Understanding the Millennium - Part 4

I was going to finish this series with the previous post, but I needed some more practice writing millennium (two l's, two n's). So, to start with, the structure. Again, as with the last section of chapter 19, 20:1-10 is concentric, meaning the elements repeat each other with the first reoccurring last, the second reoccurring second last, usually placing the emphasis on the middle element.

A 20:1-3a Satan is bound in the Abyss for 1000 years

B 20:3b Satan is released for a short time

C 20:4-6 The martyrs are resurrected and given thrones for 1000 years

B` 20:7-9a Satan is released and leads an end-time army

A` 20:9b-10 Satan's army is destroyed and he is thrown into the lake of sulphur forever

Working from the outside in, how does this structure help us make sense of this, and, in particular, the 1000 years?

• A, A` (1-3a, 9b-10) Important to note here is that the situation is not too different from the beginning to the end. Satan is out of the way. In the first part, he is bound for a very long time, and in the second, he is thrown into the fiery lake forever. If there weren't a release, one could almost be forgiven for thinking 1000 years is almost as good as eternity. 1000 years is longer than any human can contemplate - what will things be like in 3020 AD?  But it is temporary, even in such a time-frame, but it will be made permanent, as the dragon, the source of the other two parts of the satanic trinity, is likewise thrown into the fiery lake to join them.
• B, B` (3b, 7-9a) Here we see an inexplicable release. It really doesn't make sense, because he is bad, he is the pangolin or the bat or whatever started Covid19, and he has no business being released. And yet, he is. For a short time. Not 1000 years, perhaps not even 3½ years. Enough time to rouse up an end-time army to erect a siege around the holy city. It is again important to note that the release in 20:3 is the same release as 20:7, so that this paragraph reads as a whole structure rather than linearly. Again, as Jason suggested to me, rather than the "Israel smashes her enemies" battle, this is more a "Israel is under siege" battle, reminiscent of Assyria's siege of Jerusalem under King Hezekiah (2 Kings 18-19). Perhaps it is a concidence, but a fascinating one, that before that siege begins, Hezekiah is established as the one who smashed the bronze snake statue which people had begun to worship (18:4). And now here, in a "type" of that scene, the "ancient serpent" leads the end-time armies of Gog and Magog to besiege God's people yet again. 
• C (4-6) Despite the goings-on, the central focus is not the rampaging of the dragon, but the people of God, the martyrs, who are given thrones and authority to rule. They are the ones who did not receive the mark of the beast (Rev 13:16-17; cf 19:20), but stayed true and trusted God. This time period appears to be concurrent with Satan's imprisonment, and is the rule which has been promised to the saints in Thyatira back in 2:24-29 who resisted Satan. This millennial rule and the binding and destruction of Satan is also the answer to the cries of the martyrs in 6:9-11; their time has now come. 

I think the exegetical payoff of seeing the passage in this way, noting the parallel structures, is that it shows equivalencies - the two releases of Satan are clearly one and the same, but the 1000 year imprisonment and eternal destruction are also not so different. Sure, one includes a release for bad behaviour, but on the one hand, it is very short lived, and on the other, it confirms God in his judgement that the dragon, and all who followed him, are incurably evil and are rightly condemned to the fiery lake. 

This structure also shows the focus - it is not about the 1000 years, but about the reign of the saints in the midst of the destruction of evil. Again, Satan is described in a fourfold manner: 

1. the dragon
2. that ancient serpent
3. the devil
4. the Satan

The dragon is the most vicious character of the book - he devours the children of God - the very people who will judge him; the serpent is the pangolin of sin from Genesis 3; the devil is God's adversary, and the Satan is the accuser. But his destruction is assured, in the same way as the martyr's vindication is assured. 

I think my point in all this is that trying to work out timetables and pre- and post- and even a-millennialism is a route which not only misreads the genre of Revelation, it also emphasises something which isn't a thing. The purpose of the 1000 year binding/reign is to show that the saints have been vindicated. But instead it is weaponised into this highly technical and irrelevant doctrine to divide and confuse. 

Why, however, is Satan released? It is not explained in the text. One suggestion is that it is to prove Satan's guilt - after 1000 years, surely Satan would be reformed? Sorry, no, still a scorpion. The other is, and this links really well with the Gog and Magog story from Ezekiel 38-39 which is referenced here, is that Satan's attack is used against her. Koester notes that "Gog, who devised battle plans against Israel (Ezek 38:11–12) only to find that God used Gog’s own schemes to defeat him (Ezek 38:4, 17; 39:2)." (Koester, Anchor, 771) What worse place to mount an attack against God's people than at God's holy city. But when Satan is released, he assembles the armies, and heads straight to the place which will mean his ultimate downfall. 

The question which must be answered by anyone who holds a view that this is not a story of a deeper reality and a deeper truth, but a timeline of the last days, is, how does a timeline of 1900 years plus in the future (and counting) help the original recipients in the 90s AD in western Asia Minor? 

My humble suggestion is that for people in fear of their lives, whose children were being stolen as slaves, whose cities were garrisons for their oppressors, that the distant future approaches to reading Revelation would be an insult to them. "You mean we have to wait that long for God to do anything?" Instead, the reading that is as true for them as it is for us is this:

Evil seems powerful and it seems like the Jesus who died and rose and ascended into heaven does not care and is not coming back. But this is God's world. Nothing happens he does not know about, and nothing can change the truth about good and evil. It is right to persevere and to resist and to stay true to your saviour who stayed true to you. And because this is God's world, and because it is stained and contorted by sin, God will bring an end to the very thing that started sin in the first place. 

So that's how I read Revelation, and if you have thoughts or suggestions, you're welcome to comment here or on fb or twitter or pigeon post. Actually, scratch that last option. I don't like pigeons. Chickens are cool though. 

Understanding the Millennium - Part 3

As we get ever closer to the key passage, it is worth noting, as my friend Jason reminded me, that there are two battles depicted which describe the destruction of the satanic trinity. The first, in chapter 19, details the destruction of the beasts we first met in chapter 13.

A 17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun, who cried in a loud voice to all the birds flying in midair,  “Come, gather together for the great supper of God, 18 so that you may eat the flesh of kings, generals, and the mighty, of horses and their riders, and the flesh of all people, free and slave, great and small.”

B 19 [And] Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to wage war against the rider on the horse and his army.

C 20a But the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf.  

D 20b With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshipped its image. 

C` 20c The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulphur.

B` 21a The rest were killed with the sword coming out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, 

A` 21b and all the birds gorged themselves on their flesh.

• A, A` (17-18, 21b) The expectation after 19:1-10 is that the wedding feast of the Lamb will follow. But instead we arrive at the "great supper of God." It is not a feast for the people of God, but a slaughter. The only people who will feast are the birds--the birds of carrion--who are gathered to feast before the battle has begun, and shortly thereafter have a banquet on which to gorge themselves. 
• B, B` (19, 21a) The followers of the beast gather with him, but with no description of the battle required, the battle is won the moment it is begun.
• C, C` (20a, 20c) The description of the capture and dispatch of the beast and the prophet is similarly brief, but brutally final. No one looks forward to going down to the underworld, but even worse, it seems (at least from Num 16:33; Ps 55:15) is to be thrown down alive. This preempts the identical punishment of the dragon in the following scene (20:10).
• D (20b) At the centre of this scene is an epexegetical comment which explains that the central issue is the idolatry encouraged by the false prophet, of the beast. This central concern of the book of Revelation, that Christ alone should be given glory. From the inaugural vision of Christ in chapter 1, through the warnings to persevere in chapters 2-3, and the lion/lamb at the centre of the throne room in chapters 4-5 - not to mention the depiction of the beast as a pseudo-Christ in chapter 13 - the question of who you worship is what it is all about. 

There are three key things to take away from this first battle:

1. the battle is swift - too short to describe and easily won by Christ
2. the indictment is how they have misdirected worship away from Christ
3. this battle is reminiscent of many battles easily won by the people of God in the Old Testament. Battles were either won with hardly a casualty, or they were lost disastrously and embarrassingly. This is the first type, and it is over before it is begun.

What then of the the second battle, where the Satan - noticeably absent from this battle - is destroyed?

At the outset, it is worth noting that the capture and imprisonment of the dragon is similarly swift and one-sided (20:1-3a). It is an angel - not even Jesus - who is able to lock Satan away in the Abyss. It could be a part of the first battle, or a consequence of it, although the introductory formula (και ειδον, and I saw) seems to suggest it might be a new scene or sequence. Nevertheless, he is imprisoned and, after a few things happening, is similarly dispatched to the fiery lake of sulphur to complete the destruction of the satanic trinity (20:10).

That is, whatever the details, and however troubling the intervening events might be, the outcome is certain, and the saints can be reassured that staying faithful to Jesus is worth it, they will be vindicated, and the very instigator of evil - the ancient serpent - will be destroyed forever.

Secondly, what is going on with the 1000 years, with the release, with the new wave of attacks, with the 1000 reign of martyrs? I'll get to that next time.

Understanding the Millennium - Part 2

The central passage, from which all other passages are reinterpreted, is Revelation 20:1–10. It concludes a cycle which began in chapter 12 and introduced three characters, often referred to as the anti-trinity or the satanic-trinity: the dragon (12:3), the beast (13:1) and the false-prophet (13:11). The second and third characters (both described as beasts) get their power from the dragon, and the focus seems to be on cultivating worship for the first beast. In this way they are like the trinity, where the dragon is like the Father, the first beast is like the Son, and the second beast is like the Holy Spirit. The actual trinity can be described in similar ways, whereby Father is the source who eternally begets the Son, and the Spirit is not trying to draw attention to himself but to the Son. The satanic-trinity imitates the actual trinity in similar ways. 

But of course, Revelation is written to real people at a real time and real place, and so the powers which are front and centre in their lives are the Roman Empire, who is depicted by the dragon; the Roman Emperor, depicted by the first beast; and the local leaders and priests, prominent in chapters 2–3, who encourage idolatrous worship of the emperor in order to gain economic benefit. But the Roman reality is not the ultimate reality; John is saying (or the angel is telling John) that when you unmask Rome, you get the devil. When you worship the emperor, you are blaspheming Christ. 

What we see with each of these characters is that they are introduced in order, and then dismissed in the reverse order. Koester in his 2015 Anchor commentary outlines the concentric structure which sees their introduction and dismissal, as follows: 

A 12 Dragon/Satan thrown from heaven to earth to destroy

B 13 Beast and False Prophet destroy on the earth

C 17a Whore rides the beast

C` 17b Whore destroyed by the beast

B` 19b Beast and False Prophet captured and destroyed in sulphur

A 20 Dragon/Satan captured (then released!) then destroyed in sulphur

I'm not 100% sure how to describe the whore of Babylon (note that Babylon was what Rome was called only after they destroyed the temple in 70 AD like the real Babylon did 600 years earlier), except that to say she would seem to be city of Rome herself, or the people of Rome, or the idea of the city of Rome - something along those lines. 

But the important thing to note is there is a certainty; as certainly as there are forces against God, who look indestructible, and wreak havoc, so too is their destruction guaranteed. What goes up must come down, and the harder they come the harder they fall. So as bad as things look today, the hope embodied in Revelation is that we are about to reach peak bad, and things will start to get better, as the city, the promoters, the emperor, and ultimately the whole empire will be destroyed. 

Of course, the reality is that it is not enough for simply the manifestation of evil to be destroyed, but the spiritual reality behind it must be dealt with also. So when the final enemy, the source of all, the dragon is to be destroyed, it is described in a fourfold manner:

[The angel] seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and the Satan, and bound him for 1000 years. (Rev 20:2)

In particular, it is his description as "the ancient serpent" which makes us recall Genesis 3, with the entry of sin which cursed the world, and now, with his destruction, its exit and time of healing. 

The power which was behind the Roman (Revelation) is the same power which was behind the Seleucid Empire (Daniel) is the same empire behind the Babylonian Empire and Tyre (Isaiah, Ezekiel). Whichever kingdom we might point at and say "that's the kingdom of the devil!", it is the devil which is the ultimate target, because there will always be another Babylon, another power which is interested in enticing people to blaspheme Christ in idolatrous worship. That is, until the devil himself is dealt with. 

Now if you are especially astute you will have noticed that I still haven't got to the millennium. Next post. Probably.

The Kingdoms of Daniel 2, 7, 8 and 9

A short while ago I put up a preterist reading of Daniel 2. Well, here it is extended to encompass Daniel 7-9 also.

All of these chapters are extrapolated by many into our time (try finding a picture on google which doesn't point to Rome or Obama!), such that the fulfilment is to be found in the very near future. While that is not wrong (Christian eschatology in a sense places the end tomorrow - Cf. Jesus' parable in Luke 12.13-21), it is not the plain reading of the text, and it is incorrect to interpret symbols as signs. What this diagram, and any preterist reading, sets out to do, is show the primary referent of the symbols before they are extrapolated to all powers and authorities which arrogantly set themselves up in opposition to God and their (his) people.

A quick note of explanation on Daniel 9 - Daniel is reappropriating Jeremiah's prophesied 70 years of exile as 70 weeks (literally 70 sevens), which this diagram shows as 70 non-consecutive 'weeks of years'.  This then encompasses not just the exile (which are completed in just 7 sevens), but from Nebuchadnezzar's ascension to  the rededication of the temple and the death of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the brutal reign of whom is the period especially focussed on throughout the second half of Daniel. Further information on this reading of the 70 sevens can be found in George Athas' article: http://www.jhsonline.org/Articles/article_104.pdf

Update: I can't count. Well, I can, so I fixed the picture.

Isaiah and annihilationism

well, i was surprised to find Isaiah's view of the afterlife is that Sheol, the place of the dead, will be annihilated.

Isaiah 25:7-9

7 And he will swallow up on this mountain
the covering that is cast over all peoples,
the veil that is spread over all nations.
8 He will swallow up death forever;
and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces,
and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth,
for the LORD has spoken.
9 It will be said on that day,
“Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.
This is the LORD; we have waited for him;
let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

my thesis was essentially that Sheol is the place of both the just and the unjust, but the righteous are not 'natural' residents - as death is a curse, and to be dead, to be in the place of the dead, in the company of the wicked (who are rightly there) is not something that will be eternally countenanced there.

as we meet the rightful inhabitants of the underworld in Isaiah 26:12-19 (esp. 14,19), the OT version of ghosts or ghouls, the Rephaim, we see that they, and their dwelling place, the land of the Rephaim will both be destroyed, and the righteous will be freed.


this understanding came as i worked on my structure a little more, coming up with:

12 Yhwh’s great deeds
13     Others try to destroy us – we will remember you
14           The dead will not rise*
      Others will be destroyed by you – they won't be remembered
15 Yhwh's great deeds

16 Yhwh brings man down
17     Pregnant writhing
              That was us
18     Pregnant writhing
 Man is brought down

19 Your dead will rise
        They'll rejoice
        They'll be sustained
  But their dead won’t rise*

*14 this includes the dead and the rephaim
*19 lit, 'you will cause the land of the rephaim to fall'


so the hope is a positive one for Israel. the rescue and restoration of the righteous, but and end to the wicked dead, the underworld and all that is associated with it. i'm not sure to what extent this rules out a new testament understanding of the underworld, but until i get my essay back i'll stick with this reading of Isaiah!

enjoy the pic if you're into hebrew at all:

(i think you're supposed to click to enlarge)

music and moving

a long time ago (my first post) i wrote about time, where we think it's heading and how that affects how we live today (i may not have mentioned all that but it's there implicitly).


so what does music say about time? Russell Rook writes

"Eschatologically speaking, music seems capable of conveying our greatest hopes and most terrible fears. It can transport us from the heights of heaven to the gates of hell."139*

reflecting on the type of music i like depending on my mood, this chapter has been really helpful.

because repetitive music (i like repetitive music, i like repetitive music) is about escapism - that time is cyclical, that there is no eschaton, that we all just keep going around and around with no consequences, as eagle eye cherry so well put it:

Go on and close the curtains
cause all we need is candle light
You and me and a bottle of wine
going to hold you tonight
Well we know I'm going away
and how I wish, I wish it weren't so
So take this wine and drink with me
let's delay our misery

Save tonight
and fight the break of dawn
Come tomorrow
tomorrow I'll be gone

there is a deep need in us for escapism, for forgetting that tomorrow will come with all its consequences. and it makes sense then that repetitive music is escapist, in popular music, and in Christian music also. anyone who has heard a group singing the chorus to 'How Great is our God' for an hour (as i heard a couple of years ago) has to question whether they are actually looking forward to Jesus' return.

but the Christian's hope is not escapist - it is towards a renewal of this earth, a restoration of justice and peace and true kingship under God's anointed king. platonic escapism that is so ingrained in so much Christian music is nothing more than a gnostic mysticism. we want to praise God with our songs, but that doesn't mean ceasing to exist as we lose ourself in the brahmanistic pantheism repetitive music encourages.

*Russell Rook, 'In God's Good Time', 138-148 in Stephen Holmes and Russell Rook, What are we waiting for? Christian Hope and Contemporary Culture. Bucks, UK: Paternoster, 2008.

books books everywhere

reading three good ones at the moment:

1. Reformation, by Diarmaid MacCulloch (Penguin: Victoria, 2004)
   
   you may remember it from here!
   
   i'm really enjoying it - it's engrossing, thorough, and good at drawing together various threads.
   
   
   
2. also on my stack is The Reason for God, by Timothy Keller (Penguin: London, 2008)
   
   
   
   i'm reviewing it for church, where we're trying to get regular book reviews going. if you've read his ground breaking article (download here i think), Deconstructing Defeater Beliefs, you'll know what it's about.
   
   
   
3. last on my list is a book that my friends at AFES ordered me a review copy of! It's called What are we waiting for? Christian Hope and Contemporary Culture, eds. Stephen Holmes and Russell Rook (Paternoster: Bucks, 2008)
   
   
   
   i originally heard about it from Chrisendom, and have already read the first three chapters - getting it only late last night!
   
   when i've finished and reviewed it, assuming i don't upset anyone in the upper echelons of AFES, it should turn up here, at the AFES online magazine, webSalt. (where you can sign up to get RSS feeds - you can even check out my old reviews of Lee Strobel's the case for easter and Peter Bolt's Living with the Underworld)

lots to read about, lots to think about, lots to chat about.

Terminator Messiah

A few weeks ago i did a thing on Christ-figures in films. Some are more obvious than others, but things to look out for are sacrifice, taking the punishment others deserve, healing, having the initials J.C.; having a beard even seems to cut it in some films.

But for my thing on Heroes on Film, i thought i'd do the Christ-figures in the Terminator films.

firstly, a brief synopsis of the three films (at this time i hadn't seen T3, which filled in a lot of gaps):

• T1 T800 sent to kill Sarah Connor
  Kyle Reese to protect her because of the child she would bear.
  He would be the messiah of the Humans against the machines
  He ends up fathering a son, called John Connors
  Don’t miss the JC initials
  
• T2 T800 now the Cyborg Messiah,
  sent to protect the Human Messiah from the T1000
  
• T3 JC now the messiah he was predestined to be

These films deal with Ontological Paradoxes, that is,
An ontological paradox is a paradox of time travel that questions the existence and creation of information and objects that travel in time. It is very closely related to the predestination paradox and usually occurs at the same time. (definition from wikipedia)

c/f The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov, written way back in 1954 - an amazing read if you can get a hold of it (mine's in a box at my parent's place in Canberra if you want to grab it)


“Critic Richard Corliss has...pointed out that the story parallels that of the New Testament, with a soldier from another world (the archangel Gabriel) visiting a woman (the Virgin Mary) to announce that she is to be mother to a messiah (John Connor has the same initials as Jesus Christ). She flees with him into the desert, where an angel of death becomes a protector/father.”

From Holy Aliens to Cyborg Saviours: Biblical Subtexts in Four Science Fiction Films, Anton Karl Kozlovic

In T2 that is.
The Cyborg Messiah takes over from the Human Messiah, taking the fore-front, and the many Christ-references.
with his wounds in his side, his Bullet Holes that Sarah needs, like Thomas in John 21, to check for herself.
The Terminator is killed by the T1000, but is resurrected, and then redeems humankind.

I guess, tho I haven’t [hadn't - ed.] seen it, that T3 is the next step, where the messiah (human John Connor, JC) takes control, on, of course, Judgement day, where he returns in power to rid the earth of evil once and for all.

For those interested, there is a fourth in the tubes, called Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins, in an odd tribute to science fiction history (in the End of Eternity), although in all probability this has more to do with the predominant US millenialist theology.

Each generation gets the cinema they deserve.


addendum - coming to Australian television screens is Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles, which may or may not be any good. it's a nice idea, despite her dying inbetween the 2nd and 3rd movies, unless they give some explanation, like she had to hide herself so no terminator would be able to use her to track John. i dunno.

now for some Christmas silliness - watch this, v.v. funny h/t to locusts and honey

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

matrices!

i used to be a mathematician.
well, i did lots of maths at high school.
7 units in my final two years, to be precise!

and it may be (unless you include counting animals in the ark), that we finally have a use for maths in Theology!

John Polkinghorne, in his chapter in The End of the World and the Ends of God (Trinity Press, 2000) on Eschatology, suggests that an understanding of matrices may help us understand the nature of the resurrection!


the current state of forgiven sinners is that which is portrayed in the first 20 chapters of John's Revelation.

but what then happens when we die? are we bodiless? do we go do the limbo rock?

Polkinghorne postulates:

What [we] would naturally think of as the vector spaces of the old and new creations could be "alongside" each other, with the continuity of resurrection being the result of a structure-preserving mapping from one space into the other. From this point of view, it would be conceivable that all persons arrive at the general resurrection at the same "time," irrespective of the time of their deaths in this world. (p40)

no limbo, no "sleep", no bodiless resurrection, no playing harps in clouds.

but does it hold water?

s(un)shine

a question i've raised once before (here) has asked itself again, courtesy of a new film, sunshine.

without giving too much away, this film is set in the not too distant future, in a world where they've discovered that the sun is cooling down a little, and they need to "zap" a little more life into it!

so my question is to what extent will we (humanity, God's image bearers) be witnesses to the destruction, collapse of the physical universe?

this idea of the dying sun is not a new idea (arthur c. clarke thought of it yonks ago, and my recollection is that j.g. ballard also mooted the idea half a century ago), it is simply a device for bringing cosmic catastrophy into the present (much like that asteroid film with that guy and the girl and the father and stuff).

the waning sun postulated in the film is one thing, but:
what of the bomb-race that looks like it's getting a second-wind?
what of the disastrous state of the evironment?
what of the increased ability for those who would do great harm to many, to accomplish their desires?

at what stage is enough going to be enough? will ther ever be any of us around to see that day when evil will be completely vanquished?
OR, might there be a similar pattern to the death and resurrection of Christ?

ie, all that is evil - conquered. all that is good - gone.
then, bursting forth, the Lord, with (to quote Jude quoting Enoch) ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

that would include, i guess, doing their very best to destroy this good world that we have been given stewardship over, perverting this good creation for their own wicked ends.

but then again, i wonder, might it ever get that far?

*no points for guessing what i've just been preaching on!

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!)

forgetfulness

steve martin, on SNL in 1976, along with some other gold, added some more weight to my thinking through of the forgetfulness of people.

(after telling a story about Jackie Onassis throwing food in a restaurant) Whew! You know why people can get away with stuff like that?

I'll tell you exactly why people get away with that. Because the public has a short memory. That's why all these big stars do these crazy, terrible things and two years later they're back in the biz, you know. 'Cause the public has a short memory.

Let me give you a little test, okay? This is my thesis -- the public has a short memory and, like-- How many people remember, a couple of years ago, when the Earth blew up? How many people? See? So few people remember. And you would think that something like that, people would remember. But NOOO! You don't remember that?

The Earth blew up and was completely destroyed? And we escaped to this planet on the giant Space Ark? Where have you people been?
And the government decided not to tell the stupider people 'cause they thought that it might affect-- [dawning realization, looks around] Ohhhh! Okay! Uh, let's move on!

ok, so maybe i just wanted an excuse to post some steve martin, which i got from here, but the point still stands, we're forgetful people. forgetting what the previous generations have tried, the mistakes our parents made - isn't the point that you watch what they do so you don't fall into the same traps - because what is past is past, we've moved on since then.

i'll write some more about this another time.

arguing for aesthetics

when i look at the world, fickle as i am, i'm able to see beauty in many places.

• Max Weber sat in a skyscraper, looking down at the goings-on in a city, and was awe-struck.
  
• in seeing the film angels and insects i now recognise the appropriate fascination we can have with the insect kingdoms.
  
• the subtitle of Dr Strangelove was How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb and the testimony of many who have had the honour to witness the detonation of an atomic bomb, is that it is indeed awe-inspiring.
  
• the Grand Canyon (depending on who you believe) may have been the result of the erosion of a massive lake.
  
• the landscape of lebanon is astounding in its sparseness (even though the cedars are no more)
  
• the growth of a tumor, seen in time-lapse photography, is also a beautiful thing.

there is a short story by Herman Hesse (from which i hope to post at some stage) which explains how, even when dying, mostly due to the effects of this fallen world, we can still see immense beauty.

whether this is due to:

1. / there being inherent beauty in these things, despite many of them being a result of the fall
   
2. 2/ us being created with the ability to see good in all things, as God is sovereign over all and his good flows over into all things
   
3. 3/ our fallen nature meaning that we are able to see good in what God calls ugly

i've been swinging between the three, but would be interested in your thoughts.


particularly check out byron's blog, particularly the comments.
also see my previous thoughts on aesthetics

WSBI 4

on sunday it was mark's turn. as previously intimated, he took us thru what the bible has to say about sin.

personally the hardest thing was working out the paradox between total and utter depravity. that is to say, all of us are infected with the curse, in many ways like one bit of yeast affects the whole loaf. (c/f Romans 7:18)
this therefore implies that anything we do is tainted by sin. that would explain why isaiah claims all his works to be but filthy rags (64:6). but, being dead to sin, clothed in Christ's righteousness, are we therefore unable to do nothing that could be described as good, that is free from that curse, as, after all, we are created in our good God's good image, who sends his rain on both the righteous and the wicked.


the answer, it seems, is no, there is naught you can do untainted by sin. AND yes, as you died with Christ, we now walk in newness of life.

the struggle to synergise this seeming antinomy would explain the negative press John Piper received (for saying John Piper doesn't just do bad things. John Piper is bad.), as well as the papist finger-wagging at Luther's encouragement to a friend (to sin boldly).

now if someone could just explain the seeming monergism of judgement i see in Romans 1-2 (particularly the pattern explicit in 2:6-11 mirroring that in 1:18-31) i could move on...

i'm looking forward to the next WaSaBI on the Cross (and what it has to do with eschatology).

stay tuned...