Actually, Yes, Your Eschatology Does Matter

Sarah Jane:       And it’s Mrs. Wormwood?

Wormwood:      That’s correct.

Sarah Jane:       As a matter of fact, that’s in the Bible, Wormwood – the book of Revelation. At the end of the world, it describes a star falling to Earth and poisoning the waters – a star called Wormwood.

Wormwood:      Fascinating. Shall we move on to business?

The Sarah Jane Adventures S1 E0, ‘Invasion of the Bane’ (2007)¹

 

So the reason this picture works is because the SJA episode quoted above involved aliens trying to take over the world using a brand of orange fizzy pop, so combine that with the idea of something falling into the water, and there you go.

I think middle-class British evangelicals² generally behave as if it doesn’t matter very much what sort of view we take on eschatology. I think we’re kidding ourselves to a dangerous degree.

Eschatology, in case you’re not as much of a long-word nerd as I am, refers literally to the study of the last things, and in Christian theology to the understanding one takes of what’s going to happen at the consummation of the age (as the New Testament calls it) or the day of the LORD (as the Old Testament calls it). In other words, after now, then what? What’s the next stage in God’s plan for his creation?

It’s a topic the scriptures have plenty to say about, but the trouble is that there is profound disagreement over how the passages in question ought to be interpreted. And I suspect it’s at least partly for this reason that the specifics of eschatology aren’t talked about much in church. I’ve been lucky in that my experience of church at least since I came to university has been one where the fact that Jesus is going to come to earth again is mentioned quite a lot; by contrast, numerous ladies now part of the congregation in question have told me that when they were younger, they barely heard anything to that effect from the pulpit. But still, that basic doctrine itself is rarely accompanied by any actual detail, even when the passage being preached on seems keen to supply some. Someone asks a question, So does such-and-such represent such-and-such? only to be told, Well, the really important thing to get out of this passage is [insert the most basic doctrine you can think of; ‘God keeps his promises’ or something of that ilk]. And I’m not saying it’s never a good idea to emphasise an overarching point at the expense of a more minor one, or that there’s no value in being reminding of basic doctrine again and again and, indeed, again, but I'm thinking of scenarios where everyone in the room was a mature Christian: there should surely have been space to deal with the text in greater depth.

So why don’t we talk about eschatology in church? Well, for one thing, as I already mentioned, because it is so controversial, and we’re worried we’ll end up disagreeing with our brothers and sisters - as if some degree of that weren’t necessary in order for us all to progress to a fuller understanding of the gospel. Also because it’s weird, in that the day of the LORD inherently represents the collision of a natural world with which we’re directly familiar and a supernatural one with which we’re not, and we’d rather not have to confront that - as if locking this jazz up in a box of taboo subjects didn’t colour it as even weirder and more difficult to deal with than it was already. It’s a vicious cycle: we don’t talk about it, and so it becomes something we don’t talk about, if you catch my drift. The guy up the front won’t address it, because he doesn’t want to force his own particular views on the folks in the pews; but all that that achieves is that the folks in the pews never get any teaching on it, and don’t have any tools to evaluate people’s particular views when they come across them. (Another reason why church shouldn’t work like that – but that’s a matter for another time.)

And an inevitable side effect of all this - or equally, given the whole vicious-cycle thing, a contributing factor - is this common understanding that it doesn't actually matter very much what sort of view one takes on eschatology. If nobody in the church is talking about it, it can’t be that big of a deal, right? And so why bother wading into the controversy and the weirdness when you can just smooth over those obscure passages filled with odd details about the day of the LORD by saying, Well, the really important thing to get out of this passage is…

But if we’re in that mindset, we’re kidding ourselves. We’re disregarding truths that our Lord has explicitly told us it is important to understand (more on that in just a moment). We’re cheating ourselves out of a fuller and more awestruck grasp of God’s character and purposes. And we’re also running the risk that we’ll end up conducting ourselves foolishly in our everyday lives, because our view of the endgame has a profound impact on what we think we ought to be doing now.

I was recently out for dinner with a bunch of theologians,³ and the conversation somehow wandered onto the topic of certain Christians somewhere in the world who are so convinced that the day of the LORD is coming imminently that they neglect to take care of their children, because they don’t see the point in bothering if Jesus is going to show up any second now anyway. And yes, there’s a lot else in scripture that one would have to be ignorant of (or choose to ignore) in order to get from the doctrine to the behaviour, but the behaviour is still a result of the doctrine. Or similarly, think of all the believers throughout history who have tried to set up God’s kingdom on earth themselves - often with violence - because they took an eschatological view according to which their doing so constituted a necessary part of the proceedings for the ushering in of Jesus’ return. Again, their eschatology had a massive impact on the way they lived their lives.

Please note that the issue in cases like these is not merely whether Jesus will return or not. Granted, there are people who call themselves Christians and yet live their lives and sometimes even explicitly talk as if the day of the LORD is never going to arrive, but that’s a (more severe) problem all of its own, and it’s not what I’m addressing here. Cases like the above demonstrate that what we believe about the manner of Jesus’ return, and not only whether we believe in the mere fact of it, does influence our present behaviour. They also demonstrate that getting this stuff wrong can lead to a lot of harm to other human beings, which is a totally rubbish witness of the love of Christ to the unbelieving world, not to mention a deplorable sin in and of itself.

And maybe this is another reason why we don’t talk about eschatology – because we’re aware of the kind of damage that can result from people being keenly subscribed to certain eschatological views, and it seems safer just not to situate ourselves in any particular camp. It seems safer to brush aside the issue by saying, Well, the really important thing to get from this passage is ...

But it isn’t safer, not by any means. In which other area of doctrine would we ever cherish and uphold that kind of uncertainty and ignorance? Do we not place enough importance on the revelation of himself and his purposes that God has given us to try to understand what it is saying about the coming day of the LORD? And I do think that a reluctance to try to figure out what’s going on with eschatology reveals a certain disdain for scripture, because scripture is about as blooming clear as it could possibly be that it really matters that we understand this stuff.

As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the close of the age?” And Jesus answered them, “See that no one leads you astray … when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place” – let the reader understand … - Matthew 24:3-4, 15

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who have fallen asleep … for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. - 1 Thessalonians 4:13, 16-18

Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or by a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction … 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place … Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. – from Revelation 1:3

I’m not saying that having a correct understanding of eschatology is a necessary condition for being a born-again believer or anything – that would be ridiculous given that we can only begin to understand this stuff once we’ve already been granted the Holy Spirit – but I do think, as I say, that an awful lot of British middle-class evangelicals are kidding ourselves to a dangerous degree by behaving as if, provided we agree that Jesus is going to be returning at some point, it doesn’t matter what sort of view we take on the particulars. Eschatology may be a ‘secondary issue’, but so are an awful lot of the issues that we do talk about in church; just because they’re secondary to the fundamental tenets of salvation, doesn’t mean they aren’t still issues. And on top of that, I think you’ll struggle to find another secondary issue about which the Bible so emphatically urges its readers not to be uninformed or deceived.

All right, so let’s imagine for a moment that I’ve persuaded you, O Obliging Reader, and you’re keen to start figuring out this eschatology jazz, but you’re not sure where to start given that nobody talks about it in church. To you I offer a couple of fairly obvious pointers, which apply not only to this issue, but any other question of spiritual importance about which you feel underinformed:

1)     Read your Bible. And read it again. And assume that it means what it says. And make connections: I honestly think that if we knew our Old Testaments properly, we wouldn’t have very much trouble with the complex imagery in Revelation. And, of course, ask that God would grant you understanding. And don’t be disheartened if obscure passages in obscure minor prophets don’t suddenly spring into total clarity: the better you know the Bible, the more connections you’ll see, and the fuller a picture you’ll begin to understand.

2)    Get opinions. Ask your good Christian friends what they think. Raise this stuff in small-group Bible studies of relevant passages (and there are a lot of relevant passages, so you shouldn’t have to wait too long; praying for opportunities is also legit). Read commentaries.⁴ Look up terminology those commentaries use that you don’t understand. You’d be amazed how much you can learn even from random strangers on the Internet. And if you’re raising an eyebrow at that last possibility – well, that hardly seems a reliable source – then allow me to clarify: don’t mindlessly believe every opinion you gather, which you won’t be able to do anyway, because they’re bound to contradict each other. Rather, test everything against scripture: when you look at the passage in question, can you actually see what so-and-so claims is in there? Does this idea align with the fundamental tenets of salvation? Does it fit into the broader picture of God’s purposes that you’ve been busy striving to discern in ever greater detail, as per my previous point? Are you convinced? And if you’re not, keep digging and thinking and wrestling. It is not going to be a quick and easy process, but it is going to be a God-glorifying one, because you will be testifying that you think what he says is important enough to be worth your time and effort, your fascination and your frustration; and because, in striving to make sure that no one will be able to lead you astray concerning these things, you will be obeying what he has asked of you.

I pray that God would grant us all a fuller understanding of these things of which he has said we are blessed if we read, hear, and keep them; that as we understand more, so might we be more awestruck at and adoring of who he is; and that we would consequently conduct ourselves in a manner that both befits the coming of his kingdom and proclaims it to the world.

Footnotes

¹ The whole run of SJA is currently available on iPlayer: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b006qgb3?suggid=b006qgb3. You’re welcome. Oh, and thanks as usual to Chrissie’s Transcript Site and NowMyWingsFit.

² This is my best stab at defining the distinct church subsection of which I have had the most experience in the past few years. Other subsections may be similarly afflicted, but I can’t really speak for them.

³ We were at Oddfellow’s: https://theoddfellowsbar.co.uk/. It was very yummy – on the pricy side, but that’s probably at least partly a result of their commendable commitment to buying local.

⁴ Oh, were you expecting a footnote recommending a commentary or two? Nope, sorry, I just wanted to mention that the Babylon Bee’s take on different views about the thousand years described in Revelation 20 is very funny: http://babylonbee.com/news/bee-explains-different-viewpoints-end-times/. Like, maybe don’t start there, but I actually found it surprisingly useful for making sense of some of the stereotypes and pitfalls associated with each position.

Death Note and Divine Justice 3: God Defeated

“No, you are just a murderer, and this notebook is the worst murder weapon in history ... You’re just a crazy serial killer who has confused himself with a god.”

Death Note E37 ‘New World’ (2007)

More amazing fanart from newgrounds.com! This ace drawing of Near and one of his favourite toys is by Gypsy-Pattie.

If you’ve got a very good memory, you might recall that one of the minor Death Note characters granted a brief mention in my post last week was Teru Mikami, Kira’s biggest fan.¹ Late on in the series, Light Yagami recruits Mikami to help him continue his murderous rampage as Kira without being caught, a development at which Mikami is thrilled beyond thrilled. One memorable episode takes a good deal of time telling Mikami’s backstory: he was always outraged by the injustice in the world and strove to stand up to it regardless of what that cost him, but as he got older and the issues at hand became bigger than mere playground politics, it became harder and harder to achieve any sort of meaningful positive impact. So when some anonymous vigilante started killing criminals by unknown, apparently supernatural means, Mikami was totally behind him. Here we see a striking difference between Mikami and Light. Light only supported Kira whilst he knew he was Kira; he was only content whilst he himself was the one drawing the lines. Mikami, on the other hand, is quite content to let somebody else be judge of all the earth, if only he can offer his loyalty and service. He sees Kira’s power and acknowledges him as his superior. In actual fact, he even goes so far as to describe and address him as ‘God’.

Mikami serves his God wholeheartedly. He does everything Kira tells him without question, even when it’s something weird that he can’t see the point of, like creating and using a fake Death Note. He tries his very hardest to understand how Kira thinks, so that he might make the decision that would best please Kira in circumstances where he has no specific instructions (although it turns out Light was none too happy about Mikami’s decision to use the notebook to kill Kiyomi Takada after she got kidnapped). He considers it an absolute privilege to be able to be of service to Kira. He is in perpetual awe of him.

But of course, in the final episode of the series – skedaddle now if you don’t want to know how it ends – Light loses. His plan to kill the investigatory team dedicated to tracking Kira down – a plan in which Mikami was a key component – fails; he is outed as Kira in their presence by irrefutable evidence including words from his own lips; he is squarely defeated.

Mikami is more kinds of distraught by this development than even the lavish expressiveness of anime can communicate. “Why? Why won’t they die?” he demands, clutching a Death Note he didn’t realise was a fake planted by the investigators. He turns to address Light: “God, I did as you told me!”

The investigators swiftly apprehend him, and their leader, Near, gives a neat summary of the most cogent proof that Light is Kira. Light, at this point, is in almost as much of a state as Mikami, and certainly more of a state than we’ve ever seen his cool and collected self before. Sweating and trembling, he yells, “It’s a trap! Near set the whole thing up to frame me! … This is impossible. This is a setup. I don’t know that man.” This last comment refers to Mikami, whose distress consequently reaches even greater heights. After emitting a kind of strangled scream, he slumps, head bowed, and is silent.

A few minutes and a little more plot explanation later, Light’s colleague Matsuda shoots him a few times to prevent him from writing on a clipping of the Death Note that’s hidden in his watch. Light is left defeated, wounded, thrashing about on the damp floor of an abandoned warehouse in a growing pool of his own blood; it’s a pretty pitiful scene. Mikami looks on in horror as Light struggles to stand up. “Mikami, what are you doing?” Light manages to exclaim. “Write! Kill them!” He crumples back to the floor and lies there gasping. And at this point Mikami sees fit to stab himself to death with a ballpoint pen.

 

Ouch.

Yes, all right, it’s a fair bit grimmer than most of the televised entertainment I enjoy, but I assure you that it’s all very well done indeed. Besides, the fact that Light’s defeat was so grim and pitiful and undignified only really enhances my point.

Mikami thought Light was God. He really did. He would have followed him anywhere. And then he saw him overpowered by mere human beings, and his world completely collapsed. I don’t think it’s inappropriate to say that I imagine it’s quite similar to how Jesus’ disciples felt when they saw their Lord on the cross. They thought he was the Christ, the Son of the living God;² they would have followed him anywhere; and then they saw him overpowered by mere human beings, and it was grim and pitiful and undignified, and surely, surely their worlds must have completely collapsed. They had left everything to follow this man,³ and here he was defeated.

Or so it seemed. Because while Light was not really God, and really was defeated, Jesus was (and is) really God, and consequently was not really defeated. Anyone who can be overpowered by mere human beings against his will, is nothing greater than a mere human being himself, and so is most certainly not worth worshipping. It was because Mikami understood this that he was so profoundly distressed by Light’s defeat. When Jesus allowed himself to be overpowered, humiliated, and killed by mere human beings, on the other hand, it was exactly that; he was allowing it to happen.

Light had run out of options; he had no cards left to play, nobody to call upon except Mikami, whom he’d claimed he didn’t even know just minutes ago and who clearly no longer saw any reason to do the bidding of his defeated God. Jesus wasn’t out of options at all. At any moment he chose, he could have summoned thousands upon thousands of heaven’s soldiers to utterly destroy anyone to dared try to lay a hand on him.⁴ And yet, that entire time, while he was subjected to one grim and pitiful and undignified affliction after another, he allowed it.

Light panicked and said whatever he thought might save his own skin; he flat-out denied and betrayed a man who’d been utterly faithful to him and done everything he asked. Jesus, on the other hand, was so utterly faithful to those he had called that he suffered the death of the cross so that he might save them. As the onlookers taunted that he saved others but couldn’t save himself,⁵ he deliberately refused to save himself, even though he could have done, in order that he might save the very same others who had, panicking, not only failed to do what he asked, but flat-out denied and betrayed him. Panic and betrayal are human things; anyone who does them, again, is not worth worshipping.

Light’s plan didn’t turn out how he intended; it was scuppered by developments he hadn’t foreseen. What made his defeat real was that it wasn’t part of the plan. In Jesus’ case, on the other hand, that he should be overpowered and humiliated and killed was the very lynchpin of the plan, making all of that no real defeat at all. The cross was not only foreseen but foreordained; the Lamb has been slain since the foundation of the world.⁶ God is almighty and all-knowing and so nothing can ever scupper his plans; anyone whose plans can be scuppered by unforeseen developments is, yet again, not worth worshipping.

To be fair, Mikami should really have seen it coming that his God would turn out to be a bit rubbish. Right from when Light first contacted him, it was clear that it was because he needed something from him; Mikami himself twigged straight away that Light couldn’t move or speak freely, and that that was why he asked Mikami to act on his behalf. Anyone who has to rely on the cooperation and competence of human beings to bring about what they desire and intend is not worth worshipping. God doesn’t involve us in the fulfilment of his plans because he needs us in order to make them work, but because he is gracious.

And indeed, God is gracious: he’s more than just just. When Light set himself up as the god of the new world he tried to create, just was the only trait he was interested in displaying. He wasn’t trying to be gracious or merciful or loving or holy or patient or faithful or any of that – and, as I’ve discussed over the past couple of weeks, he wasn’t even successful at being just. He was a mere human being and, like all mere human beings, he wasn’t worth worshipping. When he tried to play God he wound up defeated.

The true God is never defeated. Jesus suffered what he did on the cross because God is gracious and merciful and loving and holy and patient and faithful and, yes, just; far from proving him fallible, as Light’s defeat did him, that suffering displayed the perfection of the divine attributes to a fuller extent than anything else. When we look on the cross – as grim and pitiful and undignified as it might seem – we are not, like Mikami, looking on our God defeated. On the contrary, we are looking on the greatest victory ever won.

Footnotes

¹ Box on the right for the first two-thirds of this little series, and for Death Note itself, Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/browse?jbv=70204970&jbp=0&jbr=1.

² Or at least Simon Peter did: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+16&version=ESVUK.

³ Again, as Simon Peter said: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+19&version=ESVUK.

⁴ As he said himself: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+26&version=ESVUK. Twelve legions, incidentally, was more than half the military might of the whole Roman Empire at the time. (And obviously angelic soldiers are a little bit better than human ones.)

⁵ As recorded here: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+27&version=ESVUK. I’ve been consistently giving you the Matthew reference for facts that show up in more than one gospel, by the way. Do feel free to go on a hunt for the equivalent bits in the others.

⁶ This is the reference, https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+13&version=ESVUK, but you’ll notice that the ESV’s sentence structure doesn’t corroborate my assertion. For my commentary on that point, see footnote 10 in my post ‘Plan B’, which I wrote in January 2018. Ugh, look at me referencing myself…