Already, but not yet. The great humanitarian Albert Schweitzer introduced this concept over a century ago. He observed that the New Testament writers spoke of eschatology in two senses.  They wrote that God’s kingdom and all of its related blessings had arrived to a degree, but it had not come to its completion. It had emerged in part, yet the perfect had not yet appeared.

 

One of the clearest instances of this phenomenon is found in 1Corinthians 13. Paul sees the particular spiritual manifestations as an eschatological demonstration indicating that the consummation had begun. At the same time, he argues that this demonstration was evidence that the fullness was not yet complete. In 13:9-12, he states, “For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.”

 

When writing 1Corinthians, Paul considered himself to be living in a time that was “in part.” He awaited the arrival of the perfect at which time he would know God face to face and be known fully by God. As he wrote, he could see the perfect but only dimly. In a short time, he expected to see clearly and to reach eschatological adulthood. He and the Corinthians were experiencing already a measure of the promise, but they were not yet enjoying its completion.

 

Paul makes a similar observation in Colossians 1:13. “He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son.” Here Paul asserts God had incorporated him and his readers into the messianic kingdom. Yet in 2Timothy 4:1, Paul shows that the kingdom had a certain future element to it. “In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I solemnly urge you…”

 

Other eschatological texts reveal a similar already-but-not-yet pattern. Consider resurrection. Paul’s classic resurrection text is 1Corinthians 15. Here, he clearly anticipates the resurrection event. However in Ephesians 2:5-6, Paul affirms that God had already “raised us up together, and made us sit in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”

 

In Romans 6:4-5 Paul employs the already-but-not-yet of resurrection in the space of two sentences. Paul affirms that his first-century audience has been raised from the dead already, yet they awaited a future resurrection. Likewise, this model appears in Philippians 3:9-16. Paul announces his eschatological hope of reaching the resurrection. He affirms that he had not yet attained that goal, but meanwhile he would press ahead. Nonetheless, he boldly asserts that he and his original audience had already arrived to a degree. They were resurrected already—but not yet.

 

Another famous already-but-not-yet passage is Hebrews 6:5. The author speaks of those who “have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come.” The readers had begun to encounter the blessings of the kingdom of God, but they continued to wait for the age to come. It hadn’t fully arrived yet, but their experience indicated the imminence of the completion of the new age.

 

Once theologians saw this already-but-not-yet pattern in the New Testament they couldn’t ignore it. Following Schweitzer, many writers picked up this theme and built upon it in their unique ways. Here’s a quick rundown:

 

Rudolf Bultmann recognized an eschatological process in the New Testament, but he assumed that the expectations of Jesus and the disciples came to naught. Therefore, he suggested that the eschatological process described the existential experiences of Christ coming into the lives of believers.

 

Following Bultmann, C.H. Dodd spoke of a realized eschatology that Jesus developed over the course of his ministry and that the earliest disciples transformed in light of a “failed return” of Christ. A new era started with Jesus’ kingdom proclamation, and it is consummated as individuals enact “a re-living of the decisive moment at which He came” (Dodd, Parables of The Kingdom, p.164-165). Even so, Dodd expected a further eschatological event occurring “beyond history” (Dodd, The Coming of Christ, p.17.)

 

George Ladd and John A.T. Robinson proposed an inaugurated eschatology in which the end of the age had begun with the life and ministry of Jesus, yet the fullness of the kingdom would arrive in one form or another sometime in the future—either on earth or postmortem.

 

Wolfhart Pannenberg argues that Jesus encapsulated eschatology in himself, and therefore, he is the forerunner of a kingdom that will manifest itself sometime in the future.   He maintains that “God’s revelation in history also has the form of an anticipation of the definitive manifestation of his eternal and omnipotent deity in the event of the consummation of all time and history” (Systematic Theology, 3:531). Pannenberg sees Jesus as the embodiment of the future while inspiring us to life proleptically toward a future arrival of the kingdom of God.

 

Jürgen Moltmann has introduced what he calls “an eschatology of hope.” Drawing from Karl Barth and Ernst Käsemann, Moltmann recognizes the eschatological sense communicated in the New Testament, and he attempts to transform eschatology from a study of so-called last things into a means by which humanity can experience liberation. He insists that Christ initiated a movement of hope that allows humanity to anticipate a new creation. He writes, “[F]aith in the resurrection becomes faith that raises up, wherever it transforms psychological and social systems. So that instead of being oriented on death they are oriented on life” (The Crucified God, p.294). ‘Hope’ becomes central to Moltmann to the extent that he continues to anticipate a divine judgment and universal homecoming in which “all things will be liberated and saved” (The Coming of God, p.255).

 

Liberation theologians such as Gustavo Gutiérrez, Johann Baptist Metz, and Clodovis and Leonardo Boff find power in the eschatological message to address oppressive social structures. This, they suggest, will consummate God’s inaugurated eschatological program. The “human forms of liberation…point toward, and embody in anticipation, what God has definitely prepared for human beings” (Leonardo Boff, Liberating Grace, p.152).

 

The popular and brilliant Anglican Bishop of Durham, N.T. Wright, argues that Jesus’ teachings and praxis inaugurated the kingdom of God. However for Wright, Paul, picks up this theme and envisions a cosmic renewal sometime in our collective future.

 

Schweitzer recognized the already-but-not-yet in the New Testament, and he also saw that the New Testament authors believed that they would live to see the fullness of the eschatological blessings. He looked at passages like Matthew 23:34 and Romans 13:11-12 and concluded that Jesus and his earliest followers believed that they were living in the last days. They believed that they were the generation that would experience the eschatological transformation. He observed that the first-century church “became convinced that they are destined to experience the Judgment and the Coming of the Kingdom” (The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle (1998), p.230).

 

He concluded, however, that their hopes were misplaced and that the eschatological end they expected to see did not materialize. He, and most of those who followed his lead, assumed that Jesus and his disciples expected the end of the space-time universe (to borrow a phrase from N.T. Wright). Because their hopes supposedly failed to occur, the world continued as before and they had to find a way to redefine their hope.

 

Scholars tackled the so-called problem of the “delay of the parousia” in various ways. Schweitzer developed what he called “Christ mysticism.” Bultmann and his “demythologizing” thesis dominated the second half of the twentieth century. He looked at eschatology in terms of an individual’s existential experience. More recent scholarship—including the works of E.P. Sanders, N.T. Wright, Marcus Borg, Dominic Crossan, and Scot McKnight—has attempted to recontextualize Jesus and Paul by recognizing the historical context in which their eschatological teachings fit.

 

The recent research provides a powerful corrective to the de-historicizing of Jesus and Paul. However, all of the popular authors continue to pull elements of the New Testament’s eschatological imminence into our future. In other words, while they recognize a great deal of “already” they continue to make room for plenty of “not yet.”

 

In 1971 Max King published his seminal work, The Spirit of Prophecy. This book provided a framework for seeing the entirety eschatology, including the book of Revelation, as being consummated already. For King, there was no “not yet” to be realized in the fulfillment of God’s redemptive promises. He showed how we might understand God’s kingdom being realized in it fullness already.

 

Then in 1987 he released his massive book The Cross and the Parousia of Christ. This volume begins with an extended survey of the way key authors have dealt with the problem of eschatological time in the New Testament. He then provided one of the most extensive explorations ever written on the controversial subject of resurrection. King argued that the resurrection spoken of in 1Corinthians 15 has been fulfilled already, and this fulfillment signals God’s current full presence with humanity.

 

Reading through the New Testament, I find that Jesus, Paul and the other writers clearly expected that the Kingdom and all of its blessings would arrive in their day. Consider Matthew 10. In verse 7, Jesus commissions the disciples to travel through the cities of Israel proclaiming, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Then in that same discourse, Jesus assures his disciples, “You will not finish the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.” As an echo of the Daniel 7 prophecy, Jesus anticipated that the eschatological event would take place in the lifetime of the twelve.

 

Peter, one of the original twelve, shared Jesus’ expectation. Writing in the mid-first century, he reminds his contemporaries, “But the end of all things is at hand; therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers” (1Peter 4:7). Peter recognized the “already” of the kingdom and saw the proximity of the completion of the “not yet.” He was certain that it was just about here.

 

James the brother of Jesus wrote about his belief in the then-imminent arrival of the eschatological events. He encourages his persecuted readers, “You too must be patient. Make your hearts firm, because the coming of the Lord is at hand” (James 5:8.) From there he assures them of their vindication, “Behold, the Judge is standing before the gates” (James 5:9).

 

Even the mysterious book of Revelation contains repeated references to its author’s belief that the vision would occur very soon. “The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, to show his servants what must happen soon. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John… Blessed is the one who reads aloud and blessed are those who listen to this prophetic message and heed what is written in it, for the appointed time is near” (Revelation 1:1-3). The vision ends with an assurance. “Do not seal up the prophetic words of this book, for the appointed time is near… Behold, I am coming soon” (Revelation 22:10-12).

 

“Soon” for them two thousand years ago simply cannot mean “soon” for us today.

 

So, what explains the “already-but-not-yet” of the New Testament authors—especially in relationship to the sense of imminence permeating the New Testament? Unlike most of their contemporaries, the New Testament writers saw God’s kingdom arriving through a process, not all at once. They understood themselves to be living in the climatic period in which the fullness of God would fill all-in-all. They believed that the historical events surrounding the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus inaugurated the cosmic eschatological process, and this process would reach its goal within their lifetimes.

 

Drawing from Jesus, they anticipated the catastrophic fall of Jerusalem to mark the full end of one age and the full incoming of the new age. In Matthew 24, Jesus envisioned this dreadful event and the events leading up to it. He calls it a time of war when nation would rise against nation. He warns the twelve that they will be persecuted and even killed. He advises that anyone living in Jerusalem when the city is surrounded by the Roman legions should flee to the Judean mountains; there would be no Maccabean miracle. He employs the cosmically symbolic language of a darkened sun, bloody moon, and falling stars to picture the extent of the happenings. The disciples may not know the precise hour of these events, but they can be assured that “this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place” (Matt. 24:34).

 

The end of one world-order of a dead humanity (symbolized by Israel under law) would be replaced by a new world-order of a living humanity (symbolized by Israel delivered). The New Heaven and New Earth (the new world-order) would be filled with God’s righteousness—which is another way of saying God’s promises to the fathers to bless all families of the earth would become a reality (Romans 15:8). This world-order remains forever, and it is a world-order of life and godliness, reconciliation, and one in which all know God from the least to the greatest.

 

So where does that leave us today? It means that we have enough, already. That we are enough, already. That God has given us enough, already. Humanity does not have to wait for some indefinite future to arrive when a utopian world will descend from above, or when ‘the faithful’ will float away. It is enough already because God has given us the divine fullness already.

 

Looking forward to a supposed end of the world causes us to miss the perfection of the now. Hoping that God will do something that he has already accomplished will drive us to separate the world into camps of saved and unsaved. Attempting to live proleptically in a way that we don’t believe we can actually achieve leaves us feeling dis-integrated as we “fake it until we make it.” The saved can’t live in peace because they have the ongoing mission to save the unsaved—who themselves aren’t at peace because they’re unsaved.

 

Believing that we are “not yet” enough causes us heartache, depression, division, and even warfare. Even more, if we believe that we are “not yet” enough, we may live with a morbid death wish compelling us to despise this life and long for our demise so we can finally be enough in the afterlife.

 

However, if we begin to see that we have enough, that we are enough, and that God has given us enough already then we can begin to live—truly live both now and forever. We can experience the all-sufficient grace of God that fills all-in-all.

 

 

URL: http://www.presence.tv/cms/cov-enough-already.php

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