Word say?
Amillennialism states that the present age of the church between the first and second coming of Christ is the millennium. Amillennialists do believe in the millennium, but it is going on right now in its entirety and it will be until Christ returns. It is non-earthly, non-visible, non-physical, but no less literal. It is Christ’s reign right now in heaven.
Storms deals with a variety of specific topics in the book: Five foundational principles for interpreting prophecy, dispensationalism, Daniel 9 and the Old Testament roots of dispensationalism, problems with premillennialism, Is Israel the same as the church, Matthew 24, Romans 11, kingdom of God, the book of Revelation, the Antichrist in 2 Thessalonians 2. Those are some of the major chapter topics.
Storms makes a cogent case for amillennialism. He has especially strong chapters on the problems of premillennialism and on the important chapter of Matthew 24.
But the entire book is persuasive. Storms has done voluminous research on the subject. The final chapter contains 33 reasons that contribute to the case for amillennialism.
The book is not an easy read. It is 550 pages of dense theology, but it may well become the standard work on amillennialism, written by someone quite familiar with the pretribulational, premillennial, dispensational perspective.
For serious students of eschatology, this is a book to grapple with.