Hi Austin

Thank you for your comment at Provoketive Magazine (http://provoketive.com). We’re creating a space of rich conversation about life, faith, justice and culture without judgment. Our desire is to provoke the reader’s imagination through conversation and open up spaces of dialogue, learning, and hope.  We want to invite you to come back soon and continue to participate in the conversation. 

Thank you,
Jonathan Brink
Provoketive Magazine

You posted the following comment:
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Jason,

I agree with you to a certain extent, but my concern is the denial of a starting point. We must be renewed (from the Spirit) before we can renew. We must become citizens of Heaven before we can impact the world. I'm not saying that we live from Earth into heaven, but rather than when we have once become new creations ourselves, we should share that newness, that greatness, that opportunity, and that responsibility with the Earth. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, but the New Earth is not yet manifest. While we are commanded to care for creation and love one another, we cannot do what only God can do. We cannot restore the Earth ourselves, but we are called to participate in the ministry of Christ's restoration. To do so, we must be in Christ. We can't renew the Earth by ourselves, we need Christ. We can't even renew ourselves, we need Christ to do that.

All that is to say that if a beautiful work of art distracts from the truth of the gospel, we should not appreciate it as much as a child's drawing that draws people to the truth of Christ. The beautiful art isn't bad, it's just worse than the less accomplished less beautiful piece of art. The purpose and the effect of the object effects its value, and therefore my appreciation thereof.

Yes, we need to live in both worlds, just like Christ did; but for anyone to live in both, they must first live in heaven.