It took God some thousands of years to prepare the world for the Christ, so it would seem strange to me if he was to return so soon. But he might!
What would be the hurry? Jesus is King and Lord of the world, so why not let him rule until the time the Father chooses?
On 1, I take it you reject most Bible translations that all evil powers will be “destroyed” or “abolished,” and prefer to read that all powers that oppose God’s purposes were brought to “Nil Effect.” How does this distinction that evil powers aren’t destroyed, but can have “nil effect” differ, and how does perceiving “nil effect” explain my observation that they actually appear to still have a “vigorous” effect?
On 2, my sense is that the “likeness” or parallel of Jesus’ resurrection that Wright sees to our own future resurrection is not that the terra firma was already renewed, but that Jesus was resurrected in a renewed body (Paul calls it a spiritual body) which is fit for the promised future renewed earth.
AGAIN Bob you MISS the fact that said subjugation of your “evil powers” were such that were contrary to… THE REDEMPTIVE WORKINGS OF GOD — can you not see this? You look around with your fleshly eye and judge all is not well in the world and so conclude God through Christ is STILL YET to be in control… but miss the reality that the bible is about God’s redemptive grace secured through Christ, i.e., it is finished!
So Bob, forget deferring away to Wright, as in, own your own stuff… what do YOU say? IF you claim Jesus came out of the tomb with a spirit body, doesn’t THAT cut right across Jesus’ own words of Lk 24:39? And IF you understand Paul’s… “being united in the likeness of His resurrection” to be meaning a tangible fleshly albeit spirit body THEN how on earth do you understand Paul’s… “being united in the likeness of His death” — please explain your consistency!
I didn’t argue Rom 6 is about a spiritual body (only 1Cor 15!), and I agree Lk 24 sounds like they can assuringly recognize Jesus’ same old body (and maybe that vs. intends that). But I’ve already cited other less homogeneous texts that prompted the majority tradition that he has some kind of transformed body that can be difficult to recognize and can appear at will, and that is perceived to parallel the most detailed account of resurrection (spiritual) ‘bodies’ (1Cor 15). Though I have no clue or experience of what our future state is supposed to actually be.
On explaining how evil powers have “no more effect,” we’re getting circular. You appear to say that’s because our real lives and world can be shot through with evil, but God’s redemptive workings are not thwarted because redemption is not about removing evil or restoring this creation and world. But Wright reads it that God’s redemptive work is precisely aimed toward that. As Romans 8 puts its, “the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into freedom and glory.”
Very true Dave. I do hope he comes soon, after Z-Hell (1, 2, 3) arrives. I faithfully watch TV shows, like Fear the Walking Dead and The Walking Dead…And if sites like IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes, give it good reviews…I’ll go see this movie (AKA The Dead Don’t Die). It helps me to envision, how mankind might stack up to the tribulation - before Christ returns!
And I was reading something today, in Cross Cards Encouragement for Today - From Worrier to Warrior - I VIOLENTLY disagree with!
I come from a long line of worriers. It seems something in our DNA causes our minds to jump to the scariest and most irrational of conclusions.
What’s there to worry about, if you are properly prepared? As the article also says:
We find this in Philippians 4:6-7, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Jesus Christ.”
But Bob… you’re the one arguing for Paul’s… “likeness” or parallel of Jesus’ resurrection” AND Paul himself speaks directly to the nature of it in Rom 6, BUT you appear to be avoiding it like the plague because you can see the obvious point I’m making, which again you appear to avoid answering.
So Bob, what Scripture says redemption is… “about removing evil or restoring this creation and world.” Redemption was about the forgiveness of sins, and in particular Israel’s sins; NOTHING about terra firma…
Rom 11:26-27 And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come out of Zion, and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; For this is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.”
Eph 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.
Col 1:14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
So in line with your thoughts… what texts are you referring to?
No!!! I do not see that the point of Rom 6 is “directly” about the “nature” of the resurrection body at all!
Texts make varying points and 1 Cor 15 much more directly addresses that.
I see Romans addressing the power of the risen Christ in our life now.
Redemption was about **the forgiveness of sins… ** NOTHING about terra firma…
Rom 11:26-27 *And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come out of Zion, and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.
So what texts are you referring to?
Davo, I don’t see God’s concern with the “powers” of evil in 1 Corinthians, or the “Workings of God” to be limited to certain texts on your selected term of “redemption” at all, much less with only securing “forgiveness.” I see God as already able to forgive.
Chapter 15’s promise of destroying all evil powers is not specified as limited to only those that stop God from redemptively cancelling out sins’ penalty.
And even your own citation of taking away Israel’s “ungodliness” and “sins” sounds to me like more than just providing a pass on their evil. I see God wanted a new covenant where the law is written in our hearts, and ultimately as I said the restored creation that God’s promises of a new earth signify.
I already pointed to Romans 8’s reiteration of this restored creation. But Wright would point to the whole sweep of Hebrew Scripture’s concern for life in this tangible land & earth, and for an actually righteous people who do justice & love mercy and reflect God’s image & character in how they relate to this earth.
And he rightly sees that NT writers find Jesus to be who will bring the ultimate fulfillment of such hope.
The focus of the ‘nature’ comment was relative TO the resurrection in play, IN LINE WITH the death likewise in play… NOT the body per sé. IOW… you know full well, as you say. that Paul is… “addressing the power of the risen Christ in our life now” BUT appear to borrow the language of Rom 6, i.e., ‘the LIKENESS of’ to try and give credence to your belief that the body of 1Cor 15 speaks to and ‘PARALLELS’ Christ’s physical resurrection body; IMO this is just inconsistent.
Well you touch on an important thing, i.e., the promised new covenant aka Paul’s new creation. Israel was God’s special ‘creation’ and as such their covenant renewal and restoration in Christ WAS their resurrection — THIS is what was promised from of old…
Jer 31:31, 33-34 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” Cf. Ezek 37:1-14
Thus Paul’s restored creation of Rom 8 speaks again to Israel’s resurrection, which was… “the redemption of our body.” — note the singular, i.e., the corporate body.
-
Revelation 22:12 (NIV)
“Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done.” -
2 Peter 3:9 (ESV)
The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, -
2 Peter 3:8
But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
- Hebrews 2:8 (NKJV)
"You have put all things in subjection under his feet.”
For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him.
- Romans 8:22-23 (ESV)
22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption [apolytrōsis, a releasing effected by payment of ransom, a deliverance] of our bodies.
…of our bodies. Seriously!? 
NT Wright
Resurrection still future
I begin at the end. The bodily resurrection is still in the future for everyone except Jesus. Paul is quite clear in 1 Corinthians 15.23: Christ is raised as the first-fruits; then, at his coming, those who belong to Christ will be raised as he has been raised. The ‘coming’ of which Paul speaks has not yet happened; therefore, clearly, the dead in Christ have not yet been raised. This is actually the official view of all mainstream orthodox theologians, Catholic and Protestant, except for those who think that after death we pass at once into an eternity in which all moments are present — a quite popular view but one which contains many serious difficulties. I do not know whether Paul knew about the strange risings from the dead reported in Matthew 27.52-3, but had he done so he would certainly have seen them as peculiar signs and foretastes, not people actually being transformed into the likeness of Christ as he predicts in passages like Philippians 3.20-21 and 1 Corinthians 15 itself.
We should remember especially that the use of the word ‘heaven’ to denote the ultimate goal of the [21] redeemed, though hugely emphasized by medieval piety, mystery plays, and the like, and still almost universal at a popular level, is severely misleading and does not begin to do justice to the Christian hope. I am repeatedly frustrated by how hard it is to get this point through the thick wall of traditional thought and language that most Christians put up. ‘Going to heaven when you die’ is not held out in the New Testament as the main goal. The main goal is to be bodily raised into the transformed, glorious likeness of Jesus Christ. If we want to speak of ‘going to heaven when we die’, we should be clear that this represents the first, and far less important, stage of a two-stage process. That is why it is also appropriate to use the ancient word ‘paradise’ to describe the same thing. I have written about this in more detail in the book referred to in the Introduction.
… Had the post-mortem state been unconscious, would Paul have thought of it as ‘far better’ than what he had in the present?..
I therefore arrive at this view: that all the Christian departed are in substantially the same state, that of restful happiness. This is not the final destiny for [37] which they are bound, namely the bodily resurrection; it is a temporary resting place. As the hymn puts it:
The golden evening brightens in the west;
Soon, soon to faithful warriors cometh rest:
Sweet is the calm of Paradise the blest.
Allelulia!
excerpted from http://ntwrightpage.com/2016/07/12/rethinking-the-tradition/
BTW:
No, I never intended to cite Romans 6, nor saw my reading of 1 Cor 15 to depend on the language of such texts. I think the traditional reading that Paul is grappling with the relationship of our future “body” to our present one as analogous with Jesus’ resurrection rests on the language of 1 Cor 15 (aided perhaps by disciple’s perceptions of Jesus’ risen body in the Gospels).
Your reading that NT resurrection language is all about Israel’s metaphorical resurrection seems incorrect to me. I see it also applied to believers in Christ at large. I’m also skeptical that Romans 8’s words about the whole creation groaning to experience the freedom of God’s children is only about Israel’s desire for a metaphorical resurrection.
Your interpretations are stimulating and conceivable. But I’d think you would admit that very few of the leading Bible scholars have found them apparent, or even likely.
I came across an interesting article today. It’s from the Patheos, Evangelical newsletter. Let me share it here.
[quote=“Bob_Wilson, post:588, topic:14070”]
Your reading that NT resurrection language is all about Israel ’s metaphorical resurrection seems incorrect to me. I see it also applied to believers in Christ at large.
Could be a definitive view of what God did through Christ.
It, in my humble view, \only applies to believers in the sense of history. And I know you’ll slog me on that.
But the truth of the matter is that if you take the narrative (biblical) view that all of scripture is addressed to all of us through the ages, you have a hard time figuring anything out… Thus the back and forth we so often encounter.
Yeah no doubt… but appealing to tradition, really — did you read Wright above on tradition?
Hmm? IF that were the case, i.e., it all just came down to bodily physicality, THEN how could that be, given John had this to say…
1Jn 3:2 Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.
IF what these believers were to become was NOT revealed then that, 1) calls into question your summation of Paul’s supposed run-down on such in 1Cor 15, and 2) makes a nonsense of… “for we shall see Him as He is” — they knew full well what post-resurrection Jesus was like, i.e., they touched him, they clung to him, they fed him, and indeed he was personally witnessed by mega hundreds at one time, and all this over at least a 40 day period; all duly attested across the NT.
IF Christ’s fleshly resurrection was the touchstone for theirs (ours), i.e., your reading of 1Cor 15, THEN surely they had that fit testimony ALREADY, as just noted above?
Well, who’s arguing it wasn’t… “also applied to believers in Christ at large”?? — Gentiles en masse were joining the Commonwealth of Israel — notice that, joining Israel; which was as I’ve discussed previously was raising its own set of problems with some gentiles assuming God had discarded His people in terms of… no resurrection etc.
As to your use of ‘metaphorical resurrection’… that is far from an adequate understanding. Sure, metaphor has a rich usage in scripture but Israel’s resurrection is better understood in terms of covenant renewal aka covenant resurrection… which is where all the OT prophetic promises point, and of which Jesus and His firstfruit saints fulfil. Take again this testimony of Paul and note well his words…
Acts 26:22-23 Therefore, having obtained help from God, to this day I stand, witnessing both to small and great, saying no other things than those which the prophets and Moses said would come— that the Christ would suffer, that He would be the first to rise from the dead, and would proclaim light to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles.”
Paul did NOT claim that Jesus was the first to rise from death — plenty of others beat Jesus on that score… AND said deaths and subsequent resurrections together were all very real, genuine and true. The text, however, says Jesus was… “the first to rise up out of the dead ones” — as I have argued… this category of people constituted God’s covenanted ones, i.e., ISRAEL — Jesus WAS the firstfruits of Israel’s covenant renewal, aka RESURRECTION.
Again, putting aside for a moment your metaphorical blockage… this is what I see happening according to that passage in terms of covenant eschatology…
Rom 8:18-23 For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time (AD30-70 tribulations) are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us (firstfruit saints 8:30). For the earnest expectation of the creature (Israel) waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God (elect firstfruit saints 11:5). For the creature (Israel) was made subject to vanity (the Law), not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in hope (restoration), because the creature (Israel) itself also shall be delivered (redeemed 4:16) from the bondage of corruption (the law) into the glorious liberty (grace) of the children of God (firstfruit saints). For we know that the whole creation (all Israel 11:26) groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they (Israel), but ourselves (firstfruit saints) also, which have the firstfruits (down payment) of the (eschatological) Spirit, even we ourselves (firstfruit saints) groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption (deliverance) of our body (release from ‘this body of death’ 7:24, aka the OC).
All these themes are what Paul speaks of in various ways in his epistles.
I fear this typifies what happens in exegetical debates. I claim Pauline thinking about the resurrection ‘body’ actually looks to his language and argument in 1 Cor 15 (possibly influenced by the Gospels’ mysterious picture of how Jesus ‘body’ was experienced and was difficult to identify with the Jesus they had known). But skirting those salient texts, you cite yet another author (John’s) obscure text arguing that it controls the meaning of Paul’s words in 1 Cor (as if doctrines rest on solving intricate puzzles).
I have no assurance exactly what resemblance John has in mind here to Jesus in the coming age. You assume that all his epistles’ readers were among the original disciples who witnessed the resurrection and thus grasped the nature of its’ “physicality” (so they’d know the qualities and appearance their own resurrection supposedly promised). But I have no confidence either of those assumptions is correct. Man, I even doubt all witnesses like Paul of Jesus’ resurrection grasped even its’ corporeal nature)
Indeed, the very setting of John’s words is about believers’ changed character and victory over sin in their lives, and expecting that when they are fully with Christ this transformation will be completed in a way beyond their imagination. I.e. I can’t assume that like Paul, John is explicitly addressing the nature of the “resurrection body,” or what their own future bodily existence will or won’t be like.
But my central difficulty is that now we are sidetracked into conjecture about what yet another tangential text supposedly clarifies about our theories, instead of examining why even those like N.T. Wright who warn about embracing traditional assumptions, find 1 Cor 15 the central text where Paul grapples with the relationship between our present and future ‘bodily’ existence upon the new earth.
P.S. To avoid taking Romans 8’s setting free “the creation,” as a new earth kind of transformation, you repeatedly translate this as “the creature (Israel).” Assuming this unusual translation, is Israel previously called “the creature”?
Ok qaz (Bob), so this raises some obvious issues that you first need to clarify as to why-how you arrive at your ‘problem’…
-
What are you saying it means for Jesus to have “spiritually died”?
-
How do you know, or what tells you from that text that your assumption is true, i.e., “that Jesus never spiritually died”?
-
Assuming you are correct, what are you saying it must mean IF Jesus HAD “spiritually died”?
Please answer
Good logic, qaz.