That is why the teleological dimension of our heritage is so precious. The confidence in the future vindication of God's way with evil and the redemption of the world enables us as a community of faith, hope, and love to put ourselves collectively on the line in the struggle against corruption and decay. It enables us to enter into this struggle as vigorously as if it were the eve of the Last Day, yet without being forced to the despair, the haste, the sectarianism that accompany the conviction that world history has played out its predestined course and the Day is actually at hand. The vision of God's planned future vouchsafed by the Cross and Resurrection enables the church to continue and intensify its evangelical mission-thrust impelled above all by the joyous conviction that God's redeeming will cannot be thwarted and people can be helped and led even now to the point of sharing in His Kingdom. Faith in God's purpose enables us as a community of believers to make common cause with persons of good will everywhere in the effort to preserve the earth as a healthy, life- supporting place.
Christians are by no means the only people who deeply cherish the world and life within it.
In our own time, and in response to the same unremitting crisis which has excited new theological interest in eschatology, secular analyses and projections of the future have appeared in great numbers. Physical scientists, social planners, novelists, and dramatists, as well as philosophers and theologians of other religions have responded to the threat of overpopulation, nuclear war, pollution of the natural environment by modem industrialization, economic inequity, world hunger, and the insatiable consumption of the world's resources by the affluent nations. For some, doom is only a matter of time. Others, particularly the pseudo-Christian cults and new religions, despair of effecting change in the direction of events and counsel their followers to concentrate on the inner psychic renewal of the individual and the security of membership in the sect. Our eschatological faith enables us to join with the latter category of people in preparing the way so that the nation and the world can make the necessary but difficult decisions about energy consumption, population control, food distribution, and warfare.