The community of faith finds itself located precariously between Jesus' first and second comings, between the promise and fulfillment, between what God has begun in the gospel and what God has yet to complete. It thus finds itself proclaiming a gospel of life, love, hope, and faith in a world more characterized by death, hate, despair, and fear. The gospel insists that Jesus' death has shut the door on the age of violence and death, even as his resurrection has opened the door on the Age of Shalom and life. But in this tensive in-between time, those conflicting ages overlap, and the church str.