Q:
A number of New Testament passages indicate that Christ was supposed to return before his generation had died. This would have been sometime in the first century AD.
First, there is the testimony of Jesus himself, who explicitly stated that some of his disciples would not die until Jesus instituted the Kingdom, and that his generation would not pass away until all his prophecies of the end of the world had been fulfilled.
Matthew 16:28 Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.
Matthew 23:36 Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.
Matthew 24:34 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.
It is important to note that Jesus' long discourse on the end of the world, recorded in Matthew 24 and 25, was spoken in private to his own disciples.
Matthew 24:3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?
In this discourse, Jesus makes a number of assertions about the fate of his disciples. One of the signs of the end would be the persecution of his disciples.
Matthew 24:9 Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.
While tradition records that the disciples were persecuted and martyred, this was not followed by the return of Christ, as he promised.
The Apostle Paul, too, seemed to think that Christ would return for his generation.
I Thessalonians 4:15-17 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
Note that Paul twice uses the phrase '...we which are alive and remain...'. This seems to preclude the theory that Paul was speaking of some far future generation. Paul made a similar assertion in First Corinthians.
I Corinthians 15:51,52 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
Note that Paul said that '...we shall not all sleep...'. In other words, he expected that at least some of his generation would not see death. Again, there is nothing in the text to indicate the Paul was speaking about some far future generation.
Paul reiterated his belief in a soon return of Christ in the Book of Romans.
Romans 13:11-12 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.
The other New Testament writers had similar thoughts about the iminence of Christ's return.
James 5:8 Be ye also patient; establish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.
I John 2:18 Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.
I Peter 4:7 But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer.
The Apocalyptic Book of Revelations repeatedly has Christ saying that he would return soon.
Revelation 22:20 He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly....
By no stretch of the imagination can 2,000 years be considered 'quickly'.
So how do Christian believers respond to this?
A:
You raise a very good point and you're not alone in your observation of this New Testament "problem". Some very well-known and respected people over the centuries have held this objection as well. From the standpoint of a 21st century Westerner, it's very difficult to read these passages and not draw the same conclusions you have. I appreciate your honesty and willingness to pose the question and open a dialogue on the matter.
It's important to remember that what we are reading in the New Testament is an English translation of 1st century Near East documents. We need to recognize that the culture of the that time and location had it's own way of speaking and writing that made sense to the 1st century Middle Eastern readers, but may seem very foreign to us 20 centuries later. Since it's we who have changed our way of speaking and reading in 2000 years, the onus is on the 21st century American readers to seek understanding of the intended meaning of these writings from the standpoint of those who wrote them.
The 1st century readers of the passages you cited (as well as many modern Christian readers) could have easily, and very naturally, understood them to be speaking of an event other than the end of the world. It can be very easily demonstrated that the language used in the book of Revelation and the Olivet discourse is very similar to the apocalyptic style language used by the prophets in the Old Testament to speak about God's judgment on various nations. These judgements often came in the form one nation invading and significantly destroying another. Likewise, the language that speaks of God's "coming" is used in the OT metaphorically to speak of God sending judment as if He was Himself leading the armies (example: Isaiah 19:1). The Romans coming against Jerusalem in 70 A.D. was indisputably the end of an age (the old covenant age of the Jews). To many of them, it was the end of the world.
For the preterist and partial-preterist, the challenge you pose is not a big problem. From a futurist perspective, you may get another answer and it may be a little more difficult to defend, perhaps not.
There are some preterists (though they are, I believe, a small minority of those who are thus labeled) who argue that there was a mystical coming of Christ in AD 70. Most of us at this forum, I suspect, are not of that camp.
I do not believe in a mystical coming of Christ in AD 70, though I am a preterist. I believe in a divinely-appointed judgment that came upon Jerusalem through human agency (the Romans).
This was not the second coming of Christ. However such judgments are not uncommonly referred to in prophecy as the "coming" or "visiting" of God upon those being judged. It is a literary convention of the Hebrew prophets—not a suggestion of some mystical or invisible event.
