9 Climate Change and Eschatology
159
Vital Questions Regarding Eschatology
In light of the foregoing, Luetz, Buxton and Bangert have asked these vital questions:
Does climate change herald the end of the world? Does environmental degradation constitute
the beginning of the end? Is God about to create a new heaven and a new earth because we are
on the verge of destroying the one He entrusted to us in the first place? Must the world really
pass away before God’s kingdom can come? Did God expect humans to destroy creation so
that He would replace it? What did Jesus actually mean when he spoke of the ‘Kingdom
of God’? Did he mean a future kingdom, or did he interpret the ‘Kingdom of God’ as
something already begun in the here and now and [as something] that was and is to expand
through his disciples? Has God set a time when the world would come to an end? Or is He
leaving it up to humans to determine the time when the Earth becomes uninhabitable? Does
the progressive anthropogenic destruction of God’s creation in any way relieve humanity
of the originally entrusted creational stewardship responsibility? Further, could it be that
some Bible-believing Christians have adopted a sort of apocalyptic fatalism? Could it be
that doomsday Christians, although not necessarily yearning for the end of the world, still
reckon with it, as it were, in a somewhat placid and unperturbed fatalistic expectation, hoping
that when the end comes, God will then be able to finally establish His kingdom? – according
to the dictum: ‘When the last tree has come down, Christ will come’. 1 (Luetz et al. 2018,
p. 61 f.)
The authors responded to those questions by unfolding three possible end-time
scenarios (or models) which they thought could help in dealing responsibly with the
Bible’s eschatological language, especially in light of what they called the “creation
crisis”. They hoped that these three models would help clarify the crucial question of
whether it made sense for Christians to engage in fighting global warming, considering that—according to Biblicist end-time prophets—the imminent end of the world
cannot be avoided anyhow.
Three End-Time Models
The first end-time scenario was called the Rainbow Model. It was described as
follows:
After Noah and his family survived the flood (seemingly as the only family), he offered a
burnt offering in gratitude for their escape. And God promised: ‘Never again will I destroy
all living creatures, as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold
and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.’ (Gen 8:21–22 NIV). As a
sign of this promise God reportedly created the rainbow: ‘Whenever the rainbow appears in
the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living
creatures of every kind on the earth.’ (Gen 9:16 NIV). According to the Rainbow Model,
there will not be another worldwide apocalyptic catastrophe extinguishing virtually all life,
because God has promised it. Relatedly and importantly, according to this model, there is
1 The dictum is an adaptation of the Native American saying: “When the last tree is cut down, the last
fish eaten, and the last stream poisoned, you will realize that you cannot eat money.” J. Simpson and
J. Speake (Eds): The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs, 5 th edition, Oxford University Press: Oxford
2009.
159
Vital Questions Regarding Eschatology
In light of the foregoing, Luetz, Buxton and Bangert have asked these vital questions:
Does climate change herald the end of the world? Does environmental degradation constitute
the beginning of the end? Is God about to create a new heaven and a new earth because we are
on the verge of destroying the one He entrusted to us in the first place? Must the world really
pass away before God’s kingdom can come? Did God expect humans to destroy creation so
that He would replace it? What did Jesus actually mean when he spoke of the ‘Kingdom
of God’? Did he mean a future kingdom, or did he interpret the ‘Kingdom of God’ as
something already begun in the here and now and [as something] that was and is to expand
through his disciples? Has God set a time when the world would come to an end? Or is He
leaving it up to humans to determine the time when the Earth becomes uninhabitable? Does
the progressive anthropogenic destruction of God’s creation in any way relieve humanity
of the originally entrusted creational stewardship responsibility? Further, could it be that
some Bible-believing Christians have adopted a sort of apocalyptic fatalism? Could it be
that doomsday Christians, although not necessarily yearning for the end of the world, still
reckon with it, as it were, in a somewhat placid and unperturbed fatalistic expectation, hoping
that when the end comes, God will then be able to finally establish His kingdom? – according
to the dictum: ‘When the last tree has come down, Christ will come’. 1 (Luetz et al. 2018,
p. 61 f.)
The authors responded to those questions by unfolding three possible end-time
scenarios (or models) which they thought could help in dealing responsibly with the
Bible’s eschatological language, especially in light of what they called the “creation
crisis”. They hoped that these three models would help clarify the crucial question of
whether it made sense for Christians to engage in fighting global warming, considering that—according to Biblicist end-time prophets—the imminent end of the world
cannot be avoided anyhow.
Three End-Time Models
The first end-time scenario was called the Rainbow Model. It was described as
follows:
After Noah and his family survived the flood (seemingly as the only family), he offered a
burnt offering in gratitude for their escape. And God promised: ‘Never again will I destroy
all living creatures, as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold
and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.’ (Gen 8:21–22 NIV). As a
sign of this promise God reportedly created the rainbow: ‘Whenever the rainbow appears in
the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living
creatures of every kind on the earth.’ (Gen 9:16 NIV). According to the Rainbow Model,
there will not be another worldwide apocalyptic catastrophe extinguishing virtually all life,
because God has promised it. Relatedly and importantly, according to this model, there is
1 The dictum is an adaptation of the Native American saying: “When the last tree is cut down, the last
fish eaten, and the last stream poisoned, you will realize that you cannot eat money.” J. Simpson and
J. Speake (Eds): The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs, 5 th edition, Oxford University Press: Oxford
2009.