GOLDEN-AGING-IT

"The only thing new to you is the history you don't know."

I thought about that quote when I recalled a tendency we have to glorify certain periods in history, casting them as a "Golden Age."

LONGING FOR LUTHER

We're "Golden-Aging It" when we think, "Man, it would have been great to live during the Reformation; that was a time when they nailed it." But the Reformation wasn't a Golden Age--there was in-fighting, jealousy, anti-Antisemitism, and even violence (including destruction of property) on the part of the Reformers.

Although Luther didn't start out anti-Semitic, he became that way. Listen to him rage against the Jews:

“Set fire to their synagogues or schools, Raze and destroy their homes. Seize their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, Forbid their rabbis to teach on pain of loss of life and limb. Abolish safe-conduct on the highways completely for the Jews and take all cash and treasure of silver and gold from them. Let them have a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade put into their hands so young, strong Jews and Jewesses can earn their bread in the sweat of their brow.”

Luther's anti-Antisemitism wasn't like that of his native Germany in the 1930's and 40's. His wasn't  racial; he didn't believe gentiles were racially superior to Jews. Luther's rage against the Jews was theological, but still inexcusable. He gave up on the Jews, saw them as hardened against the gospel, unable to be converted, and a people God had abandoned. It's obvious Luther wasn't a dispensational premillennialist. Had he been, he would have never turned against the Jews.

WHEN IT CAME TO PROPHECY

"Augustine became the model for the Reformers who accepted his amillennialism along with his other teachings. It is quite clear from the literature of the Reformation that the millennial issue was never handled fairly or given any considered study. The basic issues of the Reformation involved the right of private interpretation of the Scriptures, the individual priesthood of all believers, the doctrine of justification by faith, and similar truths." (Dr. John F. Walvoord)

Calvin, Luther, and Melanchthon all adopted the Roman Catholic hermeneutic of spiritualizing the prophecies of the Bible, following the lead of Augustine. That made them card-carrying amillennialists.

THE COLONIES

Others who "Golden-Age-It" point to the American colonial days as their shining era on a hill and think it would be great to have lived back then. "Those were the days, the days when rugged men and women came to America to breathe the pure air of freedom, when they lived free and worshiped the same way," some think. Yes, the colonial days, that's when they nailed it.

But hold on, Sparky. In Puritan New England:

"Church attendance was mandatory. Those that missed church regularly were fined. The church was sometimes patrolled by a man who held a long pole. On one end was a collection of feathers to tickle the chins of old men who fell asleep. On the other was a hard wooden knob to alert children who giggled or slept. Church was serious business.

"The Puritans believed they were doing God's work. Hence, there was little room for compromise. Harsh punishment was inflicted on those who were seen as straying from God's work. There were cases when individuals of differing faiths were hanged in Boston Common. (Too bad there was no First Amendment in the Colonies.)

"At least two known adulterers were executed in Massachusetts Bay Colony. Public whippings were commonplace. The stockade forced the humiliated guilty person to sit in the public square, while onlookers spat or laughed at them. Puritans felt no remorse about administering punishment. They believed in Old Testament methods." (They weren't dispensationalists either.)

Not only that, but also the Puritans executed 19 (by hanging) and 1 (by being pressed to death) for being witches. (They never burned a witch at the stake, a common misconception.) Altogether, they accused 140 of the crime and as many as 13 sentenced to prison may have died during their incarceration.

IT DEPENDS ON WHOSE OX IS BEING GORED

The First Amendment wasn't in the Puritan vocabulary, any more than "tolerance" was. In 1638, the Puritan authorities brought Anne Hutchinson before the court on charges of criticizing the Puritan pastors and teaching that people were saved by faith and not by deeds. In spite of her argumentation during the trial, they found her guilty; her punishment: banishment. In the spring of that year, the Puritans forced her, her husband, and their 15 children out of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. They moved to Rhode Island and after the death of her husband, Anne relocated to New Amsterdam.

There, in 1643, Anne and 5 of her children were killed in an Indian raid. A Puritan minister, upon hearing of her violent death, said that she deserved it. Those Puritans were a harsh and unforgiving bunch.

[In 1922, the state of Massachusetts erected a statue of Anne Hutchinson on the grounds of the State House. In 1945, the legislature voted to revoke her banishment. Puritan wrongs had finally been righted.]

GIMME THAT OLD TIME RELIGION

But surely the times of the Apostles, the first century AD, ah, that was the Golden Age. Was it? We think of the brave martyrs who went to their deaths singing rather than denying our Lord. True. But not all. The Roman governor of Turkey, Pliny the Younger, wrote to the Emperor Trajan in 112 AD concerning those who were under accusation of being in the "mad sect:" 

"Others, accused by an informer, first said that they were Christians and afterwards denied it. They said that they had indeed been Christians, but stopped. Some said three years, some several years, and one even twenty years before. All of them adored your image and the statues of the gods, and cursed Christ."

Not all were faithful unto death, which shouldn't surprise us; we know human nature.

A Golden Age? Wait, to read Revelation 2-3 is to see that the first century church, far from being idyllic, was rife with sins and problems. Acts,  I Corinthians, II Corinthians, Philippians, the epistlels to Timothy, and Galatians expose divisions, factions, the observance of the Lord's Supper a disgrace, gross immorality, marriages falling apart, lying about giving, one Apostle lapsing from grace, in-church opposition to Paul, racial divisions, heresies, two Christian women at odds with each other, and false teachers cavorting over the map.

We read of believers who made shipwreck of the faith, of Demas who abandoned Paul, "having loved this present world." We hear Paul's warning about "Alexander the coppersmith [who] did me much harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Be on guard against him yourself, for he vigorously opposed our teaching. We weep over an abandoned Paul, who wrote, "At my first defense no one supported me, but all deserted me." Hardly a golden age.

To look for a Golden Age in human history is to forget Genesis 3: in a fallen world, there is no golden age. The Golden Age awaits the Millennial Kingdom predicted in the Old Testament and confirmed in the New in Revelation 20.

In every era since Genesis 3, God is at work in amazing ways, weaving events so as to bring about the revelation of His Son Jesus Christ to rule and reign over the earth.

The search for a Golden Age in a fallen world yields the same result we see in"Eldorado" by Edgar Allen Poe:

Gaily bedight,

   A gallant knight,

In sunshine and in shadow,   

   Had journeyed long,   

   Singing a song,

In search of Eldorado.

   But he grew old—

   This knight so bold—   

And o’er his heart a shadow—   

   Fell as he found

   No spot of ground

That looked like Eldorado.

   And, as his strength   

   Failed him at length,

He met a pilgrim shadow—   

   ‘Shadow,’ said he,   

   ‘Where can it be—

This land of Eldorado?’

   ‘Over the Mountains

   Of the Moon,

Down the Valley of the Shadow,   

   Ride, boldly ride,’

   The shade replied,—

‘If you seek for Eldorado!’