Waiting

"The creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God" (Rom.8:19 RSV).

This is one of those statements which can only be understood when it is accepted that God is actively working in history to bring about a desired consummation which is yet future. There is nothing static about such a statement; it does not define a condition of life or society which can be expected to remain the same generation after generation into infinity. Here is a plain indication of "that far‑off Divine event, to which the whole creation moves." (Tennyson) Man, says Paul in this noteworthy passage, is at present subject to futility. There will be no disagreement or dispute as to that. One day future, he also says, men will be set free from this bondage and obtain liberty. The verse above quoted equates that desirable end with the "revealing of the sons of God". To anyone acquainted with Scripture terminology this can only refer to the manifestation of the Christian Church to all mankind "in glory" at the consummation of the Age ("end of the world" in common parlance) in association with the Lord Christ at His Second Advent at which time He puts into operation the second stage of the Divine Plan for human development—the rule of righteousness. This doctrine and expectation finds no favour with quite a few serious Christians who feel more impressed with the claims for orderly evolution of the human society toward Christian ideals than for the catastrophic or authoritarian intervention of God Most High to save men from their own folly, but the doctrine is a true one nevertheless. The fact must be faced, that man, after thousands of years on this planet and possessed of marvellous powers of perception and invention, is creating problems of survival far faster than he is solving them, and the end can only be disaster—unless God intervenes. It remains now for the Church of today to rise to its destiny and be worthy of being thus "revealed" when the time comes.

AOH