T. D. Alexander: “Meaningless! Meaningless! . . . Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless” (Eccl. 1:2)! So cries the author of Ecclesiastes as he attempts to make sense of this world “under the sun.” Looking around, it’s easy to conclude that life is absurd. We live in a world full of injustice. Evil people prosper; good people suffer. We live in a world terrorized by death. Life can be snuffed out unexpectedly. Death comes to everyone; no one escapes. We live in a world that throws the unexpected at us. Our inability to control our destiny adds to our sense of despair and hopelessness. For some in difficult circumstances, death can seem better than life itself. While Christians aren’t immune to feelings of despair and hopelessness, faith in Jesus Christ lessens the pain of pessimism and despair. Faith in the resurrected Son of God gives us confidence to trust that this life is but the prelude to something more wonderful. City
Consummation
A Biblical Theology of the City of God
T. Desmond Alexander: What Is the City of God? The apostle John’s vision of a gigantic, golden city brings the book of Revelation to a dramatic conclusion. The vision recorded in Revelation 21:1-22:5 forms the climax to a series of amazing visions that reveal through rich imagery God’s plans for humanity and the world. The descent of this extraordinary city from heaven to earth marks the goal of God’s creative and redemptive activity. John’s vision of the city abounds with imagery drawn from the rest of Scripture. Elements of the Garden of Eden reappear in Revelation 21-22, especially the tree of life (Rev. 22:2; Gen. 2:9; 3:22-24). Importantly, in New Jerusalem the consequences of Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden are fully reversed. People are no longer barred from eating of the tree’s life-renewing fruit. God and humans enjoy each other’s presence, living together in perfect harmony. God’s Original Plan The creation of New Jerusalem does not occur as an
Water into Wine
Dane Ortlund: In John 2 Jesus, having declared that his hour ‘has not yet come’ (v. 4), turns water into wine at a wedding uniting a bride and a bridegroom; a celebration, a feast. In John 3 Jesus calls himself the bridegroom (3:29). Conclusion: John 2 is an anticipation of the real wedding, the true celebration, the ultimate feast. That’s why Jesus told his mom, ‘My time has not yet come.’ His own wedding was yet to come. (see further D. A. Carson, p. 179 of this book) As Edmund Clowney once put it, reflecting on Jesus’ presence at the Cana wedding: Jesus sat amid all the joy sipping the coming sorrow, so that you and I today can sit amid all this world’s sorrow, sipping the coming joy.
Two-age eschatology chart
I’m grateful to Rick Ianniello for this chart by Kim Riddlebarger. You can download a black and white pdf here, and a colour one here. I particularly like Riddlebarger’s statement that the first advent of Christ is “definitive and conclusive” in securing and assuring the believer of all the blessings inherited at the consummation.
Our great hope
“The great hope for Christians, the thing for which we long and to which we look for strength and encouragement, is the day when our King will part the skies and return to establish his glorious kingdom, finally and forever. That glorious moment is when everything in this world will be set right, when justice will finally be done, evil overthrown forever, and righteousness established once and for all.” – Greg Gilbert, What is the Gospel? (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2010), 91. (HT Of First Importance)
Already Not Yet 