Recapitulation – God’s reverse engineering of creation. Eschatology has tended to mean that which is to come. Then it meant that which is to come which has actually come in Christ, the proleptic future. Now it means the bow wave of God’s work of recreation, coursing through the created order, renewing everything in line with the end. It’s quite an image, and an idea, and in one sense challengeable at every point, yet we see by faith not be sight. The Church is on the crest of that bow wave, or it should be. Sometimes it isn’t. The world seeks to resist that bow wave, puts up its sand banks, and storm walls. But God just does a new thing, outflanking the world. A crucified God: who’d have thought it?
Douglas Knight reminds us, once again, that we are grafted into Israel, not the other way around. We then partake of Israel’s paideia. We are in the same school as them. Yes, things are different, for Christ has come, who has summed up Israel in himself, yet also, the people of Israel are still being formed. Their story is not a handy source of illustrations, much as we might refer to Shakespeare, or Dickens for illustrations; their story is our story, which is God’s story, his narrative. Israel is still central to God’s plans. This is the election of God, through which the world is blessed.
Pay a visit to the all-new Solly Gratia.
You can find out more about The Eschatological Economy at Amazon.com or at Amazon.co.uk or at Eerdmans
