How ‘nigh’ really is the end of the world?

Well, there you have it! The numbers are in! The award for the hottest year on record goes to… 2024! Beating previous award-winning 2023, it racked up an impressive 1.6 degrees hotter than the pre-industrial average. In fact, the world’s been on a record-breaking streak for some time now: the top ten hottest years occurred in, well, the last ten years.

But we won’t just look back on 2024 as yet another record-breaking year in a long run of unwelcome records. We’ll look back on it as the first year our world breached 1.5 degrees, the so-called ‘safe limit’ of heating.

Now, 2024’s heat is probably a spike caused by the Pacific El Nino weather pattern, and it may be a little cooler in 2025. But with carbon emissions still going up (the ones we’re supposed to be getting to zero!), it’s all but inevitable that 1.5 degrees will be the norm (yes, the norm) within ten years and 2 degrees by mid-century. And all but inevitable too are melting polar ice sheets and tundra, rising sea levels, release of methane, loss of almost all coral reefs and the species and livelihoods they support, as well as ever more intense storms and wildfires, drought and famine.

I wonder how that sounds to you. Does it all sound a bit apocalyptic? Or, to put it as one climate protestor’s placard read: THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGHER THAN YOU THINK. And if it does sound apocalyptic, isn’t that supposed to be our line?

Last month I promised we’d be looking at key features of the more thoroughly Biblical gospel that’s renewing evangelicalism. And this is a big one: the end of the world.

In our (mainstream evangelical) church, it used to be commonplace to hear that ‘on that day’, when the final trumpet sounds and Jesus returns, He’s going to whisk His followers off to heaven and destroy the earth. The end of the world is nigh. Get ready. The thing is, though, there’s surprisingly little to support that in the Bible. Not even in Revelation – despite the construction of elaborate modern ‘end-time’ fantasies. Reading the Bible more closely, we’ve been discovering that God’s plan isn’t the destruction of the earth, but its renewal. Beautifully and wonderfully, God’s plan is to reconcile, renew and restore all things (Col.1:20, Matt.19:28, Acts 3:21). It’s not the end that’s nigh, it turns out, but the renewal of the world. That’s our line: the renewal of the world is nigh!

The trouble with the unbiblical end-of-the-world scheme is it’s led us to act in ways opposed to God’s purposes in Christ for us and for all creation. A casual disregard for what He’s entrusted to us. Even wilful destruction. If this car’s headed for the scrap heap, there’s no point looking after it. And, if Jesus could return and destroy it at any moment, planning for a liveable world for our grandchildren’s grandchildren seems like a lack of faith. Worldly. Or worse still, perhaps we can hasten Jesus’ return with nuclear Armageddon or environmental apocalypse. No, enough! Unbiblical thinking – unsurprisingly – leads us into ungodly action.

But now that we see the Biblical picture – the renewal of all things – everything looks different. It makes sense to live now in a way that hands on a flourishing world to future generations. Because, if Jesus returns in my lifetime, He’ll renew it, make it flourish, but even more abundantly. It makes sense to make food choices – supermarket aisle discipleship! – that make for peace, energy choices that restore, work commitments that make for a better world. To be a people committed to justice, peace and mercy. Because one day – no matter how apocalyptic the climate’s looking today or how bad it gets – the one who died on the cross to reconcile all things to God will return to complete the work of making all things new. Ground for living. Ground for hope. The renewal of all things is nigh. Get ready. Yes, indeed, come Lord Jesus!