← Ask NT Wright Anything
Ask NT Wright Anything
Should Church Leaders Be Ordained? Are We Needed To Usher In The New Creation?
00:40:59
Loading summary
Transcript29 lines
- [00:00]
A
I'm NFL linebacker TJ Watt and this is my personal best. YPB by Abercrombie is the activewear I'm always wearing. That's why I reached out to co design their latest drop. I worked with designers to create high performance activewear that holds up to my toughest workouts. Shop YPB by Abercrombie in store, online and in the app because your personal best is greater than any Ask Nt Write Anything is sponsored by Logos. Start going deeper in the Bible with a free trial@logos.com NT.
- [00:40]
B
When did making plans get this complicated? It's time to streamline with WhatsApp, the secure messaging app that brings the whole group together. Use polls to settle dinner plans, send event invites and pinned messages so no one forgets mom 60th and never miss a meme or milestone. All protected with end to end encryption. It's time for WhatsApp message privately with everyone. Learn more@WhatsApp.com hello, welcome to the Ask nt Write Anything podcast, the program where we answer your questions about Jesus, the Bible and the life of faith. I'm Mike Bird from Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. And of course I'm joined by by.
- [01:26]
C
Tom Wright from Oxford in England.
- [01:29]
B
And Tom, you're surviving one of those balmy English summers where it's a horrible, what, 25, 26 degrees, I believe.
- [01:38]
C
Actually, it's worse than that in Oxford right now. It's going to be getting up around 30 today and then today and tomorrow is going to be worst and then I think it's going to cool off after that. But Maggie and I are heading off up to Scotland quite soon, so it'll be cooler up there.
- [01:52]
B
Oh, I'm glad to hear. I'm glad to hear. I mean, 32 was like a spring day in Brisbane.
- [01:58]
C
I know. Oh, I know.
- [02:00]
B
Well, anyway, Tom, we've got some good questions that our listeners have sent in about the Holy Spirit, Church hierarchy and the Resurrection in Revelation chapter 20. Now, Tom, I think this may be one of the unique episodes where you and I might actually disagree, but our listeners are going to have to be very attentive to reach the point where that happens. So let's get on with our first question from Mark Wiley in Long beach, usa. He's got a question about cooperating with the Holy Spirit and this is what he asked. He says, dear Professor Wright, I have read several of your books and enjoyed them all. Thank you for all of this great edifying work and for doing this podcast. I know I've read it before, but can't remember where I am getting old. But could you explain how we cooperate with the Holy Spirit in helping to usher in the new creation and the new world when heaven and earth are joined together? Also, is this a project achieved through many small steps or one that when the conditions are right, heaven and earth just come together suddenly? So, Tom, is the new creation project something that's just going to run on autopilot or is there kind of a cooperation between us and the Holy Spirit? And what does that cooperation look like? I think Mark would definitely love to hear your thoughts.
- [03:30]
C
Yeah, it's a great question. Thank you very much to Mark Wylie for this. The key text Here is Romans 8. And you could say that about several different topics. So, you know, like whatever your question, go to Romans 8 as a good starting point because you may well find help there. And just as a little advertisement, my recent book into the Heart of Romans goes inch by inch through Romans 8 to try to explain all this. And at the heart of that we find this to us rather confusing moment where Paul talks about the Spirit, the Holy Spirit bearing witness with our Spirit. And sometimes it gets quite, quite confusing. So that translators have worried whether to use the capital S for spirit for both of those, or for one of them or neither of them. Which shows that Paul is seeing that when the Spirit comes to indwell us, then if you can get a razor blade of meaning between who our Spirit then is and who the Holy Spirit is, well, good luck to you. Because sometimes it appears quite fluid and we are aware of a movement, thoughts, feelings, reflections, possibilities within ourselves. And then Paul will say, well, I worked harder than all of them, but it wasn't me, it was the grace of God that was with me. And somehow that double effect runs through so much Christian self understanding. And certainly in Paul then in Romans 8 particularly, Paul does see the Holy Spirit as the one who is going to bring about the new creation. And that of course resonates with Genesis 1, where Spirit of God, or the Ruach Elohim, the great divine wind, broods over the waters like a dove to bring to birth the creation, the dry land, and so on. And so this is a sense that the same thing is happening again only now into the new creation. And then at that point, precisely because those who are in Christ, who are indwelt by the Spirit, are are places where the Holy Spirit is at work, then we are caught up with this. Not so much that God does a bit and we do a bit, but that God does it all. But because of the fusion between our Spirit and the Holy Spirit, which is a very difficult and dangerous thing to think about or to try to practice, then what we are doing in that process is itself part of the work of new creation. And let's be quite clear, we are not bringing about the new creation by our own efforts, even by our own spiritual inspired efforts. God will bring God's new creation in God's own way and God's time. What we can do is, as it were, borrow from that promised future. So bringing into the present signs of hope from God's new world. That actually is part of what the sacramental life of the Church is about, though that's a whole different area of questions that we might get to one day. But it's about then being caught up in what God is doing at the moment. Because part of the dignity of being human is, as Psalm 8 says, and Paul is echoing Psalm 8 in this passage, to be little lower than the angels, but crowned with glory and honor, with all things put in subjection under our feet. Now the glory and honor doesn't mean going to heaven and shining like a light bulb. It means being given a share in the sovereign authority of God over the world. That was God's purpose for humanity. It was fulfilled in Jesus. It is now implemented through his spirit filled followers. And this comes to a head in Romans 8, 26, 7, 8, which are a fascinating and often misunderstood passage. And as I try to do, I give credit where credit is due. My friends Brian Walsh and Sylvia Keesmaat wrote, wrote a book called Romans Disarmed. My friend and former pupil Hayley Goran St Jacob wrote a book on the image of God in Romans 8. And they have both expounded it this way. And I've learned a huge amount from them and I'm very grateful to them. But basically, if you read Romans 8, 26, 27, then the danger is you see that as a detached little bit about prayer. Now, there's nothing detached in Romans 8. It's all a very tight unity. But the prayer there is the prayer of lament that with the world the way it is right now, what is God's response? What is the Holy Spirit's response? The world is groaning, the church is groaning in travail, longing for the full redemption. And then we discover that the Spirit is groaning within us with inarticulate groanings. And God the Father, the heart searcher, as Paul calls him, knows what is the mind of the Spirit. So we are caught up in the extraordinary dialogue between the Spirit groaning with the pain and suffering and horror of the world, and God the Father listening to that and knowing what's happening and sustaining the purpose of renewing the whole, redeeming and renewing the whole world, and that shaping the groaning of the Spirit, the listening of the Father is the shape of Christ, the shape of the cross, which is why he says in verse 29 that we are conformed to the image of the Son, which by the way, is the title of Hayley Gorenson Jacob's book. So Romans 8:28 does not say, as most translations of had it, all things work together for good to those who love God, as though it's just all things doing it automatically, almost. I've got in my own translation. We know, in fact that God works all things together for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. Our vocation is to be places where the Holy Spirit groans in longing for God's future new creation. And Paul says God takes that prayer that we thereby offer and uses that as part of the means to bring about further signs of healing and new creation in his world. So then to the question, is this achieved by many small steps or one when conditions are right? My sense is that God sometimes acts quite dramatically and does a whole new thing, all very quickly. But equally often we are waiting. And the small little steps, we may not even realize we're taking them, but eventually they will get us there. That's how prayer often works. I have a friend whose slogan for prayer is push P U S H Pray until something happens. And there's a sense that, yeah, you pray day by day, you wait on God, you invoke the Holy Spirit, and then one day something quite extraordinary happens and you realize, oh, I think that's the answer to which we've been building up for the last week or month or year or however long it is. So I want to say, yes, the Holy Spirit does work in many small steps, but also sometimes quite dramatically, and that we are caught up in that process, in our own lament, in our own prayer.
- [10:44]
B
Tom, I've got a follow up I've got to ask, and this is a, a question that keeps coming up. Can non Christian people and entities be used to usher in the new creation? So is the nhs, the UN World Food Program, or charities like the Smith family, or people who do great work in ecological preservation, is it possible that instruments outside the church, even actors outside of Christianity, can be used in a way that anticipates or moves us towards the new creation? I get this question a lot, yeah.
- [11:26]
C
Yeah, the short answer to that is just read the Bible and see because in the Bible you have, for instance, the figure of cyrus in Isaiah 45. Now it's very clear in Isaiah 45, Cyrus does not know Yahweh, but Yahweh. Yahweh knows Cyrus. And Yahweh has a purpose for Cyrus. And part of the point of that is to keep Israel humble, that Israel is going to be rescued from Babylonian captivity. But it won't be because they've been specially good or specially energetic or anything. It'll be despite the fact that they're still quite muddled and quite sinful and so on. But God has purposes which involve things that are going to happen to his people. And he wants to use Cyrus precisely, I think, in order to keep Israel aware that he sovereign and that he can and does use all sorts of people in his purposes. And you know, the history of the church and people have been very grateful to Cyrus, even though we have no idea that he ever came anywhere near faith in Israel's God. And you could say some people might say that even Pontius Pilate was used by God. And of course, there were some in the early church who wanted to canonize Pontius Pilate because he was the one who was instrumental in sending Jesus to his crucifixion and thereby in redeeming the world. I think that's going too far myself. But I think the important thing is that God wants his world to be wisely ordered through human beings for the good and the prospering of human society as a whole. And God would much rather that people, even if they don't have faith, were doing their best in with a kind of combination of wisdom and humility to bring peace, justice, order to the world. God would much rather that than either anarchy on the one hand, or waiting until sufficient number of people have become. Christians said that all world governance would be in Christian hands, which might or might not be a wise thing at the moment. So I think God can and does use all sorts of means, politicians, agencies, the United nations, et cetera. It doesn't mean that. That everything they do is thereby okay. The church has the right and the vocation to go on speaking truth to power at whatever level that power is, and reminding people when they're getting it right and reminding people when they're getting it wrong. And that would apply to any government, any UN agency, whatever it might be, any program. But the idea of people working to alleviate poverty and to feed the hungry and so on is the translation into secular mode of what the church has done from the beginning anyway, of what Jesus did in his incarnate life. What we are seeing in our generation is the post enlightenment Western world trying to do without God, what the church had always tried to do with God, and that God would much rather have it done even if people don't acknowledge him, than not have it done. In other words, the world to go back to a barbarism where nobody cares for anyone else and everyone's just looking out for their own ends. So the church should be supporting that, saying yes to it and then saying and how much better and clearer would it be if you were actually sustained by Christian faith? So it's a both. And yet again.
- [14:58]
B
Well Tom, let's pivot from the Holy Spirit to church hierarchy because we've got a question from Haley Simoneau from Madison and she asked this, following up on your answers about the roles of teachers and pastors, etc. Is it possible we go too far with structure in the church's hierarchy? The accounts in Acts 6 and 7 lead me to wonder if the accounts of Stephen and Philip challenge the apostles response to the widow's needs. Many commentators believe that there is contempt in their statement that it is not their job to wait on tables and Jesus had demonstrated a far more menial task when he washed their feet. God showed he could raise up ministers of the Word right away if the others needed to serve humbly. So Tom, do you think we put too much emphasis on hierarchy in the church? Because, you know, there are some denominations where they don't really have hierarchy. I mean, there are Quakers, there's certain streams of the free church. Traditionally some Brethren churches don't have designated pastors or leaders. And, and we both know from reading the New Testament that sometimes the leaders of churches appear almost invisible. Like when Paul writes to the Philippians, he refers to the overseers and deacons. But when he writes to the Corinthians, there's no sense that there was a clear authority structure, that Paul simply said, look you guys, you know, get a hold of your flock and get him in line. Stop bugging me with these stupid questions and get a leash on your own crazy people. Is hierarchy really necessary?
- [16:39]
C
Yeah, this is an old, old question. And speaking as someone who was ordained priest nearly 50 years ago and ordained bishop, whatever, 25 years ago or something, you'd expect me to say, yeah, hierarchy is a good thing. But I have seen the virtues and the vices of hierarchy and obviously the vices are pretty darn clear where people can give themselves heirs and imagine that they are somehow special and beyond criticism, et cetera. And some of the scandals that have rocked the chur in recent years, I think, come about precisely because too much emphasis has been put on the idea that now that you are ordained, you're a different kind of person, you're kind of above criticism. And sometimes folk in the church who've been taught to believe that the clergy and the leaders are somehow extra special, they then can be taken in and duped and misled because they've lost the facility to critique them. At the same time, I would say it's very interesting. Interesting that just as the very hierarchical churches like the Roman Catholics and the Anglicans have had many scandals of people who thought they were above criticism, so some of the newer free churches, I mean, think of some of the big mega churches in America over the last generation. They haven't had much in the way of an official hierarchy, but such leadership as they've got have had exactly the same problems as in the more hierarchical churches. That is, people who assume that because they are preachers, they are teachers, people falling at their feet to thank them for their leadership or whatever, they then are subject to the temptations which all of us in leadership are subject to of whatever sort. So I don't think it's easy. I don't think we should say either yes to hierarchy or no to hierarchy. I'm not quite sure about your example from Corinth. It'd be an interesting one to discuss because I'm pretty sure there were elders and deacons and people in the church in Corinth. But one of the things that's going on in Paul's writing to Corinth is that he knows they're already getting into personality cults, and he doesn't want to do anything to encourage that. You know, I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, and so on, whereas that doesn't seem to be a problem in Philippi. And the difference, interestingly, between the Corinthian correspondence and the northern Greek correspondence, Thessalonians and Philippians, is very marked. But back to Acts 6 and 7. I've often been struck by the fact that when the apostles say, okay, there's a job that needs to be done, but we cannot leave our tasks, which are the word of God and prayer, in order to do that job, I want to say, absolutely. I totally get that. Having been in church leadership, it's very easy to be drawn down into admin, into sorting out church accounts, into doing the thousand things which have to be done in order for the church just to flourish, to have the building cleaned, whatever it may be, the lighting working, goodness knows what. If the clergy are trying to do that as well as prepare their sermon, the chances are that the sermon isn't going to be all it should be. So the ministry of the Word of God, and remember that in the early church, the huge reinterpretation of the Old Testament, which was going on the whole time because Jesus, death and resurrection and ascension had opened up new ways of reading Scripture. And the apostles are studying and praying and teaching to make sure the church is grounded. All that's happened was according to the Scriptures, they can't leave that task and the prayer that goes with it. And I think that's right. And I don't think that's contempt at all. I think that's a very modern reaction. I don't think they're saying, oh, no, that's beneath our dignity, far from it, because they themselves are still servants of God in the church. Rather, what we then see happening, interestingly, is that among the seven who are set aside to help look after the distribution of food to the widows, two of them, Stephen and Philip, have completely different ministries pretty soon after. And this is a sign, as I've often observed as a bishop, when you lay hands on someone and pray for the Holy Spirit to equip them for the ministry that God is giving them, then other ministries may develop as well. Stephen becomes the greatest apologist, and then the first martyr, Philip, becomes a wandering evangelist floating off down into the desert where there's an Ethiopian eunuch reading Isaiah in his chariot. And this wasn't part of the game plan when the apostles prayed for them, but it's a way of saying God can and does do new things, and where there are tasks that need to be done, God will supply the people to do that. And I often used to say when I was bishop of Durham, when God is at work in a community and people are coming to faith, or then we should expect and pray for ministries of various levels and sorts to emerge from the community. You know, when Paul had to leave Thessalonica in a hurry, he didn't say to them, now look, you hang tight because we've got a young man training for ministry in the seminary in Caesarea, and he'll be with you in six months or a year, so just wait till he comes. No, absolutely not. It was, if God has been working in your hearts by the Spirit, God will raise up appropriate leadership of all the different kinds each time Paul lists ministries in the church, it comes out differently, which implies to me both that there are significantly different ministries for which people do need to be set aside prayerfully, and eventually they need their needs to be met so they can do those ministries. But also it implies that God can work outside the structures, alongside the structures, et cetera. So ordination I see as the wonderful moment when the church together prays for the Holy Spirit to equip this person, this man, this woman, to do these specific tasks. When you do that, you have no idea which particular direction that ministry is going to take. And the church has to be both flexible enough to cope with the Spirit, given new ministries, and firm enough to say we need structure, because without structure, we're like a body without bones. We just become flabby. Or then worse, somebody comes along and says, I'll tell you exactly what to do, and you get a kind of a totalitarian rule over the church, which is deeply unhealthy.
- [23:12]
B
Yeah, I think it's definitely true. The body of Christ needs a head, and the ultimate head is Christ himself. But if we don't have some sense of leadership and direction and structure, we're just going to run around doing our own thing in 10 different ways. Well, Hayley, we hope we hope you've answered your question on that front. We're going to take a break, and when we come back, we're going to get into a discussion of resurrection in Revelation 20 and into what may be the greatest exegetical scandal in the history of the Ask nt Write Anything podcast. So back in a moment with all of that.
- [23:53]
A
If you've shopped online, chances are you've bought from a business powered by Shopify. You know that purple shop pay button you see at checkout? The one that makes buying so incredibly easy? That's Shopify. And there's a reason so many businesses sell with it. Because Shopify makes it incredibly easy to start and run your business. Shopify is the commerce platform behind 10% of all e commerce in the U.S. sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today@shopify.com promo. Go to shopify.com prom.
- [24:25]
B
This episode is brought to you by Logos. I have been using Logos for years. Whether I'm preparing a lecture for class, working on my latest book, or doing some sermon preparation, I never do it without Logos because it gives me an instant digital research assistant right in my very hand. Whether I want to check out various Bible translations, the Dead Sea Scrolls in English or Hebrew, or look at various Christian writings like the Apocrypha or if I simply want a platform to read theological books and commentaries. Logos is the number one place to do is the necessary digital tool for doing Bible study and sermon preparation today. I don't know how you can do this without Logos, so make sure you go check out their new offering where you've got plans starting at $9.99 per month. So visit logos.comnt to get started for free with an exclusive extended free trial. That's logos.com NT start your adventure in the world of digital Bible resources today.
- [25:46]
A
Lo's knows you've got a job to do and we help get it done with the Mylowes Pro Rewards program. Eligible members save more with volume discounts on qualifying orders through a quote of $2,000 or more. Join for free today. Lowe's we help you save offer can't be combined with any other discount, contract and or special pricing exclusions. More terms and restrictions apply. Details@lowe's.com Terms subject to change.
- [26:19]
B
Well Tom, our next question is a great one and it takes us into a bit of exegesis of Revelation 20. It's from Sherry Casella in Lubbock, Texas and she asked this some friends and I have just completed an almost year long reading of Surprised by Hope and I am subsequently involved in a group of Bible study using Jen Wilkins Revelation video study. By the way, I love Jen Wilkins. She's a wonderful Christian lady and teacher. In your book you make the case for a two part resurrection Jesus on Easter day and the rest of us at some future time. Our Revelation study has just reached chapter 20 and a new question has emerged. Verses 4 to 5 seem to refer to yet another two part resurrection with differing views about whether the two parts are physical, spiritual, or whether there is one of each. Could you speak of two resurrections here, 1,000 years apart and how they relate to the two part resurrection passages in surprise by Hope? Are these entirely different part of the same unfolding events or something else? Thank you for your willingness to share your insights. Now for our listeners, let me read these particular verses from Revelation 20 in verse 4 and following and I'm using Tom's translation and I'm reading this off Logos it says then I saw thrones with people sitting on them who were given authority to judge and I saw the souls of those who've had their heads cut off because they had borne witness to Jesus and because of the word of God, and also those who had not worshiped the monster or its image and had not received the mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with the Messiah for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come back to life until the thousand years were complete. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who has a share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them. They will be priests to God and the Messiah, and they will reign with him for a thousand years. This is the famous millennium passage in Revelation 20. And we've got two resurrections referred to here. Tom, how do you understand them?
- [28:52]
C
It's very difficult. And as Sherry says, I made the case in surprise by hope for actually what Paul says very clearly in 1 Corinthians 15, that we live between the resurrection of the Messiah on Easter Day and the resurrection of all the rest of us at the end. Paul says, then comes the end, and that's et cetera. And likewise in Philippians 3:20, Paul says, We are citizens of heaven. From there we await the Savior, the King, the Lord Jesus, who will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body. And these fit together perfectly well, and they go with the rest of the New Testament until we get to this passage. Now, the thing, of course, about Revelation is that, as we know it is full of dramatic imagery and often imagery which you can't easily put together. Some artists have tried to do that in a kind of Hieronymus Bosch style. But as with the lion, who is also the lamb, and who has sword coming out of his mouth and eyes and goodness knows what, there's a sense that these images are not meant to all to go into one single coherent picture. They are different strands of meaning which kind of shock us into thinking differently about things. And I think the first thing I would say is that the thousand years is a typical revelation type of thing, which basically means a significant long period. It doesn't. I mean, no doubt if God wants it to be an actual thousand years, God is, well, capable of doing that literally. But it seems to me like a lot of other things in Revelation and in the sort of literature from which Revelation comes, we would be very foolish to take everything there literally, just like looking at the picture of Jesus as a lion who is also a lamb. Do not try this at home. These are symbols which lead us to the truth rather than a photograph of what will happen when we get there. So I've come and gone on this one. I actually did look after up in my book Revelation for Everyone, which I am not a revelation expert. I've never claimed to be, but I did the whole of the New Testament for the everyone series. So sooner or later you've got to deal with every passage. And I think what I basically said there is that the idea of these people who have this first resurrection is basically the Church in the present age, who are, as Birth 6 says, the royal priesthood, they are the people who are redeemed. This takes us back to Revelation chapter 5, where the people who are worshiping God and the Lamb are saying, by your blood you ransomed humans for God and made them the royal priesthood who will reign over the earth. So I see the present reign and the. I don't like the word spiritual resurrection because that can easily be misunderstood as though that's a real thing as opposed to a bodily one. But the kind of resurrection that Paul is speaking of in say Romans 6 or 2 Corinthians 5 or Colossians 3, where we are already raised with him, we already seated in heavenly places with him. And so that this I see as a prediction of the age of the Church. Now the problem with that is that most of us have not had our heads cut off because of bearing witness to Jesus.
- [32:23]
B
Exactly.
- [32:23]
C
And so on. So that it seems to me you could say maybe. I would say, but as a non expert, I'm prepared to entertain other views as well as I am on lots of other things, that this might be a way of saying that the Church as a whole in the present age is characterized by martyrdom, by witness, by not worshiping the beast, etc. Etc. And that the risen life, which we already have, as in Romans 6, as in Colossians 3, etc. Means that we are already to be acting as the royal priesthood, that is to say, sharing the worship of God, of all creation, and through our life and work, reflecting God's sovereign will into the world. That's the royal and priestly bits. So then that would be the present age of the Church. But of all the passages in the Bible, I think this is one where I would want to say I do not want to be dogmatic about this. And it may well be that there are other interpretations, including whatever Mike, you're going to say, which would challenge this. And fair enough. And it may well be that there are two or three different ways of interpreting which we don't see how they go together, but maybe they do because Revelation is often like that. So that's where I would be at the moment.
- [33:53]
B
Yeah. When it comes to understanding the book of Revelation, I've got some very big charts featuring the European Union, Donald Trump Missiles and attack helicopters. I can't bring them out there, they're too big. No, I go back and forth on this passage all the time, Tom, because students always ask me about it. Now on the one hand, I think there is a pattern across revelation about suffering and vindication. And that seems to be true in every age. In every age there's martyrs and God always eventually vindicates his people. But this seems to be particularly climactic. And the thing I find strange, and I can't get my head around is that in this passage the people who participate in the first resurrection don't participate in the second one. So that's why I'm a little bit hesitant at, by saying, well, this is a kind of like Romans 6 or Colossians 3, resurrection. And then there's a final resurrection because it seems like this is a reward for a particular set of martyrs who have come out of a particularly notorious, a very specific period of persecution at some point in the future of the Church. But then again, I go back and say, but this is a familiar pattern across revelation, you know, suffering and vindication. And yeah, it really depends on what commentary I'm reading at the time about what I'm persuaded by on a given day. So yeah, there are some days where I think, yeah, this is just a general pattern. The Church is called to be a kingdom of priests in every age and we may suffer martyrdom, but maybe this is about a particular time in the future where a group of Christians who have been faithful under persecution and they experience resurrection and there's some kind of messianic interregnum which we call the millennium. And then Christ returns and you have the end of all things with resurrection and the final states. So yeah, I go back and forth in my mind on this all the time, Tom.
- [36:01]
C
Yeah, well, I hope you don't lose too much sleep doing that, because I confess that though I have puzzled over this many times, it's not my daily thought patterns to come and go on it, but I'm aware that in what you just said, we are treading into the territory of 18th and 19th century theology, indeed 17th, 18th and 19th century theology,. The 17th and early 18th, which is very much a post millennial thing, that the ministry of the Church will eventually result in the thousand year reign of the saints. There'll be a thousand years when God's people, the, the followers of Jesus will be ruling the earth and everything will be wonderful. And then at the end of those thousand years there'll be this other sudden flurry and Everything will go horribly wrong and then Jesus will return over against then what you get in late 18th through 19th century, and particularly with movements like the Plymouth Brethren or whatever dispensational. The world is getting worse and worse and worse and worse. And then, then Jesus will come when the night is at its darkest, as it were, and he will rescue the tiny little group of Christians who are left. And then there will be a millennium. The more I've looked at those movements in church history, the more I thought, nice try, no cigar. That's just not how this language is meant to work. And actually, you see, when you said, Mike, about that the people who share in the first resurrection, that they, I think you said they don't share in the second resurrection. I'm not sure that's in the text. I mean, I think it says, and the rest.
- [37:37]
B
And the rest. The rest of the dead came back to life until a thousand years. So you've got this one group who. Of martyrs who come back to life and they came to life and reigned with the Messiah for a thousand years, and then the rest of the dead did not come back to life until the thousand years were complete. So that's the bit that really gets me.
- [37:58]
C
Me. Yeah. But I think you could interpret that as saying that the first lot are basically the church, whether you think they've sort of notionally been martyred or whatever, and that that is the age of the church. But then at the end of all things, then the rest of the dead will come back to life. And that's when White says the second death will have no power over those who have a share in the first resurrection, which is like what Jesus says, anyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Now, of course, we know perfectly well that in terms of biological death, all those who have lived and believed in Jesus from the beginning have died and are waiting resurrection right now. But they will never die. Is a way of saying the second death has no power over them. They have already. And that's why in John's Gospel, in Colossians, et cetera, we get. You have already passed from death to life. So that, yeah, there is still biological death, but it's no big deal. Now, now, I know that can be overstated, but I think that may be what's going on. But in all of that, does it matter that you and I can't sort this out? Well, I think. No, that's fine. Because there have to be always passages of scripture which tease and puzzle us. And it may well be that things which tease and puzzle theologians and exegetes in one generation will become completely clear in a new way in the next generation, and that in the new generation there'll be things which we think are clear which will puzzle them. And I think that church history is a matter of constantly struggling to grow up into the full revelation of what's in Scripture. Of course, the danger is that people say, oh, well, that's just a bit of muddled stuff. We don't need to pay any attention to it. No, I think we do need to pay attention to it. And that's what you and I have been paid to try to do. And we still trying to do it.
- [39:57]
B
Exactly. Well, if you have any further questions on the Book of Revelation you'd like Tom and I to discuss or maybe tease out in front of you, be sure to ask them@askntright.com fill out the questionnaire there, and who knows, maybe your question will end up on the show. Also, we have a great lineup of bonus episodes where we get into more content about the Book of Acts, about justification by faith, and other more controversial issues of the day. So for the price of a bad coffee, you can sign up to those bonus episodes. Otherwise, that's all we have time for today. I'm Mike Bird.
- [40:41]
C
And I'm Tom Wright, and we look.
- [40:44]
B
Forward to seeing you on the next episode of Ask NT Wright Anything.
- [41:13]
A
Martha listens to her favorite band all the time in the car, gym, even sleeping. So when they finally went on tour, Martha bundled her flight and hotel on Expedia to see them live. She saved so much she got her seat close enough to actually see and hear them. Sort of. You were made to scream from the front row. We were made to quietly save you. More Expedia made to travel savings vary and subject to availability. Flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.