Some time ago, I abandoned the view that the earth will be destroyed at the end of the age and have come to believe the earth will be restored as the final dwelling place for glorified believers and that God’s glory will fill the entire created order. In light of this, I have pondered how one’s responsibilities concerning creation in the meantime are to be viewed. While I don’t have a great deal to say about this just yet, I happen to be reading an article on the new heavens and new earth recently and the author’s comments were ones with which I could resonate. Here is what he said:
“While I do not think of myself as an environmentalist, I must admit that they are concerned about the right things. Too often this issue is passed off by Christians as a secular or liberal concern, important only to radicals or new-age spiritualists. Evangelicals speak of it only occasionally, and then usually from the standpoint of a mere consumer. Further, when evangelicals do address creation’s future it often sounds quite dismal. A. Truesdale, believing this is indicative of eschatology run rampant, states:
‘Theologians and scientists who are evangelicals should join hands to help lead evangelical Christianity out of its bondage to an errant eschatology. Dispensational premillennialism defrauds the creation of the gospel’s promise that it too ‘will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God’ (Rom. 8:21, NKJV). It also cripples the witness of evangelical faith in the world.’
While I am not ready to abandon the progressive nature of revelation or to relegate apocalyptic literature within the canon to a lower status than other passages (something Truesdale appears ready to do), I must agree that the exaggeration and galvanization surrounding this eschatology have led to inappropriate conclusions regarding the nature and scope of apocalyptic literature. Indeed they have fostered an insensitivity, even neglect, toward passages teaching continuity between the old and new earth. Certainly these problems are being corrected, but as yet the corrections have not reached the people in the pews. As evangelicals we believe that God created this world, in whatever way we think that took place. We should further believe that this world has a future in God’s plan of redemption (Hos 2:14–23; Rom 8:18–25; Col 1:16–20). If God cares enough about his creation to redeem it, how can we be apathetic, or merely economically inclined, toward it?”[1]
Αυτω η δοξα
[1] Gale Z. Heide, “What Is New About the New Heaven and the New Earth? A Theology of Creation from Revelation 21 and 2 Peter 3,” JETS 40 (1997): 40.
