A huge issue has arisen amongst evangelicals: social justice and social action have become front, left and center — in shaping our behaviors and in understanding the gospel … and Patrick Mitchel, from Ireland, we get a pushback that can make us think again. The issue is one of “how much continuity is there between now and the kingdom?”<\/p>\n
<\/i><\/p>\n
I’ve been thinking about the link between
\neschatology and social action recently. One line of thinking, that can
\nbe called the ‘future continuity’ argument, is hugely influential in a
\nlot of missional writing and emphasizes the strong continuity between
\nthe future and the present. We experience now the ‘presence of the
\nfuture’ – in the kingdom of God and in the Spirit. AND we hope for the
\n‘future of the present’ – where the present will have a strong
\ncontinuity into the future in a renewed earth. <\/p>\n
Since God’s kingdom has broken into the present,
\nwe are called to co-operation with what God is already doing in
\nredeeming creation. This leads to ‘kingdom ethics’ where what we do now
\nin this world matters deeply as we are called to help fulfil the Lord’s
\nprayer ‘May your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven’. This
\ncalling gives deepened spiritual significance and motivation to all
\nthat we do in this life: for our bodies; our work; for art; for ecology
\nand so on.\n<\/p>\n
N T Wright says this sort of thing towards the end of Surprised by Hope<\/i>
\nbut it has been around for quite a while. For instance, one church I
\nread about recently was removing rubbish from a local canal. Their
\nmotivation was mainly eschatological; fulfilling their calling to
\nco-operate with God’s agenda of a renewed creation.\n<\/p>\n
Now please hear me – I’ve no problem with most
\nof this. Future hope should profoundly shape our lives and priorities
\nin the present. The New Testament obviously has some sort of continuity
\nbetween the ‘now’ and ‘not yet’. Social justice is close to the heart
\nof God. But the more you think about it, the more difficult it is to
\ndraw straight lines between cleaning up a canal (or whatever action you
\nwant to substitute here) and helping ‘complete’ God’s kingdom plans for
\na renewed creation. The reality is we know very very little about the
\nfuture new creation. Will there be canals there? Art? Forests? Music?
\nBooks? We just have very little solid idea.\n<\/p>\n
Have we been so keen to reject individualistic
\nideas of salvation that separate social action from the gospel that we
\nhave too easily assumed a strong, if not almost literal, continuity
\nbetween the present and the new creation? And have we, almost
\nunnoticed, put our<\/i> efforts, our<\/i> fulfilment
\nof kingdom ethics, centre stage in God’s plan of redemption? Have we
\nbegun to assume that the primary motivation for social justice is an
\neschatological vision of a perfectly just future? I’m not too sure the
\nScriptures do this – it seems to me the Bible’s primary motivation for
\nsocial justice is a deep love of God and a deep love of neighbour.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A huge issue has arisen amongst evangelicals: social justice and social action have become front, left and center — in shaping our behaviors and in understanding the gospel … and Patrick Mitchel, from Ireland, we get a pushback that can make us think again. The issue is one of “how much continuity is there between…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gospel"],"yoast_head":"\n