Topic Video: The Already and Not Yet

Paul faced a serious challenge to his longstanding belief when Jesus came but didn't bring creation to its climactic end as Israel had expected. How did Paul come to his understanding of eschatology? Find out why Paul's eschatology is commonly described as "already and not yet" in today's topic video.
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By and large, traditional Jewish teachers believed that the turning point between this age and the age to come was the appearance of the Messiah. When the Messiah came, God’s enemies would be destroyed, and God’s faithful people would immediately receive his full blessings in the new heavens and new earth.
Paul faced a serious challenge to this longstanding belief. He knew that Jesus was Israel’s Messiah, but he also knew that Jesus had not brought creation to its climactic end as Israel had expected. So, Paul followed the teachings of Jesus and received special revelation from God that caused him to deviate from traditional Jewish outlooks. As Paul explained it, the transition from this age to the age to come was not a simple, straightforward transition from one age to the next. Instead, it involved a period of overlap when both ages existed alongside each other simultaneously.
It’s become common to describe Paul’s eschatology as “already and not yet” because Paul believed that some aspects of the end times or last days had already become reality in Christ and that they would continue until Christ returned in glory. But what facets of the age to come had already become reality? What was yet to come?
In the first place, Paul emphasized that when Jesus ascended to his throne in heaven, he began the final stage of God’s kingdom. For example, Paul wrote that when the Father raised Christ from the dead:
He … seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come (Ephesians 1:20-21).
Although, at the present time, Christ's reign is realized primarily in "the heavenly places" rather than on earth, he already reigns "above all rule and authority." In this sense, the worldwide kingdom of God promised for the age to come, is a present reality.
A second aspect of the age to come which is already present with us, is the foretaste of our eternal inheritance in the Holy Spirit. Paul taught that when Christ ascended to his throne on high, he also poured out the Holy Spirit on the church on earth as a foretaste of the full inheritance for God’s people that will come when Christ returns. 2:44
In Romans 8:23, Paul explained that believers are those “who have the firstfruits of the Spirit.” In the Old Testament, the firstfruits indicated that a greater harvest was coming in the future. So, for Paul, the gift of the Holy Spirit in every believer’s life is a foretaste of the great blessings that will come at the consummation when Christ returns. According to Ephesians 1:14, the Holy Spirit himself is:
… the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it.
A third feature of the age to come that is also present now, is the beginning of the new creation. In the Old Testament, God promised his people that he would completely recreate the world in the last days and fulfill all that he had planned for the world from the beginning.
In Paul’s mind, the fact that Christ was already defeating the powers of evil and saving people proved that the new creation had already begun.
God has done a lot of wonderful things for us already: I’m justified, I’m saved, I’m redeemed, I’m adopted into the family of God. And yet, not yet am I fully adopted into the family of God the way I one day will be. Not yet am I glorified. Not yet am I free from sin, temptation, sickness, death. It’s this “already, not yet” that is kind of the overlap of the ages, that is, that the old age continues. I still have a body that’s falling apart, I still am tempted to sin, there’s evil in the world around, as we all know all too well. And yet, I also belong to the new age. I am a child of God. I do belong to him. I rejoice in that. I worship him. I have a certain future with him. And we Christians live all of our lives in the tension of that overlap of the old age and the age to come.”