The Now and the Not Yet

It would not be stretching things to describe Christians as those who live in the present and who have an interest in the future. We have been saved through hope (Romans 8:24), brought into a relationship with Christ that has blessings for us in the present and anticipates a glorious future. There are things true of us now, and there are things not yet true of us. We live in the now, and we look forward to the not yet.

The glory of our position as Christians is that we have already entered into the blessings that are to be ours in all their fullness one day. That comes across clearly in Paul's teaching on the Holy Spirit as our guarantee. As Paul contemplates a glorious future with Christ, he says that 'he who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee' (2 Corinthians 5:5). Paul uses the same Greek word in Ephesians 1:14, where he describes the Holy Spirit as the 'guarantee of our inheritance [NOW] until we acquire possession of it [NOT YET], to the praise of his glory.

This 'guarantee' is the first instalment of the whole inheritance which is to be ours, but it is important to realise that, as Lloyd-Jones puts it, 'it is a pledge, or guarantee which is also of the same kind and of the same nature as the thing itself' (Ephesians, I, p303). In other words, what we have NOT YET received in its fullness, we have, even NOW been given by way of a promise, a pledge and a guarantee. Our present possession of the Holy Spirit is eschatological, anticipating the future.

That is also the teaching of Romans 8:23, where believers are described as having the 'firstfruits' of the Spirit, which is why we groan inwardly, awaiting our adoption as sons. In addition, therefore, to the strand of teaching in Paul making explicit that we are the sons of God NOW, there is this dimension in which we acknowledge that what we have now is simply the beginning. The final state of the righteous is a world of love, as Edwards puts it. And, as Sinclair Ferguson says, 'already the Spirit enables believers to experience an overflow, as it were, from that world' (The Holy Spirit, p179). The fruit of the Spirit is nothing other than our heavenly character personalised in this world; the love, joy and peace of Heaven appear in the bud in the NOW of this present world long before they appear in the NOT YET of Heaven.

This is how Geerhardus Vos explains it:

Although in one sense the inheritance of this world lies yet in the future, yet in another sense it has already begun to be realized in principle and become ours in actual possession. The two spheres of the earthly and the heavenly do not lie one above the other without touching at any point; heaven with its gifts and powers and joys descends into our earthly experience like the headlands of a great and marvellous continent projecting into the ocean (GV Anthology, p34).

This, then, is our position. The end of the ages has already come upon us, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:11. That is why we need to understand the Old Testament with all its warnings and examples. As New Covenant believers we are living between two horizons: the Scripture has been fulfilled to the extent that Messiah has come as the head of a new creation; but, in common with all believers, we await the consummation.

I want us to bear all this in mind as we approach our studies today. We are going to look at some of the things that are true of the believer now, living in this age of the Spirit, in which we have the blessings of the future in principle. We are also going to look at some of the things that are not yet true of the believer, simply because we have not yet been called home. But I want to look at this through the lens of the New Testament letters, where it seems to me that sometimes, because of the situation into which Paul was writing and speaking, it was important to him to emphasise the present status of the believer (the now), and on other occasions it was important to emphasise the future consummation (the not yet). Sometimes the particular needs of the church led him to expound what it means to be in Christ here on earth; sometimes the needs of the church led him to expound what it will mean to be with Christ in Heaven.

Part 1 - Heavenly blessings that are ours now

Colossians --COMPLETE IN CHRIST

Paul had not been the means of bringing the Gospel to Colossae. Nonetheless, he has reason to thank God that the ministry of Epaphras (1:7) has been fruitful there. Although many of the believers in Colossae were not known to him personally, he still feels a great burden for them:

I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you, and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not seen me face to face, that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (2:1-3).

Paul has said in 1:29 that his pastoral concern for the believers has been of the nature of a struggle, of a contest, as he strives to encourage them in the things of the faith.

He goes on in Colossians 2 to specify the reason for his struggle. Paul is aware of the presence in Colossae of a false and damaging viewpoint that stands ready to take captive the people of God (2:8). The description of the danger is this: 'philosophy', 'empty deceit', 'human traditions', and what Paul calls 'the elemental spirits of the world' want to ensare the believers by challenging their fundamental standing in Jesus Christ. Paul demonstrates that the work of Christ on the cross dealt with all our sins, all our debts, and all the demands of the law (2:13-14).

Nonetheless, there were those who were critical of the Colossian believers in respect of the requirements of the law, such as eating, drinking and keeping Sabbath (2:16). There were those who wanted to draw up a list of regulations and requirements for the believers, specifying things that they should or should not do. Paul's position is that these were going beyond anything that Christ demanded of his people, they were 'according to human precepts and teachings.' He goes on to say of them:

These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh (2:23).

Older New Testament scholars tended to speak about a 'Colossian heresy' which this epistle was designed to address. It seems, however, that the peril really came not from one particular aberration of doctrine, but from a variety of religious and philosophical positions. 'Let no one disqualify you,' Paul says in 2:18, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind and not holding fast to the Head' (ie Christ). The problem was not one particular heresy, but an assault on a fundamental issue of the Christian life: the believer is filled, or complete, in Christ (2:10).

On the one hand, the believers were assaulted by the claim that they did not have enough; on the other by the claim that they had too much. Their faith in Christ was suspect because they had no ecstatic experiences of which to speak; and they had no ecstatic experiences because they were not living the ascetic lives that their detractors were demanding.

Paul's answer is to point them to the fullness that there is for those who are united to Christ now. What the Colossian believers needed was not ecstatic experiences, but a deepening understanding of what they were in Christ. Perhaps that is one reason why there is so little reference to the Holy Spirit in this epistle. It is possible to turn the Spirit into a source of heresy, by insisting that there is some 'second blessing' that you enjoy from the Spirit that you don't get by believing in Christ. The only reference to the Holy Spirit is at 1:8, where Paul talks about the believers' 'love in the Spirit'. The emphasis in Colossians is not on the Holy Spirit but on the risen Christ. For Paul, the antidote to these human opinions about how the Christian life could be bettered is to give the Colossians a firm grounding in Christology.

That's why 1:15-20 stretches our minds with its statements about Jesus, the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of creation. It's why 2:9-10 insists that the fullness of deity dwells in Christ in a visible form, and we are filled in him. Our life, to use the wording of 3:3 is hidden with Christ in God; Christ is NOW our life (3:4). The reason for the lack of reference to the Holy Spirit is precisely because the Spirit imparts and conveys what Christ bestows. The dynamic of the Christian life is that Christ is risen, and we are united to him in his death and in his resurrection.

If some of the Colossians believers were disillusioned because of the continued of the continued presence of sin, and were listening to the false teachers prescribing a regime of self-denial to cope with it, so that they could enter into the mysteries of God, Paul wants to say 'NO!' Christ is your life. You are complete in him. You have died in him, put off the old self -- 'Christ is all and in all' (2:11).

Four practical results come from this. First, through union with Christ we put to death what is earthly (3:5ff). So Ferguson: 'the fact of union with Christ in his death to sin and new life to God is the foundation for growth in holiness; the knowledge of it provides the motivation' (p152). Second, through union with Christ we relate to one another in the church (3:12-17), putting on love and being bound to one another in harmony. Third, through union with Christ we fulfil our responsibilities (3:18-4:1), as those who serve the Lord Christ. Fourth, through union with Christ we continue in the spiritual disciplines which testify to the reality of Christ in our lives (4:2-6), praying, watching and witnessing.

In this eschatological age, you do not need special visions or ecstatic experiences. You do not need to be able to speak in tongues or perform miracles. You do not need to submit to a regime of spiritual disciplines which only pander to the flesh. The glitzy world of signs, wonders, miracles, tongue-speaking is of the flesh -- it is a sham and a fraud. We all like emotional highs; we prefer feelology to theology; and the Christian world is full of it -- 'It felt right', 'God said it to me', 'it gave me a buzz'.

Mark Haville was very involved with the signs and wonders kingdom. He writes of his desire to feel more of the Holy Spirit in his life, In one meeting he had 'proof' of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit:

I ran around the room at full pelt, blowing on people. I had already noted where the most responsive people were sitting during the prolonged worship session. Their responses were astounding. Some were experiencing ecstasies for some time on the floor. Others shook energetically and praised God with mantra-like chanting. When the meeting was at a crescendo I remember experiencing the most intense exhilaration in the pit of my stomach (The Signs and Wonders Movement -- Exposed, p20).

Yet Haville came to repent of the sham, the lack of financial integrity, the deceit, and above all, the subjectivism of it all. 'Emotions,' he says, 'make good servants but terrible masters ... subjective arguments based on subjective experiences do not point to objective truth' (p28).

Jonathan Edwards faced the same problem in the Great Awakening with people who thought that faintings, and swoonings, and heightened, ecstatic experiences were indisputable evidence of the continued work of the Holy Spirit. That was why he wrote his Treatise on the Religious Affections, not to prove that there is no emotion in religion, but to demonstrate that true spirituality arises from the illumination that the Spirit gives, in which we see 'the excellency and sufficiency of Christ, and the excellency and suitableness of the way of salvation by Christ' (p206).

You need to keep focussed on what you are in Christ NOW: you are COMPLETE in him, therefore you are FULL.

Galatians -- CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST

In many ways the letter to the Galatians was written for a similar purpose to the epistle to the Colossians. This letter was written not to one congregation, but to the 'churches' (1:3) of the southern Galatian region, a region which included the cities of Antioch, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe, places which Paul visited in Acts 13ff.

By the time the letter was written (and it is not easy to work out when that was), many throughout the region had, in Paul's words, deserted the one who called them in the grace of Christ, and had turned to a different Gospel (1:6). They had been 'bewitched' (3:1) and had turned back 'to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world' (4:9). Paul's fear is that his labour on their behalf was mis-spent and in vain.

What was it that had caused this change? There were those, first, who were questioning Paul's authority as an apostle, claiming that his message was a human message (cf. 1:11). Paul spends a good part of the epistle going over his apostolic credentials as one set apart by God to preach the gospel, recognised by the other apostles.

Secondly, those who detracted from the apostle and his message were insisting on certain legal requirements as necessary for salvation. The presence of the 'circumcision party' (2:12) highlights the problem: there were Jewish believers in the region who insisted that the Old Testament rituals, such as circumcision, were necessary for salvation; faith in Jesus Christ was not enough. That is why Merrill Tenney says that 'the tone of the book is polemic ... it is not an essay, written merely to entertain or to instruct complacent believers. It was written to stimulate theological thought and to rouse an endangered church to action. Its words are sharp as the edge of a dagger, and its thought savors of battle smoke' (Charter of Christian Liberty, p27). When it comes to the essence of the argument, Calvin is absolutely correct:

Those who wished to make believers observe such ceremonies had the perverse and wicked fancy that in doing so they would be justified and obtain God's favour. This was to deny the power of the death and passion of the Lord Jesus Christ (Sermons on Galatians, p115).

To add the law to the Gospel as a means of full justification is, according to Galatians, a perversion of the Gospel -- it is another gospel altogether. We do not have time to go into minute detail to the intricacies of Paul's argument, which revolves around the relationship of law and promise. God made promises to Abraham 430 years before he gave the law to Moses (3:17). The law does not disannul the promise, believing which Abraham was justified; the law pointed to the one who would fulfil the covenant promise and redeem us from the law's curse. To that extent the ministry of law was intrinsically a ministry of grace.

Those who insisted on supplementing Christ with law-keeping as the basis of their salvation, instead of embracing Christ's law-keeping as the basis of our salvation, are the objects of Paul's attack in this epistle. Gresham Machen is right: 'the Judaizers are dead and gone, but not the issue that they raised. Faith or works -- that is as much as ever a living issue' (Notes on Galatians, p212). The glory of the gospel is that our salvation depends IN NO SENSE on what we do. That is why the Larger Catechism answers the question (73) 'How doth faith justify a sinner in the sight of God?' in the following way:

Faith justifies a sinner in the sight of God, not because of those other graces which do always accompany it, or of good works that are the fruits of it, nor as if the grace of faith, or any act thereof, were imputed to him for his justification; but only as it is an instrument by which he receiveth and applieth Christ and his righteousness.

Let's be very clear. Paul is not saying in Galatians that we are free to do what we like. Quite the opposite. His argument is that we have been set free by God to serve God. The moment we imagine that we please God by pleasing men is the moment we have lost sight of this great doctrine of our liberty.

Paul personalises this and illustrates it with reference to Peter, who had been given a ministry to Jewish converts as Paul had to the Gentiles. In Acts 10, Peter had received the vision in which God showed him that he should not call any person common or unclean (Acts 10:28). At the Jerusalem Council he stood up to testify publicly about the Gentiles that 'God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them...' (Acts 15:8-9).

But at Antioch, where Peter gladly shared fellowship and food with the Gentiles, something happened. When a group came from Jerusalem who wanted to enforce the special customs and rituals which had been given to the Jews, Peter withdrew from them, and Paul charged him with hypocrisy. Calvin says that Peter committed three sins: he split the church, he denied the grace of the Lord Jesus, and he confirmed these Jews in their error of believing they were superior to the Gentiles (Sermons on Galatians, p144). Peter was denying the true liberty that comes as a result of the death of Christ; and as Calvin points out, Paul exercised his liberty rightly in rebuking Peter.

What was Peter's problem? Simply that he wanted to be liked, to please everyone, even when it led him, in Paul's language in 2:13-14, to hypocrisy, to conduct that was inconsistent with the truth of the gospel. He was 'ever the first to recognise, and the first to draw back from, great principles and truths' (Arnold, quoted in Wilson, Galatians, p40). Luther's take on this is that 'it is a perilous thing ... to trust to our own strength, be we never so holy, never so well learned ... for in that whereof we think ourselves most sure, we may err and fall, and bring ourselves and others into great danger. Let us therefore diligently, and with all humility, exercise ourselves in the study of the holy scriptures, and let us heartily pray that we never lose the truth of the gospel' (Luther on Galatians, p84).

So what happened between Paul and Peter illustrates the very theme of the letter. We have been crucified with Christ (2:20; 6:14), and therefore we are free. We are a new creation, in which neither circumcision nor uncircumcision are determinative of our relationship to God (6:15).

Paul is aware of the power of indwelling sin. He knows that it is possible for sin to take advantage of doctrine. That is why he says 'do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh' (5:13). Instead, having been crucified with Christ, we are to crucify the flesh so that we will bear the fruit of the Spirit (5:22), live by the Spirit (5:25) and walk by the Spirit (5:25).

Everything changes in the light of the crucifixion. Yet it is so much part of our sinful nature to want to please men, to be content with outward appearances and with external religion. It is so comfortable for us to live our lives in the comfort zones of pleasing people. In the NOW, however, in this eschaton, the only ground of our standing is that Christ has died for us. We are CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST, [NOW], therefore we are FREE to please him.

Ephesians -- CREATED IN CHRIST (2:10)

Like Colossians, this letter to the church at Ephesus was written from prison (3:1) and bears a lot of similarities to Colossians. Unlike either Colossians or Galatians, however, it was obviously not written to counteract any false teaching or any ethical problem in Ephesus. Paul had spent a great deal of time in Ephesus (Acts 19:8,10), and his farewell to the elders of Ephesus is full of pathos, and is very moving (Acts 20:36-7). For that reason, it is perhaps strange that this letter contains no personal greetings.

Although Ephesians is not occasional as many other Pauline letters are, it does raise a very important issue for the early church -- the relationship between Jewish and Gentile believers. This letter is a statement of the Gospel which among other things highlights the fact that because we have been reconciled to God, we have been reconciled to each other (2:14-16).

The letter is in two parts. The first part, chapters 1-3, is primarily doctrinal; the second, chapters 4-6, is primarily practical and ethical. But that is not a rigid distinction. Throughout this letter we are reminded that what we believe must always influence the way we live, and the way we live always reflects what we believe.

The opening movements of the letter take us to the planning of redemption from before the foundation of the world, where the triune God purposed that God's people would be made heirs of the most glorious inheritance. In this sense they were 'in Christ' in that divine election (1:4), before they came to be in Christ through the application of redemption. God had a purpose of grace which Paul describes as 'the mystery of his will' in 1:9; a mystery not in the sense that it could not be known, but in the sense that it could only be known by revelation and disclosure.

Paul wants to thank God for the faith of the Ephesian Christians, who came to trust in Christ as a consequence of God's sovereign and gracious purpose. They are blessed 'in the heavenly places' (1:4 -- see 1:20, where this is used of Christ, 2:6,, of us, 3:10, of spiritual rulers, 6:12 of spiritual wickedness). It is an interesting phrase, reminding us both of the supernatural nature of the Christian faith, and of the reality of our present status. We are physically on earth, yet spiritually we are, even now, where Christ is. The consequence of that is that 'the Christian looks out upon lifre and the world, and in one sense he sees it as everyone else sees it, yet at the same time, he sees it differently. As Christians we do not look at anything as the world does, but as people who belong to the heavenly realm; we see everything differently, we see everything from the spiritual standpoint' (Lloyd-Jones, Ephesians, vol 1, p77).

The work of redemption, planned in eternity, has been accomplished in time through the death of Christ and applied in time through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Grace alone has the power to bring those who are spiritually dead alive again, and God has worked in the hearts of his people in such a way as to demonstrate that all of salvation is of grace. The Gentile believers in Ephesus are not second-class citizens because they did not belong to the 'commonwealth of Israel', but they are one body, members of the same household.

There is a very important lesson in all of this. There are no second class citizens in Christ's church. Some of us may have been brought up in the church all of our lives; we are familiar with the doctrines, the language and the routines. Others may be new to the church, converted from nonchurchgoing families, for whom everything seems strange and unfamiliar. Yet all are one; and perhaps one of the reasons Paul wrote this letter was to remind those who had come in from the outside that all who are in Christ are the recipients of the same blessings, and are debtors to the same grace -- 'this mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel' (3:6).

This, then, is the reality of God's eternal purpose -- that Christ has a church in the world, a 'family', which is to enjoy spiritual blessings here. One of the great emphases of Ephesians is on the church; arguably, no Pauline letter stresses the importance of the church quite like this one. The church is God's household (2:19), it is God's temple (2:21), it is where God's wisdom is made known (3:10), it is where God has the glory (3:21), it is the bride of Christ (5:25). And the church is also God's new creation -- 'we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them' (2:10).

All of us who are in Christ, whatever our background, whatever the extent of our previous involvement with God, are a new creation. The church is the dwelling place of God in the world, just as the tabernacle mirrored the creation, so the church mirrors the creation -- it owes its life to the Creator God, and exists for his glory, subject to his authority.

But where is the church? How do you recognise it? Someone once said of Jonathan Edwards' book The Religious Affections that he 'was taking a look at Protestantism's sacred domain -- the inner life -- and demanding that it be subjected to a public test' (John E. Smith, introduction to Vol 2 of the Yale edition of Edwards, 1959, p43). In a sense, that is exactly what Paul is doing. How readily do we move from the first part of Ephesians into the second? We emphasise the importance of the inner life, the spiritual life, the individual, unseen, spiritual blessings that are ours. But we must not stop there.

The new creation, according to Paul, manifests itself in good works. It is not a case of good works making us Christians, but of biblical Christianity demonstrating itself in our practise and in our lifestyle. What does that mean? Paul argues that the church has been equipped by the risen Christ to serve him in the world -- chapter 4 argues that the ascension of Christ has secured the gifts that are needed 'to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure fo the stature of the fullness of Christ' (4:12-13). This is the now -- we have the spiritual equipment we need to serve God in the world.

So we are reminded to live according to the power of the new creation, to 'put on the new self, created after the likeness of God' (4:24). Lest any of us think that this is some esoteric, exotic form of religious practice, listen to the way in which Paul fleshes this out. What does it mean to live as God's new creation in this fallen creation?

It means that we tell the truth to our neighbour (4:25), that we do honest work (4:28), that we put away bitterness, wrath and anger (4:31), that we deal with sexual immorality, impurity and covetousness (5:3), that we exercise control over our tongues, over our habits, over our time. It means that wives submit themselves to their husbands, and that husbands love their wives. It means that children obey their parenst and fathers bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. It means that slaves (and employees) serve their masters as serving Christ. It means that we put on the armour of God, so that we will be able to stand firm when evil abounds.

In other words, the now of our Christian lives, with all the blessings of the covenant of grace poured into these lives, is lived out in the ordinary callings of our providence. We cannot all be ministers and missionaries, but we are all blessed, and we are all called to serve the Lord where he has placed us. That, in turn, transforms our service. Our lives are different to those who have no place for God in their thinking. That does not mean that we won't face similar problems to the world in marriage, home and work; but it does mean that we have new motivations, new constraints, and above all a new goal -- to glorify God in all we do

So when you're trudging to work, remember that you are created in Christ to serve the Lord, and be all you can be for him. When you're running the children to playgroup, and you've to come back to clean up the dog's vomit from the kitchen floor before the Bible study comes to your house, and your harassed and bothered -- remember that you are created in Christ to serve the Lord, and be all you can be for him. When you're tempted to stop speaking to your Christian neighbour because of some small, petty thing that has kindled a huge flame -- remember that you are created in Christ for good works. You have blessings in Christ, as a consequence of which your life, your outlook, your behaviour, can never be the same again.

Let me illustrate this with a reference to a seventeenth century Carmelite monk, named Nicholas Herman, but who is popularly known as Brother Lawrence. Most of his time in the monastery in France was spent in the kitchen. Initially he hated that; but one day he had a profound sense of the nearness of God, which never left him. He felt as close to God carrying out the tasks of the kitchen as he did in his religious devotions. A book of his letters and some reminiscences published in 1692, a year after his death, became a classic text on the spiritual life. Entitled The Practice of the Presence of God, it contains the following observation by Brother Lawrence:

The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clutter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquillity as if I were upon my knees at the Blessed Sacrament. (www.ccel.org/ccel/lawrence/practices.iii.iv.html - Fourth Conversation).

That precisely is the message of Ephesians. We are blessed in Christ to be fruitful for him, to express our covenant love in faithful and diligent service, and to enjoy the knowledge of God even in the most mundane of routines.

Conclusion

So what is my current status as a Christian, as I live in the eschaton, with my ascended Lord and head in Heaven and I on earth? I am complete in Christ; there is nothing that I need apart from him; no second blessing, no definitive Spirit baptism, no 'other'. I am crucified with him; that is what makes me free, and what gives me the impulse to overcome sin and live by faith in the Son of God. I am created in him; incorporated into the church, which is his new creation, and called, equipped and enabled to glorify him in all the humdrum of my earthly life.

To put it otherwise -- in Christ, I am full, I am free, and I am fruitful; that kind of life is the best possible kind of life anyone could be living at this present time.

'Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever. Amen' (Ephesians 3:20-1).

Part 2 -- Heavenly blessings not yet ours

We have seen that in some of his writings, it was necessary for the apostle Paul to emphasise the present status and position of the believer, in order to encourage Christians to rest content with what Jesus had done for them, and to encourage them to continue living their lives to the glory of God. But equally true is the fact that in some places Paul had to emphasise things that lie in the future, in order to strengthen the faith of believers and encourage them to serve Christ now.

We are going to look at three more of Paul's letters to see how he addresses the situation of three groups of believers by lifting their eyes beyond the horizon of this world to better things to come.

1 Thessalonians -- waiting for the heavenly appearing (1:10)

The Thessalonian correspondence is among the earliest of Paul's letters, written probably about the year 50 or 51. Paul knew about Thessalonica -- he had witnessed and preached the gospel there after persecution had driven Paul and Silas out of Philippi on Paul's second missionary journey (recorded in Acts 17-19). This was the beginning of mission work in Europe as Paul responded to the vision of the man from Macedonia who beckoned him to 'come over and help us'.

The record of the mission in Thessalonica is told us in Acts 17:1-9. Paul preached on three successive Sabbaths in the synagogue, proclaiming the resurrection. Many believed, but the result was that there was an uproar in the city, with the Jews accusing the Christians before the city officials of acting against the decrees of Caesar. After a stay in Thessalonica, whose length Luke does not disclose, Paul and Silas departed to Berea, continuing the mission to Athens and to Corinth.

It was probably while he was resident in Corinth that Paul received a report from Timothy of the situation in Thessalonica. Obviously the needs of the church there were on his mind; he writes about them with a great deal of affection, comparing his presence among them like that of a 'nursing mother taking care of her own children' (2:7). The enforced separation was difficult -- 'we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person, not in heart, we endeavoured the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face because we wanted to come to you -- I, Paul, again and again -- but Satan hindered us' (2:17-18).

Timothy's report was the catalyst for the writing of the letter, and the first thing that thrills Paul is to hear that, notwithstanding the pressures and the threat of persecution, the believers had remained loyal to Jesus Christ. The message has been a means of encouragement to Paul himself, and he continues to pray that the Thessalonians will be established in holiness.

Paul spends a good deal of the first part of this letter explaining and expounding his ministry among the Thessalonians, and their reception of the Gospel. Possibly the need for this arose because there were some who were slandering Paul, and sowing seeds of doubt among the converts at Thessalonica, saying that he was just another of these itinerant, fly-by-night charlatan preachers who came, saw, made a fast buck, then disappeared. Part of Paul's concern is to remind them of the circumstances which had forced his departure, and also of the fact that the faith of the Thessalonians had not depended on him. It was obvious that the message was not received simply because it was the word of Paul or his companions; it was received through the power and conviction of the Holy Spirit, in joy and in affliction (1:6). The result was a complete change of life and outlook:

'you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come' (1:9-10).

This reference to the heavenly appearing of Jesus Christ introduces us to one of the important themes of the Thessalonian correspondence. It also reminds us that when people become Christians they do so because they have come to realise that this world is not all there is. Idols are earth-bound; they keep our eyes focussed on things below. But the Gospel transforms our outlook, shifts our horizons, changes our perspective. Through the Gospel we are taught by God to see things from a heavenly perspective and a completely new dimension. Christians know that there is a day coming when the glory of Christ will be revealed and seen as never before.

It is interesting and important to note that this theme of the second coming occupies Paul in both of the letters to the Thessalonians. There is a difference, however; in the first letter the emphasis is on the immanence of Christ's return -- on the fact that he could return at any time. In the second, the emphasis is on events which will precede the coming. Both of these strands of teaching are found in Christ himself, of course, and both must be a feature of our eschatology.

But what was it that occasioned this first letter? At least part of the answer to that question is that the Thessalonian Christians had really misapplied the doctrine of the second coming of Christ. They had been so fascinated by it and so taken up with the thought that Jesus could come back at any moment that two things happened as a consequence.

First, they had failed to apply this doctrine to their own personal lives. Some of them had stopped working and were living off the charity of others just because they were expecting Jesus to return at any moment. This in turn had a tendency to make them neglect the personal, ethical issues of the faith. They were being 'super spiritual' in the sense that the one, dominant theme for them was the second coming, but Paul has to remind them that the will of God is their sanctification; and that means living the lives God wants them to live.

The doctrine of the second coming of Jesus Christ continues to fascinate Christians. The phenomenal success of the 'Left Behind' series of Christian books, fictionalising a particular view of the second coming bears testimony to this fact. Even this year, a book on The Rapture is to be published on the 6th of June -- on 06/06/06! Yet we need to be careful that we do not succumb to the Thessalonian heresy of being distracted by aspects of the truth which lead us to neglect others. Just as Martha was cumbered and distracted by her service, we can be distracted by our theology. The acid test is -- 'what is the fruit of this theology?' what results are being seen in my life as a consequence of what I believe?

Secondly, the believers in Thessalonica had misunderstood how the doctrine of the second coming impacted on those of their number who had died. Paul has to address the situation in which some of those who had responded to the gospel had died and been buried. Lest he give the impression that it is wrong to grapple with these doctrines, Paul has a magnificent section in this letter on the proper application of the reality of the second coming of Christ.

His basic position is this: 'since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep' (4:14). The believers in Thessalonica mistakenly thought that death had the last word, that it was going to rob their brothers and sisters of something important when Jesus came again. Not so, argues Paul; the present status of the Christian is not the only reality. When you lovingly commit the sleeping body of the dead saint to the ground, you do so in hope. That is what the gospel did for you; it turned you from idols to serve God, and to wait for his Son from heaven.

Part of that waiting is the waiting of hope, the waiting in the assurance that even now the death of the saints is precious in the sight of the Lord (Psalm 116:15), and that what is sown in dishonour is to be raised in glory (1 Corinthians 15:46). The dead in Christ will rise first when the trumpet sounds. Here we are in the world of the dying, but we believe in a coming day when the coming Christ will raise his people.

Nicholas Wolterstorff is Professor of Philosophical Theology at Yale University. In 1983 his twenty-five year old son, Eric, was killed in a climbing accident in the Alps. In 1987 he wrote a wonderfully moving little book entitled Lament for a Son in which, with brutal honesty, he explores and recalls his response to the loss of his son. This is what he says:

To believe in Christ's rising from the grave is to accept it as a sign of our own rising from our graves. If for each of us it was our destiny to be obliterated, and for all of us together it was our destiny to fade away without a trace, then not Christ's rising but my dear son's early dying would be the logo of our fate.

Slowly I begin to see that there is something more as well. To believe in Christ's rising and death's dying is also to live with the power and the challenge to rise up now from all our dark graves of suffering love. If sympathy for the world's wounds is not enlarged by our anguish, if love for those around us is not expanded, if gratitude for what is good does not flame up, if insight is not deepened, if commitment to what is important is not strengthened, if aching for a new day is not intensified, if hope is weakened and faith diminished, if from the experience of death comes nothing good, then death has won. Then death, be proud.

So I shall struggle to live the reality of Christ's rising and death's dying. In my living, my son's dying will not be the last word (Lament for a Son, pp92-3).

That is where Paul runs with the doctrine in Chapter 5. The day of Christ's appearing will be a day of terror for those who do not believe. It will be the day of the thief. But look at how this is to impact our lives: 'since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation, for God has not destined us for wrath but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing' (5:8-11).

We have not yet seen this aspect of the glory of Jesus Christ. But we live in the light of Easter reality, in the light of the resurrection. All we have now is not all we have. Our present status is glorious, and will give way to something even more glorious, in the light of which we are to continue serving God, encouraging one another, being at peace, helping the weak, giving thanks in all circumstances.

The church at Thessalonica was a young church. Young Christians can sometimes be obsessed with things. They wonder why older Christians sometimes don't understand them, or share their enthusiasm for things. It's always been like that. Paul says to these young converts at Thessalonica to keep the glorious, heavenly appearing before them as their goal in life, their hope in death and the reason why they should live holy lives in Christ Jesus. So it is that this great letter concludes with the majestic benediction:

Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it (5:23-24)

That is the hope and joy, and blessing of waiting for the heavenly appearing.

2 Corinthians -- longing for the heavenly dwelling (5:2)

Paul's letters to the Corinthians were written just a few years after the Thessalonian correspondence. He had visited Corinth during his second missionary journey, and sent the letters to the believers there sometime during his third. According to Acts 18:11 Paul stayed in Corinth for eighteen months on the basis of the assurance he had from God that many in that city would come to faith.

The city of Corinth was an important Greek city-state of ancient origin, which housed the temple of Aphrodite, the goddess of love. It was a city of affluence and wealth, prosperity and luxury. In consequence, it was also a city of immorality and sexual promiscuity. To 'Corinthianise' was to live a life of debauchery and fornication.

Rome destroyed the city in 146BC, and it remained virtually a ruin for the best part of a century until Julius Caesar rebuilt it in 44. It began to flourish, and was populated with a mixture of Jews, Greeks and eastern peoples. It hosted the Isthmian games, second in importance only to the Olympics, and several allusions in 1 Corinthians are drawn from the sporting world.

Corinth was a polytheistic community; any god or goddess who was anyone had a temple or a cult at Corinth. Paul is thankful for the core believers who established the church there, people like Stephanas and his household (1 Cor 16:15), Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue and Gaius, were baptised as new believers in Corinth.

When Paul reached Ephesus, on his third missionary journey he sent a letter to Corinth which we do not have, but which is referred to in 1 Cor 5:9, in which he counselled the believers there to dissociate from those who were sexually immoral while professing to be Christians. A second letter required to be written (our 1 Corinthians) when a report came to Paul from members of Chloe's household giving an up-to-date report on the situation in Corinth.

Things could hardly have been worse. In a short time the believers had become divided into factions, some committed to Paul, others to Peter, others to Apollos and others to 'Christ'. They had begun to tolerate an immoral brother in spite of what Paul had counselled earlier. They had no problem with bringing matters in the church before the law-courts of the world. They had written for guidance on issues to do with celibacy and marriage, eating food offered to idols, the place of women in the church, the distribution of spiritual gifts, decorum in public worship, the Lord's Supper, the resurrection and other issues. Paul wants to point to the cross of Christ as the only authority to which the believer is subject.

These weighty subjects are not simply occasional problems. They are constant problems in the life of the church, and Paul's letter remains an important source of guidance and direction for the life of the church and the behaviour of God's people. It also had the desired effect:

For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it -- though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while. As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. For you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us. For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret (7:8-10).

But there was another consequence of his letter. There were some who questioned his authority to write as he had written. They attacked his character, saying that although his letters were weighty, his physical presence was nothing to write home about. As Robert Reymond puts it,

They claimed that since he was not one of the original apostles, he was not qualified to teach, and that he had no credentials, as did they, that he could show (3:1). They attacked his personal character by saying that he 'lived by the standards of the world' (10:2), that he was boastful (10:8), deceitful (12:16), and that he embezzled the funds for the poor that were being entrusted to him (8:20-23). (Paul, Missionary Theologian, p201).

For that reason, Paul devotes much attention in 2 Corinthians to his calling and ministry as an apostle. In spite of the detractors, the misrepresentation, the slander and the lies, Paul can talk of himself as one who is 'always led in triumphal procession' by God in Christ, through whom the fragrance of the knowledge of Christ is spread everywhere (2:14).

It could not have been easy to face such criticism, most of which was unfounded. Yet it is the common lot of Christians, not just apostles, pastors and teachers, to face exactly that kind of criticism. This is not the exception; it is part of the portrait the Bible paints of the believer:

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you (Matthew 5:11).

If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you (1 Peter 4:14).

I hear whispering of many -- terror on every side -- as they scheme together against me, as they plot to take my life. But I trust in you, O Lord, I say, 'You are my God' (Psalm 31:13-14).

In spite of the criticism and misrepresentation, Paul says, 'we do not lose heart' (4:1). The reason for his confidence is simply in the glory of the living Saviour -- 'we believe and we also speak, knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence' (4:13-14). In other words, Paul looks at his life and ministry in eschatological categories: 'we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal' (4:18).

It is this thought that opens up the great development of thought in chapter 5. It does not matter what becomes of this jar of clay, this tent which is our earthly home; we have the assurance of something permanent, something lasting. 'we are always of good courage' (5:6) precisely because we have the Spirit as a guarantee -- the first instalment of something to be realised in all its fullness in the future. We live in the now, in the in-between time, and it is characterised by groaning.

What sustains us in the face of the discouragements of Christian life and witness? What buoys us up in the face of suffering and loneliness? What do we have in the face of misrepresentation and slander? We have the hope of the Gospel, the assurance that when this earthly tent, this tabernacle, is destroyed, you have a permanent dwelling, not made with hands.

It is possible that Paul is drawing here on part of the New Testament tradition regarding the trial of Jesus. There is certainly an echo of the accusation brought against him in Mark 14:58:

We heard him say [said the false witnesses], I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and in three days I will build another, not made with hands.

There the slander was against Jesus as they misrepresented his prediction about destroying the temple and building another. Here the slander is against his followers, whose hope is that the tabernacle/temple (cf. 1 Cor 6:19, where temple imagery is used of the body, and again at 6:17, where 'we are the temple of the living God) will be destroyed and give way to a house not made with hands, to something eternal, secure, and permanent. In this present mode of existence we long for the putting on of that house.

I think there is a use here of the tabernacle imagery of the Old Testament. It is interesting that in the Book of Exodus the regulations for the construction of the tabernacle are intertwined with the regulations for the garments of the priests. Compare Exodus 26:1

Moreover you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twisted linen and blue and purple and scarlet yarns; you shall make them with cherubim skilfully worked into them

with Exodus 28:3-5

You shall speak to all the skilful, whom I have filled with a spirit of skill, that they make Aaron's garments to consecrate him for my priesthood .. they shall recive gold, blue and purple and scarlet yarns, and fine twined linen.

There was a sense in which the priests were to be clothed with the house; the patterning of the tabernacle covered the person of the priest. In 2 Corinthians 5 Paul merges the imagery: we are here in a tabernacle, travelling through the wilderness, strangers and sojourners like our fathers were; this is not our home, this is not our rest. We are heirs of the patriarchs, who lived in tents, heirs of the promise, acknowledging ourselves to be strangers and exiles on the earth.

It ought not to surprise us that the terrors of the wilderness surround us, that the inhabitants of the wilderness attack us, that the dust of the wilderness clings to us, that the pressures of the wilderness weaken us, that the temptations of the wilderness assail us, that the loneliness of the wilderness engulfs us, that the hardship of the wilderness discourages us.

But we do not lose heart. We have seen the promised land. We live and work in the now longing for the not yet, groaning with the desire to be further clothed with the robe of glory. We are not afraid of death. In the words of Thomas Boston, when the saints see death they say

Is this Mara? Is this bitter death? It went out full into the world when the first Adam opened the door to it, but the second Adam hath brought it again empty to his own people (Fourfold State, p247.

Death is just the exchange of something transient for something eternal. To use the illustration of Douglas Kelly in his study in 2 Corinthians New Life in the Wasteland, it is like the woman from the Isle of Lewis who had to move out of her black house with its floor of earth and the thatched roof falling in. 'She was weeping and refusing to leave her home, but soon enough she was fine when she got into her nnew house with its damp-proof course and running water' (p95). And that is Paul's encouragement: there is something heavenly waiting for him, for which he in turn longs.

All of which is reinforced by that little sentence at 5:7 -- 'we walk by faith, not by sight'. We are afflicted now, but not crushed; we are perplexed now, but not forsaken; struck down now, but not destroyed; longing to be clothed with the house from heaven which is not yet ours, but we have the Spirit as the guarantee. Walk by faith, then, lift your eyes beyond the tyranny of the immediate, follow righteousness and serve the Lord. Pray with the psalmist:

Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings, from the wicked who do me violence, my deadly enemies who surround me ... As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness (Psalm 17:8,9,15).

2 Timothy -- looking to the heavenly crown (4:18)

The Book of Acts closes with Paul in Rome, having appealed to Caesar, and finding himself for two years (probably from AD 60-62) under house arrest. He was still able to preach the gospel with boldness and without hindrance. So as Luke began his account of the life and ministry of Christ with a decree from Caesar in Rome, he ends it with Christ being preached in that very city.

The pastoral epistles of 1 Timothy, Titus and 2 Timothy fall outside the scope of this history. Paul was probably released from prison after these two years, and probably also left Rome on a fifth missionary journey. At some point he was arrested and imprisoned in Rome again, this time with little hope of release. Nero had persecuted the Christians with severity and cruelty following the fire of AD64. Perhaps Paul was being accused of complicity in this event. He was probably decapitated outside the walls of the city in AD 65 by order of Nero.

The last letter Paul wrote, therefore, has a special poignancy. Paul is burdened, not because he is going to die, but because he must leave the church behind; it is the church that is the object of his love and concern in these letters. Paul hopes that Timothy will be able to visit him before winter, but he knows that the time of his departure has come.

It is interesting to note how Paul's thoughts in this final letter dwell much on ultimate realities. As he encourages Timothy, by reminding him of the great purpose of God by which salvation came to us in Christ Jesus, he tells Timothy

But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me (1:12).

Of Onesiphorus, who diligently found Paul and ministered to him, Paul says 'may the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that Day (1:18). He tells Timothy that 'I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory' (2:10). He encourages Timothy to preach the word into the godlessness of these 'last days', solemnly charging him 'in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom' (4:1). This is a letter in which the 'not yet' is not far away.

Perhaps in the affluent West, with our comfortable lifestyles and our comparative wealth, we fail to appreciate the solemnity of this great epistle. This letter, as someone has said,

Is written in the shadow of the scaffold and is to be seen as what Paul considered to be important in his last communication to a trusted subordinate ... Those who live comfortably in secure communities should not belittle this contribution, for in many lands with anti-Christian governments, people still die for their faith. Indeed, there have been more Christian martyrs during the past century and a half than in the previous eighteen centuries combined ... There is no fanaticism here, nor any attempt at grandstanding. The apostle writes from a lowly posture and sets the example of the way Christians should die for their faith (Carson and Moo, Introduction to the New Testament, p580).

When God pointed out to Satan how different Job's lifestyle was, how righteous his servant Job was, Satan's response was, 'Does Job fear God for no reason?' (Job 1:9). The argument of Satan was that Job was righteous only for what he was getting out of it: 'you have blessed the work of his hands,' Satan says to God, 'and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face' (Job 1:10-11). The subsequent book proves that Satan is a liar indeed: Job honours God for God's own sake, not for his own.

Or, to use Jesus' words: Job, like Paul after him, has discovered that a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions (Luke 12:15). From a human point of view, Paul's boast to have fought the good fight was empty and hollow. Was he not now in a Roman cell, under the shadow of the scaffold? Listen to Calvin's comment:

This is evidence of his exceptional faith, for not only did everyone think that Paul was in an extremely wretched situation but that his death would also be shameful. So who would not say that he had struggled without success? But he himself does not depend on man's twisted judgements, but in his great courage he rises above every calamity so that nothing can interfere with his happiness and glory (commentary on 1&2 Timothy and Titus, p162).

The acid test is not what we are like when everything is going well, but what we are like when we are stripped of our comforts, bereft of our friends, and facing the bleakest of prospects. Can we then anticipate with longing, excitement and hope the heavenly crown which will be given to all those who love the appearing of Jesus Christ?

In one of his letters from prison, dated 27 March 1944, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, who would be executed by the Nazis the following year, Bonhoeffer reflects on Easter and observes that

'we are more concerned to get over the act of dying than to overcome death. Socrates mastered the art of dying; Christ overcame death as the last enemy. There is a real difference between the two things; the one is within the scope of human possibilities, the other means resurrection ... if a few people really believed that and acted on it in their daily lives, a great deal would be changed ... Do you find, too, that most people don't know what they really live by? (Letters and Papers from Prison, p240).

That, at last, is what Paul's theology is urging us to ask. Do we know what we live by? Is our perspective set by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the great hope of the church? What a transformation in our lives would result if we deepened our longing for the heavenly appearing, for the wearing of the heavenly house, and for the receiving of the heavenly crown, waiting for the time when the 'not yet' becomes the 'now'