As I read books from the perspective of Eastern peoples or from ancient times, I am struck with how this worldly they are. Today, for most Christians, this sounds like an insult. When you read the Bible, however, it is incredibly this worldly focused.
Our God is not like the gods of Greek mythology, battling invisible powers far removed from this world; instead, he became a man and died. In the Old Testament, he did not threaten hell, he threatened plague and exile; In the New Testament, when Jesus ascended, the angel said, why are you looking up, go....This echoes the last words of Jesus, "go into the world..."
The great hope of the New Testament is not heaven, in fact, as we typically understand it. It's the resurrection of our bodies! See this emphatic emphasis in 1 Cor. 15.
How is it then that we get so otherworldly that we become useless and irrelevant to this world now?
