Is God going to use human effort to fix the world? And if the answer is no, does that mean we shouldn’t do any good in the world? Thomas Oden:
“The Renewed Destiny of the Cosmos”
The purpose of God in redemption is not merely to prolong creation quantitatively [i.e. just to make it longer], but to redeem and perfect it qualitatively [to make it better]. This consummation has begin irreversibly in Jesus Christ.
The consummation does not come by human action, political strategy, revolutionary planning, or evolution, but by God’s own completing activity. This does not mean that God’s kingdom lacks political consequences, or that there is therefore no need for peacemakers or the struggle for justice in history. Rather it means that however imperfect is our own struggle for peace and justice, it will be perfected by God’s own peace and justice, finally, beyond history.
Thomas Oden, Classic Christianity, pg. 820
This seems to be at the heart of the book we’re studying on Sunday mornings: Revelation.