A Fresh Perspective

The British atheist Malcom Muggeridge joined the Catholic Church at the age of 79. When he was asked to explain his conversion, he said that all the books and sermons he had read had little, if any, persuasive influence upon him. But when he saw Mother Teresa in Calcutta with the poor, he said, “If this is it, I’ve got to have it.” On the other hand, Swiss physician Paul Tournier tells about going back to his medical school to visit his favorite professor just after he had written his first book. As they sat in the gathering gloom of a Swiss winter afternoon, Tournier read from his new book. When he finished his reading, he looked up and there were tears in the old man’s eyes. “Oh Paul,” he said, “that’s a wonderful book. Everyone of us Christians should read that.” Tournier was surprised and exclaimed, “I didn’t know you were a Christian, professor. When did you become one?” “Just now,” he responded, “as you read your book.” I’m sure people of other religious traditions could tell...

How will God’s dream for the world (kingdom) be realized in the future? Will it come about by means of a dramatic, divine intervention? Most Christian interpreters assume that the early church believed Christ would return visibly and personally to judge evil and finally fulfill the promise of the future kingdom. It is difficult, however, to actually know how literally they understood the expectation of Christ’s “coming” ( parousia ). The basic meaning of the word is “presence.” Of course, if someone is absent and later becomes present, then that person has “come back” or “returned.” But in one sense Jesus never left. In the New Testament the Spirit functions as the equivalent to the living presence of Christ in the church and in the world. Understood in this light, Jesus’ “coming” is not an invasion from the outside, but an unveiling, manifesting, appearing from within as the central agent in the realization of God’s new world. New Testament scholar N. T. Wright has argued that the...