Oprah Winfrey recently co-hosted a 10-week spirituality class with Eckhart Tolle endorsing his new book A New Earth. Twenty-seven million people have downloaded their web seminars. According to Tolle, “this new heaven and new earth are simply a state of being; once we ‘awaken our consciousness’ we will become aware of heaven within us, and we don’t need to wait for some future salvation or utopia.”
The hope of ‘a new earth’ is not new. As we read in Scripture, “… the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth … and not only so, but we ourselves …” (Romans 8:22-23).
I have been studying the teachings of the Church Father, St. Irenaeus (140-202). The word ‘recapitulate’ is a central theme in his teaching. Recapitulate is translated as to sum up or bring together. Ephesians 1:9-10 says, “and he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.” Recapitulate is the summing up, the gathering together of objects now apart and unrelated into a final, perfect unity. God in Christ will join again to himself those divided from him by sin. Recapitulate speaks of restoration. Irenaeus teaches that salvation is a recovery of what was lost in Adam. The obedience of Christ reverses the results of Adam’s disobedience making possible communion with God, restored likeness to God, and the renewal of all things.
Creation has been subjected to futility because of the sin of humanity (see Gen. 3:17-19). Climate change, famine, acidic waters, tornados, flooding and earthquakes, the disappearance of species and disruption of ecological systems all sound alarm bells. People are tuned into the earth’s trauma.
As Christians we need respond to environmental issues in a responsible manner but we must never forget that a new heaven and a new earth is made possible by the power of God. If sin is the original problem of creation, then the coming Saviour is the solution, not the power of positive thinking or the power of corporate effort or ‘go green’ campaigns.
Major Ann Braund and her husband, Jamie, are the corps officers of Cariboo Hill Temple in Burnaby, B.C. Ann and Jamie have three teenage children: Joanna, Jared and Jessica. She enjoys her family, her dog Charlie and her church family. She also enjoys being a foster mom when the opportunity arises. She has loved four foster daughters.