THE TWO WITNESSES.
Two books.
A few days ago, I received a book, sent by my oldest son, an important book, a possible ‘breakthrough’ book.
So, what book was this?
It was: LIFE AFTER DOOM, written by a prominent Christian writer, Brian D. McLaren, who finally, FINALLY, admits that the earth where we live, is doomed. DOOMED. We, WE, have made it inhabitable. Every day we read of another unnatural’ disaster, taking the lives of thousands. Any day now, living somewhere in North America, you may get a registered letter, cancelling your home insurance, because your environmental risks are too great. No fire insurance means no mortgage, so down goes its value.
When I survey the world, with wars in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, with crucial elections everywhere, with right-wing thinking – against environment – gaining, then this book makes imminent sense.
LIFE AFTER DOOM, has as subtitle, Wisdom and Courage for a World Falling Apart. Brian McLaren argues that we must read the Bible differently, a book, not about us and our souls, but about Creation, for whose restoration Jesus died to bring it back to its former glory, while we must be God’s co-workers in this process.
Stefan Paas, another prominent thinker, professor of Mission, has come to the same conclusion. In his 400 pages Dutch book, VREDE OP AARDE (Shalom on Earth), he and McLaren are in full agreement: two prominent witnesses!
Both books point to Revelation 11.
Both books remind me of Revelation 11, where, suddenly, two mysterious witnesses appear, both initially received by the church with open arms. Then illusion sets in, and, just as sudden, the church turns against them.
I can now see how these two modern witnesses will meet the same fate.
Why?
Because almost from its very beginning – see the apostle John’s letters – the church succumbed to Greek Gnosticism, separating body from soul, and promoting heaven at the expense of the earth, essentially causing our Climate Crisis. My (Presbyterian) Hymnbook still exalts the merits of heaven, a notion so ingrained in most churches, that most people, dying with that notion, will be faced with the naked truth that not heaven, but the earth is where we end up.
Back to earth: the final Truth
From the first chapter of Genesis to its very last chapter in Revelation 21, Creation occupies the Biblical center. This is plain from the categorial statement that in the new creation: “There is no TEMPLE there.” No temple means no religion. No religion means no bible.
Jesus did not favor religion: religion killed him. Jesus brought us LIFE, and LIFE means body, soul, spirit: total human involvement here, on the earth, God loves so much.
No temple also indicates that Organized Christianity has had its day. “There is no temple there’, suggests that we have to start moving that way now, and give our utmost effort and energy to the ‘cosmos’, to everything and anything God created in his wisdom, a world that we are uncreating.
Highly controversial.
Last Sunday our preacher was a Salvation Army Major. He preached on Romans 8. After the service, at the coffee hour, I expressed my full agreement with his presentation, centering on the birth of a new creation.
Since nobody joined in my conversation, it dawned on me that, basically, for the biblically illiterate, church and sermons are often a waste of time, because people lack the Christ-centered framework and the biblical infrastructure.
That to me is again a sign of the very last days, as the emphases now focus away from the Bible and away from the soul-destined heaven. This again became plain to me when the father of two murdered missionaries in Haiti, as reported in the New York Times, expressed his confidence that his children now were in heaven, in spite of Jesus’ repeated statements (John3: 13) that ‘nobody can go to heaven except Jesus who came from there’. Till the very last, just before his Ascension, Jesus told his followers again that, where he is going, nobody can follow.
On the contrary.
The entire human and biblical histories have only one aim: THE NEW CREATION. Jesus’ death on the cross was not primarily for our sins: its immediate aim was to wrest creation from the clutches of Satan: see John 3: 16. When Adam and Eve sinned, they transferred ownership of creation, God’s Holy Work of Art, to God’s great enemy. Jesus’ death and resurrection restored that ownership.
Still in doubt? Read John 3: 17:
“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
For these two witnesses the battle has just begun. The Church with Popes and Cardinals, Basilicas and Cathedrals, confessions and superstitions, will not lightly surrender its pomp and circumstance.