Foretaste of the Future

For many Christians, the book of Revelation inspires confusion and fear. It's seen as a coded screenplay for the end times, or it's just too strange to understand. The problem, Dean Flemming contends, is that when we read Revelation as focused on the future, we miss what it says about what God is doing in the world now. Revelation is one of the richest texts in Scripture for understanding both God's mission to make everything new and how the church is caught up in that mission. In Foretaste of the Future, Flemming mines this largely untapped resource by introducing a missional reading of Revelation. Drawing from a variety of cultural perspectives, Flemming explores Revelation's original context, key themes, and transformational message that rings out for each new generation. By reading Revelation in light of God's mission, we gain a renewed vision of God's great purpose to redeem and restore all creation through the work of the slain Lamb. We also see how God's people are called to help offer a foretaste of salvation and healing now, along with insight on how to contextualize this mission in particular settings. A missional reading not only invites us to imagine the future; it teaches us to let the future cast its light into the present to guide our way.

Dean Flemming (PhD, Aberdeen) is professor of New Testament and missions at MidAmerica Nazarene University in Olathe, Kansas. He has spent more than twenty years as a missionary educator in Asia and Europe and is the author of a commentary on Philippians and Contextualization in the New Testament, which won a 2006 Christianity Today book award.