Discussions about eschatology and millennial views are sometimes dogged by questions about their importance and practical relevance.1 Yet early church history shows that belief in a particular millennial view, in this case premillennialism, was no small thing. In fact, it was a major weapon in the early church’s battle against the greatest enemy to Christianity of that era— Gnosticism. Donald Fairbairn argues this point in his article, “Contemporary Millennial/Tribulational Debates.”2 Fairbairn is a professor of historical theology at Erskine Theological Seminary and earned his doctorate in patristics from the University of Cambridge. I would like to summarize some of Fairbairn’s...