Exegesis and Theology

In Surprised by Hope, Wright does a good job defending the historicity of the resurrection (albeit with problematic concessions about inerrancy; e.g., the illustration of Wittgenstein’s poker, pp. 31ff). He is also correct to point out that the hope of Christians is not a disembodied soulish existence in heaven but a resurrected body on the new earth.

Wright’s main argument about the resurrection and the new creation is correct. Conservative who know they agree with Wright on these points may be surprised by how much they end up disagreeing with Wright along the way in this work.

For instance, because he’s not willing to fully challenge Darwin (83), Wright is forced to concede that death is part of the good creation of God (94-95). This puts in jeopardy the truth that bodily resurrection is the Christian hope in the face of a fallen world. That truth is close to the heart of Wright’s argument in Surprised by Hope, but this concession puts an otherwise good argument off-kilter from what the Bible is actually saying. Wright says, “Death as we now know it is the last enemy, not a good part of the good creation” (p. 99, emphasis added). This is very different from Rom 5:12 (to name just one passage).

Wright is not always quite fair when dealing with other positions. For instance, he brings up Harold Lindsell and Tim LaHaye when discussing dispensational theology, but he nowhere deals with scholarly dispensationalists like Darrell Bock, Craig Blaising, or Alva McClain who have actually made some of the points Wright is making before Wright made them. This is all the more annoying because Wright has a habit of speaking as if he has finally discovered truth that everybody else has missed when often time he seems simply to have failed to do the requisite research in historical theology.

Wright’s aberrant soteriological views also appear in Surprised by Hope. Wright either distorts or fails to mention the Reformation view of justification when presenting his own view on the matter (139f.). Those who hold to the traditional view are "overanxious" and wish to "rigorously exclude" any "mention of works." While such a person can be found, Wright ignores the concerns of a number of careful evangelical scholars who have argued his views on justification contain unbiblical deviations from what Protestants have historically accepted since the Reformation.

In getting justification wrong Wright gets the gospel wrong. In other works, Wright also foregrounds the end of the exile when it comes to the cross (JVG, 592), repentance (JVG, 247-51, 256-58), and forgiveness (JVG, 268-72). As a result the larger story of the Bible about creation, fall, and salvation from sin becomes the story of Israel about election, exile, and return from exile.

This distortion of the gospel is clear in what Surprised by Hope omits. Wright wrote an entire book about the resurrection of Jesus and bodily resurrection as the hope of Christians without actually coming around to telling his readers how they could be saved from sin and included in the resurrection of believers. Though he included a chapter about Jesus as judge, there is nothing to tell a reader how he can escape God’s judgment. Even the section on evangelism deals primarily with mistakes that evangelicals have too often made. Wright does not handle how an individual can be saved from his sin.

Though Wright is correct that salvation is more than an individual’s relationship with God, salvation is certainly not something less than an individual’s salvation from sin. The Fall was cosmic in extent, but it sprang out of the actions of individuals. Likewise, redemption is cosmic in effect, but it too centers on the rescue of individuals from sin and the restoration of fellowship with God.

In the end, Wright’s main argument about the resurrection is correct, but because Wright has so many other central things wrong, the book itself disappoints.

Lincoln, Andrew T. Paradise Now and Not Yet: Studies in the Role of the Heavenly Dimension in Paul’s Thought with Special Reference to His Eschatology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991.

This book is reworking of Lincoln’s 1975 University of Cambridge dissertation (supervised by C F. D. Moule) (ix). Lincoln organized his material by biblical book in chronological order (Galatians, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Colossians, Ephesians). The final chapter synthesizes the material.

Paradise Now and Not Yet contains many helpful exegetical discussions. I found his treatments of 2 Corinthians 5; Philippians 3:20-21; and Colossians 3 especially helpful. I often found myself making notes in BibleWorks to remind me to consult this book when working through these passages.

Philippians 3:20 provides one instance.  Like other commentator’s Lincoln rejected the translations “citizenship” and “colony” and opted for “commonwealth” as the correct translation of πολίτευμα in Philippians 3:20 (cf. O’Brien, 360; Fee, 379, n. 17; Silva, 184; Bockmuehl, 233). Lincoln goes on to make the following observation: “The Christian’s commonwealth and government is εν ουρανοῖς and it is there because that is where his or her Lord is, as the following clause clearly implies. If Christ is to come from heaven, then he is envisaged as being there until that time” (101). In this comment Lincoln shows that Paul’s statement about our commonwealth being in heaven demonstrates connects to the return of Christ in that his return will establish this commonwealth on earth. Furthermore, Paul speaks of this in terms of the transformation of our bodies. Thus the previous reference to not having minds set on earthly things is not a critique of the material world. Instead, heavenly things are those things related to Christ and his kingdom since that is the current location of the reigning Christ. Earthly things are sinful because the earth is the sphere where sin is worked out.

The latter part of Lincoln’s concluding chapter is also very helpful. He notes, for instance, that Paul’s use of heaven can have “local, spatial or cosmological connotation[s]‘” but that they also often develop “a qualitative force” (185). Or, Christ’s presence in heaven means that “this realm can be seen as the present sphere of fulfillment of God’s promises of salvation” (186). Though Lincoln develops this in a supercessionist direction, it need not be. I thought a better way to develop this insight would be to integrate it with Richard Gaffin’s proposals relating to walking by faith and not by sight. As Lincoln notes, our union with Christ connects us to Christ in heaven so that we can say that we are seated in heaven with Christ (Eph 2:6; cf. Col 3:1ff.) or that we are part of the heavenly Jerusalem (Gal. 4:26). Though we can’t see these realities, we must live in by faith in light of them. Lincoln helpfully discusses how the reality of our heavenly existence should affect our life on earth now. He also relates the fact of our present relation to heaven to the Holy Spirit, though this could have been developed further.

On the negative side, at times Paradise Now and Not Yet reads like a Cambridge dissertation. Sometimes Lincoln leads readers through a discussion of a possible Jewish apocalyptic antecedent to Paul’s thought simply to conclude that the possible parallel isn’t really justified. Even when Lincoln does think there are valid parallels, the exegetical insights they yield are do not seem significant enough to warrant the discussion. Lincoln also doubts the Pauline authorship of Ephesians (197, n. 29) and the integrity of 2 Corinthians (55).

For those interested in reading Lincoln’s work, I would suggest reading pages 184-95 first and then working through the previous chapters.