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A Glorious Future The Times of
Restitution And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.—Acts 3:20,21 When the people heard this, they probably thought Peter was speaking of the restoration of their nation to the status it previously had under David and Solomon. That was what the apostles had expected. Prior to his ascension when the risen Jesus spoke with them, they asked, “Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6). They wanted Rome gone and the Jews in charge of their own affairs, though, historically speaking, that rarely produced a nation that was pleasing to God. Thomas “Tip” O’Neill—a longtime Speaker of the House in the U.S. Congress—once declared, “All politics is local.” Such was the case in Jerusalem and Christ’s first disciples. They were not thinking of the Gentiles, nor the state of those who were dead. They were preoccupied with their status as future rulers. Shortly before his crucifixion, Jesus asked them, “What was it that ye disputed among yourselves by the way? But they held their peace: for by the way they had disputed among themselves, who should be the greatest” (Mark 9:33, 34). In this sermon Peter made it clear he was not preaching some new doctrine. God’s holy prophets had been talking about this “since the world began,” a phrase alternatively translated “from the earliest ages” (Weymouth), “from of old” (RSV), and “from the most ancient time in the memory of man” (Amplified). To prove this he quoted Moses: “The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken … whosoever will not hearken unto my [Jehovah’s] words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him” (Deuteronomy 18:15,19). How was Peter able to make the connection between this statement by Moses and Jesus? It could have been by inspiration of the holy spirit which he and the others had received so recently. But it might also have been a lesson he learned when he witnessed the transfiguration of Jesus (Matthew 17:1-9). In the transfiguration vision Jesus talked with two whom Peter, James, and John believed to be Moses and Elijah. We are told that they talked of the coming death of Jesus (Luke 9:31), though it is likely other subjects were discussed as well. It is not inconceivable that in that vision “Moses” said explicitly, “You are that prophet I predicted would come at a future time.”
In verse 25 Peter reminded them they “are the
children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers,
saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be
blessed.” That great promise is recorded in Genesis 22:18. The Resurrection The plan of God was never meant to bless the living only, nor just a single group of human beings. It is a plan that will eventually bless all mankind, both the living and the dead. But to bless the dead requires a resurrection from the dead. Many Jews did believe in a resurrection because this doctrine was a distinguishing feature between Sadducees and Phrarisees: “The Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neither angel, nor spirit: but the Pharisees confess both” (Acts 23:8). To the Sadducees there was only the here-and-now. There was no consciousness in death and no future. But God’s holy prophets believed in a resurrection because they spoke of a future time of blessing. We also find the verb sleep used to refer to someone who died, including evil people: “So Ahab slept with his fathers; and Ahaziah his son reigned in his stead” (1 Kings 22:40). Jesus referred to Lazarus as “sleeping,” when in fact he was dead (John 11:11, 14). To say a dead person is sleeping makes complete sense only if a time is coming when that person will wake up. When Jesus spoke with Martha about her dead brother Lazarus, they discussed the resurrection: “Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again. Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day. Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live” (John 11:23-25). Adam Clarke, in an end note on 1 Corinthians 15, said this about the doctrine of the resurrection: “One remark I cannot help making; the doctrine of the resurrection appears to have been thought of much more consequence among the primitive Christians than it is now! How is this? The apostles were continually insisting on it, and exciting the followers of God to diligence, obedience, and cheerfulness through it. And their successors in the present day seldom mention it! So apostles preached, and so primitive Christians believed; so we preach, and so our hearers believe. There is not a doctrine in the Gospel on which more stress is laid; and there is not a doctrine in the present system of preaching which is treated with more neglect!” Perhaps one reason the resurrection is seldom mentioned is because there is so little agreement about what will happen after a person is resurrected. The idea that anyone is restored to life only to hear a sentence of punishment pronounced upon him makes no sense. Yet that’s what it says in one translation: “The time is coming when all who are in the grave shall hear his voice and come out: those who have done right will rise to life; those who have done wrong will rise to hear their doom” (John 5:28,29, New English, emphasis added).
John 5:29 is more correctly rendered in the American Standard Version:
“They that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have
done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment.” Those who have done good before
they died are those who walk in the footsteps of their lord and master Jesus.
Those who have done evil are everyone else. They come back to life in the
world’s great “judgment day,” not to “hear their doom,” but, according to
Isaiah, to be instructed in righteousness: “Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O
LORD, have we waited for thee; the
desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee. … when thy
judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn
righteousness” (Isaiah 26:8,9). The Gentiles In the first chapter of Acts when the question about restoring the kingdom to Israel was asked, the apostles were not yet spirit begotten. That occurred a few days later in the upper room at the time of Pentecost. For a few more years the gospel message was restricted to Jews, until, in chapter ten, Peter was able to welcome Cornelius and his family into the family of Christ’s disciples. As difficult as this might have been for some Jewish Christians to accept, it had been prophesied by God’s holy prophets. The apostle James quotes Amos to emphasize that a time would come when God would accept the Gentiles (called “heathen” in Amos 9:12) just as he accepted Jews: “Simon has told us, how for the first time God has looked with favour on the Gentiles, and chosen from among them a people dedicated to his name. This is in agreement with the words of the prophets, where it is written: Afterwards, I will come back, and build up again David’s tabernacle that has fallen; I will build up its ruins, and raise it afresh; so that all the rest of mankind may find the Lord, all those Gentiles among whom my name is named, says the Lord, who is the doer of all this” (Acts 15:14-17, Knox, emphasis added).
When the armies of Titus completely destroyed Jerusalem in 70
A.D., the Jews were scattered into distant
countries. Since then, the gospel message has been almost exclusively directed
to the Gentiles: “I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so
that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until
the full number of the Gentiles has come in” (Romans 11:25,
NIV).
Israel is not abandoned forever because Paul said in the next verse, “And so all
Israel will be saved.” Israel’s salvation along with the unbelieving world of
mankind will occur in the “times of restitution.” Restitution The word restitution means “a return to or restoration of a previous state or position” (American Heritage Dictionary). In God’s plan that previous state or position is what was enjoyed by Father Adam and Mother Eve in their perfection. The past six-thousand years has been a time when the world has been experiencing sin, death, and imperfection, the consequences of disobedience. In the coming kingdom when the world will learn righteousness, all will gradually walk up the highway of holiness with earthly perfection the prize at its end: “And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; … and the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away” (Isaiah 35:8,10). This is the prospect described by John the revelator: “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away” (Revelation 21:4). This is the kind of plan we would expect from an all-wise, benevolent, all-powerful creator. He made no mistake when he brought forth our first parents, and allowed Satan to lead them down a path of disobedience. He did not create this world in vain, nor will he “burn it up” eventually: “For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else” (Isaiah 45:18). Speaking of this marvelous future time when God will bless Israel and all mankind, the apostle wrote: “This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: and they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more” (Hebrews 8:10-12). |