marginalization of the beatific vision from modern Protestant theology proves a remarkable case study and, I suggest, marks a fundamental problem with the earthy eschatology of the contemporary church. Eschatological naturalism marginalizes the presence of God and regularly maligns the spiritual hope of earlier Christians. Middleton exemplifies both patterns.21 He offers only very scattered and marginal reference to the presence of God as an element (much less the key element) in the kingdom of God.