For those of us who were raised on images of an afterlife floating around in the sky playing harps
(like in the Saturday morning cartoons), today’s reading from St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans strikes
me as a very intriguing corrective.
It’s a passage that hints of a future not of surfing on cumulus clouds in some kind of wispy spirit
world, but of a new heavens and new earth, reconstructed by God himself. St. Paul says that when
Jesus returns, something new and indescribably wonderful will replace the groaning world we now
share.
But before we go any further with this line of thought, I’d like to make a distinction we’ve made once
or twice before. When Jesus returns, it won’t be to bring the kingdom of God. It’ll be to finalize the
kingdom of God. Jesus already brought the kingdom of God to earth some 2000 years ago. We’re
living in a period that’s been called the “already and not yet.” We already have God’s saving grace,
forgiveness of our sins, and the indwelling gift of the Holy Spirit to heal and empower us. We’re now
charged with the responsibility of spreading the good news of Jesus and being agents of God’s love
and healing on this injured planet. In other words, to spread the kingdom of God here and now.
The “not yet” is what Paul is referring to in today’s epistle reading. It can be a rather awkward topic
of conversation in this day and age. It’s almost with embarrassment that some dare to talk about the
end times, judgment, and the hope of what Paul calls “the freedom of the glory of the children of
God.” To speak openly of these things seems to invite raised eyebrows in many circles. Yet as
uncomfortable as our culture may be with all of this, the scriptures showcase these things as being
absolutely central to our Christian beliefs and lives. The miracle of the resurrection of Jesus Christ
is said to give us the opportunity to participate eternally with God in what the scriptures call the
coming new heavens and new earth. This will take place when Jesus “returns in glory to judge the
living and the dead” as the Creed says. It says, “His kingdom will have no end.”
While some may say this line from the Creed with a skeptical wink, it’s clear that Paul not only
believed every word of it, but that he was privy to some very intriguing specifics about some of what’
s going to happen at Jesus’ second coming. I wonder if he heard these things in conversation with
the disciples, or perhaps even from the risen Lord himself. We may never know in this life, but Paul’
s words are written not with doubt, but with authority. I’d like to focus this morning especially on the
hope that Paul shares with us—a hope that I think can sustain us in times of anxiety or
discouragement.
I’m going to focus especially on Romans 8, verses 18-25. Paul begins this portion of our passage
by kind of scoffing at the troubles we face as Christians in this life. He says that these troubles are
not even worthy of being compared to the glory about to be revealed in us when Jesus returns. The
day in which our redemption is completed is, in the words of Bob Dylan, like a “slow train coming
‘round the bend.” And when it arrives at the station, it will be unimaginably wonderful for those who
are in Christ. Regarding this verse, St. Chrysostom writes, “Whatever our sufferings may be, they
belong to this present life, but the blessings to come stretch forever.”
Next, Paul launches into something I find absolutely fascinating. Listen closely. He writes, “For the
creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was
subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the
creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of
the children of God.” Did you get all that? Neither did I.
Let’s untangle this one. Paul starts to put all of this into the context of the entire cosmos. He talks
about the impact of evil and of redemption on the entire creation! You see, it’s not just human
beings who’ve been impacted by the great rebellion against God and His ways, but all of creation.
Deep in the dim mists of prehistory, the scriptures say that Satan, the greatest of the created
beings, rebelled against the Creator along with a large band of angels. Besides eventually spurring
on the fall of humanity, Paul says that in some incomprehensible way this knocked everything in the
created order off kilter.
Revisiting an illustration might help us to better understand this. You may remember a few weeks
ago when I talked about J.R.R. Tolkien’s creative imagery of the Fall. He writes that the Ainur, or the
fallen angels, were members of the great celestial choir who rebelled against the direction of the
Conductor, and decided to sing according to their own tunes. The music of the rebels soon
deteriorated into an appalling dissonance. Humans in the choir eventually joined in this act of
rebellion. They were now violently out of tune with God’s musical score, and the whole choir
deteriorated in response, and has never fully recovered. In this way the beautiful music of the God-
created cosmos was torn and defaced by rebellion and sin, and it’s remained so ever since.
I think what Paul’s saying here is that the rest of the angelic choir has been waiting with bated breath
for God’s people to return and once again to sing in harmony and restore God’s music in creation.
And through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ they’ll sing more gloriously than they’ve ever sung
before.
This is where Christian hope comes in. Paul writes of the hope that the creation itself will be set free
from the bondage of decay. I’d like to spend a moment or two on this, because I think it says
something about what the promised new heavens and new earth will be like. The Greek word
translated as decay is phthoras, which carries a nuance of “deterioration” or “dissolution.” Think
about this. Paul says that the creation itself will be set free from slavery to deterioration. Those of
you who’ve ever had a course in physics or chemistry may be familiar with the concept of entropy.
What entropy is, is the tendency for things in the universe to deteriorate and eventually become
inert and uniform. Stars burn out and go dark. Mountains erode. Houses eventually fall apart. The
grass withers and the flowers fade (Isaiah). People age and die.
What Paul seems to be saying here is that, when our redemption is completed, that is, when Jesus
returns, it’s all going to change. The new heavens and new earth will no longer be subject to
entropy. It’ll be built to last. Do you see how this relates to human beings? Eternal life in new
resurrection bodies that will never grow old or decay, but will remain forever fresh, vibrant, and
youthful. Paul writes to the Corinthians, “…the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised
imperishable, and we will be changed.” And the extraordinary thing is that it’s not only human
beings that will be changed, but all of creation will become imperishable. Paul writes “Creation itself
will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of
God.”
This, of course, is unimaginable to us. It has to be the work of the Creator of the universe; He’s the
only One who could pull this off. We don’t know exactly what this will look like, but Paul says that the
present momentum of sin, death, and decay will be reversed forever and all creation will be set free.
The writer John Eldridge comments, “How wonderful this will be! Creation can be so breathtaking
now. What shall it be like when it is released to its full glory?” So we have the promise of future
glory in the imperishable new heavens and new earth.
Now Paul writes, “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and
not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we
wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.” As the cosmos looks ahead to the great changes
coming, it’s as if it’s been groaning in labor pains, wistfully pining for that great day. For one thing,
the pain of labor will be over. And for another, the infinitely priceless and indestructible new reality
will be born. And we of faith, who through Jesus have been indwelt by the Holy Spirit, groan as well.
Have you ever done that? Have you ever just longed right down to your marrow for things to be
right in this world? For people to love each other? For all the suffering to end? I can think of many
days when I’ve come home and blew a sigh and said, “Come, Lord Jesus.”
Paul knows the feeling. And here he connects this to us having the first fruits of the Spirit. This is
very significant. In the ancient Near East, the idea of first fruits would have been instantly
recognizable. The first fruits were commonly understood to be both the beginning of the harvest,
and the promise that the full harvest would follow in due course. What this is referring to is the time
between the completed work of Jesus on the Cross, and his coming again. We have the first fruits
promised by Jesus himself—the gift of the Holy Spirit—with the pledge that the completion of the
harvest at His second coming is on its way. Now we have the Spirit; then we’ll have flawless and
imperishable resurrection bodies in a new heavens and new earth not subject to decay. It’s the
“already” and the “not yet.” The kingdom has already come, but it will soon come to its day of final
and eternal completion, and you and I will be there front and center to experience it.
And this is where Paul brings all of this around to completion by returning to the theme of hope.
Because we do not, we cannot with our rational minds and our life-bound experiences see how all
this can be. It goes against everything we’ve been taught and everything we’ve experienced with
our senses. But do you know what Paul says? Paul says, “Who hopes for what is seen?” If we
could see it, it wouldn’t be hope, but just simple perception. But when something is so wonderful as
to be beyond our wildest and fondest imaginings, it’s hope that keeps it within our grasp. It’s hope
that keeps the coming reality alive in our hearts.
Sometimes in this life we feel we can keep ourselves safer by downplaying hope. We fear
disappointment. But I think what Paul’s saying is that it’s OK to let your hair down and hope!! My
friends, Jesus is coming again! Heaven is on its way! We don’t need to burden ourselves with some
austere, heavy, and dutiful form of Christianity which we endure out of some vague sense that there
may one day be relief. Rather, we have the unparalleled privilege of hoping for something too good
for words, and promised by God himself. And if there’s one thing we should know from reading the
scriptures, it’s that God keeps His promises.
So we do as Paul says, “we hope for what we do not see, [and] we wait for it with patience.” Here
the Greek actually indicates waiting with a sort of an eager patience in these last days. Eagerness
and patience are held in tension with each other. Do you remember what it was like when you were
a kid and summer vacation was on its way? If you exercised too much eagerness without patience
you weren’t focused enough on what needed to get done in the present, and your schoolwork
suffered. So it is with us, as Jesus has given us work to do before he returns. On the other hand, if
you exercised too much patience without eagerness, you may have become tired and pessimistic.
Without an eager expectation our hope may diminish.
So instead, we nurture both eagerness and patience, richly indulging ourselves on the sweet fruit of
hope, which gives us the energy to persevere in faith through the hardships of this present life. And
our promised reward one day will be the delicious freedom of endless summer thriving in the
sunshine of God’s eternal love. May we live fully in the already and the not yet, savoring our
citizenship in the kingdom of God, and looking ahead to that day when all things will be made new.
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
(like in the Saturday morning cartoons), today’s reading from St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans strikes
me as a very intriguing corrective.
It’s a passage that hints of a future not of surfing on cumulus clouds in some kind of wispy spirit
world, but of a new heavens and new earth, reconstructed by God himself. St. Paul says that when
Jesus returns, something new and indescribably wonderful will replace the groaning world we now
share.
But before we go any further with this line of thought, I’d like to make a distinction we’ve made once
or twice before. When Jesus returns, it won’t be to bring the kingdom of God. It’ll be to finalize the
kingdom of God. Jesus already brought the kingdom of God to earth some 2000 years ago. We’re
living in a period that’s been called the “already and not yet.” We already have God’s saving grace,
forgiveness of our sins, and the indwelling gift of the Holy Spirit to heal and empower us. We’re now
charged with the responsibility of spreading the good news of Jesus and being agents of God’s love
and healing on this injured planet. In other words, to spread the kingdom of God here and now.
The “not yet” is what Paul is referring to in today’s epistle reading. It can be a rather awkward topic
of conversation in this day and age. It’s almost with embarrassment that some dare to talk about the
end times, judgment, and the hope of what Paul calls “the freedom of the glory of the children of
God.” To speak openly of these things seems to invite raised eyebrows in many circles. Yet as
uncomfortable as our culture may be with all of this, the scriptures showcase these things as being
absolutely central to our Christian beliefs and lives. The miracle of the resurrection of Jesus Christ
is said to give us the opportunity to participate eternally with God in what the scriptures call the
coming new heavens and new earth. This will take place when Jesus “returns in glory to judge the
living and the dead” as the Creed says. It says, “His kingdom will have no end.”
While some may say this line from the Creed with a skeptical wink, it’s clear that Paul not only
believed every word of it, but that he was privy to some very intriguing specifics about some of what’
s going to happen at Jesus’ second coming. I wonder if he heard these things in conversation with
the disciples, or perhaps even from the risen Lord himself. We may never know in this life, but Paul’
s words are written not with doubt, but with authority. I’d like to focus this morning especially on the
hope that Paul shares with us—a hope that I think can sustain us in times of anxiety or
discouragement.
I’m going to focus especially on Romans 8, verses 18-25. Paul begins this portion of our passage
by kind of scoffing at the troubles we face as Christians in this life. He says that these troubles are
not even worthy of being compared to the glory about to be revealed in us when Jesus returns. The
day in which our redemption is completed is, in the words of Bob Dylan, like a “slow train coming
‘round the bend.” And when it arrives at the station, it will be unimaginably wonderful for those who
are in Christ. Regarding this verse, St. Chrysostom writes, “Whatever our sufferings may be, they
belong to this present life, but the blessings to come stretch forever.”
Next, Paul launches into something I find absolutely fascinating. Listen closely. He writes, “For the
creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was
subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the
creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of
the children of God.” Did you get all that? Neither did I.
Let’s untangle this one. Paul starts to put all of this into the context of the entire cosmos. He talks
about the impact of evil and of redemption on the entire creation! You see, it’s not just human
beings who’ve been impacted by the great rebellion against God and His ways, but all of creation.
Deep in the dim mists of prehistory, the scriptures say that Satan, the greatest of the created
beings, rebelled against the Creator along with a large band of angels. Besides eventually spurring
on the fall of humanity, Paul says that in some incomprehensible way this knocked everything in the
created order off kilter.
Revisiting an illustration might help us to better understand this. You may remember a few weeks
ago when I talked about J.R.R. Tolkien’s creative imagery of the Fall. He writes that the Ainur, or the
fallen angels, were members of the great celestial choir who rebelled against the direction of the
Conductor, and decided to sing according to their own tunes. The music of the rebels soon
deteriorated into an appalling dissonance. Humans in the choir eventually joined in this act of
rebellion. They were now violently out of tune with God’s musical score, and the whole choir
deteriorated in response, and has never fully recovered. In this way the beautiful music of the God-
created cosmos was torn and defaced by rebellion and sin, and it’s remained so ever since.
I think what Paul’s saying here is that the rest of the angelic choir has been waiting with bated breath
for God’s people to return and once again to sing in harmony and restore God’s music in creation.
And through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ they’ll sing more gloriously than they’ve ever sung
before.
This is where Christian hope comes in. Paul writes of the hope that the creation itself will be set free
from the bondage of decay. I’d like to spend a moment or two on this, because I think it says
something about what the promised new heavens and new earth will be like. The Greek word
translated as decay is phthoras, which carries a nuance of “deterioration” or “dissolution.” Think
about this. Paul says that the creation itself will be set free from slavery to deterioration. Those of
you who’ve ever had a course in physics or chemistry may be familiar with the concept of entropy.
What entropy is, is the tendency for things in the universe to deteriorate and eventually become
inert and uniform. Stars burn out and go dark. Mountains erode. Houses eventually fall apart. The
grass withers and the flowers fade (Isaiah). People age and die.
What Paul seems to be saying here is that, when our redemption is completed, that is, when Jesus
returns, it’s all going to change. The new heavens and new earth will no longer be subject to
entropy. It’ll be built to last. Do you see how this relates to human beings? Eternal life in new
resurrection bodies that will never grow old or decay, but will remain forever fresh, vibrant, and
youthful. Paul writes to the Corinthians, “…the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised
imperishable, and we will be changed.” And the extraordinary thing is that it’s not only human
beings that will be changed, but all of creation will become imperishable. Paul writes “Creation itself
will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of
God.”
This, of course, is unimaginable to us. It has to be the work of the Creator of the universe; He’s the
only One who could pull this off. We don’t know exactly what this will look like, but Paul says that the
present momentum of sin, death, and decay will be reversed forever and all creation will be set free.
The writer John Eldridge comments, “How wonderful this will be! Creation can be so breathtaking
now. What shall it be like when it is released to its full glory?” So we have the promise of future
glory in the imperishable new heavens and new earth.
Now Paul writes, “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and
not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we
wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.” As the cosmos looks ahead to the great changes
coming, it’s as if it’s been groaning in labor pains, wistfully pining for that great day. For one thing,
the pain of labor will be over. And for another, the infinitely priceless and indestructible new reality
will be born. And we of faith, who through Jesus have been indwelt by the Holy Spirit, groan as well.
Have you ever done that? Have you ever just longed right down to your marrow for things to be
right in this world? For people to love each other? For all the suffering to end? I can think of many
days when I’ve come home and blew a sigh and said, “Come, Lord Jesus.”
Paul knows the feeling. And here he connects this to us having the first fruits of the Spirit. This is
very significant. In the ancient Near East, the idea of first fruits would have been instantly
recognizable. The first fruits were commonly understood to be both the beginning of the harvest,
and the promise that the full harvest would follow in due course. What this is referring to is the time
between the completed work of Jesus on the Cross, and his coming again. We have the first fruits
promised by Jesus himself—the gift of the Holy Spirit—with the pledge that the completion of the
harvest at His second coming is on its way. Now we have the Spirit; then we’ll have flawless and
imperishable resurrection bodies in a new heavens and new earth not subject to decay. It’s the
“already” and the “not yet.” The kingdom has already come, but it will soon come to its day of final
and eternal completion, and you and I will be there front and center to experience it.
And this is where Paul brings all of this around to completion by returning to the theme of hope.
Because we do not, we cannot with our rational minds and our life-bound experiences see how all
this can be. It goes against everything we’ve been taught and everything we’ve experienced with
our senses. But do you know what Paul says? Paul says, “Who hopes for what is seen?” If we
could see it, it wouldn’t be hope, but just simple perception. But when something is so wonderful as
to be beyond our wildest and fondest imaginings, it’s hope that keeps it within our grasp. It’s hope
that keeps the coming reality alive in our hearts.
Sometimes in this life we feel we can keep ourselves safer by downplaying hope. We fear
disappointment. But I think what Paul’s saying is that it’s OK to let your hair down and hope!! My
friends, Jesus is coming again! Heaven is on its way! We don’t need to burden ourselves with some
austere, heavy, and dutiful form of Christianity which we endure out of some vague sense that there
may one day be relief. Rather, we have the unparalleled privilege of hoping for something too good
for words, and promised by God himself. And if there’s one thing we should know from reading the
scriptures, it’s that God keeps His promises.
So we do as Paul says, “we hope for what we do not see, [and] we wait for it with patience.” Here
the Greek actually indicates waiting with a sort of an eager patience in these last days. Eagerness
and patience are held in tension with each other. Do you remember what it was like when you were
a kid and summer vacation was on its way? If you exercised too much eagerness without patience
you weren’t focused enough on what needed to get done in the present, and your schoolwork
suffered. So it is with us, as Jesus has given us work to do before he returns. On the other hand, if
you exercised too much patience without eagerness, you may have become tired and pessimistic.
Without an eager expectation our hope may diminish.
So instead, we nurture both eagerness and patience, richly indulging ourselves on the sweet fruit of
hope, which gives us the energy to persevere in faith through the hardships of this present life. And
our promised reward one day will be the delicious freedom of endless summer thriving in the
sunshine of God’s eternal love. May we live fully in the already and the not yet, savoring our
citizenship in the kingdom of God, and looking ahead to that day when all things will be made new.
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Waiting Eagerly
Romans 8:18-25
Romans 8:18-25
July 20, 2008
Fr. Dan Tuton
Fr. Dan Tuton