From the above it is obvious that the meaning of history is to be found in the kingdom of God, indeed the kingdom of God even creates history, and all history is moving toward the eschatological kingdom. But with this we have not yet seen the specific significance of history. Is the significance of history to be found in God's patience, so that history is only a time that is allowed for man to repent (K. Barth), or is it more than this?
In order to answer this question we must first consider the following question: what is the content of the eschatological kingdom? There are three possible answers to this question.2.47 The first is the refusal to answer because it is considered an unapproachable mystery, the mystery of the divine glory. But this is the easy way out, in fact it is no answer at all because `kingdom' is a concrete symbol and ``if concrete symbols are used at all, mere silence about their meaning is not permitted.''2.48
Another answer sees the eschatological kingdom as having no direct relation to history and the development of the universe. It is established in eternity, and the problem of human existence is whether and in what way individuals may enter this transcendent realm. History is understood merely as the element in which the individual must make decisions, relevant to his own salvation but irrelevant for the kingdom of God which is above history. History is the earthly realm out of which individuals are moved into the heavenly realm.
The third answer asserts that the ever present end of history (understood as the transcendence of the kingdom of God) elevates the positive content of history into eternity at the same time that it excludes the negative from participation in it. Therefore nothing which has been created in history is lost, but it is liberated from the negative element with which it is entangled within existence. The eschatological kingdom of God thus includes the positive content of history, liberated from its negative distortions and fulfilled in its potentialities.
The question of the content of the eschaton must be answered from the biblical doctrine of salvation. This is obvious because if we understand salvation in a gnostic sense as salvation from this world we will only see the significance of history as a chance given for us to repent; but if we understand salvation in biblical-reformed terms as a salvation of this world we will see the significance of history in the fact that it is the totality of ingredients which make up the eschatological kingdom of God.2.49
We have already seen in chapter one that the Son of God was incarnated in order to save this world from sin and not to ontologically replace this world with a new world. We are not saved from this world, we are saved together with it, in our historical existence.
This contains the idea that in the eschaton we will come across our present realities again. In other words this world and what is realized in it supplies the totality of the ingredients of the eschaton. ``Since there is an historical dimension in all realms of life...one could say that life in the whole of creation and in a special way in human history contributes in every moment of time to the Kingdom of God and its eternal life. What happens in time and space, in the smallest particle of matter as well as in the greatest personality is significant for the eternal life.''2.50At this point we see the significance of the biblical doctrine of the resurrection of the flesh. There is an identity of the self regarding the person who died and the person who is resurrected (That very person is resurrected). There is also an identity of the self in its corporeality (Resurrection of the flesh). There is even an identity of the self in its temporality. ``What am I? What other than this piece of filled time? As such I am and as such I am saved. In the eschaton I find this piece of filled time, that I call my life, that I myself am, returned.''2.51
The biblical idea of resurrection and what is implied by it is not limited to the resurrection of individuals. ``The symbol of resurrection is often used in a more general sense to express the certainty of Eternal Life rising out of the death of temporal life. In this sense it is a symbolic way of expressing the central theological concept of the New Being. As the New Being is not another being, but the transformation of the old being, so resurrection is not the creation of another reality over against the old reality but is the transformation of the old reality, arising out of its death. In this sense the term `resurrection' (without particular reference to the resurrection of the body) has become a universal symbol for the eschatological hope.''2.52
Therefore we can say that there is a completely correlative relationship between the eschaton and history. This means that the one component is just as essential for the other as the other for that one. There is a full reciprocity. We have already seen that the eschaton creates history, now we can add to this and say history provides all the ingredients of the eschaton. Thus the eschaton is more than the goal of history. It is the summarizing, the recapitulation and consummation of history to unity. Through this, history is made fully into history: its unity, its connection, the solidarity of its parts become visible.2.53
Having answered the question of the content of the eschatological kingdom we can resume our discussion of the meaning of history. In the first place we can completely reject the idea that history only exists under God's patience, as a time that is allowed for man to repent. This idea contradicts the biblical concept of salvation (discussed in chapter one) as well as the biblical idea of resurrection.
Secondly, in order to further understand the significance of history, we must keep an eye on God's Judgment as God's rejection of that which rejects Him.2.54
With Tillich we could say that in the permanent transition of the temporal to the eternal, divine judgment is to be understood as the rejection of the claim of the negative to be positive. In this sense God in his eternal life is called a `burning fire', burning that which pretends to be positive but is not. But as the negative lives from the positive it distorts and therefore nothing is only negative, nothing that has being can be ultimately annihilated; but it can be excluded from eternity in so far as it is mixed with non-being and not yet liberated from it.2.55 In other words, all creation is Gods creation and as such is good (Gen. 1:31). It has come under the curse of sin but Christ came to save this world from sin, and this world returns in the eschaton. We could think of the salvation of this world in terms of God plucking a burning coal out of a fire, the whole is saved but some sparks fly off.2.56 Thus the whole is saved and freed from the negativities of sin - even the demons serve a positive function in the kingdom: they are made to be stools for the feet of God or Christ (Ps. 110:1; Heb. 10:13). This must not be understood in terms of an apokatastasis panton, as the restoration of all things, and beatitude, not for some, but for all. The possibility of eternal lostness must be kept open. All humanity depends on this. ``Man is only man if in his lifetime he has the freedom to fall, that applies for all eternity. If the emphasis of eternity no longer stands on time, time becomes worthless.''2.57Anyway man's participation in the kingdom of God depends on the choices he makes in his historical existence.2.58This gives an infinite weight to every decision and creation in time and space. Now man can choose for or against salvation and ``everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.'' This quotation continues with the following significant words: ``But how are men to call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without a preacher? And how can men preach unless they are sent?'' (Rom. 10:13-16).
With this we have, at last, come back to the point with which we concluded the previous section, namely, that in its essence world history is to be understood as mission history. From Israel God comes to the nations of the earth; the apostles went into the world with the gospel of the kingdom; and the church directs itself at all people with the gospel of the kingdom. It directs itself to all nations (Mat. 28:19) in their pagan context of being. This apostolic meaning of history has a positive and a negative side. It consists negatively of the breaking of the works of the devil and in the reconciliation of guilt. ``Alle werk Gods is zijn bezigheid - in den messias, door den Geest - in het vleesch, om datgene, wat gedaan is, ongedaan te krijgen; de schuld der zonde te verzoenen; en zoo de aarde weer schoon te vegen.''2.59 All history must be seen in this light. This breaking of the works of the devil and the reconciliation of guilt occurred once and for all in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But it is spread in historical existence by the work of the Spirit. In this apostolic process of christianization it is not only individuals that are converted, but rather there is a breaking and upsetting of the whole pagan context of being as such. The kingdom of God comes in place of paganism.2.60 This is the positive side of the apostolic meaning of history. The salvation of God works itself out in existence so ``that man may again stand up out of destruction, so that he may bathe in the overflowing light of God's glory on the cleansed earth.''2.61 This world must be lived as His kingdom; His image must be expressed in this reality; this life must be sanctified to His service. Therefore sanctification and not forgiveness is the meaning of history; sanctification understood in a biblical, reformed sense as living before God's countenance in the world and in time.2.62 We can clarify this idea of the positive side of the apostolic meaning of history by saying: ``de zonde is er bij gekomen, bij het proton, en bovendien de verwerking van de zonde, enerzijds in de verzoening, welke de eigenlijke verlossing is, en anderzijds in de heiliging, welke ook reeds verheerlijking is.''2.63Sanctification is already glorification. This does not mean that we already experience the eschatological kingdom of Glory - there is a modal difference between the present and the future kingdom. What it does emphasize is the fact that history contributes to the eschatological kingdom to the extent that it has been sanctified.
With this we see the importance of the apostolic meaning of history and the significance of the confession of the kingdom of God in the present. The kingdom of God is not to be understood as a static theocracy but as a militant holiness that is not immanent in the world, but is imminently breaking into the world. And this imminence of the kingdom is not to be understood only christologically but also pneumatologically.2.64 Therefore history is to be understood as God's ascension to the throne. This ascension is a struggle, God's struggle with the flesh. God rules in medio inimicorum (Ps. 110; 1 Cor. 15). Man's resistance to God's lordship is revealed in the historical process. This is one of the purposes of the Law, to produce the consciousness of guilt (Rom. 7). But this resistance and guilt of man does not hinder God's ascension to the throne. On the contrary, the other side of God's ascension to the throne lies in the reconciliation of guilt. His throne is the cross.2.65
Before we leave this topic we must note two things; Firstly, history provides the `plus' of the eschaton above the proton. Through the experience of sin and grace we go from the posse non peccare to the non posse peccare, and the eschaton is no restitutio in integrum, but the synthesizing, recapitulation and consummation of history to unity.
Secondly, even without sin and thus without salvation there would have been history and the eschaton would have exhibited a plus above the proton. That is the meaning of the theologoumenon of the covenant of works.2.66