Time is not anything to do with eternity.
We hear people say things in conversation like, ” It seems to be taking an eternity” or “It’s been an eternity since we won the final” or a surfer might say he was, “held under the water for an eternity”
I want to shout it from the rooftops TIME HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ETERNITY!!!
Please dear reader explain the phrase used in my examples above where the speaker says an eternity. How can you have an eternity?
If you have “an”eternity then you must be able to have “an” other (another) eternity true?
Yet eternity has no beginning point and no ending point…..
Eternity is not ever measured by time, whether that be seconds, years or billions of years…eternity is not of this creation.
Time is a created thing which only came to be because in the beginning God created….
Time is a way for Mankind to see things.
Eternity is God’s domain. Eternity is, just as God IS. God is I AM. Always. There is no night or day or seasons of time, no changing of God, no growing older through time, no thought of a long time ago. God is not young or old. God IS. There is no back then God did this, and one day He will do this and this. God is present and fully Himself in the NOW realm…which is not connected to time.
God is and everything else comes forth out of Him into the visible creation we see and know. God cannot be known by us unless He became visible in this created realm. The eternal One became a Man!
That Man was subject to time. He came at the right set appointed time. And while He was among us He revealed God. But He now has become a life giving Spirit in the hearts of all who believe in Him.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday today and “forever”?(eis aion) Literal versions have Heb 13:8 Jesus Christ yesterday and to-day the same, and to the ages;
Jesus said as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.
And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. Joh 17:2 – 3
Jesus was NOT speaking about this thing called eternity but about the life of the age.
Joh 17:2 according as Thou didst give to him authority over all flesh, that—all that Thou hast given to him—he may give to them life age-during;
Joh 17:3 and this is the life age-during, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and him whom Thou didst send—Jesus Christ; YLTJoh 17:2 even as Thou hast given Him authority over all mankind, so that on all whom Thou hast given Him He may bestow the Life of the Ages.
Joh 17:3 And in this consists the Life of the Ages–in knowing Thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent. WNT
Strictly speaking we have not been told about eternal life but about a LIFE that is for the AGES of created time in which we shall continue in Christ to know the Father and to reveal Him to creation until all things are restored to Him. Once all things are restored to the Father through Jesus Christ then God shall be all in all. After that…who knows?! We are not told.
1Co 15:24 Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power.
1Co 15:25 For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet.
1Co 15:26 The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.
1Co 15:27 For “HE HAS PUT ALL THINGS UNDER HIS FEET.” But when He says “all things are put under Him,” it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted.
1Co 15:28 Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.
We are also not told how long that unfolding of time shall take to complete the times of restoration of all things.
Act 3:21 Heaven must receive Him until those times of which God has spoken from the earliest ages through the lips of His holy Prophets–the times of the reconstitution of all things.
We are revealing the Father as the Father is being revealed in us. And this revealing of the Father is happening inside of ages of time….or eons of time. The AGES(periods of time) still to come which Paul speaks of in Ephesians 2:7 are for the ultimate goal of God being ALL IN ALL. To that end we are abiding in Jesus Christ bearing good fruit unto the Father –revealing Him to all people –declaring the grace of God—so that all people shall come to know this wonderful God Who has revealed Himself through Jesus Christ in your heart.
There is no “in eternity we shall know Him”…..it is all here and now!! In the TIME we have been given we are the revelation and the knowledge of God to all things.
God has set this whole thing in motion. He has determined successive AGES of time to be lived in until the ALL THINGS are made subject to Jesus Christ. In the long suffering of God these ages shall continue until the very last person ever born shall willingly surrender to faith in Jesus Christ. Then every enemy shall be subdued beneath His feet. Then there shall not be any enemies left to subdue. All shall have been conquered by LOVE. All shall have been DRAWN or dragged to Jesus by the Father so that that same ALL shall come to know Father through Jesus living inside their hearts.
Col 1:16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. Col 1:20 and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.
All things RESTORED TO THE FATHER through Jesus —that includes those beings that are invisible, ie Angels. All things shall return to the Father.
Rom 11:36 For from Him [all things originate] and through Him [all things live and exist] and to Him are all things [directed]. To Him be glory and honor forever! Amen.
To Him are all things!! All things(all people, all angels) are being directed by the Spirit of God –Who is the Father–to the Father through Jesus Christ the WAY the Truth and the LIFE. God shall not fail for LOVE never fails….even though it looks to us from our limited time-frame and earthly perspective that He has failed. God shall be vindicated and all creation shall worship Him through Jesus Christ.
