giving up hope

i like paul ricoeur. heaps. i'm writing 15,000 words on him (well, trying to).

but sometimes i don't get him. but that's also when i should most try and get him.

he reflected on Jesus' words 'whoever would save his life must lose it', and figured this included losing even the hope of the resurrection. [Critique and Conviction, 155-8]

his point is simple - holding on to the hope of reward means that you haven't given everything up. so his question is, in effect, would you still follow Jesus even if there was no new creation to look forward to?

so after my initial recoil, i think i get his point, but then i ask, who is this Jesus that bids us give up our all? he is the one who makes promises he can keep: 'in my fathers house there are many rooms,' 'blessed is the one who is persecuted on my behalf, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,' and so on.

the life lost that it may be found is the life that builds up treasure in heaven and not on earth. faith is trust in the promise maker to keep his promises, despite appearances.

perhaps what Ricoeur is tapping in to is what it meant for Job to trust God chinnam (for naught)? but still, while this may represent one shade of meaning, it is not the final word, but qualifies what it is to trust in this life, without saying anything about the next.

eschatology and restoration

only two days away from my WaSaBI seminar on the above-mentioned topic, subtitled, is it right to say "the Christian hope is to go to heaven when we die"?

my plan is as follows:

why do we think what we think?
and take a look at world histories, and how we get to where we seem to have got to

what actually happens when we die?
we can think thru matrices(!) and a few passages that talk about the now and the not yet

what will be the characteristics of the new heavens and new earth?
looking at a few passages, working out what will be continuous, where the discontinuity is

what is God's goal for creation?
restoration

if we live now for the future because of the past, how does our thinking about the future affect how we live now?

it will be nice to get all this stuff out that has been swinging around in the monkey-bars of my head for so long.
and i hope it should be fun too!
Sunday 24th June, 2:30-4:00pm, Wild St Church Hall, Maroubra

WSBI 5

this is one of the many emotive pictures we were shown this morning, in a primer to the third WaSaBI, this one entitled the cross and eschatology.
i guess, in the same way as you need to understand the absence of something to grasp its true value (try this with oxygen sometime), our presenter wanted us to understand the hopelessness of this world, in order to fully grasp the hope we have in Christ.

after discussing despair, we grappled with 4 views of hope, the marxist, western hedonist, postmodern, and finally the Christian (ours and God's).

i found it a real encouragment looking at the manifold terms the new testament uses to express hope:

• hope
• expectation
• God's purpose for the world
• heaven
• inheritance
• last day
• eternal life
• plan
• predestination
• jesus

just reading through this list, thinking about the images each word or phrase speaks of the hope we have is quite powerful.

slightly off-kilter, but i have been finding more and more of late (perhaps it is sydney? or just my eyes being open a little wider?), the idea of the cross seems very much an after-thought:
the gospel, so i hear, and so the bible tells me, is the resurrection.
therefore the cross in some ways is simply the means to an end. that end being the inreaching, and eventual victory, of the resurrection age into this sin-bound age.
yes, the cross was the only way for our sins to be dealt with, but even the payment of sin is again simply a means to an end, the resurrection.

although this is perhaps a discussion for another time, for a WaSaBI on eschatolohy and the cross, the cross hardly got a leg in!


personally, the framework used to discuss all 4 views of hope, was very helpful, not to mention challenging.
diagramatically this means, the starting point, the present, and the end-point(=eschaton=hope)


so if one of our starting points is the resurrection of Jesus Christ, our present is that we are resurrection living, and our end-point is our resurrection bodies, this begs the question: Do we treat one another differently to how we did beforehand? Does the present reality of our partaking NOW in the resurrection show us to be different to the days gone by?
similarly, if the starting point is the sabbath-rest, the end-point is meeting God face to face, then our present reality needs must be fellowship together in the spirit - no longer seeing one another, nor our true selves, as through a glass darkly.


as i hope you can tell, this was another great WaSaBI. top work rob.

the next WSBI will be held on 22nd april - this is a call out for any articles on atonement, of a suitable level to hand out to comers prior to the reading group WSBI. links to any articles would be greatly appreciated - or you can email them to doug at-symbol wildstreet dot org dot au (yes, the reading group is because i'm running it, failing volunteers, and due to preaching commitments am unable to write a talk - though feel free to volunteer your services to wild street bible institute!)

really here

NEITHER presumtion of, nor resignation to, the future, allow us to truly embrace the present - we are able only to truly love and to serve, practically able to be involved when we have real hope.
Hope is nothing else than the expectation of those things which faith has believed to have been truly promised by God. - Calvin
FOR without that view of the future, we will become despondent with the lack of change, and will indeed become resigned to the downward trend of history, the decline of man.
BUT, being sure of our future in Christ, we can truly fix our eyes on him, unwaveringly following and serving him and his kingdom, toward the ends of his kingdom.

so, knowing the end is nigh, do we live presuming the coming, being resigned to the coming, OR are we realistically expecting his kingdom?

i say this to counter the thought that we live oblivious to the present, for i would suggest it is only in having this realistic expectaion of the future that we are able to properly grasp hold of the present.

(the vibe of these ideas were stolen off me by Jürgen Moltmann, long before i was born...)