Introduction: Stories
who here reads novels?
some have a waffly introduction that you can skip
others jump straight in with the main theme in the first line.
Here’s some famous ones:[1]
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
and indeed the book is about the turbulent best and worst of the French Revolution period.
"In a hole in the ground there lived a …"
yes, The Hobbit!
And the book tells the story of a Hobbit who left his safe cosy little hole,
ventured out into the dangerous dark world, and came safely back to his homely hole at last.
"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."
Pride and Prejudice
and Jane Austen is all about the social maneuvering it takes to finally get those single men hitched
here is a tough one:
“in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
is this just a waffly prologue, we can skip, or is it the main theme, the big idea of the whole Bible?
It’s the first time we meet our main character – and what he is doing, maybe his most characteristic activity?
God created
Today, we are going to sweep right through the biblical story,
from the first creation in Genesis to the new creation in Revelation
we going to see creation is God’s purpose from first to last
this is God’s super story – the context that gives purpose and direction to our individual sub-stories,
the chapters where we make our brief appearances
We’re going to compare this story with two rival stories, we often hear
now, many stories fall into a three-part structure.
For example, your typical romance:
boy meets girl, fall happily in love – part one
then, tragic separation – part two:
maybe torn apart by social class and snobbery – like in Jane Austen: pride and prejudice.
But, at long last, the couple are reunited, marry, live happily ever after etc-part three.
An average chick flick, I suppose?
For the guys, take a Hollywood action movie.
People are going to work or chilling out, their normal lives – part one
then, suddenly, the sky turns dark, it’s an alien battleship, we’re under attack!
Or, at the beach, a surfer screams, he’s dragged under
it’s a shark – Jaws!
Chaos and turmoil. The struggle begins. Will humanity survive? – part two
But at last, the bugs are blown up, the shark is slain,
Peace and order are restored – part three.
In short: good-bad-good; or harmony-conflict-resolution.
Like a symphony in three movements:
the first in a major key, the second, more dark and sombre, in a minor key.
And the third more cheerful and upbeat major movement.
this sort of three part plot is the story of the Bible.
A three act play of Creation, fall, redemption
which, as we’ll see, can be read as a divine romance or a cosmic battle.
To help us remember the key chapters of the plot,
I’ve recalled an old Sunday school lesson: the gospel in colours.
Act One: Creation – Clean and Green
“in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
the first two chapters of Genesis give the details
I think the central take home message is this:
creation is good, but it is not God.
That might sound obvious, but actually it’s not
it rules out major rival stories.
Ever since the ancient Greeks like Plato, many people have believed that creation itself is the fall.
Our souls are trapped in sinful physical bodies like a prison.
We gotta break out and float back up to the light.
The story is still floating around today.
Some eastern religions, new age thinkers, and even in the church.
By contrast, in Genesis chapter 1,
the morning stars sang for joy (Job 38:7)
the chorus on every day of creation resounds, “God saw that it was good.”.
As for human beings, we are very good: made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27).
One thing this means, is that God put us in the garden to look after it as his representatives.
Humans are to be “priests of creation”.
Like kings and queens, wisely ruling the earth to the glory of God.[2]
in the garden of Eden, humanity lived in a rich network of relationships:
close to God, each other, and the good fruitful earth.
It was God’s first intention and plan, and it hasn’t changed since the first line
It was the best of times, the original Golden Age,[3]
Act Two: Creation and Fall – Blackout
but,
as we know, Adam and Eve were tempted.
creation is good but not God,
humans are in the image of God but are not gods themselves.
So there are two ways we can be tempted to go wrong.
We can treat creation as if it were God – idolatry.
Or we can write it off as worthless – what an insult to its maker.
I can act as if I am God; I am the author of my story.
Or I can despair: forget my infinite value as an image of God.[4]
in Genesis chapter 3, Adam and Eve tried to become like God in their own strength (Genesis 3:4-5)
and became less like God than they were made to be – full of shame.
And that rich matrix of relationships shattered like a broken mirror.
humans are the crown of creation, so when we fell, all creation fell with us.
Even the ground was cursed with thorns and thistles. (Genesis 3:17-18)
The clean and green creation was darkened.
The worst of times,
Now, there was death.
Blackout
———— SHIRT ————
One of the neat things about the Bible, like a good novel, is that,
the more you read it, the more you discover images and themes that reappear, combine, contrast,
deepen the meaning in new ways
Creation and Fall: Take Two
So here’s a different take on Creation:
Genesis 1 began with God’s Spirit blowing over the dark waters.[5]
In many ancient near eastern cultures, this primaeval ocean was a symbol of chaos and evil
the creator god fought the sea and killed its monsters.
The Bible uses this idea.
God sets boundaries of the sea, so it can come no further (Proverbs 8:29)
and we even meet monsters like Leviathan and Rahab.
Imagine a sort of spiritual, super-sized Jaws.
You Lord rule over the surging sea;
when its waves mount up, you still them.
You crushed Rahab like a carcass;
with your strong arm you scattered your enemies.
The heavens are yours, and yours also the earth;
you founded the world and all that is in it.
Psalm 89:9-11[6]
Creation as a marine battle
defeating the waters of chaos and nothingness
This picture is applied to the Exodus, when God rescued his people Israel out of slavery in Egypt.
God defeated Pharaoh, the dragon in the seas (eg Ezekiel 32:2)
he blew back the Red Sea, to make dry land – just like Genesis – so his people could pass through.
a new creation – the birth of Israel
Was it not you who cut Rahab to pieces,
who pierced that monster, the Dragon?…
Was it not you who dried up the sea,
who made a road in the depths of the deep
so that the redeemed might cross over?
Isaiah 51:9-11
40 years later, they were in the Promised Land,
it was a sort of new Eden:
Again, the presence of God
People lived in harmony
The fertile land flowed with milk and honey.
It was the Golden Age of Israel.[7]
But.
sadly, it didn’t last
the rest of Old Testament history is like a slow motion replay of Genesis 3 – The fall – stretched over centuries
What happened with Adam and Eve,
happens all over again with the people of Israel.
Many of them forgot that creation is not God.
They worshipped idols.
Again, things fell apart.
By the end,
Jerusalem was in ruins, the earth infertile.[8]
the land itself spewed them out (Leviticus 18:28)
like Adam and Eve, the people were driven out into exile.
Adam and Eve, then the people of Israel, and it’s really the same for us
the same old story
God blesses us, but we rebel and turn away.
Our relationships suffer.
And, like never before, today we can see the literal physical impact of human sin on creation.
This week I read a Christian poem lamenting the oil spill: "Poisoned Sea, Impoverished Soul"[9]
the fall isn’t just an ancient myth: it’s our story today.
It didn’t just happen, once upon a time, it happens (Rob Bell)
Looking Forward: Two Future Stories
so here we are.
Paradise lost
Creation and fall.
Green and black.
For chick flick fans, the romance has turned sour – get out your hankies
the old testament portrays God as a heartbroken husband,
pleading with his beloved people, who dumped him.
For blokes, the aliens have landed
like evil monsters, sin and death slithered up from the seas and invaded God’s good world.
Where does the story go from here?
Which side will win?
How will it all end?
Will our hero win back his bride?
Will we beat back the aliens, or will humanity perish?
when we look to the future, for what can we hope?
There’s a few big stories people tell.
Who here is an optimist? Here’s a story for you
Story One: Onwards and Upwards
Every day, in every way, we’re getting better and better
look at the stunning progress of human knowledge, science, technology, exploration over the last centuries.
Man, we’re good!
we’ve escaped the bad old days, the dark ages,
We can defeat disease, solve our problems, cure the curse
We don’t need God now: we ourselves can bring in the new golden age.[10]
That sounds pretty cheerful, but let’s not forget the cynics and pessimists – here’s a tale for you.
Story Two: Doom and Gloom
Every day, in every way, the world is getting worse and worse.
It’s all downhill from here.
The marriage – it’s over.
The monsters have won.
There’s a (Conservative) Christian version:
God’s not interested in the material world
It’s fallen, so he’s going to trash it on judgment day.
The best we can do is save souls for heaven
get a few people into the lifeboat before the ship of creation goes down
remember those two basic ways we can go wrong?
act like we ourselves are God, we are the author of the story.
Or deny that creation is good.
Here they are again.
Do you think we sometimes slip into one of these mindsets?
On one hand, we can think everything depends on our Christian programs, our church growth strategies, our human efforts
on the other, we can get spiritual tunnel vision and forget that all of creation, all of life, matters to God.
By contrast, the people of Israel told a third story about the future,
unlike the second sad story, it gave them hope for this world.
Unlike the first story, it’s a hope that is not based on us
Let’s play spot the plot in these verses from the prophet Isaiah
Israel’s Third Story: God’s New Creation
Isaiah 51:3 The LORD will comfort Zion
and will look with compassion on all her ruins;
he will make her deserts like Eden,
her wastelands like the garden of the LORD.[11]
Isaiah 55:12
the mountains and hills
will burst into song,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.[12]
Isaiah 25:6-8
On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
a feast of rich food for all peoples,
On this mountain he will destroy
the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
he will swallow up death forever.
what a vision!
What a hope!
It’s not about Israel manufacturing a new golden age – that first story.
It’s more than individual souls getting to heaven – that second story.
The biblical hope is for
Restoration of the whole person – body and spirit together (the Bible rarely makes a distinction),
as part of the whole community of God’s people – the great feast,
within the whole good creation.
God saves wholes, not just souls.
But as the Old Testament draws to a close,
this hope had not yet been fulfilled.
which brings us to act three of our drama.
Creation. Fall. Redemption.
Act Three: Creation and Christ – Redemption
sometimes we think God the Father first made the world.
But that didn’t work out, so God switched to plan B:
Jesus Christ came to save humanity.
Creation and salvation are split apart.
But look at what Paul says in Colossians 1:15-20
by Christ all things in heaven and on earth were created…
Through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven…
All things are what Christ made – and what did he come to save?
– all things![13]
Maybe creation and redemption are part of the same package, God’s same ongoing plan.
Reinforcing this idea
Paul called Christ the second Adam – the first new man.[14]
he is the true image of God, what we were meant to be.
the first Adam failed to look after the garden,
but Christ puts creation right, freeing it from sin and death.
in the Gospels, the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, the dead rise
again the raging waters threaten human life
– the disciples bobbing in their fishing boat, as the storm sweeps in.
Jesus walks all over them, he rebukes the wind and stills the waves.
Like God did at creation and Exodus.
But it wasn’t an easy victory.
The Sunday school story has red for salvation
Act three is blood red for the cross.
to free creation from the curse, Christ suffered its worst effects – that is, death.
What was the sign of the earth’s curse?
– thorns: how appropriate that Christ died, crowned with thorns
And when he rose, more echoes of Eden.
This is from theologian Tom Wright’s Easter Sunday sermon this year. Sunday morning:[15]
Mary in the garden becomes for a moment Eve, weeping for her lost innocence and her lost Lord, and then discovering that the one she thinks is the gardener really is the gardener, the one through whose healing stewardship the whole creation will be dug afresh and planted with the Tree of Life.
Christ is picking up the job the first Adam walked away from.
The true gardener
Weeding out sin and tending the green shoots of God’s new creation.
a mediaeval legend even said Adam was buried at Calvary,
and the wood of the cross, that brought us new life,
came from the tree of life in Eden.
Yes, creation and redemption go together.
In God’s story, green and red are intertwined.
———— SHIRT ————
Now we approach a twist in our tale.
Christians believe that “if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
others may well ask, “where is this new creation?” (2 Peter 3:3ff)
Look around you: the vision of prophets like Isaiah has not arrived.
It’s a problem
it’s the tension that split apart Judaism and Christianity.
Early Jews and Christians both believed that at the end of this age
God would raise all the righteous from the dead.
So Martha says to Jesus after her brother Lazarus has died,
“I know he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” (John 11:24)
but then, Jesus rose from the dead – not on the last day, but now [16]
Christians realized the expected final act of the three part drama had split into two stages.
Stage one: the resurrection of Christ.[17]
stage two, still to come, what Martha was waiting for: when we rise from the dead to join him.[18]
the Hollywood plot had three parts: good-bad-good
because of this two stage resurrection, our Christian drama is four acts.
In effect, Hollywood part three has begun before part two is over.
Parts two and three of the story, sin and salvation, currently overlap
our present has been invaded by God’s future
The resurrection, the last days, have begun.
one person, Jesus Christ, has been raised in advance
like fresh green grass growing through a crack in blackened old concrete.
Like a golden glow on the highest mountain peaks, that shows the sun is rising,
even though down here in the valley things are still pretty dark.
Right now, we are in act three of God’s story.
Christ is already risen, but we are not yet
That’s the source of the bittersweet tension we so often experience
It’s like an agonising dissonance, a musical chord that cries out for resolution
we’re waiting for act four – pure gold.
Act Four: Creation and New Creation – The Golden Age
so what will act four bring?
what exactly is our future hope?
Here’s the Christian answer in one sentence:
“One day, God will do for the whole cosmos what he did for Jesus at Easter.”
That is from New Testament scholar Tom Wright.
if you want to know more about the biblical hope, I recommend his book.
“Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church” (2008)[19]
“One day, God will do for the whole cosmos what he did for Jesus at Easter.”
I love that line, but what does it mean?
much more than disembodied souls
At Easter, God raised Christ with a physical body – both similar and different to what we have now.
Jesus barbecued fish on the beach, he ate it,
he said to his disciples, “Touch me – see, I’m not a ghost!” (Luke 24:39)
And yet, his body was different.
Glorious, powerful, imperishable as gold (1 Corinthians 15)
maybe a bit like figure skaters in the Winter Olympics
what strength and grace and beauty!
when he returns, Jesus will transform our lowly bodies to be something like that. (Philippians 3:20-21)
That’s why the Apostles Creed says, I believe in “the resurrection of the body.”
What’s more, Christians can say we believe in “the resurrection of all creation.”
In Romans 8, Paul says all of nature is groaning as in labour pains,
longing for the day when
“the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay
and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.” (Romans 8:19-23)
It’s the exodus of the universe.
all things reconciled, the entire creation set free,
That’s the grand scope of salvation in Christ![20]
CS Lewis had this vision
remember, in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,
the white witch’s curse held all Narnia frozen in deathly winter.
when Aslan returned, The snow melted and everything came to life.
streams flowed again, flowers blossomed, all good creatures rejoiced and danced and feasted.
One day, what happened with Jesus on an individual scale will occur on a cosmic scale.
The Significance of Stories
The stories we tell matter.
Especially the super stories, the big picture frameworks,
that give purpose and coherence to our lives.
Like the punch line of a joke, the end of the tale shapes its whole meaning.
A 1997 survey in Time magazine (March 31), showed that two thirds of Americans who claim to believe in life after death reject a bodily resurrection.[21]
They’ve lost the plot of God’s big creation drama,
Forgotten God said creation was good
They’ve written off all those Old Testament prophecies –
the whole people of God rejoicing with the whole good creation.
If that’s your story, it has some implications:
Fighting injustice or poverty or corruption?
protecting the environment?
Waste of time.
Salvation’s not about this world – God’s going to wipe it out[22]
we are going up to heaven when we die
evangelism is all that matters – just save souls.
lifeboat theology.[23],[24]
But if we get a grip on God’s great saga.
– the multicoloured polychromatic chronicle of the cosmos.
We’ll see the mission of God is far bigger.
we are saved as wholes, not just souls,
so it is not just so-called “spiritual” work that is valuable to God.
It’s not just pastors, evangelists, missionaries, professional Christians, who are building for the kingdom.
Think of a mediaeval cathedral.
A stonemason chips away at a statue, an artisan carves wood, another works on stained glass.
A cook feeds the workers, a tailor clothes them, a priest encourages them, an accountant pays them.
An architect dreams of soaring spires
an engineer calculates the strength to carry them.
A whole community with all their different abilities, building together over generations for the glory of God,
That sounds like Paul’s body of Christ to me (1 Corinthians 12)
imagine the joy workers would feel if resurrected centuries later, when the cathedral was complete,
and they could see the part their work had played.
Hey, look up there on the façade – there’s that little statue I carved.
Look at the sun shining through that stained-glass window – isn’t that glorious?
That was made by a guy who was so down he was going to give up, but I encouraged him.
everything we have done to honour God and bless others
will be taken up, perfected and resurrected with us in the new Jerusalem.
Nothing good will be wasted.
remember Paul’s great chapter on the resurrection, 1 Corinthians 15
here’s how he ends: because Christ has been raised, (1 Corinthians 15:58)
“Therefore, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord,
because you know that in the Lord your labour is not in vain.”[25]
Conclusion: the Golden Ending
The Bible’s big picture is framed by Genesis 1-2 and Revelation 21-22
like matching bookends, the prologue and epilogue of our saga.
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” (Genesis 1:1)
In the end, God is still creating:
the prophet wrote,
“I saw a new heaven and a new earth,
for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.”
Revelation 21:1.
The old creation passes, and the new is born
like Jesus’ old body died, and was transformed into his new risen one.
“and there was no longer any sea”
That’s bad news for literalistic surfers.
But very good news for poetic theologians.
As we’ve seen, the raging ocean is a biblical symbol of evil,
Out of it even comes, in Revelation, the anti-Christ beast.
now the monsters of the sea that try to dissolve and destroy God’s creation,
have all been overcome. (Revelation 20:2)
Death has been swallowed up in victory (1 Corinthians 15:54)
green, black, red
Now at last, the truly best of times, the Golden Age is here.
the new creation is come
———— SHIRT ————
The Golden Age:
It’s the last part of that threefold Hollywood story, or the final act four of God’s drama:
The evil aliens are smouldering corpses.
shark meat is sizzling on the barbecue.
The Hobbit is safely home.
For the less macho version, here’s Revelation 21:2
I saw the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, [26]
prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.
Everything that kept them apart,
pride and prejudice, sin and suffering, are now overcome
After the long long wait,
wedding bells are ringing: Christ and his church, God and his people, together again.
It’s happily ever after in the city of gold.
It’s the day when God will resurrect the whole created cosmos, just like he raised Christ at Easter.
Your dead will live;
their bodies will rise.
You who dwell in the dust,
wake up and shout for joy!
Isaiah 26:19
Wake up O sleeper!
Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.
Ephesians 5:14
[1] See “100 best first lines from novels”, from the American Book Review, at http://www.pantagraph.com/news/article_a125216a-649f-5414-88b5-76a688ea3b6a.html
[2] Here is a strong ground for a Christian theology of the arts – like music and painting that use the good things of creation to praise God and bless people. It’s part of the significance of communion.
[3] we even have the first mention of gold in the Bible: like everything else, “the gold of that land is good.” (Genesis 2:12)
[4] Note that the image of God in us is damaged and deformed by sin, but not destroyed. Genesis 9:6 repeats "in his image God made humankind" – after the fall!
[5] “the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” 1:2
[6] Also Psalm 74:12-17. Jeremiah 4:23-26 depicts the exile of Israel as a sort of undoing of creation:
I looked at the earth,
and it was formless and empty;
and at the heavens,
and their light was gone.
I looked at the mountains,
and they were quaking;
all the hills were swaying.
I looked, and there were no people;
every bird in the sky had flown away.
I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert;
all its towns lay in ruins
before the LORD, before his fierce anger.
[7] Indeed, King Solomon made gold as plentiful as stones in Jerusalem. (2 Chronicles 1:15)
[8] symbols of the anti-creation forces in Genesis: thorns and the sea, come back. The Old Testament compares the surrounding nations to thorns in Israel’s side and to the raging sea, trying to sweep Israel away.
[9] http://blog.sojo.net/2010/05/27/poisoned-sea-impoverished-soul-a-litany-of-lament-over-a-despoiled-ocean/
[10] especially in the 19th century, many Liberal Christians bought in to this belief: the true meaning of the gospel is the infinite potential of humanity. evil monsters? sin and Satan? Come on, we don’t believe that stuff any more.
[11] Cf Ezekiel 36:33-36 "I will resettle your towns, and the ruins will be rebuilt. The desolate land will be cultivated… This land that was laid waste has become like the Garden of Eden."
[12] The wolf will live with the lamb, The infant will play near the cobra… the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. Isaiah 11:6-9. God planned to flood universe with himself. In part, the world is so beautiful, because it is designed as a receptacle for God’s love, "designed to be filled, flooded, drenched in God, as a chalice is beautiful, not least because of what he know it was designed to contain or as a violin is beautiful, not least because we know the music of which it is capable" (NT Wright)
[13] again, in Ephesians 1:10, God’s plan is "to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ."
[14] Romans 5:12-21, 1 Corinthians 15:21-22. To highlight this connection between Adam and Christ, mystery plays in the middle ages deliberately used the same actor for both.
[15] http://www.ntwrightpage.com/sermons/EasterMorning2010.htm
[16] Jesus replies to Martha, who expects a resurrection in the distant future, "I am the resurrection and the life"-already in the present!
[17] Paul called Christ, “The beginning and the firstborn from the dead.” (Colossians 1:18), “within a large family” Romans 8:29, the first fruits from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20)
[18] the resurrection of Christ was not a one-off but a first off, abnormal, but the new norm, an exception to the rule, but the new rule (Morton, 2004). Orthodox Easter icons show the risen Christ pulling Adam and Eve up out of the grave.
[19] less substantial, maybe a little easier to read, “Heaven” by Randy Alcorn (2004)
[20] Peter in Acts preaches about the "universal restoration of all things" that God promised long ago through the prophets (Act 3:21). The noun apokatastasis was often used of repairs and restoration of temples. The verb is used of Christ restoring a man’s withered right-hand (Matthew 12:13, Mark 3:5) or a blind man’s sight (Mark 8:25) – putting creation right on a small scale as he will on a large when he returns. Also the disciples hope of God restoring the kingdom to Israel (acts 1:6), and the hope that Elijah will come and restore all things (Matthew 7:11). In Matthew, Jesus spoke of the "renewal of all things" (Matthew 19:28). The word is palin-genesia, which can mean rebirth, restoration, regeneration, literally, re-Genesis, another Genesis, a new, or renewed, creation.
[21] A 2005 CBS News poll found 78% of Americans believe in life after death.
[22] 2 Peter 3:5-10 appears the classic argument for this position. "The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will" – often "burned up"- destroyed – in older translations, but the better manuscripts probably read "disclosed" or "laid bare". Perhaps an image like that of Paul in 1 Corinthians 3:13: the fire on the last day that tests the quality of everyone’s work, burning up the straw and revealing the gold to be of lasting value. Furthermore, Peter’s model was the flood in Noah’s time, which purified rather than destroyed the planet. Remember God’s promise of the rainbow after the flood to never again destroy all living things (Genesis 8:21)
[23] Maybe it’s this story that Karl Marx meant when he said religion is the opium of the people – it stops them fighting for a better world. By contrast, Jurgen Moltman, whose theology centres on hope, writes "the goad of the promised future stabs inexorably into the flesh of every unfulfilled present". So eschatology is "the doctrine of Christian hope … forward-looking and forward moving, and also revolutionising and transforming the present", as we are moved by "faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven." (Colossians 1:4-5) Marxism is perhaps a good example of the dangerous implications that may flow from the myth of human driven progress, in this case the workers’ revolution that would bring the golden age of the Communist paradise. When we forget that is first and foremost God’s business to bring the new golden age-we are just privileged co-workers; when we think, everything depends on us, then reforming zeal often tends to violently override those who appear to hinder its vision. By contrast, we should not "rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead." (2 Corinthians 1:9). Someone once asked missionary theologian Leslie Newbigin whether he was an optimist or a pessimist about the future. He replied, I am neither: Christ is risen from the dead!
[24] NT Wright: “Never at any point do the Gospels or Paul say Jesus has been raised, therefore we are we are all going to heaven. They all say, Jesus is raised, therefore the new creation has begun, and we have a job to do…. What the New Testament really says is God wants you to be a renewed human being helping him to renew his creation, and his resurrection was the opening bell. And when he returns to fulfil the plan, you won’t be going up there to him, he’ll be coming down here.”
Brian McLaren: "Jesus’ message is not actually about escaping this troubled world for heaven’s blissful shores, as is popularly assumed, but instead is about God’s will being done on this troubled earth as it is in heaven."
[25] Paul said that if Christ was not raised, our faith is futile and his preaching was in vain. We might as well eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die (1 Corinthians 15:14,17, 32). The church is called to be an "enclave of the future", a colony of heaven on earth (Philippians 3:21). Christian ethics is about celebrating and embodying the new creation of the resurrection. It’s practicing in the present the tunes we’ll sing in God’s new world. (NT Wright) It’s not "oiling the wheels of a machine about to roll over a clifftop. It’s not restoring a great painting shortly going to be thrown on the fire. It’s not planting roses in the garden that’s about to be dug up for a building site." (NT Wright).
[26] it’s the reverse of the rapture: Not souls snatched up to heaven, but the New Jerusalem coming down to earth. The classic rapture text is Thessalonians 4:17-"caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air." This is the parousia, presence or coming of Christ. The word had two meanings of interest (BAGD): a cult expression for the coming of a hidden divinity, who makes his presence felt, revealing his power, often by healing. The visit of a high-ranking person to a province, especially a king or governor. In 1 Thessalonians 4:17, to meet is apantao. The word refers to the procession of citizens going out to meet this honourable visitor and accompany them back into the city. The same word occurs in Matthew 25:6 (10 virgins meeting the bridegroom), and Acts 28:15-16 (Roman Christians coming out to meet Paul as he enters their city).
