Paul said, "Be diligent to present yourself approved before God, a workman who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." (2Tm 2:15). This "rightly dividing" includes TIME. We must know what is past and what is future in the Bible. One person might put some portion of the Bible into the time division called PAST. Another might regard it as FUTURE. They cannot both be right, so at least one of them has wrongly divided the word of truth and has a distorted view of it.

An Example of Dividing Past and Future

Read Revelation 20:11-15 as an example of the problem of dividing time. Then try whether the events described there are in the future or the past, first from John’s standpoint, then from our standpoint.

The Crucial Divide

Looking again at the above example (Rev 20:11-15)let’s put the dividing line at the time John saw the vision --John's standpoint. Does it matter on which side of that line, past or future, we place the events which the vision represents? Moving the dividing line up to our own time or standpoint, does it matter how we regard the vision as representing our past, or as yet to be fulfilled in our future? The next exercise will help you decide whether it really matters.

Let's say you take the vision as representing the future, from your standpoint. You might think of the vision as a somewhat literal description of future events whose shape is not far different from what John saw in the vision.

But now let's say you think of the vision as representing events, in the past. You might then have in mind events whose shape in reality were far different to anything in the vision. You might treat the vision as purely and intensely symbolic. Consequently, you might not believe in any literal end of the world, resurrection of the dead, day of judgment, or hell.

So all four concepts listed will be understood quite differently, depending on which side of the past/future divide they are put; clearly, a right understanding of God's word, and its important doctrines, depends on rightly dividing in terms of time.

The Shifting Divide

What was the past for those who wrote Scripture, is the very ancient past for us. What was the near future for Bible writers, is, from our perspective, now history. But the Bible was itself written over such a lengthy period, that what is prophetic future in one book, may turn up as historic fulfillment in another. The divide shifts generally forward as we turn the pages. To understand the Bible properly, we must have a reasonable idea of where, in any given portion of Scripture, the divide should be placed along the time-line of the Bible's unfolding story.

The next exercise will demonstrate what I have just said. To prepare, read Exodus 3:7-8, Jeremiah 31:31-32, and Hebrews 8:6-9.

These passages place three men at widely-spaced points in human history:

It is instructive for us to think about the perspectives of these three men on two events, namely the giving of the old covenant at Sinai, and the inauguration of the new covenant through Jesus Christ.

From this exercise, you can see that what was in the FUTURE for Moses, was in the PAST for Jeremiah. For Moses, it was still a future event that God's people would escape from bondage in Egypt, and Moses would give them the law-covenant at Mount Sinai. For Jeremiah that was history.

You can further see that what was in the FUTURE for Jeremiah, was in the PAST for the writer of Hebrews. For Jeremiah, the enacting of a new and better covenant was yet future and stood as a promise. For the author of Hebrews it was history and stood as prophecy fulfilled. The future had become the past.

This demonstrates the principle of the shifting divide.

The Great Divide

The previous exercise leads us very nicely into noticing that there is one great divide in the Bible, more important than any other. While the imaginary line separating past from future moves constantly forward in the Bible, there are various points in history at which one marks the passing of that line over a certain event, especially where an important long-term change occurred.

The greatest such marker concerns what we were thinking about before. Where would we mark the turning point where Jeremiah's prophecy for the future new covenant became no longer a promise for the future but a fulfillment in the past? Paul is quite clear about where to put this great divide. The cross of Christ is the main divider of time in the Bible. Look at Colossians 2:14.

"Having cancelled the handwriting of ordinances against us, which was hostile to us, Christ has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to his cross" (Col 2:14).

Paul rightly divides the word of truth in saying, "Having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us... he has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross" (Col 2:14). Paul pinpoints the cross of Christ as the time-divide where the two covenants meet, and FUTURE from Jeremiah's standpoint became PAST from Paul's.

How crucial this is! What if Paul had got it wrong, and moved the time-divide from the cross to a future day when, say, the temple in Jerusalem would be destroyed? What a difference that forty-year anachronism would make! Instead of opposing the teachers who said Christians must keep the law of Moses (Acts 15), Paul would have joined them with a loud Amen, regarding a false doctrine as true, all because he was wrongly dividing the word by forty years!

What Future Is Left In The Bible?

How much future was left in the Bible, once its last page was written? Had the shifting divide caught up with the future, and rendered all the Bible as history? How much, if anything, was left in the Bible for future fulfillment? Is what we said of Jeremiah's future, true of every Bible author's future? Or did many of the things that Daniel, Ezekiel, Paul, John, and other Bible prophets saw as future, remain future long after the Bible was complete? Do those things still remain future today? Or has the Bible's future now become the past ? These are important questions.

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