There’s a view circulating in some Reformed and covenantal circles that deserves careful examination—full preterism. Its proponents argue they’re simply taking the Bible’s prophecies with maximum seriousness. Their claim: every eschatological prophecy in the New Testament—including the Second Coming, the resurrection of the dead, and the final judgement was completely fulfilled in AD 70, when the Roman armies destroyed Jerusalem and the temple. Nothing prophesied remains future. It’s all done.

It sounds bold. It even sounds, to some ears, impressively biblical. But is full preterism a legitimate option within Reformed orthodoxy?

WHAT FULL PRETERISM ACTUALLY CLAIMS

To be fair to its proponents, full preterism begins with genuine biblical instincts. Jesus said “this generation will not pass away until all these things take place” (Matthew 24:34). The New Testament writers speak of the Lord’s coming as “near” and “at hand.” Full preterists take these urgency texts with full seriousness and conclude that everything Jesus and the apostles predicted was fulfilled within a generation—by AD 70.

The problem is not the question they’re asking. The problem is where their answer leads.

PARTIAL PRETERISM VS FULL PRETERISM—WHERE THE LINE IS DRAWN

Before making the case against full preterism, it’s important to distinguish it from partial preterism—a perfectly legitimate Reformed position held by respected theologians such as RC Sproul, Greg Bahnsen, Kenneth Gentry, and Vern Poythress.

Partial preterists agree much of Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation describes events surrounding the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70—the great tribulation, the vindication of the martyrs, the judgement on apostate Israel. They read the imminence language seriously and historically.

But partial preterists draw a firm line: the bodily return of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the final judgement remain future. These haven’t yet occurred. The hermeneutic—the method of interpretation—is similar, but partial preterism stays within the boundaries that the creeds and confessions of the church have always maintained.

Full preterism takes the same hermeneutic one fatal step further, collapsing everything into AD 70. And at that point, it’s no longer a matter of eschatological nuance. It’s a departure from Christian orthodoxy itself.

REASON 1: IT CONTRADICTS THE BODILY RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD

This is the most serious objection, and the apostle Paul made it first. In 1 Corinthians 15—the New Testament’s great resurrection chapter. Paul insists the future bodily resurrection of believers is inseparably tied to the bodily resurrection of Christ. “If the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either” (v. 16). The two stand or fall together.

Full preterism teaches “the resurrection” was a spiritual or covenantal event that occurred in AD 70—a transition from the old covenant age to the new. But this is precisely the error Paul warned against. He named Hymenaeus and Philetus as men who had “swerved from the truth, saying the resurrection has already happened” (2 Timothy 2:17–18). Paul called this teaching gangrenous—it spreads and destroys.

John 5:28–29 is equally direct. Jesus declares “an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out”—some to resurrection of life, others to resurrection of judgement. This is a physical, universal, bodily event. Job anticipated it: “After my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God” (Job 19:26). Full preterism cannot accommodate these texts without stripping them of their plain meaning.

REASON 2: IT UNDERMINES THE VISIBLE, BODILY RETURN OF CHRIST

Full preterism reinterprets Christ’s Parousia—His “coming” or “presence”—as a coming in providential judgement through the Roman armies in AD 70. But the New Testament’s description of the Second Coming resists this reading at every turn.

Acts 1:11 could hardly be clearer. As Jesus ascended visibly into heaven, two angels told the watching disciples: “This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” The same Jesus. The same manner. Bodily. Visibly.

Revelation 1:7 declares: “every eye will see him, even those who pierced him.” This demands a universal, visible event—not a localised Roman military campaign that most of the world never witnessed. Matthew 24:27 compares the Son of Man’s coming to lightning that flashes from east to west—impossible to miss. And impossible to spiritualise away.

REASON 3: IT PLACES THE CHURCH OUTSIDE CREEDAL CHRISTIANITY

This point is often underestimated. Full preterism does not merely conflict with Reformed confessions — it conflicts with the universal confession of the entire Christian church across every century and tradition.

The Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Chalcedonian Definition all confess Christ “will come again to judge the living and the dead.” This isn’t a distinctively Reformed conviction. It’s the very bedrock of Christian orthodoxy, affirmed by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Lutherans, Anglicans, and Reformed alike—without exception.

The Westminster Confession of Faith (Chapters 32–33) likewise affirms a future, general resurrection of all the dead and a final day of judgement when Christ will judge every person who has ever lived.

Full preterism requires rejecting not just one confessional tradition but the unanimous witness of the church throughout history. No church, council, or recognised theological tradition taught full preterism until a handful of modern writers proposed it in the late twentieth century. That is an enormous burden of proof—and it has not been met.

REASON 4: IT COLLAPSES THE LIVING HOPE OF THE CHURCH

Perhaps the most pastorally devastating consequence of full preterism is what it does to Christian hope. If everything has already been fulfilled, what exactly is the church still waiting for?

The New Testament answers that question with unmistakable clarity. Paul tells Titus believers are “awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13)—present tense, still future. In Romans 8:23, believers groan inwardly, “waiting eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies”—a bodily transformation still to come. John writes: “when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

Full preterism transforms all of this living, forward-leaning hope into a backward glance at a first-century historical event. The church is left not with anticipation but with memory. That is not the posture the New Testament calls us to.

CONCLUSION: A LINE THAT CANNOT BE CROSSED

Reformed theology is genuinely broad in its eschatology. Amillennialists, postmillennialists, and historic premillennialists have debated the shape of the end times for centuries. And all remain within the bounds of orthodoxy. Partial preterists and non-preterists read the Olivet Discourse differently—and both views are at home in the Reformed tradition.

But full preterism is different in kind, not merely in degree. It denies the bodily return of Christ. It denies the future resurrection of the dead. It denies the final judgement. And in doing so, it steps outside the boundaries that the whole church—not just the Reformed church—recognises as non-negotiable.

The question matters because the hope matters. The Christian’s hope isn’t a historical memory. It’s a living, certain, future reality—grounded in the empty tomb, secured by the risen Christ, and consummated at His return. That hope is worth defending.

RELATED FAQs

Isn’t full preterism just taking the Bible’s “imminence” language more seriously than other views? Full preterism deserves credit for taking imminence texts seriously—but seriousness about one set of texts cannot come at the cost of another. The same Bible that says “this generation will not pass away” (Matthew 24:34) also says “every eye will see him” (Revelation 1:7) and promises a future bodily resurrection of all the dead (John 5:28–29). A faithful hermeneutic must account for all the data, not selectively prioritize texts that fit a predetermined conclusion. Partial preterism demonstrates that imminence language can be honoured without collapsing the entire eschatological hope of the church into AD 70.

• Didn’t RC Sproul lean toward full preterism in his later years? This is a common misunderstanding. Sproul was a committed partial preterist—he argued forcefully that the great tribulation and much of Matthew 24 were fulfilled in AD 70, but he explicitly and repeatedly affirmed the future bodily return of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the final judgement. He distanced himself clearly from full preterism precisely because it crosses creedal boundaries he considered non-negotiable.
• If the resurrection already happened spiritually in AD 70, doesn’t that fit Paul’s already/not-yet framework? Paul’s already/not-yet framework actually destroys full preterism rather than supporting it. Paul consistently places the bodily resurrection of believers in the not-yet column—as something still awaited, groaned for, and hoped for (Romans 8:23; Philippians 3:20–21). In 2 Timothy 2:17–18, Paul explicitly condemns those who say “the resurrection has already happened,” calling it a destructive error. Far from accommodating full preterism, Paul’s own theology pronounces judgement on it.

How do we answer the full preterist argument that “all things” in Matthew 5:18 demand a complete fulfillment by AD 70? Matthew 5:18—“until all is accomplished”—refers to the fulfillment of the Law’s moral demands in Christ, not to the completion of all eschatological prophecy by a specific date. Reformed exegesis consistently reads this in light of Christ’s active obedience and his role as the Law’s fulfillment (Matthew 5:17), not as a timetable for the end of all prophecy. To make AD 70 the hermeneutical key that unlocks every New Testament text is to impose a controlling assumption on Scripture rather than derive one from it.

• Is full preterism a salvation issue—should full preterists be regarded as non-Christians? Most Reformed theologians treat full preterism as a serious departure from orthodoxy without rendering a blanket verdict on the eternal standing of individuals who hold it. The denial of a future bodily resurrection does strike at the heart of gospel hope. Paul’s language in 1 Corinthians 15 is sobering. But the church has historically distinguished between formal heresy requiring excommunication and serious error requiring correction and pastoral engagement. What can be said clearly is that full preterism falls outside the bounds of confessional Reformed Christianity and outside the creedal consensus of the whole church.
• How should we respond to the full preterist claim that the church has simply misread Revelation for two thousand years? This argument proves far too much. To claim that every church father, every council, every confession, and every orthodox theologian across twenty centuries all fundamentally misunderstood the church’s eschatological hope requires extraordinary evidence — and full preterism has not produced it. The Vincentian Canon—the principle that true Christian doctrine is what has been believed “everywhere, always, and by all”—weighs heavily against any position that appears nowhere in Christian history until the modern era. Novelty is not itself proof of error, but in matters touching the resurrection and the return of Christ, the burden of proof on the innovator is immense.

What is the best pastoral response when someone in the congregation feels drawn toward full preterism? The best pastoral response combines genuine engagement with firm doctrinal clarity—taking the person’s biblical instincts seriously while showing them where the view ultimately leads. Walk them carefully through 1 Corinthians 15, Acts 1:11, and 2 Timothy 2:17–18, and help them see the difference between partial and full preterism, since many are drawn to the former without realising they’re being led toward the latter. Introduce them to credible partial preterist scholars like RC Sproul or Kenneth Gentry, who demonstrate that honoring the imminence texts does not require abandoning the creeds. Above all, keep the focus on what is at stake pastorally—the living hope of resurrection and return that sustains the church through suffering, grief, and death.

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