Eternal

Eternal

6/12/14

How long is eternity?  Can the human mind even contemplate such a length of time?  This is a basic concept that we have about God and His eternal status but do we grasp the meaning of such a term and the implications that it has?  If we do then we will have a foundational concept of Kingdom and the basic understanding of why these two warring kingdoms can never mix.  And how does this eternal status come into play with human creation and restoration, especially when all of these works come together in the eternal restoration of God’s ultimate creation, the answer lies within the meaning of the word eternal.

Once again I find myself being led to the book of Genesis with the setting being the Garden of Eden.  As I have mentioned many times I have believed that once a person, like me, read the part about the creation setting they could then continue with reading and then focus on other “more important” things such as Kingdom, life and freedom of choice, etc.  But what I find most humbling is that God continues to bring me back to the beginning of His Word and then shows me more concepts of His Word and the life that brings together so much of the scriptures.  I also have to sit in wonder and think of the many ridiculous reasons of why I did not see these things before, and then also contemplate why God has chosen me to share them with you.  I guess God is exercising His own created mechanism of choice through me.

About four years ago God dropped a concept into my heart that was kind of unusual, yet I had heard about this concept for most of my life.  The term that God placed into my heart is eternal and that eternity knows no time.  Now, at this time in my life God had been waking me up on certain occasions and when my eyes opened my spirit would instantly become troubled.  I had no idea of what was going on or about to occur, but very soon afterwards something would transpire in the world that would draw world attention.  One can imagine that this would be very frightening to me and everyone that knew what was transpiring in my life.  I had no idea of why God would all of a sudden change gears and give me a phrase to think about when I was already familiar with it.  Boy, it took a while but a few years later God opened my spiritual eyes and revealed what it was that He meant by eternal, all the while preparing me to hear His voice to share His character with those who do not know Him.

What I am about to say may seem like a ridiculous statement but I will explain it in detail as the subject of this article.  God dropped into my heart that eternity knows no time.  Now, when you read that statement one will automatically go “duh”.  But let us think about this statement for a moment and one will understand that it is one of the key foundations of Kingdom; which is another “duh” statement, right?  And just what does this statement have to do with humans and restoration?  Spirit is eternal and if Satan is a spirit then the choices he made, makes, or will make are etched in his stone for eternity.  So if a choice coming from a spirit being is eternal that means that our choices are eternal as well, since we have the Spirit of God within us.  Puts things into a whole different light doesn’t it. 

If something knows no time that means that time is non-existent to that object.  We know that God is eternal and we know that all of the angels, Satan and his demons are eternal and that they have a defined sentence already in place.  We can grasp this concept without too many problems but when we take a closer look as to what these defined sentences are and how those sentences came into place we will see just how defined the Kingdom lines really are.  First of all we must understand that God, Satan, and every angel are spirit in nature and that is their foundational makeup.  And since it is their foundation, then that means that spirit is their first and foremost living condition that knows no time.  With me so far?

Secondly we must understand that even the spirit world has a choice.  Satan was not always called Satan and long before humans were created, Lucifer was present in heaven.  Lucifer was a very powerful angel and in charge of many activities in heaven.  Yet it is written that Lucifer wanted more, so much more that he wanted to be like God and to be on equal terms as God.  So, this states that a spirit can think and want things, which means that a spirit can have a choice.  This is evidence that God created choice into spirit beings that are eternal in nature.  So, if a choice is made to which goes against God’s laws then that eternal and no time being will have to live with its choice for eternity.  Remember this concept while you are reading.

We know that when God sets something into motion He will allow that action to run its full course.  So isn’t possible that since Lucifer wanted to be like God and as powerful as God and to complete the actions that God would allow Satan to make his choice to try and create as God would?  This act by God would follow the completeness of God and His fullness of His authority over every created thing; it is a logical finite process so it should be logical in the infinite as well since both represent God and His completeness.  If one remembers the old Frankenstein movies where the created being overcomes the desires of the creator and then tries to kill the creator comes to mind when trying to understand the process between God and Satan. 

When we pick up Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden it is not too much into the passages when the serpent appears and begins his relationship with Eve.  The creation of the human has already occurred and it will not be too much longer until God, Adam and Eve and the serpent have a general meeting to lay out the terms of the consequences of the choices that each one of them played in breaking God’s command.  Now, why would Satan actually commit such an act after he had already been sentenced to a lifetime of separation from God?  Why would God allow him even to have access to the earth, the humans and to play any role in the human’s development in life as we know it?  Why didn’t Satan pick on the cows, sheep or goats to harass?  Or why didn’t he transform himself into another gorgeous human being to tempt Eve?  It is through his eternal sentence that brings us the answer since humans are the only ones that have an eternal spirit which has the same choices that Satan had at one time.

Lucifer made an eternal choice and since he did not know what a human was when he made this permanent choice his plans were made relevant to what he was already familiar with.  The creation of mankind was a direct slap in the face to Satan and proved to be the perfect target for his revenge against God and His “permanent” ways of creation.  The standard of knowing no time was foremost in Satan’s life and it is something that he cannot change and when Satan witnessed how God created the human and the manner in which He did so, this gave more fuel to his fire to seek revenge.  Being second best is a pain, don’t you think?  We all want to finish number one and win every title that we begin to seek.  The old sayings that ending in a tie is like kissing your sister or getting into the finals and then lose really put our ambitions into perspective when it comes to accepting second place.  How many wars have been lost and the losing country still having severe issues with the victorious country or region that fester for generations?  Place this anger on an eternal level and one can begin to understand just how much Satan wants and wanted revenge, which places into perspective once again the importance of spirit and its eternal and lengthy meaning.

The majority of us does not stop and realize what roles the choices we make play through our lives.  For the most part our choices are minor and can be reversed with little or no consequences, but what happens when a choice comes along that we have to make that might affect our lives for eternity?  We must remember that the entire job of our enemy is to separate us from God eternally just as he is separated.  Where Satan is a spirit and has made his eternal choice he too wishes for us to make the same choice that he did so long ago.  Satan longs to place it within our hearts that making choices is our right and that we deserve the best of everything, all based upon the world’s standards of course.  To the immediate eye this would seem logical and easy to follow; which when we draw this conclusion our enemy has us right where he wants us and the doors are wide open for him to show us the pathway of the world.  This brings up another thought that I will deal with in my next article and that is why we still have an opportunity to make changes in our choices and ways while Satan does not have that opportunity even though both Satan and humans are creations of God. 

Think for a moment the importance of a choice and how a small and simple choice on a specific matter could grow into a large and complicated mess after that choice is made.  If a choice has no eternal bearing or importance do you believe that our enemy would use our choices to harden our hearts towards God or towards others?  A simple disagreement about a single issue could lead to a long lasting anger situation with a close friend which could lead to some tragic event; it seems farfetched but read the news or watch the news, it occurs every day around the world.  Our enemy wants nothing more to lessen the reality and importance of the choices that we face.  If this lessening can progress long enough within our hearts it will become an inner law of ours which will spiritually blind us to the eternal issues that one day will present themselves in a full manner.

As most of you know, right now there is a huge battle over a couple of human issues.  These are not regional issues but global ones that have been presented into each home and at any given point in time people are expected to make a choice about how they feel concerning these issues.  We all know that if you choose to ignore these issues or not have an opinion about them you are labeled and placed within the same category as those who oppose them.  What implications do these choices have upon our lives?  Here on earth, not much just a little trash talk from those who differ from your thoughts, but what will happen in a few weeks or months when those progressive issues become reality in your community or advance into laws?  What choices will you make then and how will it be looked upon from an eternal standpoint? 

It is the job of our enemy to blind us from the eternal truth and get us to believe that our choices have no effect on our spirituality or our eternal future.  A choice does not have feelings only the human that has to deal with the consequences inherits those.  Satan’s choice was eternal and through his example we must understand that the choices that we make each day shape our eternal lives and it is imperative that we follow God’s Word directly within our hearts and to keep it within the confines of our spirit.  There are two kingdoms at war for a reason and it all centers around you.  I cannot stress enough the importance of the ability that we have to make a choice and how important it is to make the godly choices within our lives.  Yes, the world will scream and holler at you and yes, you may be placed within a certain category but if we make the right choices then our eternal lives will be forever secure within God’s love and protection, no matter what comes your way.

It seems like Satan had the prime targets in his sights for this proving ground that would give him the opportunity to say to God, that like I your next creation will choose to abandon your ways as well.  But there is a catch to this setting and it is Satan’s job to ensure that we do not understand it and it has to do with Kingdom boundaries and how they function through spiritual laws.  Not laws that bind people, but laws that separate, permanently separate God’s ways and Satan’s.  Since God is eternal and His laws are spiritual that means that His laws are eternal as well and since He is God and cannot change His ways that means He can NEVER break them in any way, shape or form.  In short, this means that since Lucifer, a created spiritual being made by a holy spirit, chose to wish for something else and through these choices his life is permanently changed forever and under no circumstances can he have another opportunity to change his choices. 

With this realization of how important and how eternal our choices are, we cannot make any further choices without understanding God’s Word as much as possible.  It is also imperative to understand and to know exactly what is transpiring within our world and the direction that it is travelling.  If we do not follow these two examples we as a people, as a community, as a nation and as a Church are doomed to fall into the blinded category that all of humanity has accepted as the norm and lose our own eternal existence without knowing the freedom through God that was so preciously and graciously given to us by a loving Creator.  Our enemy will lull us to sleep when it comes to the choices that we are presented with and through these choices, simple ones or complex could determine our eternal future; it did for our enemy so why would you expect him to act any differently?

DLB