78 Chapter 1 Paul’s eschatological ecclesiology means that a messianic citizen is by consequence a global citizen, not just in the resistance to any current national sovereignty, but also in the hope that messianic sovereignty may be actualized globally, animating loyalty among all humanity and reconciling all creation. (p. 120) Zerbe (2012) perceived the messianic citizen in the same way as Church Father Augustine perceived the church: as a network of citizens that form an inspiring polis or city in the world, which is not in any way dangerous or threatening to peaceful coexistence in the world. As Augustine sketched in his famous De Civitate Dei, on the one hand, there is the city of man, which is formed by the love of the self (amor sui) that is widespread in the world. On the other hand, due to God’s grace, there is the city of God, present within the city of man but shaped by the love of God (amor Dei), which produces a serving, spiritual city within the larger city of man. This city of God has a cosmopolitan scope: it is meant to fill the whole Earth. The city of God can and will be a suffering entity in the contemporary world, although faith and hope imply that God will not permit the city of man to exterminate His own city, which will prevail by the Second Coming of Christ. Investigating Augustine’s explanation of the city of God, Pieper (2021) concluded that it clearly favours cosmopolitan ideals over political egoism. Zerbe (2012) argued the same with regard to Paul’s eschatological ecclesiology. The Christian politeuma that is central to it provides a strong motivation for a global allegiance in the life of the Christian. This allegiance extends much further than ecclesial discipleship. Where discipleship may be ‘easily susceptible to an individualist interpretation or practice’, Zerbe (2012) posited that citizenship ‘not only conjures up the crucial element of personal loyalty and practice, but also that of a social and global-ecological vision, formation and identity’ (pp. 2–3). To demonstrate how this notion functions as a ‘vital framework for understanding Paul’s apostolic letters’, Zerbe (2012) chose to translate faith as loyalty. The reason for this is that pistis and pisteuein, in their original sense, not only denote conviction in the sense of considering something to be true but also loyalty and fidelity—a view recently corroborated by Sierksma-Agteres (2023). ‘In Paul’s theology conviction, trust and loyalty are integral—that is, both central and interrelated. They cohere not only linguistically in the one word pistis (…), but they also cohere when we consider Paul’s overall theological expression’ (Zerbe, 2012, p. 26). Thus, the idea of Christians having their politeuma in heaven means that they are, first and foremost, loyal to God; however, as creation and mankind are in the Biblical-Christian conception fully His, and as His commandments
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