Paul's vision, though, is starting small, with actual communities in which reconciliation and justice has to be practiced - like the rich/poor distinction in the Corinthian church, for instance, or the projected reconciliation between Philemon and Onesimus. But he clearly believes (Ephesians 3) that communities like this send a signal to the wider world that Jesus is Lord - which is aimed at then the whole world coming into line.

If you ask people in England where does Tom Wright sit on the theological spectrum, they say, "Well he's an evangelical of course," as though, come on, get used to it.

The cross is the place where, and the means by which, God loved us to the uttermost.

We can glimpse it in the book of Acts: the method of the kingdom will match the message of the kingdom. The kingdom…goes out into the world vulnerable, suffering, praising, praying, misunderstood, misjudged, vindicated, celebrating: always – as Paul puts it in one of his letters – bearing in the body the dying of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be displayed.

It's very easy for a church just to slide along from week to week, taking it for granted that we do our services like this and that, and we celebrate the sacraments like this and that.

When we begin to glimpse the reality of God, the natural reaction is to worship him. Not to have that reaction is a fairly sure sign that we haven't yet really understood who he is or what he's done.

Genesis 1...was designed to reflect God, both to reflect God back to God in worship and to reflect God into the rest of creation in stewardship.