#116 Questions about Surprised By Hope

[Music] The Ask NTRI anything podcast. [Music] Hello and welcome back to the show. I'm Justin Briley, director of Premier Unbelievably, with the show brought to you in partnership by SBCK and NTRIGHT Online. We've got links to special deals for both our PAN organizations with today's show. Today on the show, Tom is answering questions on his best selling book, Surprised by Hope. Do certain Bible passages contradict the idea of a renewed earth, as one person. What method can I use to share the gospel, as another? What about the fate of those who seem to reflect God's love but don't necessarily believe? If the kingdom of Jesus is here, why is the world still such a mess? Great questions coming up. Thanks to Rev Rand, who left this review of the podcast, said "Love this podcast. I've been trying to navigate my way through following Jesus for many years, and this podcast is a light forward for my faith struggles." Thank you Bishop Tom for your thoughtful, reasoned and pastoral answers. 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Guess include Alistair McGrath, John Wyatt, Lisa Fields, Glen Skryvna, Calvin Robinson, Joseph DeSousa and more. Plus a big conversation between Sharon Dirk's and Ian McGill-Christ. It's going to be a great day. Unbelievable.live is the place to book your place. The links are with today's show. Welcome back to the show. Today we're taking your questions on one of Tom's probably most famous and successful books, Surprised by Hope. Tell us about Surprised by Hope, firstly very briefly what it encapsulates in terms of your thought and theology and what made you want to bring it out when it came out in I think 2007? Yes. When I was on sabbatical in Harvard in 1999 I was teaching a course on the resurrection of Jesus and I discovered in doing the reading for that and teaching I think it was about 25 lectures or something like that. All sorts of misunderstandings which people had at a popular level and at an academic level about what happens after death and so on and about what the Christian teaching really is. Huge confusion about. When I was then appointed as Canon theologian of Westminster Abbey and they said you could be doing a course of lectures here and people in London would come I said well how about I do something on life after death and resurrection and all that. I did a course of nine lectures at Westminster Abbey in 2001 and then over the following years including when I became Bishop of Durham in '03 I would take those lectures and do a set of either three or six or nine or whatever on the road in various locations and each time that they kind of got polished a bit and changed around a bit and finally in 2000 and I think early 2007 I pulled them together and made it into the book that we now have. So that was quite exciting really because I was able to incorporate the sort of questions that people would ask after I'd done the lectures and I think that's that made it a more robust book as a result. Well a lot of people have asked questions that stem from the book among the listeners of the show so here's one from a listener in Nigeria called Kay who says hello Tom I've recently finished surprised by hope thoroughly enjoyed it and was challenged by it however I do have a question he brews 13 verse 14 and first John 2 verse 17 how do you interpret those in light of the message of your book that heaven is not the final destination and that this earth is not utterly useless and so is so relevant to God that he will renew it. Thank you and stay safe. But perhaps for those like me who don't have a photographic memory on these Bible verses Tom Hebrews 13 verse 14 and first John 2 17 do you want to sort of tell us what they say or some of that. I've got a text here Hebrews 13 14 says for we do not have here a city which remains but we seek the one which is to come so it's the contrast of the present city the present habitation and the future one and then first John 2 17 says the world passes away and so does its desire but the one who does God's will remains forever. Now of course it's easy if you take those verses without context to interpret them in what is basically a platonic sense that is to say the world here or the present city would be the spacetime universe that we know and where we live and then the one that is to come you would think aha this must be a non-spaciotemporal non-physical universe but of course within the Jewish world this eschatological contrast that sense of God's future which is promised to us doesn't mean a non-spaciotemporal one there are some Jews who would push it in that direction like phyllo of Alexandria in the first century for instance but most Jews certainly of Paul's day contrasting the present city and the future city would think of the future city as something which is pretty much like the present one in terms of being a spacetime and matter reality but one which is now filled with the presence of God and a city where justice is done a city where love and mercy abound and so on. Likewise in John's letter and also in John's Gospel the word world is one of those words which encapsulates several different things so when he says the world passes away it doesn't mean that the good creation passes away the good creation is what God made through the word all things were made through him says John chapter one and there is no sense that God's ultimate desire is to scrap all the all things that were made but rather to redeem them as you find in say Colossians chapter one that great hymn about creation and new creation and new creation happens because of redemption and the thing that passes away is the world which is full of corruption and decay it's pretty much like Revelation chapter 21 when it says the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and I saw a new heaven and a new earth and most commentators on Revelation say this doesn't mean a total discontinuity it doesn't mean that God will totally scrap everything at the present and make something day novo it's rather a new creation out of the old and what passes away is the corruption decay sin death deadliness of the old and the word world can be used by John to encapsulate that negative sense rather like in Paul the word flesh encapsulates the negativity of corruption sin and decay in the present human condition that that doesn't mean that the resurrection will not be a resurrection of the body a resurrection to a physical space or temporal reality so it's really important to understand the way in which our minds in the western world particularly have been so infected by that platonic antithesis of physical and non-physical and instead to replace that with the present corrupt physicality and the new non-corrupt physicality and obviously in the process of putting these ideas sort of in a way unveiling the biblical sense of what that world will be you've helped to broaden a lot of people's sense in through surprise by hope especially of what the gospel is of what the the kingdom message is not simply a escape hell and go to heaven sort of when you say this particular prayer but this does present problems for some people who are kind of struggling to kind of come into a sort of a broader understanding issue like of what what that means for the way that they present the claims of Jesus and faith to people. Jody for instance in Wisconsin you assays as my husband I recently completed surprised by hope. Now we grew up in a Christian religious environment that shared the gospel with concepts similar to well if you were to die tonight do you know if you would go to heaven or hell. Now realizing this question leaves out how the gospel impacts our lives now and that the new creation and resurrection are different than maybe we thought before could you give us an idea of replacement question or concept for when sharing the good news with others so so if that's been their sort of formula before Tom can you offer a new formula or question away into those conversations. I very much understand that I am congenitally worried about formulae because humans cannot be captured with formulae and when we're wanting to share the good news of Jesus with people we do need to be sensitive to particular situations and not simply say here's the standard question here it is bang because that can be very very unhelpful however. I would say the gospel of Jesus is not, here's how you go to heaven. The gospel of Jesus is God raised the crucified Jesus from the dead and thereby launched a new world, a new creation. And are you already a part of that? Would you like to be a part of God's new creation? Is that something that appeals to you or are you determined to turn your back on the good creator who now is doing his new creation? And I would want to explore questions like that and put the positive because Jesus is Lord, Lord who has rescued and renewed the old creation and is now master minding the project of new creation and inviting people to share it with him. So it's not just about where you're going to end up. It's, are you going to be a part of the team? Are you going to be batting for the right side? Are you going to be embracing your vocation as somebody who is called to be part of God's new world? Because you can, through the death of Jesus, leave behind the world of corruption and sin and decay and everything that's messed you up so far and you can be part of this new world and that can happen right now and on into the future. So out of that nest of ideas, I would want, prayerfully, if I was talking briefly with somebody in a particular situation, I would want to select what would seem appropriate for that occasion from that whole area. Yes, I mean, as you say, perhaps there has been value in sort of very sort of step by step approaches to evangelism in some context. But at the same time, often that can hand people a very one dimensional faith at the same time is that's the way they accept it. And we just have to live with the fact that sometimes things aren't quite as simple as we would like those have them presented to us. Oh, quite. And I do want to say, God can use and has done and will use all sorts of stumbling half-hearted attempts, including my own, to bring people to faith. And God is gracious and doesn't wait for either the evangelist or the person concerned to get it all absolutely right. All that needs to happen is something about the love of God in the death and resurrection of Jesus reaching out and grasping somebody. So the proper response then is, as Paul says, the son of God loved me and gave himself for me. And if somebody even has a smell of that and can respond to that, then there's all sorts of theology which can come in and help them as they move on from there. But you don't have to know the whole theory before you can actually have what we loosely call saving faith. What if engaging scripture could be both deeply informed and beautifully accessible? With the filament Bible app, your print Bible becomes a rich, interactive study experience. Sibley's scan, the page number, and filament opens thousands of expertly crafted notes, devotional reflections, interactive maps and videos, plus audio scripture to help you explore the text with greater insight and context. It's a seamless way to go deeper into God's Word wherever you are. Learn more at filamentbibles.com. Let's go to another question which involves it in a sense that the fate of non-Christians, Jan, has this question, having read surprise by hope. He wants to ask about your theory about the fate of non-Christians at the final judgment. I'd like to ask what Tom thinks will be the fate of those who do not worship money, sex, power or God, but actually prioritize kindness to others, integrity, honesty and justice. Do they bear the image of God sufficiently that even if they don't acknowledge or worship him, I suppose the question from Jan is, "Will we see them as part of the kingdom even if they haven't explicitly acknowledged God?" They don't seem to have gone in the direction either of worshipping money, sex and power and so on. Yeah, of course one of the things one always ought to remind oneself of is that we are not God, and that this is God's business as to who is part of the kingdom and who isn't. That's not to say we slide back into a kind of relativism where well it doesn't much matter because God's going to do what He's going to do anyway, but I'm reminded of that remarkable moment in Mark 12 when Jesus sees that one of the scribes has answered wisely and says, "You're not far from the kingdom of God." The scribe has got hold of something even though he's not actually signed up to being a follower of Jesus or not at the moment. Who knows? And in the gospel stories we meet other people who are well spoken of. There's the centurion who the Jewish people say he's a good guy. He really loves our people. He built our synagogues. So please, when you come and do what he wants in terms of healing his slave and so on. And then there's Cornelius in the book of Acts who has been fasting and praying and seeking God as best he knows how even though he's not Jewish and even though he's certainly until Peter comes and visits him doesn't know about Jesus. And so throughout we are being nudge towards saying what theologians have said through the use of the phrase common grace, I don't much like that phrase, but that God's love in creation reaches out and opens up. And there are many, many people who say, "Actually, this is the way we should live. I have a sense that we are supposed to be people of mercy and kindness and goodness." And sometimes tragically there are people who are professing Christians but who show almost no mercy and love and generosity and wisdom. And so that's when wise people I think say, "This is actually God's business. Our task is to make Jesus known by what we do and what we say." And if we find that there are people who already seem to be living that way, well, tremendous. The missionaries who in the 19th century went out into far flung foreign lands in ways that it's hard for us to imagine today because we can cross the world so quickly and internet, etc. Missionaries regularly would come back and say, "This was really interesting because when we talked about Jesus and about the new life which was available, some people would say, we always knew there was something like that. Thank you for making it explicit." And that's very different from somebody who says, "I've never believed anything like that, but suddenly bang, I'm getting converted." And I think God moves in many mysterious ways and we have to allow for that without in any way, relativising the central fact of Jesus as though Jesus was just one way of being good or one way of becoming part of God's people or something. The message of Jesus remains absolutely central and decisive, but the boundaries of God's love are no doubt much more widely thrown than some Christians like to imagine. Well, our final question on today's show comes from Elisa Rae, who's in Pennsylvania, and again comes on the back of having read surprised by hope and prompting a lot of questions. Elisa Rae says, "Thanks for the podcast. Listening to entry-right sort process on a variety of issues has opened my eyes to ideas about my faith and God's relationship to the world that I'd never been exposed to before. I've now come to realise many of the beliefs I took for granted as universally Christian are actually uniquely American and not necessarily healthy or theologically based. Well, my question is related to what Tom covers in surprise by hope and our workers' Christians in cultivating God's kingdom, which is already here through Jesus. I believe Tom's correct, however, what I've been wrestling with is this, previously the issue of evil in the world philosophically hadn't bothered me so much because I know I'm living in a fallen world. What I'm having trouble reconciling now is this dichotomy of living in a fallen world, but also God's kingdom already having been established here. How can God's kingdom already be here and evil be just as prevalent as before Jesus came? And I know we've tackled this in one or two ways in the past, but perhaps we could revisit it for the sake of Elisa Rae. And this sort of, yeah, she's struggling with how to put those two things together now. Yeah, sure, and thanks to Elisa Rae for articulating it so sharply, because I think many of us grew up with this idea that, oh well, we live in a fallen world, so evil is going to go on and on and on, but fortunately God has prepared a totally different better place called heaven and one day all these people will go and join him there and then that'll be all right, won't it? And against that, we have to put these interesting old books called Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, which make it quite clear that Jesus is saying the kingdom of God is at hand. And when he says the time is fulfilled, he doesn't mean it's nearly fulfilled. He means the time is up. This is the prophetic moment. The new thing is happening here. And when people said to Jesus, as we find people saying today, it looks as though the world is going on the same way, Jesus told stories about a farmer going out and sowing seeds in the field. And then somebody else comes along and says a different kind of seed and the evil and the good ones grow together until the harvest, but the good ones are growing. And in the original parable of the sower in Mark 4, 1 to 20, for instance, you have seeds which do different things because of the different soils, but some falls in good soil and brings forth fruit, 30 fold, 60 fold and 100 fold. Now here's the thing, we in the modern west are very used to looking around the world and imbibing the rhetoric of the secular enlightenment, which says that actually Christianity has basically failed. The world is just the same as it always was, if anything worse, because Christians are bigger and they do stupid things and they fight wars, etc, etc. All of that is true, of course. But when you look at the whole sweep of history, I'm thinking here, for instance, of the work of someone like Tom Holland, who's made this point very strikingly recently, you can see quite dramatic shifts in public perceptions. I mean, we at the moment are faced with this horrible thing of the war in Ukraine, but the fact that we, most people in the modern western world and around the rest of the world, look at it and say, this is inhumane, it shouldn't be allowed. What can we do to stop it? Show's that the consciousness of the world has actually radically changed. In the first century people would say, well, that's just what tyrants do and there's nothing you can do about it. And the fact is, it was the same with apartheid that many people in days gone by would have said, well, that's just how people choose to be. But the world as a whole got together and said, this is not the way that we should treat human beings. Where did that instinct for what we now call human rights come from? Of course, there is a secular agenda of human rights, but that secular agenda is borrowed directly from the Jewish and Christian world views which have soaked into the consciousness of the world. That is an extraordinary phenomenon, a historical phenomenon which we shouldn't downplay. So, though there is, of course, a huge raft of stuff still to do, not least because many Christians in the modern world have been Platonists who've said, don't worry about the present state because we're off out of here. This world is not my home, I'm just passing through. There have been many who've said that's not good enough. The God we worship, the God who made heaven and earth is a God of justice and mercy who wants His justice and mercy to be seen in all the earth as far in advance as we can of the eventual new creation which He will make. And that's part of the gift of the Spirit. Jesus says in John 16 is that through the Spirit and Jesus followers are to convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment. Like Jesus arguing with Pontius Pilate in John 18 and 19, we are to be a community that in our life and by what we say to those in power holds up a mirror and says, this is how God's world ought to be run. You are doing it wrong right now and we are going to pray for you and work with you to see if we can do it better. So, yes, it is an ongoing problem, but it is precisely the problem which Jesus was addressing with those seminal parables, seminal, both in the sense of seminal for his teaching and because they are to do with the semen, the seed, the seeds growing secretly, the seeds which have been planted which are already producing a great deal of fruit, a great deal more than we are often aware of. And you could add, I suppose, to that parables around the yeast in the dough and these things take time. It's not as though it's an instant sort of effect that takes place. Thank you so much, Tom. Yeah, it's been really helpful. Four questions there from Nigeria, a couple from the USA and elsewhere that you've answered on, surprised by hope. By the way, surprised by hope continues to be cell well wherever it can be found. So, if you want an introduction to Tom's thought and theology on the whole idea of new creation and what it means to see this kingdom in there now, then that is a wonderful place to start. But for now, thank you very much, Tom, for being with me on today's show. Thank you. Hey, thank you for being with us. Next time, Tom responds to someone who says they can't seem to shake their sinful addiction. He's answering pastoral questions from listeners about how to develop spiritual disciplines, how to escape the cycle of besetting sin, and how to respond to homeless people with substance addiction and mental health problems. 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