College Study #35: "God's Eternality"

‘Behold, the Lamb of God’

ide o amnos tou theou

College Study

35^th teaching

4.29.2013

 

 

 “God’s Eternality”

 

 

          Turn to Psalm 90

          This psalm written by Moses uses a lot of words that evoke a sense of time. In fact, one of the themes of psalm 90 is the contrast between the everlasting God and the short-lived man. Moses says that God is from everlasting to everlasting, that He has been our dwelling place through generations. A thousand years to God are like yesterday past. But on the flip side, human life is characterized by brevity. We live seven or eighty years and then our life is gone, flown away, cut off. We finish our years like a sigh. And that’s it, we’re done.

          This makes time both precious and dreadful. In this respect, Time is our master and we are victims of it. We suffer time. Anyone who has ever set an alarm to go off in the morning knows that. We in Time are bound by Time. We cannot stop the process of change, the change of minutes into hours into years. Therefore we cannot fight time. We are subjects of Time, not it’s masters.

          Humanity has failed, thus far, to invent a time machine. We may be able to go mostly anywhere we want to in space, but we cannot go anywhere we want to in Time. There is no backward through history or jumping forward into the future. We have only to experience each moment passing, unable to change anything about time.

          And so we have the proverb: Time waits for no man.

          But while we as creatures suffer the experience of time, unable to escape the present, never realizing the future and never reliving the past, the same cannot be said for God.

          Tonight’s study is entitled: “God’s Eternality”. That is, God’s nontemporality or timelessness. This is to say, in other words, as the church father Irenaeus said: “Look for Him that is above the times, Him who has no times.” We may be subject to Time, but God is the Master of Time.

          Now let me first say this as a precaution:

          I feel that time as it relates to God is extremely mysterious. I thought I knew little about God’s timelessness before I began researching for this study. And after I began studying, I realized just how little I did know about the subject. And after that, I realized that I might know even less about the subject now than when I first began. I mean, time alone is a complex subject in the realms of philosophy, science and physics. But time as it relates to God is extraordinarily complex theology.

          Time, as it relates to an eternal and infinite God, is largely incomprehensible. We can hardly think of what it would be like to live without successive moments that produce past, present or future. This topic of God’s Eternality, then, to say it right from the get-go, is one which we shall never totally understand in this life.

          Even St. Augustine, arguably one of the greatest early Christian thinkers, seemed to believe that it is not a reasonable requirement for a satisfactory articulation of a doctrine such as timeless eternality that one must be able accurately to describe what it is like to be timeless. Meaning, we can believe this doctrine even though we cannot fully describe or comprehend it. The same thing is true of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity or God’s Infinity. Things like that must be understood to the extent that we can comprehend them, but beyond that, it belongs to God.

          Part of what it means to say that God is incomprehensible, ‘mysterious’, is to recognize that even if we say that God is timeless we do not and cannot have a straightforward understanding of what His timeless life is, or of what it is like to be timeless.

          In the words of my very wise wife: “It seems like Eternality is just one of those attributes that makes God God, just the fact that it’s something we can’t wrap our minds around”.

          So the goal then for tonight is not so much to attain a complete understanding as it is to gain an overview of the teaching of God’s Eternality in Scripture. If indeed this is something that God has revealed about Himself, then we have the duty and privilege to study it and learn about it as much as is humanly possible from God’s revelation to mankind. Just because we cannot totally understand it does not mean we can ignore it.

          I think we too often shoot for ignorance and blame it on the complexities and mysteries of God. God’s teachings are not there as a proof that we should never aim to understand them. No, God’s teachings are there to teach. Don’t blame your lack of knowledge about God on God. It’s not His fault.

          Therefore, tonight we will cover four points:

1.    What is Time?

2.    What is Eternality?

3.   Biblical Basis for God’s Eternality

4.    Implications of Eternality (God’s knowledge is complete/hymn by Isaac Watts/we are victims of time, God is not)

 

1.    What is Time

          As is the case in any major or complex discussion, we need a definition of terms. Since Eternality relates to time, we should first ask ourselves what Time is.

          Unfortunately, Time is not an easy concept to nail down.

          I found this quote on Wikipedia: “Of all obstacles to a thoroughly penetrating account of existence, none looms up more dismayingly than “time.” Explain time? Not without explaining existence. Explain existence? Not without explaining time. To uncover the deep and hidden connection between time and existence, to close on itself our quartet of questions, is a task for the future.”

          So while the counting of time and the measurement of time with clocks and calendars and timers and sundials is all very familiar to us, what exactly Time itself is remains elusive.

          Though in simplest terms, Time has been called the fourth dimension. It is a dimension in which events can be ordered from the past through the present into the future. Time has to do with measurements of durations and events and intervals between. Think of Time as the Great Organizer. Time organizes things so that we can say this happened before or after that.

          A phrase that first appeared in a science fiction novel from 1922 I think sums up time quite well. The phrase says: “Time is what keeps everything from happening at once”.

          Another thing we need to know about Time is that Time is linear not cyclical.

          It’s incredibly interesting that a large variety of ancient cultures and people groups (Incans, Mayans, Native Americans, Babylonians, Greeks, Hindus and Buddhists to name a few) all regard time as cyclical. They have a concept of a wheel of time which repeats over and over through the ages and through each life. So then to many ancient groups, Time is a loop, a wheel within a wheel, ever spinning and repeating endlessly.

          However, in contrast, the Jewish concept of Time as encompassed in the Bible says that Time is linear, beginning with the act of creation by God and moving through on a course of determined history until the end of the ages.

          On a side note, it’s interesting to me that some people refer to the end of the world as the end of time. What could they possibly mean by that?

          That the Bible clearly teaches that Time is made up of a linear series of predetermined events is clear from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8.

          Solomon says there is a time for everything. Everything has its time and purpose through history. So in contrast to the pagan idea of Time being repetitive and cyclical, the Bible shows that Time is actually linear, an ordered succession of events on a path headed from beginning to ending.

          Speaking of beginnings, we cannot believe that Time is eternal or infinite. It is not. Time had a beginning when Creation began. This is clear from two proofs: scriptural proof and philosophical proof.

          Firstly, the scriptural proof. At least four times, the Bible says that time had a beginning.

          I Corinthians 2:7, “But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory.” Before the ages, that’s literally before unfolding periods of time.

          II Timothy 1:9,  God “…who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began…”

          Titus 1:2, “…in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began…”

          Also, Hebrews 1:1-2 says “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds…” That word there for worlds is the same word in Greek for ages. Literally it’s saying through whom He made the ages, or made time.

            Secondly, the philosophical proof: There cannot be infinite time without a beginning. An infinite number of moments is impossible: if an infinite number of moments occurred before today, then today would never have come, since it is impossible to traverse an infinite number of moments (yet the time up to today has been traversed). There is no end of an infinite, but today is the end of all previous moments. Today has arrived; hence, an infinite number of moments could not have occurred before today. Therefore, Time must have had a beginning and it cannot be infinite.

          Since Time is a dimension which measures changing events and intervals, then there is no Time without changing events and intervals. Thus, at least by this definition of Time, there was no Time before Creation, only the Time-lessness of God.

          St. Augustine agrees by saying: “The world was made not in time but together with time. For, what is made in time is made after one period of time and before another, namely, after a past and before a future time. But, there could have been no past time, since there was nothing created by whose movements and change time could be measured.”

          As Norman Geisler so aptly puts it: “God did not create in time, for there was no time before He created a changing world. His act was not a creation in time, but a creation of time.”

          So Time, then, is a linear dimension in which events and intervals happen in a succession of past, present and future. Time involves the measuring of change. Time also, by our definition, had a beginning at the beginning of Creation, as seen in both scripture and philosophy.

2.    What is Eternality?

We know now what Time is. Our next task is to discover what Eternality means.

          We commonly say or hear contemporary Christians say that God is “beyond time” or “outside of time”. We often hear or say that without thinking of this specific doctrine or of its implications. But to say that God is “outside of time” is to proclaim this doctrine of God’s Eternality.

          God’s Eternality means that God is nontemporal or timeless. Since God created Time at Creation, He is necessarily transcendent above and beyond time.

          Purely, Eternality says that God has no past, present or future, but that He simply exists in an eternal Now.

          Eternality is of course related to the words eternal and eternity, which mean everlasting duration or Everlastingness, sempiternity is the proper term. However, eternity can also mean timelessness. Eternity can mean both endless duration and timeless existence. So to be clear between the two definitions, we have come to call timelessness Eternality and endless duration Everlastingness. Eternality means time does not effect it. Everlastingness means that from whatever point on, there is no end.

          To put the two definitions to practical use, let’s consider this example:

          Does the human soul have Eternality or Everlastingness? It has Everlastingness, not Eternality. When we die, our souls will continue to live on either in Heaven or Hell in an endless and everlasting existence.

          Also, angels and demons do not have Eternality, though they have Everlastingness. When they were created, their existence would never end since they are immortal. They have endless duration.

          However, nothing and no one but God alone has Eternality, not only pure ending infinite existence but an existence which is not effected by Time or divided up into a past, present or future.

          So remember this distinction: Eternality refers to God’s unique timeless existence. Everlastingness refers to endless duration. God has both, but God alone possesses Eternality.

          The doctrine of Eternality was mainly developed by two early Christians: Augustine and Boethius. We’re already familiar with Augustine from having quoted him on this and many other subjects. Boethius is most likely unknown to you and I, though.

          Boethius lived from 480 to 525AD. Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius was a 6^th century philosopher. He wrote:

                “It is the common judgement, then, of all creatures that live by reason that God is eternal. So let us consider the nature of eternity, for this will make clear to us both the nature of God and his manner of knowing. Eternity, then, is the complete, simultaneous and perfect possession of everlasting life; this will be clear from a comparison with creatures that exist in time.

          “…for it is one thing to progress like the world in Plato's theory through everlasting life (meaning Everlastingness, the endless duration of the world), and another thing to have embraced the whole of everlasting life in one simultaneous present (meaning Eternality).”

          So by Boethius’ definition, God exists in eternity embracing the whole of everlasting life in one simultaneous present. This doesn’t mean that God exists in a moment of time, since that would mean God exists in time. Rather it means that God’s life is Now, a continuous Present.

          Do you see how incomprehensible this is? We can say this and believe it, but how could we possibly know what timeless life is like?

          And yet it must be the case. We’ve seen that time did begin from scripture and philosophy, and if God made time then He is outside of time. Furthermore, there are several other doctrines which you can imply Eternality from.

          For example: God’s Omnipresence. If God is present everywhere, this can mean not only present everywhere in space but present everywhere in time. And if God is everywhere in time then time does not affect Him in the same way it affects us.

          Also, God’s Perfection. If God is Perfect and whole, then He cannot become better and He cannot get worse. He exists as a complete, entire, whole Life. His Life is not segmented into a God from the past or a God He will be in the future. All of God’s life is accessible to Him. God cannot remember what He once was. He simply always is, and always is Perfect.

          On this subject, God’s wholeness, the medieval teacher Anselm of Canterbury says of God’s essence: “Suppose, on the other hand, that it exists as a whole in individual times severally and distinctly. (A human being, for instance, exists as a whole yesterday, today and tomorrow.) In this case we should, properly, say that it was, is and will be. In which case its time-span is not simultaneously a whole. Rather it is stretched out in parts through the parts of time. But its time-span is its eternity and its eternity is precisely itself. The supreme essence, therefore, would be cut up into parts along the divisions of time.” In order for God to be perfectly whole and wholly perfect, He cannot be cut up into divisions of time. God cannot be divided. He is Perfecct.

          Also, God’s Immutability. Time has to do with the measurement of changes. But if God does not change then Time in fact is meaningless to Him. Whatever is in Time changes. Whatever is in Time will eventually have a past, has a present and will have a future. But God does not change. God cannot be in Time, if He were then He would be changing.

          Thomas Aquinas suggests that “the eternal is changeless, but what can be computed (counted) by its befores and afters has changed. It follows, then, that the eternal cannot be endless time. It must be something qualitatively different, not just different in quantity”.

          And also, God’s Infinity. If God is infinite then God has no reasonable limits. A being in time has the very reasonable limitation of Time. A being in time is limited by Time. Hence, God cannot be in Time, otherwise God would be limited by Time.

          Now this all isn’t to say that God does not act or interact in Time. History shows that God works miracles. The Incarnation is an act in which God stepped into Time as we understand it. But though God can act within time, He still transcends it, just as we have learned that God is both immanent within and transcendent above the universe.

          In summary, consider this statement: The distinguishing mark between time and eternity is that the former (time) does not exist without some movement and change, while in the latter (eternity) there is no change at all.

          Again, what does this look like? What is it like to exist without time, to be a timeless Being of not only endless duration but without limitations of past or future? It’s incomprehensible. We know that Eternality means God is outside of Time, and I truly believe that the subject is deserving of further study. But the best response with our limited understanding is worship.

3.    Biblical Basis for God’s Eternality

          The biblical teaching of Eternality is definitely not as clear as other teachings. This is a very mysterious attribute of God. But I hope that you found some Project Scriptura verses.

 

          Consider John 8:58, the God-man Jesus Christ says “Before Abraham was, I AM.” Not “Before Abraham was, I was.” Interesting that it’s in the present tense. I think that’s a hint at what God’s Eternality is like: pure Present Now. Before Abraham was born, God present-tense existed.

4.    Implications of Eternality

          As I said, I think there’s so much more to learn and study concern God’s relationship to Time and His Eternality, but as the phrase goes “we’re running out of time”. And so further study will have to remain “for another time”.

          However, there are a few implications of the doctrine that I’d like to finish up with:

          Firstly, what will life in Heaven be like? Will we be timeless too?

          I thought about this and I don’t think so. I think that God will maintain Eternality even when we inhabit eternity. After all, there will be time in heaven. The song says “when we’ve been there ten-thousand years”. More importantly, we know from Scripture that there will be events in Heaven: the judgement seat of Christ, the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, the Return of Jesus Christ with His saints at the Second Coming. Furthermore, when John glimpses Heaven in Revelation, he sees a sequence of events. Everything wasn’t happening all at once. We will be experiencing semiternity or Everlastingness, an endless duration of Heaven, but we will not be experiencing Eternality: existence without past, present or future. If we had no past in heaven then there would never be a time when we entered heaven, neither would we be thankful for Christ redeeming us in the past if we never had a past.

          What does this mean? I think it implies that even Heaven is just a glimpse of what God is like. If Heaven has Time but God exists outside of Time then there’s a very real sense in which Heaven is just like God’s doorstep and God Himself still exists transcendent above even there. Don’t know how scriptural that statement is, but there you go.

          Secondly, God’s Eternality has implications on God’s Omniscience.

          Again, the writings of Thomas Aquinas prove helpful. Aquinas uses this metaphor to explain God’s foreknowledge of the future. “He who goes along the road does not see those who come after him; whereas he who sees the whole road from a height sees at once all those traveling on it.”

          Nearer to our day, Pastor Chuck Smith adapted Aquinas’ metaphor and explains it in this way by comparing it to a parade. Time is just like you standing at the front of a parade. You see the banners and the baton-twirlers and the trumpets and the tubas. But someone at the back of the parade already saw those, and now that person is seeing the floats and the flowers and the mayor in his car. That’s what linear time is like from our perspective. But God views time as outside of it, like a man standing at a distance and seeing the whole parade not as it passes by in moments but in its entirety.

          God therefore knows and sees all things future, all your free decisions, without necessarily controlling those free decisions but at the same time ordaining and allowing them because He sees them in the future.

          Thirdly and finally, a major implication of God’s Eternality is this: God is better than you.

          As I’d mentioned earlier, we are victims of Time. We can do nothing against Time. Hours proceed totally uncaring of human life and existence. What Time for us is like is, I think, well summarized by Dali’s surreal painting Persistence of Memory. Time melts and fades away.

          This means our Time should be precious. When Blythe and I were married, I gave her this pocket-watch-necklace. It symbolizes the time that we had as an unmarried couple, our time dating and courting and getting to know each other, which exist now only as memories. But it also symbolizes time to come that we’ll spend together.

          Time is precious, my friends. Let us not waste one of the greatest resources we have. God knows I am guilty of that.

          But as we read, Psalm 90:12 says “…teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”

          Time is fleeting and before you know it, you are in the next stage of life. Regret comes from not seizing the day, from not numbering your days, from not esteeming Time as precious.

          The great hymn-writer, Isaac Watts, once penned these words to a hymn called Our God, Our Help. This hymn almost retells the words of Psalm 90, all about our frailty and God’s Eternality.

Our God, our help in ages past,

   Our hope for years to come,

Our shelter from the stormy blast,

   And our eternal home:

 

Under the shadow of thy throne

   Thy saints have dwelt secure;

Sufficient is thine arm alone,

   And our defense is sure.

 

Before the hills in order stood

   Or earth received her frame,

From everlasting thou art God,

   To endless years the same.

 

Thy word commands our flesh to dust,

   “Return, ye sons of men”;

All nations rose from earth at first,

   And turn to earth again.

 

A thousand ages in thy sight

   Are like an evening gone;

Short as the watch that ends the night

   Before the rising sun.

 

The busy tribes of flesh and blood,

   With all their lives and cares,

Are carried downwards by thy flood,

   And lost in following years.

 

Time, like an ever-rolling stream,

   Bears all its sons away;

They fly forgotten, as a dream

   Dies at the opening day.

 

Like flowery fields the nations stand,

   Pleased with the morning light;

The flowers beneath the mower’s hand

   Lie withering e’er ’tis night.

 

Our God, our help in ages past,

   Our hope for years to come,

Be thou our guard while troubles last,

   And our eternal home.

 

 

 

          You know what? God is better than you. He’s more reliable that you. He’s more helpful than you. He’s more faithful than you. He’s longer-lasting, more enduring than you. And the same thing applies to me.

          If God has Eternality, the quality of timelessness, is He not the One best Subject to whom we ought to devote all our faith, all our trust and all our hope?

          Eternality is an immensely comforting doctrine. God is not subject to Time. He is Master over it. He does not grow weary or tired or old or weak as we do. We may not totally understand what God’s timeless life is like, but we can understand this. We can apprehend the teaching that God is beyond time. And He is thus totally reliable.

          “Be thou our guard while troubles last, and our eternal home”.