Theme: The story of God and God’s creation, including humanity, is a story of God’s thoroughgoing commitment to restore of all things from the powers of sin and death. In the end, God will redeem humanity in Christ—body and soul and will renew all creation. God’s benevolent rule will extend over a renewed humanity in a new heaven and a new earth.
Outline:
1. Old Testament: Humanity’s Problem and God’s Solution
A. Genesis 1-2: The creation of the world, humanity as its caretakers, and all of it “good” and “very good” (1:31)
B. Genesis 3 and 12: The fall and its initial reversal in the call of Abraham (also Exodus 19:4-6; Isaiah 49:5-6). Israel’s presented as God’s first answer to the problem of sin. “Kingdom of priests-” Israel’s vocation as a nation, their calling. Struggled to fulfill that calling.
C. Old Testament texts foreshadowing of the restoration of all things: e.g., Isaiah 65:17-25; Amos 9:11-15 . Restoration of all peoples, and creation itself, through Israel. The earth will have great productivity and do what it’s supposed to do. Restored humanity will live in this restored world.
2. New Testament: A Final Vision of a New Humanity in Christ and a Renewed Creation. The Jews thought the final day would come in one stage. In NT, two stages, “already and not yet,” Jesus was stage one. The life to come already lives in us and with us, in Jesus.
A. 1 Corinthians 15:20-28: Paul’s “end times timeline.” Death comes through one man, now life comes through one man. Picture of Christ’s resurrection of believers’ guarantee of resurrection to come. The end will come when Christ’s reign has done what it’s meant to do. All power has been subjugated. The last enemy is death. When death is gone, life will happen. Christ turns the kingdom over to God, who is all in all. We live in an in-between time. Death has been dealt a blow, but is not yet gone. The final victory has been announced.
B. Romans 8:18-30: God’s Children and creation groan for final (physical) restoration. Echoes of Genesis 3. Creation will be restored with its downward spiral into decay, and is joined at the hip with the children of God. Which one is closer to the final day? Paul implies that we have a taste of glory and freedom already (believers are leaning into that new reality in Christ), and creation is longing and waiting and eagerly hoping to lean into that reality of the children of God. Death and sin still exist, but they no longer reign. Romans 6:23. Three groanings - creation, humanity, and, on our behalf, the Spirit. Redemption OF our bodies, not FROM our bodies - bodily resurrection. Philippians 3:21 - Transformation of our bodies. Embodied eschatology, embodied and tangible, though different.
C. What about 2 Peter 3: Isn’t it all going to burn? God is slow because He wants all to be saved, but it is true that the final day will come. The earth will be laid bare - not burned up, but proved. 1 Same term used in Peter 1:7. The earth is laid open for God’s judgment. Peter talks about the elements burning up, but doesn’t say the same about the earth.
D. Revelation 21:1-4, 22-27; 22:1-5: A vision of the renewed creation. God and humanity living together in a new creation, a new heaven and new earth. A day is coming when bodies will be healed and human society will finally reflect God’s ideas of mercy and justice. No evil, death will not be able to touch us.
3. What does eschatology—the “then”—have to do with the now?
It tells us what God values - justice, mercy, the earth, the ordinary things (God comes through and redeems the ordinary). We’re marked by freedom and glory.
New creation - Paul uses this phrase twice. He’s talking about what’s happening in the now. 2 Corinthians 5, Galatians 6. We’re part of a new reality.
Takeaway: What we believe about the way God will wrap up all things impacts deeply how we live today. How we live in this time and in our embodied lives matters! How we treat God’s creation in the present matters. And we are invited to live into “the freedom and glory of the children of God” even in our present lives that often include suffering. God will make all things new, on that we can count.