The Spirit’s Magnificent Acts in Restoration, Scene Two
The Mission of God: Lesson Six
By Steven L. Childers
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Introduction
Last time, we saw that we are living between Pentecost and Christ’s return—the first scene of the final act of God’s mission.
During this present age, the risen Christ continues his redemptive mission through his church by the power of his Spirit, making disciples of all nations. When that mission reaches the completion appointed by the Father, Christ will return in glory and open the final scene of God’s mission—a scene that will never end.
In this final scene, the Father works through his Son and by his Spirit to bring his purposes for humanity and creation to their glorious fulfillment.
We will follow three great movements:
The Spirit’s magnificent acts fully restore God’s people.
The Spirit’s magnificent acts fully restore God’s world.
The Spirit’s magnificent acts fully restore God’s mission.
And because this lesson also concludes the course, we will end where we began—with the one practical question again:
What in the world is God doing—and how can I join him?
I. The Spirit's Magnificent Acts Fully Restore God's People
The first great movement in this final scene is the complete restoration of God’s redeemed people. What the Spirit has already begun in believers, he will bring to glorious completion when Christ returns.
Those who belong to Christ already have a new standing before God through Christ and a new heart by his Spirit. Yet we still struggle with sin, suffer in a fallen world, live in mortal bodies subject to weakness and pain, and eventually die.
But it will not always be this way.
A. The Spirit's Restoration of our Bodies and Souls
Act Four, Scene Two begins with the personal, visible return of Jesus Christ. At his coming, the dead will be raised, and believers still living will be transformed (1 Thess. 4:16–17).[1]
Paul writes: “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. . . . The dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed” (1 Cor. 15:51–52).
For believers who have died, their souls—already with Christ in heaven—will be reunited with their resurrected and glorified bodies. The same Spirit who gives us spiritual life now will then give life to our mortal bodies (Rom. 8:11).[2]
Patterned after Christ’s resurrection body, our same bodies will be raised imperishable, glorious, powerful, and completely free from corruption (1 Cor. 15:42–44).[3]
So the Christian’s ultimate hope is not to escape the body and remain forever as a disembodied soul in heaven. Our hope is resurrection—the full restoration of the whole person, body and soul, in the world to come.[4]
And the Spirit’s restoration will reach even deeper. Adam and Eve were created upright and able not to sin, yet still capable of sinning. But when the Spirit completes his work in us, we will be unable to sin. Every thought, desire, and action will be perfectly aligned with God’s will.[5]
Every thought, desire, and action will be perfectly aligned with God’s will.
What the Spirit has begun in you now, he will then bring to full and final completion.
B. The Spirit's Restoration of all our Relationships (Shalom)
The Spirit’s final restoration will include not only our bodies and souls, but every relationship God designed for human flourishing—with God, ourselves, others, and creation.
Most importantly, our relationship with God will be fully restored. We will see him “face to face” (1 Cor. 13:12; Rev. 22:4), enjoying perfect, unbroken fellowship with the triune God.[6]
From that restored relationship will flow the healing of every other relationship. We will be whole within ourselves—free from shame, fear, guilt, and corruption—and fully restored to one another, without alienation, rivalry, loneliness, or death.[7]
Our relationship with creation will also be made whole as our vocation and mission in the world are fully restored to God's original creation mission.
This is biblical shalom—peace, wholeness, harmony, joy, and flourishing in every relationship God created us to enjoy.
II. The Spirit's Magnificent Acts Fully Restore God's World
The Spirit’s final restoration will not stop with God’s people. He will also fully restore God’s fallen world.
Humanity’s rebellion brought both humanity and creation under God’s just curse and Satan’s tyrannical rule. But through his life, death, resurrection, ascension, and reign, Christ decisively defeated sin, Satan, and death. At his return, that victory will become final and universal.
A. God Removes Everything That Corrupts His World
When Christ returns, he will come in glory as the conquering King and righteous Judge, and every remaining enemy will be removed.
The Bible reveals this general sequence:
Christ raises the dead—believers to “the resurrection of life” and unbelievers to “the resurrection of judgment” (John 5:28–29).[8]
He judges the living and the dead––both unbelievers and believers (Acts 17:31; Matt. 25:31–46; Rev. 20:11–15).[9]
Unbelievers are condemned and removed from his kingdom.[10]
Satan and every hostile power are finally judged and cast away forever (Rev. 20:10).[11]
Death itself, “the last enemy,” is destroyed (1 Cor. 15:24–26; Rev. 20:14).[12]
God’s curse is finally removed: “No longer will there be anything accursed” (Rev. 22:3).[13]
At last, every consequence of the Fall is gone: God’s curse is removed. Satan’s tyranny is ended. Death is destroyed. All our pain, suffering, grief, and struggles are over. The battle is over.
B. God renews everything he created in his world
When Christ returns, God will not only restore redeemed humanity. He will also restore the fallen creation itself, setting it free “from its bondage to corruption” (Rom. 8:21).[14]
Jesus calls the coming new creation the “new world” (Matt. 19:28), using the same word Paul uses for the Spirit’s regenerating work in believers (Titus 3:5). Peter similarly speaks of “the restoration of all things” (Acts 3:21).[15] Together, these texts portray the new creation not as God destroying his world, but regenerating, restoring, and renewing it.[16]
John writes: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.... And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.... And he who was seated on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new’” (Rev. 21:1–5)[17]
So our ultimate hope is:
not going back to Eden
or merely up to heaven where our soul has no body,
but going forward to Christ's return,
when heaven comes down to a renewed earth as our eternal home.
This new world will not be unrelated to the world we know now. Like our resurrection bodies, God’s present creation will be transformed and glorified—freed from every trace of corruption.[18]
And this restored world is the guaranteed inheritance of every believer. Paul writes that the Spirit is “the guarantee of our inheritance” (Eph. 1:13–14)—God’s pledge that what he has begun in you now, he will one day complete in you and in all his creation.
III. The Spirit's Magnificent Acts Fully Restore God's Mission
After the Spirit fully restores God’s people and God’s world, one question remains:
What will restored humanity do in God’s restored world?
The answer takes us back to Genesis 1–2. God’s original creation mission was never abandoned. What sin corrupted, Christ redeemed; and what Christ redeemed, the Spirit will finally restore to its intended fullness
A. Restored Humanity Reigns with Christ and Cultivates God’s New World
God’s original creation mission had two dimensions: humanity was to multiply and fill the earth with God’s image bearers and rule and cultivate his world so that his invisible kingdom would become visible and his name glorified (Gen. 1:26–28; 2:15).
The first dimension will reach its goal. Jesus teaches that in the resurrection there will be no marriage—and therefore no further procreation of image bearers (Matt. 22:30)—because God’s redeemed people will be complete. Revelation pictures that finished multitude “from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages” (Rev. 7:9).
But the second dimension of the creation mission will continue forever.
In the new world, God’s original creation mission will be fully restored: God ruling in and through us as we cultivate every sphere of influence he entrusts to us, making his invisible kingdom visible and bringing glory to his name.
This is why Revelation says Christ has redeemed a people to be “a kingdom and priests” who will reign with him (Rev. 5:9–10), and finally promises, “They will reign forever and ever” (Rev. 22:5).
This reign with Christ has already begun. Paul says that God has “raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6). Even now, united to the reigning Christ, we begin to fulfill God's restored mission through our work—and cultivating all the spheres of influence he entrusts to us so that his rule becomes increasingly visible through our lives.
That is why our work, calling, and vocation matter so deeply. Work was part of God’s good design before the Fall. Work itself was never the curse; the curse on work made it painful, frustrating, and futile (Gen. 3:17–19).
Because of the Fall, we often distort work in opposite ways. We either deify it, making it a source of identity and significance, or demonize it, treating it as a necessary evil. In the new earth, both distortions will be gone.
Our present occupations may change. There will be no disease for physicians to fight, no violence for police to restrain, no poverty or injustice for relief workers to overcome, and no lost sinners for pastors and missionaries to evangelize. But our God-given gifts and abilities will not become useless. They will be redirected toward joyful service in a world where nothing is broken.
Revelation even says that “the glory and the honor of the nations” will be brought into the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:24–26), suggesting that the faithful cultural fruit of human work may be purified and gathered into God’s renewed world.[19]
So the calling we begin to recover now will reach its fullness then: reigning with Christ, cultivating his world, and glorifying God through every sphere of life.
The curse on our work will end. The mission of our work will not.
B. God’s Redemptive Mission Ends—His Creation Mission Does Not
This distinction brings the whole biblical story together.
Before the Fall, there was nothing to redeem. Humanity’s mission was to bear God’s image, cultivate his world, and make his gracious rule visible throughout the earth.
After the Fall, redemption became necessary because humanity and creation came under sin, death, God’s curse, and Satan’s tyranny. But redemption was never God’s abandonment of his creation mission.
Redemption is God’s way of restoring humanity and creation so that his original creation mission can finally be fulfilled.
The Son accomplished that redemption. The Spirit now applies it and empowers the church to participate in God’s redemptive mission among the nations.
But when Christ returns, that redemptive mission reaches its appointed completion. There will be no lost sinners to evangelize, no unreached peoples to reach, no churches to plant, no curse to reverse, and no death to defeat.
God’s redemptive mission will have accomplished its purpose.
But the creation mission will continue forever. Restored humanity will continue to reign with Christ, cultivate God’s world, serve, worship, and glorify him throughout every sphere of the new creation.
God’s redemptive mission will end. His creation mission in and through your life will continue forever.
Conclusion
We began this course with one great question:
What in the world is God doing—and how can I join him?
And throughout these lessons, we have returned to one central conviction:
God delights to manifest his presence and pour out his power on those who will dare to align their purposes more fully with his purposes for the world.
We have now seen where God’s mission is going. One day, restored humanity will reign with Christ forever, cultivating God’s renewed world so that his invisible kingdom is perfectly visible and his name is glorified throughout every sphere of life.
But that calling does not begin then.
It begins now.
Already united to the reigning Christ and seated with him in the heavenly places, we are called to begin living today as the people we will one day fully become.
Richard Lovelace gives us a compelling picture of this restored calling. United to Christ by the Spirit, we share in his continuing mission as his prophets, priests, and kings:
As prophets, we proclaim and uphold God’s truth in a world filled with lies.
As priests, we pray and intercede for others to experience God’s mercy and blessing.
As kings, we use everything God has entrusted to us to make his invisible kingdom more visible—not only in human hearts, but throughout every sphere of life until they increasingly reflect the order of heaven.
That is the creation mission Christ is restoring us to fulfill.
So do not settle for a smaller story centered on comfort, success, security, recognition, or personal fulfillment. Jesus calls us into an upside-down kingdom where we find our lives by losing them for him and the gospel.
Make God’s redemptive mission central to your life—helping others be redeemed and restored.
And make God’s creation mission the mission of your whole life—your family, work, relationships, resources, gifts, and every sphere of influence he entrusts to you.
Then begin each day with Jesus’ prayer:
“Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
And ask:
“Father, how can you rule in and through me today so that your invisible kingdom becomes more visible and your name is glorified in every sphere of life you entrust to me?”
FOOTNOTES
[1]Jesus describes the same coming hour when “all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out” (John 5:28–29).
[2] What will happen to believers who are still alive at Jesus’ return? Paul tells us, “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord” (1 Thess. 4:17). Paul writes, “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, (have died) that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thess. 4:13). Paul does not want his readers to lose hope about their future with the Lord, simply because other believers have died. Some Thessalonians seem to have believed that Christians would not die before Jesus returned. Paul is reassuring them that those who have died in Christ will be raised from the dead and united with all believers who are living when Jesus returns. It’s a mistake to interpret this passage as giving us any more specific details about this event and what follows. Paul is not teaching that Jesus will miraculously scoop up all his followers to snatch (rapture) them out of this corrupt world before his final judgment on all who are “left behind.” When he writes, “and so we will always be with the Lord,” he’s not teaching that all the believers who are caught up with the Lord and each other “in the clouds” will be staying up in the clouds forever. Instead, Revelation 21:1–3 shows us the opposite, that heaven (holy city, new Jerusalem) will come down to earth in all its fullness.
[3] These resurrection bodies will not be new in origin but new in quality––our same bodies, transformed and glorified, freed from every trace of corruption. On the significance of καινός (kainos, new in kind or quality) rather than νέος (neos, new in time or origin) in Paul's resurrection and new-creation language, see especially 2 Corinthians 5:17 (“if anyone is in Christ, he is a καινὴ κτίσις,” a new creation) and John's parallel use of καινός for the “new heaven and new earth” (Rev. 21:1, 5). See Anthony A. Hoekema, The Bible and the Future (Eerdmans, 1994), 280–86, and Moisés Silva, ed., New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis, rev. ed. (Zondervan, 2014), s.v. “καινός.” On Paul's use of the Greek words kainos versus neos in the New Testament's resurrection and new-creation language as denoting renewal in quality rather than origin, see N. T. Wright, Surprised by Hope (HarperOne, 2008).
[4] The terms that Paul uses in 1Thessalonians 4 for Jesus' "coming" (parousia, Παρουσίαν in verse 15) and our “meeting” (ἀπάντησιν in verse 17), reflect the political rhetoric of the Roman Empire used to describe military or political dignitaries making official visits. Paul’s words imply that believers will meet the Lord "in the air,” not as an act of departing from fallen creation, but as a majestic act of welcoming their victorious, conquering Lord and King back to the world he created. Paul’s emphasis is on the majestic, final union when Christ’s purified bride is fully united to the groom forever. Apparently, when that final union first takes place, it will not be on the surface of the earth, but above it “in the clouds.”
[5] On the believer's final, unopposed inability to sin as the completion of progressive sanctification, see Anthony A. Hoekema, Saved by Grace (Eerdmans, 1989).
[6] John also writes that there will be no temple in the city, “for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” (Rev. 21:22). We will enjoy perfect, unbroken fellowship with God forever.
[7] On the “communion of saints” as encompassing both the church living on earth and the church already with Christ, reunited at the resurrection, see Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 4, Holy Spirit, Church, and New Creation (Baker Academic, 2008).
[8] The Scriptures present a general resurrection of believers and unbelievers as occurring together (Dan. 12:2, John 5:25–29, Acts 24:14–15, Rev. 20:11–15). Some Christian traditions, e.g. Historic and Dispensational Premillennialists, believe that the resurrection of unbelievers will take place one thousand years (millennium) after the believers' resurrection. On the two resurrections—of life and of judgment—as distinct outcomes of the one final resurrection event, see Anthony A. Hoekema, The Bible and the Future (Eerdmans, 1994). While the Bible describes much detail about the resurrection body of believers, there is nothing said about the resurrection body of unbelievers. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul says nothing about the resurrection of unbelievers, he is only speaking of the resurrection of believers. So we can only speculate about what the bodies of unbelievers will look like for all eternity and the nature of the “place” of the unbelievers before they’re judged and cast into hell forever.
[9] Paul writes, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil” (2 Cor. 5:10; see Hebrews 10:30; James 3:1; I Peter. 4:17). The Bible teaches that everything a believer has done, including thoughts, words, and deeds, will be taken into account on the Judgment Day (Matt. 25:35–40, 1 Cor. 3:8, Eph. 6:8, 1 Pet. 1:17, Rev. 20:12; 22:12). Paul describes the believer’s judgment with this imagery: “Now if anyone builds on the foundation (Christ) with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one's work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire” (1 Cor. 3:12–15). The loss referred to here is not a loss of salvation but the loss of eternal rewards. Leon Morris writes, “Here and now the man who gives himself wholeheartedly to the service of Christ knows more of the joy of the Lord than the half-hearted. We have no warrant from the New Testament for thinking that it will be otherwise in heaven.” Biblical Doctrine of Judgment (Wipf and Stock, 1960), p. 67. Although believers must all appear before Christ on the Day of Judgment, they should not fear because God promises them that “there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1). John writes, “By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment” (1 John 4:17). See how Answer 52 of the Heidelberg Catechism reflects this: “In all my distress and persecution I turn my eyes to the heavens and confidently await as judge the very One who has already stood trial in my place before God and so has removed the whole curse from me. All his enemies and mine he will condemn to everlasting punishment: but me and all his chosen ones he will take along with him into the joy and the glory of heaven.”
[10] To those who have rejected him, Christ will say, “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matt. 25:41). Revelation describes this final judgment as being cast into “the lake of fire” (Rev. 20:15). In the parable of the weeds, Jesus taught that “The field is the world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels” (Matt. 13:39). On that day, Jesus promises he will send his angels to separate the wheat (the righteous) from the weeds (the wicked). In this parable, Jesus teaches that “the enemy (Satan) came and sowed weeds (the wicked) among the wheat (his Church)” (Matt. 13:25). Then Jesus says, “Let both grow together until the harvest (the end of the age), and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, ‘Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn’” (Matt. 13:30). Prior to the final judgment day, there will be many professing Christians within the church who are not true believers. But when Jesus returns, his visible Church (the wheat) will finally be purged of all unbelievers (the weeds).
[11] The one Jesus called “the ruler of this world” is finally condemned, and Satan will be cast into the lake of fire, never again to deceive, accuse, or tyrannize God’s people or world (1 Cor. 6:3, John 12:31; Rev. 20:10). The promise of Genesis 3:15 will be fulfilled in its ultimate sense: the serpent will be finally crushed beneath the victory of God’s promised Redeemer. On Genesis 3:15 as the protoevangelium whose ultimate fulfillment is Satan's final defeat and destruction, see O. Palmer Robertson, The Christ of the Covenants (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1980). Humans will not be the only ones judged on that final day. Satan and his fallen angels (demons) must also appear before Christ’s final judgment seat (1 Cor. 6:2–3, 2 Pet. 2:4, Jude 6). Glorified believers will also participate in the judgment of Christ on the world and the angels (Matt. 19:28). Paul writes to the Corinthians, “Do you not know that the saints will judge the world” (1 Cor. 6:2)?
[12] John writes, “Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire … and if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire” (Rev. 20:11–15). Similar to how believers will receive degrees of eternal rewards (1 Cor. 3:12–15), Jesus seems to indicate that unbelievers will receive degrees of eternal punishment (Luke 12:47–48). On the final judgment of Satan and his angels as preceding the removal of the curse from creation, and on 1 Corinthians 15:24–26's destruction of every hostile power culminating in death's own destruction, see G. K. Beale, A New Testament Biblical Theology (Baker Academic, 2011).
[13] Death, mourning, crying, pain, corruption, and every remaining effect of the Fall will be gone from God's world forever (Rev. 21:4)
[14] On Romans 8:19–23 and creation's future liberation as bound to humanity's own redemption, see Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans, New International Commentary on the New Testament (Eerdmans, 1996).
[15] The Greek word in Peter's sermon in Acts 3:21 is ἀποκατάστασις (apokatastasis), meaning “restoration” or “reestablishment”—the restoration of something to its proper condition.
[16] This renewal of the world will include the complete purging and cleansing of all forms of evil and corruption. Jesus says at the end of the age his angels will remove from his kingdom not only “all law-breakers” but also “all causes of sin”––all stumbling blocks (Matt. 13:41). Peter describes the coming day of the Lord as a time when “the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed” (2 Pet. 3:10). The Greek word εὑρεθήσεται (heurethēsetai), translated “exposed,” is used in the earliest Greek manuscripts and can be translated “found, revealed, and discovered,” possibly conveying the exposure and revelation of the righteous and unrighteous works that have been done on the earth. Peter is teaching that God’s final judgment of the whole earth with fire, will be like God’s earlier judgment of the whole earth with water during the times of Noah (2 Pet. 3:5–7). During the flood, the earth was not completely annihilated but purged of all its wickedness. So, when Peter writes that “we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet. 3:13), he’s not referring to a totally new earth that is completely different than the present one. Instead, he’s referring to a gloriously renewed and restored earth that remains in continuity with the present one—but is completely without any form of corruption. In the same way that God will make us recreated bodies from our dust, God will also make a new, recreated world after being “burned up” and “dissolved”. The world will be a new creation, but not a totally new creation. We’ll still recognize the earth and the world as we know it, but it will be fully redeemed, restored, and glorified to flourish according to God’s design – just like our new bodies.
[17] Heaven and earth will no longer be separated with God “up in heaven,” where his will is done perfectly, and man “down on earth” where God’s revealed will is not done perfectly. When Jesus returns, the “first heaven and the first earth will pass away.” In 1 Peter 3:5-13, the Apostle Peter describes the “passing away” of the “old world” and its transformation into the “new world.” When Jesus returns, heaven will come “back down” to earth like it was in creation before the Fall, when God’s presence was with his people (Immanuel) on earth. But it will be far better than Eden.
[18] The Greek word John and Peter use to designate the “newness” of the new earth is not νέος (neos), meaning new in time or origin, bu καινὸς (kainos) meaning new in nature or in quality. Similarly, when Paul says in Romans 8:20-21 that creation waits with eager longing to be set free from its bondage, he’s referring to how the present corrupt creation will be delivered from all its corruption when Christ returns to make all things new – not become a totally different creation.
[19] Theologian Anthony Hoekema writes, “One could also say that whatever people have done on this earth which glorified God will be remembered in the life to come (see Rev. 14:13). But more must be said. Is it too much to say that, according to these verses, the unique contributions of each nation to the life of the present earth will enrich the life of the new earth? Shall we then perhaps inherit the best products of culture and art which this earth has produced?” The Bible and the Future (Eerdmans, 1994), p. 286. Abraham Kuyper suggests that whatever has been accomplished by the nations of the earth that brings glory and honor to God in this world, will somehow be retained and glorified by God in the world to come. And all these great accomplishments will be the result of the faithful work of both famous kings and unknown servants. Kuyper writes: “If an endless field of human knowledge and of human ability is now being formed by all that takes place in order to make the visible world and material nature subject to us, and if we know that this dominion of ours over nature will be complete in eternity, we may conclude that the knowledge and dominion we have gained over nature here can and will be of continued significance, even in the kingdom of glory.” De Gemeene Gratie (Hoveker & Wormser, 1902) I, 482-83 (see also 454-94)..
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