The Enemy of My Enemy...
I think U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” is not just a spiritual in the musical sense. It is a deeply theological song. Some think that it can’t be a “Christian” song, because Christians have found the answer in Christ, but that is not the discontent that the song is communicating. Bono understands the Gospel and believes in redemption through Jesus Christ. The thing that he is still looking for, is the same thing that we all are: a fully realized Kingdom.
We exist in the “already not yet.” We have tasted the Kingdom of Heaven, but we don’t yet have it completely. And where that is most easily seen is in death. Sure, some would have you believe that death is no longer an enemy. But then it isn’t really our friend either.
Jürgen Moltmann expressed the frustration well a few years ago:
I do not believe in a heaven that so many embrace, where people sit around in the clouds playing harps. That transcendent, “spiritual” vision is not found in Scripture. The bible talks about a future hope where heaven and earth are one; where we have experienced a physical resurrection. And that hope as well as the reality of the “already not yet” of the Kingdom inspires us to live today as though the hope were more than just a future. We want to live as citizens of the Kingdom now.
Moltmann again:
We can live in that hope and still acknowledge that death is not good. It is not a gift or a friend and I look forward to the day when it is defeated once and for all.
We exist in the “already not yet.” We have tasted the Kingdom of Heaven, but we don’t yet have it completely. And where that is most easily seen is in death. Sure, some would have you believe that death is no longer an enemy. But then it isn’t really our friend either.
Jürgen Moltmann expressed the frustration well a few years ago:
“The nearer I am coming to my death, the more I am reflecting and expecting with the Nicene Creed the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. I don’t want to go to heaven. Heaven is there for the angels, and I am a child of the earth. But I expect passionately the world to come: The new heaven and the new earth where justice dwells, where God will wipe away every tear and make all things new. And this expectation makes life in this world for me, here and now, most lovable.” –Moltmann “Thinking Means Transcending: On the Philosophy and Theology of Hope”
I do not believe in a heaven that so many embrace, where people sit around in the clouds playing harps. That transcendent, “spiritual” vision is not found in Scripture. The bible talks about a future hope where heaven and earth are one; where we have experienced a physical resurrection. And that hope as well as the reality of the “already not yet” of the Kingdom inspires us to live today as though the hope were more than just a future. We want to live as citizens of the Kingdom now.
Moltmann again:
“Believing in the resurrection does not just mean assenting to a dogma and noting a historical fact. It means participating in this creative act of God’s … Resurrection is not a consoling opium, soothing us with the promise of a better world in the hereafter. It is the energy for a rebirth of this life. The hope doesn’t point to another world. It is focused on the redemption of this one.” -Moltmann “Jesus Christ for Today’s World”
We can live in that hope and still acknowledge that death is not good. It is not a gift or a friend and I look forward to the day when it is defeated once and for all.
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