The God Who Created You Is Eternal

The God Who Created You Is Eternal

Text: Psalm 90:4 (KJV)

4 For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.

1).The idea of eternity is right up near the top in the category of “Hardest to Believe Ideas in the Bible.” *(Evolution)

*Some people struggle with the idea that there is no beginning and there will be no end to time.

2). The Bible says that God is eternal, which means He exists endlessly.

* As far backward and forward as you can look, you see God.

* There was never a time when He was not, and never will be a time when He will cease.

3). God is eternal. Connected to God’s “always-ness” is His “everywhere-ness.”

* Eternity means He has no limits with regard to time. God always is and always was.

* Omnipresence means He has no limits as to space. God exists everywhere.

* Omniscience no limits as to knowledge. God knows everything.

4) Many Bible verses speak of the eternity of God.

* God explains eternity like a house that he lives in. “He inhabits eternity”

Isaiah 57: (KJV)

15 For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place…

* Moses said that God is “Everlasting to Everlasting”

Psalm 90:1-2 (KJV) A Prayer of Moses the man of God.

1 Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. 2 Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.

5). It’s ok to struggle with God’s Eternity.

*God is a “Holy” God- Set apart- Lofty, Higher- He is not like a man, and cannot be compared to a man. God is “High and Holy”, “Lifted up”, He cannot be understood as we would understand a man. *If we could understand Him fully, He would be no greater than ourselves.

*God has to be imponderable and incomprehensible to be God.

* We would be disappointed if we could unravel all the mysteries of God.

* If we could figure God out there would be no basis for faith!

6). God must be worshiped as “The Eternal God.”

* We have to go as far as our limited understanding will take us and then we hit a wall of non-understanding.

* When we get to this wall, we drop to our knees and declare, “God, You are beyond finding out! You are greater than my understanding! This is the true attitude of worship!

* What we don’t understand about God, we must leave for Him to reveal to us either now or when this live is over.

*Here is what we do know about our “God’s Eternal Nature….”

I. God existed before time.

Genesis 1:1 (KJV)

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

A. Those four words summarize the doctrine of God’s eternity.

B. This beginning, of course, refers to the beginning of the creation we call earth (or perhaps the beginning of the universe), not God’s beginning.

C.S. Lewis also had a helpful idea about how to compare time with eternity. If you could take hundreds of pieces of white paper, say 8.5” x 11” in size, and tape them all together to form a huge, white backdrop … then take that giant white “curtain” and tape it to the side of a large skyscraper … then take a pencil and go to the middle of that backdrop and make a small line about an eighth of an inch long—that line would represent time against the expanse of eternity. Time is a mere blip, a small mark, compared to eternity. (Of course, the illustration breaks down when you get to the edges of the white backdrop, as if eternity had limits. In reality, the white sheets go on forever.)

God is the white backdrop, and the span of history on earth is time. We exist against Him as the backdrop for everything.

II. God exists in the past, present and future all at the same time.

A. With us, events happen on a linear plane, one after the other. That’s what we call history—the succession of events one after another.

B. For God, there is no past, present, and future. He exists in all those “times” at once.

C. It is like someone in a helicopter watching a person walking an a journey. The one who is higher can see:

* Where he was, (the past)

* Where he is, (the present)

*Where his is going, (the future)

John 8:56-59 (KJV)

56 Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad. 57 Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? 58 Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. 59 Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.

III. God exists outside of time.

A. Time is a temporary phenomenon, not an eternal one.

* When Adam and Eve sinned, everything changed. Life on earth became temporary instead of eternal.

* God put in motion a redemptive plan by which man’s holiness might be restored and he might enter once again into eternal fellowship with God.

* Time as we know it—though it seems permanent—is only a temporary blip on the giant canvas of eternity.

* God stands outside of time (life on earth) looking down on it from His eternal perspective.

* It is very important for those of us who are bound by time to remember that God is not.

B. Even though we are constrained by time at the present, our hearts still retain the call and longing for eternity.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 (KJV)

11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.

IV. God created time.

A. We read the record of God creating time in Genesis 1: 14-19.

Genesis 1:14-19 (KJV)

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: 15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. 16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. 17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, 18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. 19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

B. Those celestial markers will have different functions when the new earth is created and eternity is lived out from the New Jerusalem.

V. God controls time.

A. A deist is someone who believes there is a God who created the world but who is not involved in running it.

* The example of a clockmaker is used to illustrate this idea of God:

* A clockmaker creates a clock, winds it up, and lets it run without further interference. God, the deists say, created the world and its inhabitants and systems, and is now allowing it to run on its own without interference from Him.

* Many people try to explain why bad things happen to good people by saying God has taken a “hands-off” policy toward this world.

* Deists are wrong. Their view has no biblical support whatsoever. God is definitely in control of the times and seasons of our lives. He knows the time of our birth, the events of our life, and the time of our death.

Psalm 39:3-5 (KJV)

3 My heart was hot within me, while I was musing the fire burned: then spake I with my tongue, 4 LORD, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days, what it is; that I may know how frail I am. 5 Behold, thou hast made my days as an handbreadth; and mine age is as nothing before thee: verily every man at his best state is altogether vanity. Selah.

Psalm 139:16 (KJV)

16 Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.

B. What does the eternity of God mean to me in practical terms?

* The knowledge that God is eternal gives us reassurance.

Isaiah 40:28-31 (KJV)

28 Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding. 29 He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. 30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: 31 But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

* Regardless of how your life may have come apart in the past or present, God sees it in the context of the future as well.

Jeremiah 18:1-6 (KJV)

1 The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, 2 Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words. 3 Then I went down to the potter’s house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. 4 And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. 5 Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 6 O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.

* We share a common hunger to know and touch the eternal.

* Our hunger for eternity is what separates us from the rest of creation, what it means to be made in the image of God.

1 John 5:10-13 (KJV)

10 He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. 11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. 13 These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

* Those are words of reassurance for the one who is seeking to touch eternity. It can only be accomplished by touching Christ.