Introduction:
A. One day a man was speaking with God and he asked him, “God is it true that to you a thousand years is just a minute?” “That’s true,” God replied.
1. The man continued, “And is it true that to you a million dollars is like a penny?” “Yes, That’s true,” God said.
2. Then the man said, “God, could I have a penny?”
3. God replied, “Sure, in just a minute.”
B. Max Lucado opens his chapter on today’s subject with a story about his daughter that took place when she was two years-old.
1. He said that Jenna was just learning to speak well.
2. But one day as they walked hand in hand through their apartment lobby, his daughter noticed a ball, and looked at her dad and said, “Just a moment” and she slid her hand from his and went after the ball.
3. Max thought to himself: “A moment? Who told her about moments? To date her existence had been time-free. Toddlers know no beginning or end or hurry or slow or late or soon. But Jenna’s phrase, ‘Just a moment,’ announced that time had entered her world.”
4. Max continued, “Life, she was discovering, is a cache of moments: measurable and countable increments, like change in a pocket or buttons in a can. Your pocket may be full of decades, my pocket may be down to a few years, but everyone has a certain number of moments. Everyone, that is, except God.”
C. Here is the main idea that I want us to wrestle with and try to grasp from today’s sermon: Life is short; God is forever.”
1. Would you say that with me? “Life is short; God is forever.”
2. Do you understand and believe both of those truths?
3. Perhaps the first of those truths is easier to grasp and believe than the second one.
D. Life is indeed short and it passes by so quickly.
1. It is hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that I am 60 years old and have been serving the Lord here at Wetzel Road for 34 years!
2. When we were children, didn’t summers seem like they lasted forever?
3. Then when we became a teenager, it seemed like forever until we could get our driver’s license, or graduate from high school.
4. But now at age 60 those things are over 40 years in the past!
5. How time flies! And it seems to speed up the older you get.
6. That’s why it is so important for us to realize that life is short, but God is forever.
7. And we want to make sure that we live in a way that makes our one and only life count for eternity.
E. As you know, we are in a sermon series called “It’s All About God – Living a God-Centered Life.”
1. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that life is all about us, but the Bible is clear that it’s all about God.
2. Creation is God’s world; history is God’s story; all of us are made in God’s image; and it is all for God’s glory.
3. Last week, we talked about our God who is holy—there is no one like Him - and this holy God calls us to take His holiness seriously and to strive to be holy as God is holy.
F. Today, we are talking about how our God is eternal; He is an everlasting God.
1. Today, I want to declare what the Bible says about God’s eternal nature.
2. God has always been and always will be; He lives beyond time.
3. We are finite; we have a beginning and an end; God has no beginning and no end.
4. Therefore, it is very difficult for us to imagine God’s eternalness; our minds are finite and we keep bumping up against finite limits.
5. As finite people, trying to understand eternity is like trying to cram the ocean into a bucket, and yet we have to try.
6. Ecclesiastes 3:11 says that God has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
7. God has set eternity in our hearts, yet we cannot fathom it.
8. We have a taste of it—like a bucket of ocean water—and we yearn for it, but it is beyond us to fully grasp it, and yet it is important that we try, so here goes.
I. God is eternal.
A. All through the Bible, God has revealed Himself to us as the eternal God.
1. He is the everlasting One, who was before the beginning of time and will be after the end of time.
2. He lives forever; He was and is and is to come.
B. Here is a sampling of verses about God’s eternal nature:
1. Deuteronomy 33:27 says: The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.
a. This is part of the blessing that Moses pronounced on Israel just before he died.
b. He reminded them that the eternal God is their refuge, their place of safety, and that God is carrying them in everlasting arms.
c. I love to sing the hymn “Leaning On the Everlasting Arms” “what a blessed peace is mine…safe and secure from all alarm.”
d. How awful and scary life would be if God were temporary, here today and gone tomorrow, you’d never know if He was going to be there for you.
e. Others come and go, but you can count on Him because He is the eternal God, and underneath you are in the everlasting arms.
2. Psalm 9:7 simply declares: The Lord reigns forever.
3. Psalm 102:12 declares: But you, Lord, are enthroned forever; your fame endures to all generations.
4. Daniel 4:3 declares: His kingdom is an eternal kingdom; his dominion endures from generation to generation.
a. God’s kingdom is an eternal kingdom.
b. All other kingdoms are temporary, including ours.
c. I’m thankful to be an American citizen, but in reality our nation is temporary—all nations are temporary.
d. Only God’s kingdom is eternal.
e. Think of all the Christians who have lived in different nations over the past 2000 years, and have lived through regime changes, and the rise and fall of nations.
f. Understanding this should help keep us from politicizing the gospel, or staking our faith on the survival of our nation, or any political system.
g. Only God’s kingdom is eternal, but not only is God’s kingdom eternal, so is His love!
5. Psalm 107:1 says: Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever.
a. This refrain was the most popular chorus in Israel for centuries.
b. It is found in many psalms and scattered through Israel’s history.
c. For example, in 2 Chronicles 20, when a huge enemy army invaded Israel, King Jehoshaphat and all the people cried out to God.
1. God spoke to them and told them not to be afraid, and that they would not have to fight; because God would fight for them.
2. So the next day, Jehoshaphat sent the choir out in front of the army—this is not a recommended battle strategy…unless you really want to get rid of your choir!
3. Guess what song they sang? “Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever.”
d. Another version of this song is found in Psalm 136
1. It is an antiphonal song, meaning it was sung back and forth in alternating parts.
2. For 26 verses, one group would declare something about God and what He had done, like: “He alone does great wonders,” or “He divided the Red Sea,” or “He led his people in the wilderness.”
3. Then the other group would respond repeatedly with this one phrase: “His faithful love endures forever.”
4. The repetition of that phrase gets a little old and redundant, but that’s the point – God shows over and over again that His faithful love endures forever!
6. These are things we need to grasp and never forget about our God.
a. His love endures forever. He is the eternal God. His kingdom never ends.
b. And because these things are true, we can trust Him.
7. Isaiah 26:4 declares: Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord, is the Rock eternal.
a. God is the Rock eternal.
b. Dwayne Johnson might be The Rock, but He isn’t the Rock eternal: that’s our God - He is the eternal and unchanging one.
8. This is true of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
a. Hebrews 13:8 declares: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
b. This is part of God’s eternal nature: He is the Rock eternal, the unchanging one, the same forever and therefore, we can count on Him.
C. God is eternal and this means that He is above and beyond time, but it means more than that.
1. God is eternal in terms of time, but also in terms of His being - everything about Him is eternal.
2. As we have seen: His kingdom is eternal and His love is eternal.
3. Additionally, God’s knowledge is eternal - He is all knowing or omniscient.
4. His power is eternal - He is all-powerful or omnipotent.
5. His presence is eternal - He is omnipresent.
6. Here is how Paul describes Him: Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. (1 Tim. 1:17)
7. To put it a different way: You can never exaggerate God. He will always be bigger than anything you can imagine or say about Him.
a. God is and does “immeasurably more than all we can imagine.”
b. We can never exaggerate God - He is eternal in every way.
II. God is eternal, but We are Not.
A. This is an important contrast and distinction because us and God that we must understand.
1. Now, I know that some of you might object and say: “Wait a minute. Isn’t there life after death? Don’t we have eternal life in Christ? Don’t we live forever with God?”
a. And the answer is Yes, those things are true.
2. The best known verse in the Bible attests to that: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (Jn. 3:16)
3. Paul declared that: Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. (2 Cor. 5:1)
4. Paul also said it this way: After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. (1 Thess. 4:17)
a. That last phrase brings us great comfort: And so we will be with the Lord forever.
B. And so will we live forever? Yes…in Christ and only in Christ.
1. We are not eternal beings in and of ourselves.
2. God created us with a temporal body and an eternal soul.
3. Only God has no beginning and no end; the rest of us have a beginning and an end.
4. Only God is eternal in and of Himself.
5. You and I will live forever only because of our relationship with an eternal God and because of the will of our eternal God - without Him, we would not exist or we would cease to exist.
6. So, God is eternal; we are not.
C. The Bible repeatedly reminds us that our lives here on earth are very short, and that we should remember that and live wisely with that in mind.
1. The Bible compares our lives to a breath, a mist, a cloud that vanishes and is gone, a shadow, or a wisp of smoke—all very fragile and temporary.
2. Psalm 39:4–5 says: Lord, make me aware of my end and the number of my days so that I will know how short-lived I am. In fact, you have made my days just inches long, and my life span is as nothing to you. Yes, every human being stands as only a vapor.
a. The ESV translates the last line as “All mankind stands as a mere breath.”
b. Let’s all take a deep breath—let it out. - that’s your life and mine.
c. In the big scheme of things, your whole earthly life is like one breath.
d. Life is short.
3. That’s why the psalmist prayed: Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. (Ps. 90:12)
a. It is wise to realize that life is short; it is foolish to think we have forever.
b. Sadly, some people put God off for later. “When I’m older; when I’m done having fun; when I’ve got more time; after I’ve made my mark.”
c. But none of us know how many days we have, or how many more moments we have.
4. We recently studied the book of James and were reminded of this truth: Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. (James 4:13-14)
5. That’s why the Bible emphasizes the fact that we must not delay: The Bible says, “Today is the day of salvation.” (2 Cor. 6:2)
6. I’m not trying to scare anyone into heaven or out of hell, rather, I’m just speaking truth and good sense.
7. I’m trying to help us acknowledge how life really is.
8. Life is short, but God is eternal.
III. God is Eternal, We are Not, Therefore, Live for God.
A. Because it’s all about God, we should live for God and make our lives count for His glory.
1. When we realize that God is eternal, and that our lives are so short – just a moment – then we gain an eternal perspective and understand what really matters.
2. The apostle Paul truly understood these things and conveyed them in a powerful way in 2 Corinthians 4:16-18: Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
a. Keep in mind, then when Paul wrote those words about light and momentary troubles, he had already experienced much hardship.
b. In 2 Cor. 11, he wrote: Five times I received the forty lashes minus one from the Jews. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. Three times I was shipwrecked. I have spent a night and a day in the open sea. (2 Cor. 11:24-25)
c. He goes on in that passage to refer to life-threatening river trips, wilderness wanderings, and exposure to cold, attacks, hunger and thirst.
d. These in Paul’s words, are “light afflictions” to be endured for “just a moment.”
C. It is the understanding of the brevity of life that grants us the power to abide and remain, rather than giving us an excuse to bail and abandon faith.
1. Max Lucado wrote: Fleeting days don’t justify fleeing problems. Fleeting days strengthen us to endure problems. Will your problems pass? No guarantee they will. Will your pain cease? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But heaven gives this promise: ‘Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.’ (2 Cor. 4:17)”
2. The words “weight of glory” conjure up images of the ancient pan scale.
3. Do you remember the blindfolded lady of justice?
a. She holds a pan scale – two pans, one on either side of the needle.
b. The weight of the purchase would be determined by placing weights on one side and the purchase on the other.
4. God does the same with our struggles as we maintain our faithful service to God.
a. On the one side God stacks all our burdens: famines, firings, bad breaks, bad parents, bad bosses, bad health, and bad days.
b. Stack them up and watch the one side of the pan scale plummet.
c. But now watch God’s response: Does God remove them? Does God eliminate the burdens? Sometimes, but many times, rather than take them off, He offsets them.
d. On the other side of the scale God places an eternal weight of glory – endless joy, measureless peace, and eternity with Him.
e. And watch what happens when God sets eternity on the scale – everything changes, burdens lift, the heavy becomes lighter when weighed against eternity.
5. If life is “just a moment” then can’t we endure any challenge for “just a moment”?
a. We can be sick “for just a moment.”
b. We can be lonely “for just a moment.”
c. We can be persecuted “for just a moment.”
d. We can struggle “for just a moment.”
6. Can we? Can we wait for the eternal glory that far outweighs them all?
7. But to do that we must fix our eyes on the eternal, the unseen.
a. If all we see is what’s right in front of us, what’s right now, it’s easy to lose heart and give up, but if we can see the unseen, if we can gain an eternal perspective, then we stay encouraged.
b. We won’t lose heart; we won’t get discouraged and give up.
c. Even though we’re wasting away outwardly, even though things are going badly outwardly, inwardly God is making us new.
d. And our troubles—light and momentary—is that how we see our troubles? Or do we see them as heavy and permanent?
e. If we could see from God’s eternal perspective, then we would see that our troubles are light and momentary, and we would see that they are producing for us a glory, a beauty that is heavy and permanent.
f. God is at work even in our troubles doing something beautiful in us and for us, something beautiful that will last forever! So we must not give up!
8. Afterall, it’s not about us anyway, and it’s certainly not about now.
9. It’s all about our eternal God, and it’s all about eternity.
D. Let me end with the story about the man who stopped to watch a Little League baseball game.
1. He asked one of the youngsters what the score was.
2. The boy matter-of-factly said, “We’re losing 18-0.”
3. “Well,” said the man. “I must say you don’t look too discouraged by that.”
4. “Discouraged?” the boy said, puzzled. “Why should we be discouraged? We haven’t even gotten our turn to bat yet.”
E. Perspective can make all the difference in the world.
1. We’ve got to be able to see beyond the inning we’re in.
2. We must lift our eyes and make sure we are seeing our eternal God and make sure we are living with an eternal perspective, for as Paul wrote: to live is Christ and to die is gain (Phil. 1:21).
3. Life is short; God is eternal; so let’s live every day for God and living like that will make our lives count for eternity.
4. If we can help you in your spiritual walk with God, please let us know who we can help.
5. If you haven’t yet made the decision to turn your life over to God, to repent and confess your faith in Jesus and His saving work on the cross, and be baptized into Christ, receiving the forgiveness of your sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit, then we would love to help you do that.
Resources:
• It’s Not About Me, Max Lucado, Thomas Nelson, 2004.
• A God Who is Eternal, Sermon by Joe Wittwer, https://lifecenter.net/sermons/2010/god-who-is-eternal/
