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TechnoratiMcEwan is fascinated with the fact that, especially in America, the book of Revelation is still taken seriously. While his direct attention is given to religious forms of apocalypticism, he also acknowledges the fact that many secular ideologies end with an explicit eschatology. But Marxism and radical environmentalism do not threaten his peace of mind as Christianity does. Why? Because Christian eschatological beliefs still influence politics in the West (even as Islamic apocalypticism influences the Muslim world).
He writes:
Thirty years ago, we might have been able to convince ourselves that contemporary religious apocalyptic thought was a harmless remnant of a more credulous, superstitious, pre-scientific age, now safely behind us. But today prophecy belief, particularly within the Christian and Islamic traditions, is a force in our contemporary history, a medieval engine driving our modern moral, geopolitical, and military concerns. The various jealous sky-gods - and they are certainly not one and the same god - who in the past directly addressed Abraham, Paul, or Mohammed, among others, now indirectly address us through the daily television news. These different gods have wound themselves inextricably around our politics and our political differences.
The human mind cannot help but look to the end. For this reason, eschatology will always be a central feature of any worldview or belief system. The Christian doctrine of eschatology is necessary to the biblical story and to the Gospel narrative.
Put simply, the Christian story unravels unless God brings the entire course of human history under His visible and perfect judgment, unless God's justice is perfectly displayed, unless the Christ is revealed in glory so that every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father [Phil. 2:11], unless Christ claims His redeemed people, unless God's triumph in Christ over death, sin, evil, and injustice is made universal. Put simply, unless every eye is dry and every tear is wiped away.
There is no Christian Gospel if history simply unwinds into a meaningless puddle, if the cosmos simply escapes into a cataclysmic black hole, or if the universe finally dies of exhausted energy. Without belief in a biblical eschatology, there is no Christian hope. Without a sense of perfect moral judgment in the end, the human heart is homeless.
Ian McEwan fears belief in eschatology. We should be far more fearful of living among those who fear no judgment to come. History cries out for judgment, and so does the human heart. Atheism offers no final hope, and no hope of moral satisfaction.
The Bible ends with just such a hope, and this confident hope frames the Christian worldview in the end as much as the belief in divine creation frames the beginning. Even so, Lord come quickly.
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R. Albert Mohler, Jr. is president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. For more articles and resources by Dr. Mohler, and for information on The Albert Mohler Program, a daily national radio program broadcast on the Salem Radio Network, go to www.albertmohler.com. For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to www.sbts.edu. Send feedback to mail@albertmohler.com. Original Source: www.albertmohler.com.
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