God's Homecoming: The Forgotten Promise of Future Renewal – Biblical Theology from Genesis to Revelation on the New Creation

by N.T. Wright

Many devout believers have been lured into the classic misunderstanding that Christianity teaches how we must leave earth and go somewhere else to be with God. But this outlook dangerously suggests that God created a world he loves only to abandon it. Nothing could be further from the scriptural truth, N. T. Wright contends. In God’s Homecoming, Wright excavates the forgotten story of God’s original purpose to dwell with us and make his home—and ours—in this new creation.

In his groundbreaking Surprised by Hope, Wright dismantled the “going to heaven” narrative. In God’s Homecoming, he returns with a panoramic pilgrimage tracing God’s homecoming promise from Genesis through Revelation. When we read the Bible as a whole, Wright argues, we do not find a narrative of souls ascending a spiritual ladder to heaven, but of God coming down to dwell with us.

Revolutionary and grounded in biblical research, Wright leads readers through the movements of the promise: God created heaven and earth to be his own home, he filled the temple with his presence, then the church with the Holy Spirit, and promises that the all creation will again be filled with his glory. He traces how the popular Christian reading got it wrong—as well as the radical transformation that awaits us and the church today if we return to God’s original vision.

Until we recover this forgotten story, Wright warns, we will keep distorting the Bible’s message. Yet, he argues, its recovery could be the key to revitalizing every aspect of Christian life as we know it: prayer, mission, evangelism, pastoral practice, and personal devotion.

Genres: Theology, Christian, Nonfiction, Audiobook

368 pages, Hardcover

First published February 17, 2026

About the author

N. T. Wright is the former Bishop of Durham in the Church of England (2003-2010) and one of the world's leading Bible scholars. He is now serving as the chair of New Testament and Early Christianity at the School of Divinity at the University of St. Andrews. He has been featured on ABC News, Dateline NBC, The Colbert Report, and Fresh Air, and he has taught New Testament studies at Cambridge, McGill, and Oxford universities. Wright is the award-winning author of Surprised by Hope, Simply Christian, The Last Word, The Challenge of Jesus, The Meaning of Jesus (coauthored with Marcus Borg), as well as the much heralded series Christian Origins and the Question of God.

He also publishes under Tom Wright.

Reviews

[Suzanne McDonald · Rating 4 out of 5]

This will be very significant at a popular level and it also speaks into a number of live debates in the academy. It is a must read, whether or not you agree with the big picture and/or some of the details. FWIW, I agree with the big picture and have all sorts of issues with some of the details :) It is also typical Wright :) Like the earlier Surprised by Hope, to which this is the sequel, there are *very* important correctives here, but also very evident 'pendulum swing' effects, leading to some interesting speculation, and also to some dubious sweeping claims/unjustifiable generalizations (so, for example, no, the attributes of God in Christian 'classical theism' are not simply unbiblical, and no this approach does not inevitably lead to an Apollinarian christology. I really do wonder whether Wright has read anything more of the book he references in this regard than the title). To pick out a few facets of the book, he does a predictably great job of setting out the scriptural contours of God's intention to dwell in and with his beloved creation with his beloved image-bearers, and the various facets of 'temple' themes, and how all of this shapes the biblical narrative / is the trajectory for eschatology, vs the 'souls going up to heaven’ view. He has attempted to meet some of the objections raised to his earlier work (in particular that his account of eternal life in the new creation was too anthropocentric, and had insufficient place for the worship of God - he's not entirely successful in this, in part because as I'll indicate in a moment, he actually has almost nothing to say about the eschaton). He has some serious (and to my mind correct) questions to put to the Thomist 'beatific vision’ tradition (intellectual apprehension of the essence of God, available to the blessed in the intermediate state), but his attempt to dismantle the whole idea of ‘seeing God’ as a key aspect of our eschatological telos via a brief dismissal of a few texts strikes me as…inadequate. He does hint that seeing God will be important at the eschaton, but since he has almost nothing to say about the eschatological consummation, this goes nowhere. His utter abhorrence of the 'souls going up to heaven' approach also means that he ends up rejecting the idea of a soul that continues into the intermediate state (which he will not call ‘heaven’ because of the confusion that causes). Instead, Wright opines that our body and soul will cease at death. Our ‘spirit' / our continuing identity is kept for us by the Holy Spirit, hidden with Christ in God until the resurrection on the Last Day (Wright refuses to capitalize persons of the Trinity; that is a recipe for confusion in this section in particular, so I capitalize where he does not). There is also some wild speculation in this section about how the Holy Spirit indwelling us in this life changes the Holy Spirit. This is highly problematic, completely unnecessary to his overall argument, and is a total hostage to fortune in terms of the reception of his book in theological circles. Finally, and as I’ve indicated, after very convincingly setting out theme of God coming to dwell with his people in the midst of his creation as a major facet of scripture from creation to eschaton, Wright ironically offers almost nothing about the actual eschatological homecoming / consummation / filling of the whole creation with the knowledge and glory of the Triune God, except to strongly affirm that it will happen. He offers plenty on the implications for the life of the church now, and as I’ve indicated, he has plenty to say about what the intermediate state is and is not, but he doesn’t draw together any summative thoughts on the nature of eternal life in the new creation. In particular, since he specifically rejects the Thomist approach to the beatific vision, his work here is crying out for something of the non-Thomist stream on that topic, which denies that the beatific vision is possible in a disembodied intermediate state and instead focuses on what it will mean to see the glory of God in Jesus Christ when he returns at eschaton and we will behold him in our resurrected bodies. But hey, I would say that, wouldn’t I :) !

[Bryan Ullrich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Main Themes of God’s Homecoming
The Forgotten Promise: God’s Return, Not Our Escape
At the heart of God’s Homecoming is Wright’s contention that the dominant narrative in much of Western Christianity—that the goal of faith is to “go to heaven when you die”—is a profound misunderstanding of the biblical story. Instead, Wright argues that the true scriptural hope is not about human souls escaping earth, but about God coming to dwell with humanity in a renewed creation. This “homecoming” motif is traced from Genesis to Revelation, revealing a consistent biblical vision of God’s desire to make his home with his people.
Wright identifies two intertwined themes:
1. Cosmic Renewal: God’s ultimate purpose is to fill all creation with his glory, bringing about a universal renewal that unites heaven and earth.
2. Relational Homecoming: God’s personal return to Zion (Jerusalem) and his covenantal presence among his people, fulfilled in Jesus and the Spirit, and anticipated in the church.
Critique of Platonism and the “Soul Going Up” Narrative
A major theme is Wright’s critique of the influence of Platonic philosophy on Christian eschatology. He argues that from the fourth and fifth centuries onward, the church absorbed a Platonic framework that prioritized the soul’s ascent to heaven over the biblical vision of resurrection and new creation. This shift, Wright contends, has distorted Christian hope, mission, and practice.
The Temple, the Spirit, and the Sacramentshe Temple, the Spirit, and the Sacraments
Wright explores the biblical theme of the temple as the locus of God’s presence, showing how the tabernacle, the Jerusalem temple, the incarnation of Jesus, and the indwelling of the Spirit in the church all point to God’s intention to dwell with his people. The sacraments, especially Communion, are reinterpreted as tangible signs of God’s homecoming, embodying the overlap of heaven and earth in the present.
Practical Implications: Prayer, Mission, Unity, and Embodied Hope
The book moves from theological exposition to practical application, arguing that recovering the biblical vision of God’s homecoming transforms every aspect of Christian life:
• Prayer becomes communion with the God who is already present.
• Mission is participation in God’s work of renewal, not recruitment for an escape plan.
• Church unity is essential, as the church is called to be a prototype of the new creation.
• Sacramental life is re-envisioned as participation in God’s ongoing presence and future promise.

[John Martindale · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think Wright makes a strong case, arguing that the Biblical authors looked forward to YHWH coming to earth, rather than hoping we'd be snatched away from earth and taken to heaven. Once Wright gets to the New Testament, he spends more time pointing to the present homecoming (the Spirit’s presence in the church on earth) before the ultimate homecoming.
While this would be a more "biblical" approach, I suspect there are reasons that the church moved away from it beyond a mere love affair with Plato. I worry that bringing back this more biblical reading could lead to more unhealthy premillennial movements due to longing for the ultimate homecoming and/or make Christianity seem less plausible due to the seeming unreality of the first homecoming.

Over time, certain notions, once widely accepted by a people, can seem to clash enough with reality or bear enough bad fruit that alterations seem necessary. For example, in the Torah, YHWH was believed to be obligated, according to the covenant, to do certain beneficial things for Israel. Also, the prophets promised that Israel would soon be restored and made prosperous; God’s glory would fill the temple, they would be loved, forgiven, comforted, and given a new heart; they would never again be put to shame, and all their enemies would be destroyed or enslaved, but these goods did not materialize.
They hoped that when God finally returned to Zion, all these goods would occur, but how many generations must die in disappointment before it starts to ring hollow? How long until it seems a delusional and foolish hope? The absence of God forced an adjustment. None of these goods are in THIS life, but instead, they are all pushed into the afterlife. With this genius tweak, nothing can falsify the faith, as the pie is now in the by and by, rather than here on earth as the Old Testament promised.

When the saints go through extremely challenging periods, the hope that God will swing in and put everything to rights tends to result in apocalyptic date setting. For example, the coming of Antiochus Epiphanes led the author of Danial to claim the divine homecoming would occur a few years after Antiochus was killed, but it didn’t. In the New Testament, we have more general date setting. Jesus was seen as the first fruits, and this meant the general resurrection was just about to occur. Jesus was to return in that generation to establish the Kingdom of God through force. They thought the ultimate homecoming was soon—God was just about to make all things right on earth. But he didn’t do so. As it is inherently unsatisfying to put our hope in the homecoming of a Savior who doesn't seem to ever be coming home, I kind of understand why people begin to look less to a homecoming of God, and begin to hope for pie in the sky after we die in the sweet by and by.
Some Christian leaders throughout history have felt discomfort with the teachings, enthusiasm, and actions of Christians who believed Jesus was coming to rule on earth, and have thus embraced and promoted amillennialism. They seemed to notice that the hope that God would come and fix this earth continues to inspire Christians to hope it will be in their generation and to act like lunatics. So again, I understand this move from a more Biblical perspective. Maybe it was for the best.

As far as Wright's realized eschatology, the coming of the Spirit and the way God was supposed to come in power and be present in the church, this too is bound to clash with reality and cause problems, for Christians don't seem any better off than before the supposed coming of the Spirit.
I think we need a theology of God's absence. In so many parables, Jesus speaks of the master who is away, the nobleman who is in a faraway country, and the bridegroom who is not present. These parables jive with reality. Yes, in the NT, we also have the claims that the Spirit would bring something more, that power, will, and ability--that transformation and life. But as 2000 years of history and countless Christians' experience testify, not really.
Ironically, claiming God's homecoming has happened through the Spirit in the church (as John and Paul describe it) only emphasizes God's palpable absence. It presses home the degree to which we are on our own, trying and failing in our own strength. Nothing brings more disappointment and disillusionment than those who feel dependent and desperate for God, who seek him with all their heart, and plead and beg, only to get nothing.
Lutheranism's insistence that we are all totally depraved and must sin in thought, word, and deed thousands of times a day, and that to try to improve or to love would be try to "earn our salvation," and that we are elected for heaven, that this was decided before we were born, as repugnant and unbiblical as it all is, is still a theodicy and a way to make sense of the hiddenness of God--the fact that he has not given us what the New Testament promised.
So Wright may be pointing us to the homecoming (Before the Ultimate homecoming) that the New Testament promised, but as this never happened, it is bound to disappoint. We must therefore adapt and move on.

[Matt Pitts · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've read a lot of N. T. Wright and benefited a lot from his work. He is easily one of the most readable biblical scholars I have encountered and few can keep up with all he has written. I certainly can't. I wasn't even aware this book had been released until Suzanne McDonald's review here on Goodreads got my attention.

I'm especially sympathetic toward a key portion of Wright's argument in this book: that the ultimate hope of Christian theology is not going away to heaven but God coming to dwell with us in the new creation after the resurrection. I have long tried to emphasize resurrection and new creation as the true end of the Bible's story of redemption rather than a disembodied experience in heaven. A few of the early chapters were mainly about showing this from scripture and with these I largely agreed.

However, Wright indicated early on that he wanted to shake things up. What starts as a tremor in the beginning ends with an earthquake by the end. Wright insists he is aiming to be biblical and avoid the distortions of Greek philosophy (especially Plato) that started in the third and fourth century. He blames Plato for Christian focus on 'going to heaven' as opposed to 'God coming to earth.'

One of the things Wright has to wrestle with in order to persuade his readers of his approach is to show that all those texts that sound like they are about the souls of believers going to heaven until the resurrection at Christ's return don't really say what they seem to most of us to be saying. Plato has corrupted our vision, so we see what we have been conditioned to see.

So if the intermediate state is not what most Christians have believed it is, then what is it? Wright doesn't fully show his hand until the last chapter. There he explains that the spirit of believers is joined with the Holy Spirit until the resurrection. Somehow this is not heaven. Here's how Wright says it:

"When the spirit has come home to a person, the spirit, fused together with the human spirit and holding it in continuing life, will stay 'at home,' holding that person in life, through and after bodily death, and on to the point where the same spirit will raise that person from the dead," (290).

The word "fused" there appears to be chosen carefully. Earlier Wright said, "Paul is thus visualizing our individual human spirit as being fused together with the divine spirit, so that they form a unity," (287). This is highly concerning language.

Later Wright says, “Bodily death finishes off the old psychosomatic ‘you.’ To cling to it, or to imagine a soul that is a personal possession, something other than the indwelling spirit, is to sidestep the co-crucifixion of which Paul speaks in Galatians 2:19-21,” (295). To say that ‘you’ no longer exist as a distinct being, that there is no ‘you’ that is ‘something other than the indwelling spirit’ sounds like pantheism where the soul is melded or ‘fused’ with the cosmic spirit.

Another concerning statement Wright makes seems to deny the Spirit's immutability. Wright says, "We might even say, with a cautious boldness, that in shaping and directing the believer...the spirit's own self, having come 'home' to that person, has been shaped afresh," (291). Again he says, "We have so often spoken of the effects of the spirit's work on the believer that we have not usually stopped to think of the effects of that work on the spirit's own self," (291).

There is much more I want to say and may do so in another place. But for now it is enough to note these highly concerning suggestions Wright is making.

[Bianca · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the first book I’ve read by N.T. Wright. I’ve heard a lot about him over the years and wanted to engage with his work for myself, especially on a topic as important as the future hope of the Christian life.

This is not a light or quick read. It’s a book that requires time, focus, and ideally a Bible, pen, and paper alongside you. I would not recommend it to new believers. It’s better suited for someone already very familiar with Scripture and willing to carefully work through theological arguments. Wright asks many questions and builds his case gradually, but at times it felt more philosophical than clear.

There were parts of the book I genuinely found interesting and worth further study. For example, the idea that the purpose of the law was not primarily to enable humans to approach God, but to make it possible for a holy God to dwell among sinful people, stood out as a thought-provoking angle. I also found his emphasis on new creation and the restoration of the whole world—rather than a purely individual focus—helpful to reflect on. His discussion of how Platonic ideas may have influenced Christian thinking, and the caution against reading those assumptions back into Scripture, also gave me pause in a good way.

At the same time, there were sections I struggled with, either because they were unclear or because I strongly disagreed. Some arguments required rereading multiple times just to grasp what he was saying. Others felt like overstatements or conclusions I could not follow.

One example I found particularly concerning was his view on praying for the departed:

“I believe it is appropriate for those still alive to pray for those in that postmortem state… we can pray with them and for them, for their continuing life of refreshment while awaiting resurrection…”

I revisited this section carefully and discussed it with my husband, and we both disagreed with this position. While I understand Wright’s broader framework, this is not something I find biblically supported.

I also want to note that I am not new to these topics. I have spent time studying eschatology, including premillennial views, both personally and in discussion with others who hold a range of perspectives within that framework. Even with that background, I found many of Wright’s conclusions difficult to agree with, and at times quite surprising.

Overall, this is a book that may push you to think and study more, and for that, it has some value. However, I personally wouldn’t recommend it to most people I know. It requires careful discernment, and I suspect many evangelicals would find significant points of disagreement.

Worth reading for awareness and engagement—but not one I would return to.

Thankful to SPCK for the opportunity to read and review this book.

[Darcy · Rating 5 out of 5]

What if the message of the Bible isn’t about how we as humans can get into heaven after we die, but about how God can come to dwell with humans on this earth? How much would that change the way we approach our faith? N. T. Wright invites us to do just that in this magisterial work, God’s Homecoming: The Forgotten Promises of Future Renewal. In his typical accessible writing style, Wright distills extensive theological reflection into a compelling and thought provoking argument, one that will challenge the traditional western Christianity way of expressing the destiny (and ultimately purpose) of our lives.

I found myself deeply inspired by Wright’s articulation of the gospel thread of God seeking to dwell among humans. Having read many of his works, including his academic tomes, this book brings many of those thoughts together on this critical theme of our eternal destiny, providing ample reference to host other works should you want to dig deeper. This way of looking at the message of the Bible truly is paradigm shifting and a much needed word to a broken world and struggling church. As he articulates, the “ancient scriptural hope” focused on “the coming of God to rescue His people and to restore creation to its intended state of justice in peace. If today’s believers were even to glimpse that proposal, let alone to work out what it might mean in practice, it would make an enormous difference to the life and vocation of Jesus’s followers as we navigate our way through the strange and often threatening world of the twenty-first century” (91).

As valuable as his exegesis is Wright’s examination of the historical development of Christian thought and theology. Understanding how and why Christian eschatology became so heavily influenced by platonic thought is as helpful as it is provocative.

And, in the end, the scholar’s pastoral heart breaks through with a powerful trinitarian as if the vision of Isaiah 40. I found myself so moved that the only word that fits is Maranatha. Come, Jesus, come.

There are some errors in the published version I have (Harper One). For example, footnote 40 in chapter three (page 70) should read 1 Kings 12:28, not 2 Kings. And the footnotes for chapter eight are, at times, baffling. At least two notes are missing, causing profound confusion for anyone looking for the references (the chapter identifies 38 endnotes but only 36 are provided, and so it is not always clear how [if!] they connect to the argument in the text). Such sloppy editing is far from what one would expect from Harper One. The book's binding, on the other hand, is excellent.

[Richard Terrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am presently reading this book for a study group and am most of the way through it. My questions are: How does Wright's view of things differ from fundamentalist assertions of a literal, on-earth rule of Christ/God in the millenium? This idea has been around a long time at least in some form, so I don't know that N.T. Wright has so much discovered something overlooked as he has appropriated it while claiming some sort of originality. The second question is: How does Wright's vision differ from the older (and understandably jettisoned) "post-millenialism" of a century or so ago? I just don't see the scintillating originality here. An observation too: Wright sounds quite a bit like a "Christian dominionist." Also, the eschatalogical language of scripture is vigorously catastrophic, even violent, yet Wright seems oblivious to this, as if it's not there at all. Of course, he might just respond to this observation by pulling the familiar scholarly ploy of saying that although certain language SEEMS to say things in a certain way it really doesn't mean it.

[JoAnn Hansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Answers my questions about my life after I die.

This book is for people who are skeptical about the "going to heaven when I die." Wright thinks through biblical promises based on the fact that believing results in God's spirit joining with ours. Then death is the sanctifier so we remain in God's spirit after we die, to return to a renewed cosmos in which Jesus rules in love. Our vocation now is to bring that rule into the world with love, mercy and justice, guided by the spirit of God within us. Wright's view is far more comprehensive and encouraging than any heaven I imagined.

[David Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I appreciated the careful theological explanation of a faithful reading of scripture regarding the intention of God to live among the people God has created and redeemed. I enjoyed the thoughtful distinction between "God's new creation in Jesus Christ" and the traditional understanding of heaven as a separate reality from earth. What made the price of purchase well worth it many times over, however, was the final chapter dealing with the perennial question, "Where are they now?" as pertaining to believers who have died. What a fascinating book.

[Paulette Kneip Mullins · Rating 3 out of 5]

UGG! I think the jest is God wants to dwell with us?? Maybe rereading will give me a better understanding of what the author was saying???

[Paul Suich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hidden in plain sight

Profoundly simple in methodology and profoundly rich in how the story of God coming to us enriches our lives.
I eagerly await the third book of the trilogy.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great sequel to Surprised by Hope by NT Wright.

[Rachel Hallstrom · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just didn’t like it…🤔

[Frank Peters · Rating 5 out of 5]

To me, reading this book felt like being wrapped in a warm blanket while having a living room conversation with my Dad. And that is as high a rating as I can give, while also acknowledging that those feeling are highly subjective. Nevertheless, thank you Prof. Wright for this book. After reading the author’s works for almost 20 years, I believe that this volume was more accessible than most and was written more patiently than has often been the case. There was little new material in it from the author (little but not zero) but rather distilled much of what he has been writing about for years. I am sad to have finished it. My short summary is that this is the author’s explanation on why the Christian hope is not, and has never been about going to heaven, but rather as is implicit in the Lord’s prayer, that God and his Kingdom will come to earth.

[Gini · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm relatively well read, but no scholar, but that won't stop me from saying I agree with his conclusions. With the knowledge that all knowledge is not what either the author or I have.
In his usual form he covers his ideas and some of the major objections voiced by others. Some of which I wondered about until his discussions were read. His explanations, discussions, comments are quite accessible to the nonacademic audience.
My major objection to any of it was his constant reminder of what his position is. But, repetition keeps all of us on track, I suppose.
I'd recommend a slow read or a re-read to stay with him, though. For those that want to fact check sources the notes, index, and index of biblical passages are available in the last 50 pages or so.
A good, timely read from an established authority in his field.