Doubling Down on Destiny

Knowing where the world is headed helps us live well today.

The other day I was at a rehab clinic working on my arthritic hip. While putting me through various exercises, the physical therapist said, “You have lumbopelvic instability, with some Lower Crossed Syndrome.”

Alrighty then.

She got out her phone and showed me an anatomical picture with an “X” through the pelvic area, showing the relationship between several weak and tight muscles that has been making physical movement miserable for me.

Geez.

I replied, “Yeah, well, you want to use big words? I see your lumbopelvic instability and raise you an eschatology.”

I’ll bet you did not plan on dealing with the word eschatology today—but in the same way I need the expertise of my physical therapist, we need understanding of where the world is headed to function well in this present day and age.

Eschatology is the theological study of final things. It focuses on the destiny of God’s creation, including the human re-embodied soul in a new heaven and new earth where God’s intentions for his handiwork are fulfilled.

This final destiny began with the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus. Jesus’ shorthand for the renewal of creation was “the kingdom of God is at hand.” This means the end of all things has already begun, and we can live in its reality today by repentance and confidence in Jesus (see Mark 1:14-15 and Matthew 7:24).

Living in the presently available kingdom and in relationship with Jesus, we are living an eternal kind of life. As Jesus describes it, new life in the kingdom is relational, a quality of life one can experience now:

Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

John 17:3

But we do not want to merely know the dictionary meanings of eschatology and eternal life, we want to experience them in our daily lives with their intended effect on our heart, soul, mind and will.

Here is an important pivot for thinking about the discipleship/formational importance of eschatology: However final things are going to play out, we can know this: Last things are indexed to first things—namely to God’s intention and purpose in creation.

Yet…

This is the tension I feel in myself and see in many others:

• Jesus inaugurated a new age…yes, I agree.

• That new age will someday be consummated…again, I agree.

• In this intermediate time, we feel frustrated, angry and anxious about the state of the world…yes; that is my experience too.

• Can we trust God’s eschatological promises for redemption and justice…I want to, and I know I should, but the state of the world and the Church makes it hard.

Given that tension, here are six ways we might apply eschatology to our inner transformation and social relations today.

1. Trust that God has written the story of creation and is superintending it to its completion.

This is a strong source of hope and poise. When I see daily headlines, I need eternal hope. When I hear fuming pundits, I need poise.

2. Know that “God’s got this.”

This knowledge produces confidence and trust—two things we must have to closely follow Jesus. We wouldn’t even follow someone across the street if we did not trust them. We won’t follow Jesus through the messiness of the world if we aren’t certain that he knows where he is going and how history ends.

3. Know the end of history is secure.

This knowledge creates expectation which, in turn, yields endurance, which then empowers us to stay spiritually alive in the daily battering of faith we experience in the world. The ups and downs of a story, the ascent and seeming victories of evil, are made bearable by the knowledge that we know how the story ends.

4. Find comfort by believing in the Redeemer God.

Our belief yields strength and gives us the ability to stand when the world shakes, the capacity to survive when life nose-dives.

5. Know that each of us and the world are utterly dependent on a story not of our making or completing.

The big picture of God redeeming the whole cosmos facilitates humility. This allows us to drop self-importance and relax—which in turn makes us more effective as God’s servants.

6. Remember that the end of God’s story is a great reversal, heading back to his intended perfections.

This provides for us a gravitational pull toward the cultivation of virtue and the quest for Christ-centered ethics. Our discipleship flows from the idea that the world, the Church, and me all have a story and a Story-Teller bringing his story to completion.

When Paul considered our present suffering, he used evocative language: Creation is subjected to frustration…it is groaning (Romans 8:20,22). But when he held that reality up to the bright light of the coming perfections that are assured by the person and promises of God, he said:

I am sure that nothing can separate us from God’s love—not death, life, angels, or ruling spirits. I am sure that nothing now, nothing in the future, no powers, nothing above us or nothing below us—nothing in the whole created world—will ever be able to separate us from the love God has shown us in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:38-39, ERV

That state of mind, that condition of heart and soul, is the great gift of eschatology rightly understood and applied to real life.