The Eternity of God

Tonight we're on lesson number eight, the eternal nature of God, or the eternity of God. If you flip over on the back, up in the upper left-hand corner, we have all 15 of our studies and I want you to notice something. Just three weeks ago we did, or we studied, the infinite nature of God. Two weeks ago we studied the self-existence of God and last week we studied the immutability, or the God who doesn't change. All these are related to one another and you'll see all three of these actually interplay tonight as we study God's eternal nature.

Number one, the first Bible point tonight is God alone is eternal. He is without a beginning and He is without an end. God alone is eternal. He is without a beginning and He is without an end. Everything in our life is conditioned by us being creatures. We are the creation of God. So therefore we have a beginning and we have an end, and all of life flows in that way. You think about one of the major activities you do as a youth — you get an education, right? Whether you're homeschooled or whether you go to a private school or public school, you start off very young, kindergarten and reading books and whatnot. Do you remember anyone — your first grade teacher by any chance? It may have been a long time. I do. Miss Lohman. That was my first grade teacher. She lived across the street, three homes down. So if I acted up, my mom knew. You know, it's funny, those things that you know because they leave such a great impression on you, and eventually you end up making it through school, whether you get through high school or you drop out. Eventually there's a point where you leave your formal education behind and you breathe a sigh of relief. No more tests ever. Praise God, you're excited because that part of your life has come to an end, right?

But normally what starts right after that? Bills. Bills and a career and a job to be able to pay those bills, right? And so maybe go into the labor force, maybe go into the army. If you're a Miss Grant, maybe go to jail. You find something to do with your life, you know? And eventually from that you retire, right? At least you hope you retire. That's a midterm goal we look for. In fact, Ken put in his papers today. Has it been over 30 years? 28 years. 28 years — wow. So congratulations. And you're not going to sit still once those papers get processed. You'll be doing something, right? But everything we do has a beginning and an end. Even the best things in life.

Think about the times that you've had the most fun in your life. Maybe when you were a kid and it was summertime, there was no school and you had a friend come have a sleepover and you just had a ball. You didn't want it to end. Or maybe it's a vacation with a family member, just some alone time with a special friend, or fellowship at your house with people that you love and care for. And before you know it, it's 10 o'clock and then 11 o'clock and you're enjoying the conversation, but you know work's coming in the morning. All things come to an end. Even our most privileged relationships come to an end, right? If you live long enough, you're going to experience loss. Someone that you have loved dearly in your life will pass away. And you miss them, right? Because as creatures, we have a beginning and we have an end.

Just yesterday afternoon, I was with one of my customers — a beautiful woman — her husband just died about three or four weeks ago. They've been married for over 60 years and they're both just godly Christians, love the Lord, and that's what's holding her on. She has the hope that she's going to see her husband again. Her husband, even right now as I speak, he's in heaven glorifying God, singing praises to His name, falling down at the feet of our Lord. But as I was talking to Joyce yesterday, the widow, she was saying how difficult it's been the last few weeks because he did everything. He, for a living, had built schools, so he was always a hands-on guy even into his latter years. As he's been dying of cancer the last couple years, he would still try to do everything. So she's learning to do things like pour vinegar down the drainpipe for your air conditioning unit to clean that out. She's learning to pay bills, she's learning to take the car in for service — all these things that he always did for her. But she'd gladly do those things just to have him with her again, and that's natural. Our lives are finite. We have a beginning and we have an end, but our God has no beginning and He has no end.

Look in Job 36:26. This is one of Job's acquaintances, Elihu. He says very true things about God at least. He says, "Behold, God is great and we do not know Him," meaning it's not possible for us to comprehend all that He is, "nor can the number of His days be discovered."

So we can't even fathom His years. My grandmother lived to be 103 years old and spry — she kept her driver's license and lived by herself up until the last six months of her life, actually a very impressive lady. And we hear about other folks — you read in the Bible about Methuselah. How old did he live to be? Anyone know? 969, I believe — 969 years, which is the oldest man ever recorded in the Bible, right? That's nothing compared to God. He says here, "nor can the number of His years be discovered," because God had no beginning. He always was before there was anything else, and He always will be.

Look in Isaiah 48, verses 12 through 13. God says, "Listen to me, O Jacob and Israel, my called, I am He, I am the first, I am also the last. Indeed, my hand has laid the foundation of the earth and my right hand has stretched out the heavens. When I call to them, they stand up together." God is so great that He laid the foundations of the earth, He stretched out the heavens, and when He calls them, they stand up at attention and they say, "Yes, Sir, what do You want us to do?" He commands the stars, He commands the earth, and He is the first, the Creator of all things, and He is the last. The application is never fear, for God is for us and with us. Never fear, for God is for and with us.

Revelation chapter 1 is a picture of Christ glorified in heaven, and He says in verse 17 and 18 — John says, "And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead, but He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, 'Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last.'" It's just what His Father said right back in Isaiah. Now we have Christ saying, "I am the first and the last." He says, "I am He who lives and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. I have the keys of Hades and of death." Christ our Savior rose from the grave. He defeated death, and He holds the keys to death, to the grave, to Hades in His hand. So we do not have to fear. His promises are true. The moment that we pass away from this earthly life, we're instantly in His presence, right? Isn't that what Christ told the thief on the cross? He says, "Today you're going to be with me in paradise," right? Because our Savior holds the keys to death in His hands.

Deuteronomy 32:40, God says, "For I raise my hand to heaven and say, 'As I live forever.'"

We can sometimes try to think that forever is something we might be able to grasp because we're used to being able to think of a long time. If you've ever waited in line at the DMV, right, you may think that that's forever, but eventually you are able to get up to the front, right? But with Christ, God our Father, and the Holy Spirit, they say that they live forever and forever. They have no end.

Psalm 90 — if you're ever thinking that your life is in a rut, if you're ever thinking that life is hopeless — and they say that a rut is a grave with both ends kicked out — Psalm 90 is a great Psalm to go to because it was a Psalm of who? Of Moses, right? And it has to do with the children of Israel who wandered for 40 years in the desert because of their disobedience. They were not allowed to enter the promised land. That generation died off. Can you think about that? Going around for 40 years, just waiting to die and waiting for people to die, the hopelessness that you would probably feel and the sense that God's wrath is upon you? Well, Psalm 90 addresses that. It's a beautiful Psalm. I encourage you to read it. We'll read a few verses from it tonight, but read it in your own time.

It says, "Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations." In all generations, God has been the refuge for His people. It says, "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, you are God." Saying, God, you've always been. He is the everlasting God, the God without a beginning and the God without an end.

There's a hymn that I love greatly. Years ago when I was in seminary, I preached every week at an assisted living facility. They had their own church. They were proud of that. And I was a little preacher boy and did that for about three and a half years and did a lot of funerals during that time, as you can imagine. And I love that hymn, "Abide with Me," talking about our eternal Father, how He's always with us. That is our God. He abides with us. He's always with us and for us, and He's the God without a beginning and without an end.

Number two, Bible point number two — eternity is infinity in relation to time. Eternity is infinity in relation to time. God is not in time. God is free from all succession of time. He is timeless. All creation is subject to time. We exist in time. Time is the record of change. Let me repeat that because again there are a lot of blanks. Eternity is infinity in relation to time. God is not in time. God is free from all succession of time. He is timeless. All creation is subject to time. We exist in time. Time is a record of change.

Time is a record of change, even going back to Genesis. Remember on the first day, God said, "Let there be what?" Light. And He separated the light from the darkness, and the morning and the evening was the first day. And then the second day, He had morning and evening — the second day. There's a rhyme, there's a rhythm there, there's a change from one day to the next, right? But as we studied last week, God is immutable. And what does that mean? God doesn't change. He stands apart from time. He never decays, never changes. There's no shadow side to God. He is free from all succession of time. He's not in time. You could actually say that all time is actually in God when you think about it, because doesn't everything have its being within God? And when we studied the infinite nature of God a few weeks ago, didn't we say that infinity isn't a number, nor is it a place, but it's a boundless supply from within? God has all the time in the world because He is not in time. So eternity is infinity in relation to time.

Look at 2 Peter 3:8, "But beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day." You may have heard the story before about the little boy in Sunday school. He's only about 10 years old and he heard this verse and he's trying to get his mind around it. You know, he's only 10. He can't even grasp 100 years, much less a thousand years, or an eternal God who has no beginning and no end. So during the service, he's thinking about it. During Sunday lunch, he's thinking about it. That afternoon, he's on the playground on the swing and he's still thinking about it. So God decides He's going to visit this boy. And He tells him, He says, "Everything you need to know is in Genesis 1:1. 'In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.' In the beginning, I was. I've always been." He says, "I created everything, and I created everything when there was nothing, out of no pre-existing material. So I can do anything. Nothing's too hard for me. There's nothing too big for me," is what God told the little boy. He says, "I'm the eternal one." And He asked the boy, He says, "What's something that's really big to you?" And the boy thought about it for a minute and he says, "A million years." And God said, "Well, a million years may seem big to you, but to me, it's just a second." The boy says, "Okay, a million dollars." And God said, "A million dollars may seem a lot to you, but to me, it's just a penny." Without skipping a beat, the boy says, "Well, God, can I have a penny?" God told him, "Just a second."

Because God is limitless, right? He has no limitations. And to Him, a thousand years is but a day. It's nothing to Him. The application is rejoice that He is the Lord of time. God is the Lord of time. 1 Timothy 1:17 has this great doxology. It says, "Now to the King Eternal." The word "eternal" there in the Greek means to the King of all ages. "To the King of all ages, to the King Eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory, age and for ages forever." Forever and ever. So He is the King of the ages, and He will be the King of the ages — ages without end. Always and forever is our God. He is the Lord of time.

We often run out of time, don't we? How many times have you been late to something in life, right? Time gets away from you. How many times have you seen a movie where the hero is trying to disable a bomb, right? It comes down to the last few seconds. Do you cut the blue wire or the red wire? And of course the hero cuts the right wire with one second remaining, just in the nick of time. God never runs out of time. He is the Lord of time.

Psalm 90 again — this is the Psalm of Moses — picking up in verse 3 through 6, says, "You turn man to destruction and say, 'Return, O children of men, for a thousand years in your sight are like yesterday when it is passed, and like a watch in the night.'" Just like a watch in the night. The Hebrews had three watches in the night. Later on the Greeks would have four watches in the night, and that comes from military days. You would take shifts keeping guard over the camp, right? First watch, second watch, and third watch. And he says that a thousand years are just like a few hours, just a watch in the night. He says, "You carry them away like a flood," talking about people. "They are like a sleep. In the morning they are like the grass which grows up, in the morning it flourishes and grows up, and in the evening it is cut down and withers." That's what our finite, creaturely existence is like, right? But not our God. He is the Lord of time. He is the Eternal One.

Number three, Bible point number three: to God the past, present, and future are but one eternal now. God clearly sees the past and future as vividly as He sees the present. To God the past, present, and future are but one eternal now. God clearly sees the past and future as vividly as He sees the present. Because God is not in time, He sees the past, present, and the future all at once in perfect detail. This may be hard for you to get your mind around, but consider this. God has never recalled a past event.

God has never looked forward to the future. Because to Him, it's all now. He knows the past perfectly because it's perfectly before Him. Our memory often fails, right? How many times have you asked someone their name and then like five minutes later you're like, "What was her name? What was her name?" You know, you're trying to think because you feel embarrassed — you've forgotten, even though you just asked them their name. God's memory is perfect, but He doesn't need His memory here because again, He sees the past, the present, and the future all at once.

Isaiah 44, God asks — He says, "Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel, and His Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts, I am the first and I am the last. Beside me there is no God. And who can proclaim as I do? Then let him declare it and set it in order for me, since I have appointed the ancient people, and the things that are coming and shall come, let them show these to them." God's saying, "Show me the future." He knows it perfectly. Man tries to prognosticate, right? When I was — years ago, when I first finished seminary — for three years, I worked at Morgan Stanley, and there was a very well-known analyst at that time who was the chief strategist at Morgan Stanley, and every year in December he published his prognostications for the following year, what would happen in the markets. And everybody read them, not just at Morgan Stanley. He was kind of like E.F. Hutton — when he spoke, everybody listened. You know what? He was wrong about 80% of the time. He was a genius, so to speak, but he was simply grasping at straws. But God knows the future just as certainly as He knows the present, and just as certainly as He knows, to us, the past. The application is this: trust His timeless perception of all things. Trust God's timeless perception of all things.

David Colson, whenever he sends an email, he always signs it with his name and then Proverbs 3:5-6. It's here on your sheet. "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths." Right? We can trust His perception of all things.

Flip over on the back and we're going to look at the reference marked with number three in Isaiah chapter 41. God asked, "Who has performed and done it?" Speaking about — He was calling Cyrus to deliver Israel from captivity. He says, "Calling the generations from the beginning, I the Lord am the first, and with the last I am He." He calls the pagans to rescue the righteous. He does the unthinkable because He calls the beginning from the end, and the end from the beginning — it's all the same to God, right?

Jude 24 and 25 says, "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy, to the only God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever." Speaking from our point of view, that God has been before all time, He is now, and He is forever. And that's the confidence that our God gives us — that we can put our trust in Him, He can keep us from stumbling because He's everywhere all at once.

Number four, God created time to reveal Himself to man. God wisely and graciously lets us experience life in successive moments, not simultaneously. God created time to reveal Himself to man. God wisely and graciously lets us experience life in successive moments, not simultaneously. God knows our frame, right? We are finite creatures. If we were presented with everything that God sees, our head would explode, right? We can barely keep up with what's going on. Do you ever get a little bit of anxiety in your stomach when you turn on the news and you hear all this going on — "I didn't know about that, I didn't know about that, what else do I not know about?" You know, there's so much knowledge for you to consume. I go to several Christian blog posts each evening, spend about 30 minutes trying to read through them, and you can't keep up with them. There are so many sermons posted on G3 or on Ligonier, and you're like, "I'd like to watch that, I'd like to watch that, I'd like to watch..." But you don't have 30 hours to watch 30 sermons every week. There's only so much time that we have. So God doesn't overload us. He lets us experience life in successive moments.

Look at Psalm 103 verses 13 through 17. "As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him, for He knows our frame." He's our Creator, of course He knows our frame. "He remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass, as a flower of the field, so he flourishes. For the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to children's children." So He knows our frame, and His mercy is from everlasting to everlasting. The application is this: time is a gift to give perspective for our past, order for our present, and hope for our future.

Time is a gift to give perspective for our past, order for our present, and hope for our future. By letting us have a linear existence, we can look back at our past and we can say, "Thank you, God, that You saved me. I'm no longer the man that I was five years ago, that I was 15 years ago." Right? We should see a progression in our walk with the Lord, and we don't take that glory for ourselves, but we give it right back to God, right? It also gives us perspective for our present, right? To know that the suffering that we may be going through at any given time is indeed finite, right? It will have an end, and God is able and more than sufficient to uphold us in that time of suffering, right? And it also gives us hope for our future, right? Because we know that there will be a day when every tear will be wiped away, when there will be no more sickness, no more sorrow, no more sadness, when we will see God as He is, when He will dwell with us, He'll make His home with us. What a beautiful and glorious day that's going to be, right? And that gives us hope for the future — to be able to persevere through trials, to be able to persevere through tribulation, to be able to persevere through sickness, right?

Psalm 90 verse 12, this is still the Psalm of Moses, says, "So teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom." So number your days in light of God's eternity, right? Ask for wisdom and know that God is with you and God is for you.

Flip over on the back. Number four on the back, John 1:3 says, "All things were made through Him, through Christ, and without Him nothing was made that was made." That includes time, right? Genesis 1:14, "Then God said, 'Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night, and let them be for signs and seasons, for days and years.'" God is the author of time. He created it. It's a good gift for us. God promises us after the flood, Genesis 8:22, "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease." You can tell that to the climate alarmist, right? There will be seasons. God has promised it because He has ordered creation in such a way.

Bible point number five: God shares His eternity with us in Christ. Christ entered time to give us everlasting life. God shares His eternity with us in Christ. Christ entered time to give us everlasting life.

John chapter 1, we know very well — verses 1 and 2 says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God." And then verse 14, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Christ humbled Himself and took on a flesh and blood existence, right? He added humanity to His deity. He was one person but with two natures, both a divine nature and a human nature. And as a man, He went through everything that we go through except without sin, right? He hungered. He thirsted. Remember on the cross — what did He say? "I thirst," right? He was tired as a human being, right? He wept. Remember when Lazarus died and Mary and Martha — and Jesus wept? He wept because He loved Lazarus and He missed Him.

Christ entered time to give us everlasting life. He left glory — this perfect communion and fellowship, the angels praising Him and His perfect relationship with the Father and with the Spirit — and He came down here to suffer for us so we could have everlasting life. Galatians 4 verses 4 through 5 says, "But when the fullness of time had come" — if you read back in verse 2 there, it says that God is the one who determines when the fullness of time is — "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son." He didn't create His Son, He sent forth His Son. His Son was pre-existing from always and forever. "Born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons."

Think about Christ in ministry, John chapter 8. What does He say? He says, "Before Abraham was, I am." He's always been. And then you go to John chapter 19 and what does He say on the cross? "It is finished." So He had always been, and yet He entered time and took on a linear existence for us to give us everlasting life. The application is this: now is God's time of favor and salvation. Now is God's time of favor and salvation.

Because Christ has entered time, the time to experience His favor, the time to experience salvation is now. Don't ever put that off. Don't ever wait for another day. You know, when we're little, sometimes as children we'll say, "Well, I'll take my faith seriously one day when I get on my own, when I get out of my mom and dad's house." No, the time is now. As adults sometimes say, "Well, you know, I've got a lot of pressures going on. I'm trying to raise my kids and I just got to get through this period, and then when the kids are out of the house it'll be easier and then I can take my walk with the Lord more seriously." Now is the time of God's favor. Now is when you need it, right? Now is when we need salvation. Don't wait. Don't put off seeking the Lord. Seek Him while He may be found. Call upon Him while He is near.

Number six, eternity helps us grasp God's mercy and truth. Eternity helps us grasp God's mercy and truth. Because God is long-suffering, we can know His mercy, right? He could have rightly ended it all in the garden, but He didn't. How would we ever have known the depths of His mercy unless He had shown us His patience and His long-suffering? And it also helps us to know His truth.

Let's look at Psalm 86:15, "But you, O Lord, are a God full of compassion and gracious, long-suffering, abundant in mercy and truth." The word "truth" can be translated "faithfulness" because God's promises are in truth. He is faithful to His Word. He is faithful to His promises. How many times in your life have you waited and waited and then God answers one of His promises in your life? And you're giving Him glory for it. You're so grateful for it. You say, "God, You are the God of truth. God, You are the God who has shown me mercy. Thank You for answering prayer. Thank You that this person has given their life to Christ — I've prayed for them and I've shared Christ with them so many times and now I'm seeing them walk with You." That is from You. That miracle praises You for Your mercy and for Your truth.

The application is this: have hope, be faithful, and live redemptively. Have hope, be faithful, and live redemptively. 2 Peter chapter 3 says, "For the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless. And consider that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation — as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you."

So we're to have hope, to be faithful, and to live redemptively. And we see that in this passage here. Look at verse 14. "Looking forward" — looking forward is hope, right? We're looking forward to these things, to His promises. "Be diligent" — that is to be faithful. We're to be diligent to be found in Him in peace, without spot, without blemish, to be holy as Christ. And then to live redemptively — it says, "Consider that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation." Right? Be about being an ambassador for Christ. Be about living redemptively, to be salt in this world, to be light in this world.

If you flip over on the back, I want to close by looking at 1 Corinthians chapter 2 verses 7 through 8. Paul is contrasting the wisdom of this age and the wisdom of the rulers of this world, which is a finite wisdom, a wisdom that is temporal and that has limitations. And he's comparing it with God's wisdom. He says in verse 7, "But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory." In other words, before God created anything, He had a plan of salvation. He created us to save us.

Adam's sin did not catch God off guard. He created man upright, but Adam freely rebelled against God. God knew he would do that. That way we can know the mercy and love of God. How else will we know the depths of Christ's love if He did not die on the cross? The cross is as much a revelation of the wrath of God as it is the love of God, is it not? That the High Priest would become our sacrifice, the Judge would become the sin bearer and would pay our penalty — to show us the love of God. "But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew. For had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." Christ's death was for us. He was the Lord of glory, and He died to share His eternal glory with each and every one of us.