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Sunday, August 31, 2008

Repeat after me....Platonic Dualism!

I finished reading N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope. He reconnects ends of our theology that are frayed or have been cut by well meaning but misguided preaching and teaching. He restores what he believes is the original emphasis of the gospel and the early church on the implications of the resurrection of the body.

The idea that physical is evil and spiritual is good, in all its historical forms, from Gnosticism to Platonic influence, needs to be rooted out of our thinking. As wonderful as Heaven is, it is not our final home. The victory of Christ over death will never be complete until we have redeemed bodies like His gloroius body. So, the message of the church is not believe and sit and wait for heaven, but get involved in the suffering and pain of physical lives caught in the destructive power of sin and death, and labor now to bring relief and truth.....and hope.

Of course He said it better, more completely, and with lots of proofs. But, I get it. This life matters, this physical body and this physical world matters. The redemption of the universe is physical, the new heaven and earth are not a totally destroyed cosmos, but a totally renewed cosmos. Its revolutionary if you are influenced by dualistic thinking, as we all have been.

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