The restoration

It is in God’s purposes from creation that the unbreakable linkage between resurrection and the restoration of rule is forged. From the beginning, God’s intent for human life was centered on the royal status of humanity and our commission to image our creator in loving and wise stewardship of the earth, which has been entrusted to our care (Gen. 1:26-28; 2:15; Ps. 8:4—8). This is the cultural mandate, our sacred calling to develop earthly life in a manner that glorifies God and reflects his intentions for a world of shalom (as we saw in chap. 2 above). God’s intent was for the holistic flourishing of embodied people in the entirety of their earthly, cultural existence. Since resurrection is God’s restoration of human life to what it was meant to be, it naturally requires the fulfillment of the original human dignity and status, which have been compromised by sin. Resurrection, therefore, when biblically understood, cannot be separated from the fulfillment of the cultural mandate.—J. Richard Middleton, A New Heaven and a New Earth, 154