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When was “The First Resurrection”?

At the end of what we call the Old Covenant, the long history of sacrificial “ascensions” also came to an end. Along with this, all the Old Covenant saints ascended to heaven in what the Revelation calls “the first resurrection.” However, it seems to me that the sacrificial rites themselves indicate that the saints did not ascend in AD70 but instead just prior to the beginning of the Roman siege.

The sacrificial rites which found their fulfilment in first century events divide the seven year process into two parts: the tribulation of the saints and then the “days of vengeance” upon the sinners. Thus, the Jewish War was not the Great Tribulation, since the Jews were the primary persecutors. The Roman siege was the final judgment upon Jerusalem and Jewry for a generation of persecution.

Two Goats

The period from the tearing of the Temple veil to the destruction of the entire Temple was a great “ascension” offering (Leviticus 1), with Christ ascending as the clean Head of the sacrifice, being taken up into the glory cloud, and returning a generation later “in like manner” (Acts 1:11) and “in clouds” for the washed Body. This “heavenly” offering is recapitulated in a national “earthly” sense in the Day of Atonement, where the High Priest made two approaches to the Most Holy, the first for the priesthood, and the second for the people.¹See James Jordan’s brilliant exposition of this pattern providing the structure and meaning of Daniel 7 in his Daniel commentary. It is the Day of Atonement rite which helps us to understand the events surround the destruction of the earthly House of God.

The history of “The Circumcision” follows the pattern found in microcosm in Israel’s annual festal calendar, at the end of which was the Feast of Booths, a great blessing for all nations from a purified Israel. Before this feast (and the promise made to Abraham concerning the blessing for all nations) could be fulfilled, animal sacrifices had to come to an end. Animals represented Adam and Eve and their offspring, as “blameless” people. Since believers were now indeed blameless before God, with the apostolic church offering itself as a willing sacrifice,²See Feed My Lambs the sins would be carried by those who had trodden underfoot the blood of Christ. They would carry the sins of the people as the cursed goat carried the burden into the wilderness. Unbelieving Judah would be expelled from the Covenant in the way Judas was exiled from the table of Christ.

Applying this to first century history, we see that the murdered saints ascended to heaven as the first goat when the persecutions ended and the siege began. After this, all the sins were laid upon the earthly Jerusalem as the second goat, and Israel according to the flesh was driven to destruction.

Avenging Abel

The final “week” of seven years follows the sacrificial pattern set by Christ’s three year ministry the initial apostolic testimony to the Jews, a period which corresponds to Paul’s time of training in the wilderness at Sinai. However it was now the blood of the Christians being spilled in the great city at the end of three years of Jewish jubilation, and the second half of this repeated week would see Zion itself turned into Sinai, a burning mountain cast down into the wild sea of the nations (Revelation 8:8).

As it was with the blood of Abel, the murderous “oblation” in the midst of the week would be a legal witness calling down judgment from heaven upon the ground, in this case the “Land” of Israel. So it was the final martyrdoms in Jerusalem—most likely Christians being murdered as scapegoats, as those who “troubled Israel” like Elijah (1 Kings 18:17) and “tormented those who dwell upon the Land” (Revelation 11:10)—which brought an end to the 3½ year tribulation of the saints, and began the Roman siege. It could then be the saints in heaven (from both the Old and New Covenants, as two legal witnesses) calling down the Mosaic curses upon the city for the second half of the week. They could do this because the Jewish Christians had either been murdered (Revelation refers to them as “two legal witnesses”) or fled to the nearby city of Pella.³See Pella: A Window On Survival by Mark Wilson. Like Sodom, there was no one righteous left in her.

“But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those who are inside the city depart, and let not those who are out in the country enter it, for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written.” (Luke 21:20-22)

Thus, the pattern of the final seven years—the Great Tribulation—is the final “sacrifice for sin,” and it is the entire “holy city” whose smoke would go up as a memorial.⁴This is the context of Hebrews 10:26: “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins…” The entire four-cornered Land became a bloody Altar of Bronze.⁵One commenter on Sin City – 2 noted that Gentry could be correct in his assertion that the Revelation concerned only this final “week.” Although it does follow the same pattern, this final week is described only in the “Seven Bowls” section of the book. This means that Gentry interprets the details of the book incorrectly.

The Final Week

The fact that the final seven years of Jewish history follows the pattern laid down in Genesis 1 reveals it to be a “de-Creation.” The Temple had represented the entire cosmos,⁶See James Jordan, The First Ascension. but that role was now fulfilled in the Body of Christ.

So it makes sense that the saints suffered and ascended (as the “first goat”, the first resurrection) for 3 years before the second goat, the unrepentant Jews, became the second goat, “the second death.” (Although, the deaths of the final witnesses and the flight of the remaining saints to Pella was also a twofold event, a sacrificial “binding and loosing” on Moriah.)

Indeed, the language used by Jesus concerning the final Feast of Ingathering (another name for Booths) employs “Day 4″ symbols:

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the [Land] will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” (Matthew 24:29-31)

The ascension of the elect of all the previous ages—including Abel and Abraham, and the apostolic martyrs—to reign with Christ is what allowed Him to pour out a “harvest” of destruction upon the Jerusalem below.

And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. (Revelation 11:8).

We cannot understand the Revelation rightly, or indeed the New Testament, without having the praxemes of the Torah either on our tongues or close at hand, but more importantly in our hearts. Otherwise we will fulfill them just as the Jews did. But the Church will never suffer again in the way it did before the end of Jerusalem (Matthew 24:21), a firstfruits Church which like her Master was offered up for the life of the world (Colossians 1:24).