A review by dkatreads
Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church by N.T. Wright

5.0

One of the most paradigm - shifting books on Christian theology and living I've read. Wright shatters the incomplete narrative that says the gospel is simply a matter of justification and atonement, and invites the reader to see and believe how it stretches further--so much further, in fact, that it lands in eternity. This eternity, Wright reveals, full of such immense hope, is so poorly understand by the modern church as to be some disembodied, spiritual existence of constant worship. Rather, he demonstrates that our hope is in the promised coming of Christ's Kingdom here on Earth--not the same one, but a redeemed one, a remade one, one with ourselves actually in it, redeemed, remade, and resurrected too. Our future is not "up in heaven," but in this New Earth, Earth and heaven and all things as they were meant to be, with all the beauty of work and opportunity for creation that entails. And this, he argues, is the full promise of Christ. Not just salvation FROM sin, but salvation INTO an inheritance and Kingdom and resurrected body. This remaking of us and the world is why Christ came, and this is the story God has been writing and preparing us for since the beginning. It was always so much bigger than us.

One of the most helpful things this book accomplishes is its exposure of the far too many habits, practices, and common forms of speaking of the church that distort this truth and dim this hope. In response, Wright calls for vigilant hope - bringing among God's people--affirming our future as resurrected, bodily beings, celebrating and looking forward to the coming renewal of the Earth and even human culture / institutions, and speaking honestly and comprehensively about the Christian gospel as a grander narrative of world-shattering, life-changing hope.