Preparation in Heaven for Revelation on Earth – The “Apocalyptic” Pattern

Posted on March 9, 2015 by J Richard Middleton

Today Baker Academic began their weekly series of blog posts “Beyond the Book.” Each week during March I will be discussing interesting things I learned about eschatology while working on A New Heaven and a New Earth. My first post, Preparation in Heaven for Revelation on Earth – The “Apocalyptic” Pattern, focuses on how I have come to interpret the many “heaven” passages in the New Testament, which seem to be associated with the Christian hope.

This is a very short post, which just scratches the surface of the topic. The full discussion can be found in chapter 10 of my eschatology book.

Also, as part of this series Baker is giving away three copies of A New Heaven and a New Earth. The winners will be announced at the end of the month, and you can enter here.

Baker Academic Blog “Beyond the Book”

Posted on March 7, 2015 by J Richard Middleton

Baker Academic Press, the publisher of my eschatology book, A New Heaven and a New Earth, is starting a new blog series called “Beyond the Book,” where authors are asked to reflect (in short blog posts) on aspects of the topic of their book. I’ve been asked to contribute the first set of blogs, one per week during the month of March, starting Monday.

My four posts will address interesting things I learned about biblical eschatology during the writing of the book, things that I had not previously known (these will be topics I have not previously blogged about). Each of the four topics I will write about illumine an important aspect of the biblical worldview, which turns out to be quite different from what many modern Christians assume.

The publisher is giving away free copies of A New Heaven and a New Earth in connection with this blog series; you can sign up to win a free copy here.

I’ll make sure to link my posts from that website to this one once they appear.

A New Heaven and a New Earth Featured on the Baker Academic Blog

Posted on January 16, 2015 by J Richard Middleton

About a month ago I made reference to the Baker Academic blog, which had featured a post they asked me to write about my new eschatology book, along with an excerpt from the book, some reviews it got, and information on my upcoming speaking engagements.

I just received an email with a link to the Baker Academic blog for today, which mentions some of their books and authors currently featured on the Internet. This is what they listed for my book [with my own comments inserted in square brackets]:

Byron Borger, at Hearts & Minds Books, named J. Richard Middleton’s A New Heaven and a New Earth as 2014’s Best Book Of Biblical Studies.

“What a book!…There is no doubt in my mind that this book is urgently needed — among evangelicals and mainline folks alike — to be fully clear about God’s promises of new creation, and how this vision of a restored Earth can animate and sustain our efforts for cultural reform now. Richard is an excellent Biblical scholar and has worked on this serious volume for years; the endorsements have been robust and exceptional, and early readers report it is nearly life-changing.”

[The full version of the above quote is available on the Hearts & Minds website; and Byron Borger had previously posted a lengthy book review soon after the book was published.]

At The Hump of the Camel, Jon Garvey reviewed A New Heaven and a New Earth. [This is a substantial new review, with 20 comments as of today. However, it gets pretty silly at the end with a humorous post called “The Epileptic, Somewhat Elliptic, Low-Down, Apocalyptic Rastafarian Calypso Blues.”]

RJS continued to discuss Middleton’s A New Heaven and a New Earth in the post “The End of the World” at Jesus Creed. [Scot McKnight had previously reviewed it on that website.]

Richard Middleton wrote “God’s Bringing Creation to Its Glorious Destiny” for The High Calling. [I previously cited this in one of my posts.]

Thanks to Mason Slater for this heads up; and thanks to all the other wonderful folks at Baker Academic who care so well for the editing, production, and marketing of their books.