Journal

NT Wright on justice and the kingdom

Posted on February 5th, 2005, in the evening

I was at the Christian Aid 'Act Justly' conference in Durham today. A great conference on justice issues all round, but NT Wright's sessions in the morning were simply profound. The real beauty was in the panorama he shared with us from scripture, but maybe a few glimpses will be worth recording even out of context.

The main content was on God's desire that all creation become everything he intends for it, and humanity's role in that project...

The human task has always been to bring the stewardly, loving, grace of God into the world.

And on God's victory over evil. With the heart of any response we can make to evil here...

The incarnate Son of God knelt in tears in a dark garden and said, "Isn't there another way?", and the answer was, "No".

Summing up how we can live and work for justice in the now/not-yet tension of the kingdom...

We can't build the kingdom, but we can build for the kingdom. Our task is to build bricks that God will use in the eventual kingdom, which remains a gift of God's grace.