(the picture in the video is from Tim Challies)
F.
Eternity
1. Definition
a. God is
without beginning or end, existing eternally
2. Scriptural Data
a. Genesis 21:33: Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in
Beersheba and called there on the name of the Lord, the Everlasting God.
b. Psalm 90:1-4: Lord, you have been our dwelling
place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you
had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are
God. You return man to dust and say, “Return, O children of man!” For a
thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a
watch in the night.
c. Psalm 102:11-12, 25-27: My days are like an evening
shadow; I wither away like grass. But you, O Lord, are enthroned forever; you
are remembered throughout all generations... Of old you laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the
work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain; they will all wear
out like a garment. You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away, but
you are the same, and your years have no end.
d. Jude 25: to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus
Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time
and now and forever. Amen.
3. Consideration and
Reflection
a. God’s
eternity is a logical inference from His aseity
i.
Aseity = self-existence/self-sufficiency, necessary existence
ii. If God is self-existent and thus, has existence
necessarily, then it is impossible for Him to go into or out of existence
b. God has
no succession of moments in his own being
i.
example: human aging
c. God has
no succession of thoughts
i.
He knows everything eternally
ii. His ordering of the world, what theologians
typically call His decrees, occur in logical order, not chronological order
d. God
eternally wills, but temporally acts
i. Our only difficulty is to hold fast the truth that
He sustains two relations to time. As the abiding Eternal One He views it in
its place, Himself absolutely unconnected with it. As the God who works out for
the creature and with the creature His own purposes He beholds, directs, and
controls all things as under the law to time. This is of course a deep mystery
to human thought: that is, to conceive of eternal willing and temporal acting,
of a timeless and successionless Agent working out and watching the evolution
of His plans. (William Burt Pope, A
Compendium of Christian Theology, 1:298–299)
e. God
doesn’t undergo change in His being, perfections, or purposes
i. Numbers 23:19: God is not man, that he should lie, or
a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do
it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?
f. God could
exist eternally in 1 of 2 ways
i.
Omnitemporally
-through
infinite time
ii.
Atemporally
-outside
of time completely
iii.
Bible offers no answer
-divine
timelessness, B-theory of time
-divine
temporality, “God-time”
-timeless
existence before creation, in time after creation
4. Practical Application
a. The
paradox of time
i.
God has all the time in the world (comforting)
-2 Peter 3:8: But do not overlook this one fact,
beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand
years as one day.
ii.
Humans don’t have all the time in the world (incentive)
-Romans 13:11-12a: Besides this you know the time,
that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to
us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand.
b. We must
live life with eternity in view
i. Romans 13:12b-14: So then let us cast off the works
of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the
daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and
sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires. (living
in holiness)
ii. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18: So we do not lose heart.
Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by
day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight
of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but
to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but
the things that are unseen are eternal. (comfort
in suffering)
iii. Ephesians 2:4-7: But God, being rich in mercy,
because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our
trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been
saved— and raised us up with him and
seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the
coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness
toward us in Christ Jesus. (hope
for believers)
iv. Matthew 25:41, 46: Then he will say to those on
his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the
devil and his angels. And these will go
away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’ (doom for unbelievers)
c. God’s
sustaining, providential control of all things and events is assured
i.
God created time
ii.
History is the events that unfold within created time
iii.
God controls time and thus, all of history
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