Join us in this enlightening episode as we delve into the provocative teachings of Bishop N.T. Wright, a figure stirring discussion in theological circles with his book, ‘Surprised by Hope.’ We explore his claims that challenge widely held Christian beliefs about life after death, resurrection, and heaven. Through a series of interviews and scriptural insights, we dissect the bishop’s arguments and their implications for modern Christian doctrine.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
SPEAKER 02 :
I lived in England back in the 60s and it seemed like every spring one or another bishop of the Church of England would publish some new outrageous doctrinal idea, an idea about God. After a while, I figured out what was going on. I think that every spring, early, maybe January, the bishops would draw straws to see whose turn it was to create a big controversy in the news before Easter. It got everybody thinking about the church and about Christianity and probably increased the attendance at church on Easter Sunday morning. Well, I never did figure out for sure what was going on, but this year it sounds like Bishop N.T. Wright, who’s Bishop of Durham, drew the short straw because he’s published a book titled, Surprised by Hope, Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church. After 2,000 years, we’re going to rethink all that, are we? Now, to boil down his most provocative idea, are you ready for this? Here it is. Christians do not go to heaven when they die. Time Magazine’s David Van Bema interviewed Wright by phone not long ago, and I found the bishop refreshing in his willingness to go to Scripture for answers. And I gather from what I read about him that this is nothing new for Tom Wright. Time Magazine asked this. At one point, you call the common view of heaven a distortion and serious diminution of Christian hope. Wright says, well, it really is. I’ve often heard people say, I’m going to heaven soon and I won’t need this stupid body there, thank goodness. That’s a very damaging distortion and all the more so for being unintentional. Now, I’m not sure what he means entirely, but lest you think he’s overstating the case, I went to a funeral a few years ago that, well, frankly, it angered me. A young man, a neighbor of ours, in his late teens, had killed himself in our neighborhood. My wife came home from work one day and found a helicopter sitting on the corner of the place and had to wait a while because they were moving the body out. The police were there. The boy had killed himself with a shotgun. My wife was in real estate at the time, and she knew the family. So we went to the funeral. The chapel was full, wall-to-wall, standing room only, and heavily populated with the young man’s fellow high school students. Well, the pastor of his church gave the funeral service and talked about how happy and much better off the young man was now. He pictured him, believe it or not, in heaven, driving around in a red convertible with music blaring from the radio. Now, I suppose he was trying to be relevant and somehow comforting to his audience of teenagers. All I can say is he didn’t make it. He failed completely. There is just no way to turn a tragedy like that, a wasted young life, into some kind of spiritual triumph. Teenagers, you know, are very sensitive to hypocrisy in any form. They know when they’re being massaged, and they recognize it for what it is. And it was evident to me after the funeral when the sobbing girls clinging to one another in grief, they had not been comforted in the least by what that preacher said. Not only that, he missed a golden opportunity to talk straight to these teens about the value of life and the loss of death. One of the things saying among the teens is get real. And what they mean by that is let’s talk about the truth and the way things really are. And they knew and they knew that they knew that this preacher had not done that. He was irrelevant. So when I heard what this bishop, Bishop Wright of England, was saying, I was profoundly relieved to hear a churchman talk straight about what the Bible really says. He called the statement, I’m going to heaven soon and I won’t need this stupid body. Thank goodness, called it a damaging distortion. And I have an idea, you have heard some version of this statement at nearly every funeral you have ever attended. So, seemed to me like a good idea to consider what the bishop had to say. Time followed up, said, how so? It sounds like a typical sentiment. Right. There are several important aspects in which it is unsupported by the New Testament. First, the timing. In the Bible, we are told that you die and enter an intermediate state. St. Paul is very clear that Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead already, but that nobody else has yet. Now, you couldn’t ask for a clearer statement by that, and one that can readily be checked in the pages of the Bible. Actually, it isn’t just Paul who says this. It’s a common theme in the New Testament. Now, it’s always a good idea to look at the context of anything Paul says, and one of the best places to start is with 1 Corinthians 15, where Paul says what the bishop says he says and develops it more fully. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, saying, What I received, I passed on to you as of first importance, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Peter, and then the twelve, and after that to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.” Now, it should be striking to anyone that this does not say those brothers have gone to heaven or gone home or gone to be with the Lord. It says plainly they have fallen asleep. But what does that mean? I think it’s taken as a metaphor for death, but what if it’s more than a metaphor? Because I think Bishop Wright thinks it is more than that. In any case, the resurrection of Jesus is fundamental to the gospel. That’s as orthodox as you can get. Paul continues, though, in verse 12 of 1 Corinthians 15. But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? Strange doctrine. Paul includes no details. But one wonders if it’s connected somehow to the modern belief that we go straight to heaven when we die. And I have often wondered why, if my mom is in heaven, why is there any need for a resurrection? Why do we need her body? She’s there. She’s looking down, watching me live my life, probably at times in great distress, but nevertheless. Well, it seems fair to say that the boilerplate funeral sermon leaves no room or need for a resurrection. It’s pointless. After what Paul says, no Christian preacher can say that that resurrection isn’t ahead of us. But it is all but assumed. Paul refuses to mince words on it. He just won’t let it lie. He says, if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless, and so is your faith. What Paul is saying is without the resurrection of Christ, Christianity is pointless. More than that, he says, we are found to be false witnesses about God. For if we’ve testified of God that he raised Christ from the dead, but he did not raise him if, in fact, the dead aren’t raised. Paul’s becoming a little heated on this. He’s saying, frankly, if the dead don’t rise, we’re liars. Later he says, if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile. You are still in your sins. Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. There it is again. They haven’t gone to heaven. They have fallen asleep. Not only that, but the resurrection of Christ is what finally removes our sins, not merely his death. And I really wonder, if you stop a Christian on the street or talk to him after church and say, what is it actually, the final thing upon which the forgiveness of our sins depends? Most of them would say the death of Christ, the sacrifice of Christ. But Paul says that without the resurrection, we’re still dead. He’s not through, though, in 1 Corinthians. He says further in verse 21, Since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming. Now, just to remind you of what Bishop Wright said, he said, quote, St. Paul is very clear that Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead already, but nobody else has yet. And that’s precisely what the Apostle Paul says. Christ first. Afterward, they that are Christ’s. When? At his coming. Well, Paul is still not finished. In verse 51 of 1 Corinthians 15. Behold, he said, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye. When? At the last trump. For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible. And we, we should be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption. This mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, And this mortal shall have put on immortality. Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. Paul calls it a mystery. And in many ways, it still is. We’ll return to the bishop’s remarks in a moment, but first grab a pencil and a piece of paper. I want to give you some information.
SPEAKER 01 :
I’ll be right back. Is it possible that an infinite God could find himself wanting anything? The Bible says it is not good for man to be alone. If it’s not good for man to be alone, then perhaps it wasn’t good for God to be alone either. Ronald Dart’s book, The Lonely God, is now available at your local bookstore. For information, you can write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll free 1-888-BIBLE-44. That’s 1-888-242-5344. When corresponding, please be sure to tell us the call letters of this radio station.
SPEAKER 02 :
Bishop N.T. Wright, continuing to answer the questions from Time magazine said, secondly, our physical state. The New Testament says that when Christ does return, the dead will experience a whole new life, not just our soul, but our bodies. And finally, there’s the location. At no point do the resurrection narratives in the four gospels say, Jesus has been raised, therefore we are all going to heaven. It says that Christ is coming here to join together the heavens and the earth in an act of new creation. He’s right about that, you know. I think he may be referring to John 14, that long speech of Jesus to his disciples the night of the Last Supper. You’ll find this in John 14, verse 1. He said, “…let not your heart be troubled.” You believe in God, believe in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there you may be also.” Now, it seems plain enough from what Jesus said himself that the reunion with Christ takes place at his coming. I found it comforting to realize that a ranking churchman still believes in the return of Christ. You would probably be surprised to know how many don’t. Time magazine went on to ask, is there anything more in the Bible about the period between death and the resurrection of the dead? And I fully expect that as far as I’ve got this far, you’ve had that same question nagging the back of your mind, wondering, where’s this going? The bishop answered, we know that we will be with God and with Christ, resting and being refreshed. Paul writes, says the bishop, that it will be conscious, but compared with being bodily alive, it will be like being asleep. The Wisdom of Solomon, a Jewish text from about the same time, says, as Jesus says, the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God. And that seems like a poetic way to put the Christian understanding as well. Now I can’t recall Paul saying anything about our being conscious. He plainly says we will be asleep. Take his statement in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4. This is the other chapter in the Bible that deals with the resurrection. In verse 13 he says, “…but I don’t want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who are asleep, that you sorrow not as others who have no hope.” For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, them who sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. So what’s going to happen? Well, Paul goes on to tell us. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain to the coming of the Lord. I take it from that Paul had no idea when the coming of Christ would be. It could be in his lifetime. He said, we who remain to the coming of the Lord shall not precede them that are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout and with the voice of the archangel and the trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so shall we ever be with the Lord. And where’s the Lord? He’s here. You know, there really isn’t much room for misunderstanding here about the fundamentals. And I assume that’s what motivated the bishop to write his book. Traditional Christian assumptions often don’t match Scripture as comforting as those assumptions may seem to be. I think some of our assumptions arise out of what I call over-interpreting Scripture. We’re not willing to leave a mystery unanswered. So we offer our own solutions, which, as often as not, miss the mark. Frankly, you’re just a whole lot better off to recognize the fact that you are dealing with things that are beyond our ken, and to attend your mind to the things that are revealed. The bishop went on to explain to Time magazine, Jesus’ resurrection marks the beginning of a restoration that he will complete upon his return. Part of this will be the resurrection of all the dead who will awake, be embodied, and participate in the renewal. John Polkinghorne, a physicist and priest, has put it this way. I thought this is fascinating. God will download our software into his hardware until the time he gives us new hardware to run the software again for ourselves. This gets to two things very nicely. that the period after death is a period when we are in God’s presence but not active in our own bodies, and also the more important transformation will be when we are once again embodied in administering Christ’s kingdom. I think that’s interesting. I had never thought of that analogy, but it’s a good one, assuming that you understand computers, which may not be a valid assumption, I know. But we have to understand this. There’s a marvelous passage of poetry in the book of Ecclesiastes that looks ahead to the days of growing old and the last moments of life. And it actually says something the same as our physicist friend said. He says, this is Ecclesiastes 12, verse 1, “‘Remember your Creator in the days of your youth.'” Before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you say, I find no pleasure in them. I remember Jimmy Stewart once. He was in an interview with Johnny Carson. And he was getting a little older, and he said, you know, after the age of 70, it’s just patch, patch, patch. And he talked about the fact that he was not finding any pleasure in life anymore. So this is what this little poem in Ecclesiastes is all about. He said, “‘Remember your Creator now, before the sun and the moon and the light of the stars grow dark and the clouds return after the rain, when the keepers of the house tremble and strong men stoop and the grinders cease because there are few and those looking through the windows grow dim.'” Remember the song, This Old House? The human body in that song is compared to an old house that trembles in the storm. I think the composer borrowed the idea from right here, from the Bible. He talks about the time when the doors to the street are closed and the sound of grinding fades, when men rise up at the sound of birds, but all their songs grow faint. In fact, you know, you get on up in years, you don’t hear as well as you used to. And there are certain frequencies I know in my case I don’t even hear anymore. My wife says, what’s that beeping? I don’t hear anything. When men are afraid of heights and dangers in the streets, when the almond tree blossoms in the grass, Hopper drags himself along and desire no longer is stirred. Then man goes to his eternal home, and mourners go about the streets. Remember him before the silver cord is severed or the golden bowl is broken, before the pitcher is shattered at the spring or the wheel broken at the well. What an image of the passing of an old man. And he concludes it by saying, And the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it. I think this lies close to the root of the computer analogy. In an earlier time, I heard that spirit compared to a recording. The information on the recording is only accessible if it’s played through the right equipment. So the idea was that this recording goes back to God who holds on to the recording. It’s not conscious. It can’t think. It’s sleeping until such time as it’s put back in some equipment. In the professor’s analogy, our software with all of its data returns to God. I think it’s better to say it’s uploaded than downloaded to God. when our flesh returns to dust. But I don’t see anything to suggest consciousness beyond perhaps the dreams of sleep. On the contrary. Ecclesiastes chapter 9, verse 4. Anyone who is among the living has hope. Even a live dog is better off than a dead lion, for the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing. They have no further reward. Even the memory of them is forgotten. So, I don’t think we are going to have a consciousness. There’s another solution to that question and to that problem. We’ll discuss that in a moment.
SPEAKER 01 :
For a free CD of this radio program that you can share with friends and others, write or call this week only and request the program titled Life After Death. Write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll free 1-888-BIBLE-44. That’s 1-888-242-5344.
SPEAKER 02 :
There’s an odd thing about really deep sleep. There is no awareness of the passage of time. One minute it’s bedtime, you’re snuggling into the blankets, the next moment it’s morning. I remember as a child when something exciting was coming the next day, I was very anxious to get to sleep because I knew that morning would come quicker. Of course it didn’t, but for me it did. There was a song popularized by Tennessee Ernie Ford some time ago that had included this line, When this feeble life is over, time for me shall be no more. I thought that was interesting to hear that. I thought about that a great deal. Bishop Wright postulates an intermediate state, which he calls life after life after death. It’s one solution to the mystery of death. But in The Lonely God, a book I published a couple of years ago, I postulate the suspension of time. I had a friend named Ted. He lived in Ted time. I live in Ron time. Ted died a few years ago, and for him, time stopped. For me, it went on. At some time in the future, Ted will be raised from the dead to appear before the Lord in Ted time. Not one second will have passed. In Ron time, several years will have passed. One minute, Ted was looking up at a nurse in a hospital. The next moment, in his time, he is looking at the face of God. For him, there is no time between these two events. Standing next to him before God will be all of us who survived him. We will have parted in time, but we will come together again in time. Even though… For Ted, the time stopped, and for the rest of us, it went on. And this addresses a misconception in the popular religious culture. Preachers are fond of picturing people up in heaven able to look down on us in real time. But if you read the Bible, that’s not possible. For them, time has ceased to be and only start ticking again at the resurrection of the dead. The picture of people who have died going straight to heaven and looking down on us dissolves into absurdity, if you think about it logically. After all, aren’t people in heaven supposed to be happy? How could they be happy looking at the mess we are making of things? Bishop Reich went on to say, Never at any point do the Gospels or Paul say that Jesus has been raised. Therefore, we’re going to heaven. They all say, Jesus is raised, therefore the new creation has begun and we have a job to do. Time Magazine asked, well, that sounds a lot like work. Bishop Wright replied, it’s more exciting than hanging around listening to nice music. In Revelation and Paul’s letters, we are told that God’s people will actually be running the new world on God’s behalf. The idea of our participation in the new creation goes back to Genesis, when humans are supposed to be running the garden and looking after the animals. If you transpose that all the way through, it’s a picture like the one you get at the end of the book of Revelation. Amazing. Time magazine asked, has anyone you’ve talked to expressed disappointment at the loss of the old view? The bishop said, yes, you might get disappointment in the case where somebody has recently gone through the death of somebody they love and they’re wanting simply to be with them. And I’d say that’s understandable. But the end of Revelation describes a marvelous human participation in God’s plan. And in almost all cases when I’ve explained this to people, there’s a sense of excitement and a sense of, why haven’t we been told this before?
SPEAKER 01 :
Ronald Dart will be right back. If you would like more information or if you have any questions, write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. In the U.S. and Canada, call toll free 1-888-BIBLE-44 and visit our website at borntowin.net. When corresponding, please tell us the call letters of this radio station.
SPEAKER 02 :
In answer to that question, why haven’t we been told this before? I really think tradition is an awfully strong force among Christian people. I don’t know where the original ideas got started. I think Bishop Wright thinks they started with Greek theology or Greek philosophy, I should say, intruding into Christian doctrine. And that may be so. But the fact is, I think a lot of theologians have known this for a long time. They just haven’t seen any particular reason to rock the boat. Some preachers, I think, also believe that a desire for heaven and a fear of hell makes a better motivator for some people. I have done two programs on the subject of immortality. If you want to ask for those when you get in touch with us, we’ll be happy to send them along free of charge. Just ask for it. Immorality 1 and 2. And we’ll be very happy to send them to you. By the way, those will be free, by the way, but I wouldn’t want you to think that we’ve got a well full of money down here because we don’t. We make available as much as we possibly can free of charge. But these stations are paid for by the contributions from our listeners, and if you feel motivated to send along some help, believe me, it will be appreciated very much. We try our best to be faithful stewards. Get in touch with us at Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas, 75791, or give us a call at 1-888-BIBLE-44.
