There is a sense within many people that we were created for something more than this life. We feel we have loved too much and meant too much for us to have no significance after death. There is a persistent suspicion that we are designed to have some sort of relationship with eternity.
The Old Testament writers understood this. One of them (probably King Solomon) wrote:
(God) has … set eternity in the human heart; yetno onecan fathomwhat God has done from beginning to end (Eccl 3:11). In other words, the notion of eternity burns in our hearts, but we can’t work out what God is up to.
The Bible is absolutely unambiguous about the existence of eternity.
- God is described as “eternal” (Gen 21:33; Deut 33:27)
- Daniel writes about God’s kingdom being an “eternal kingdom” (Dan 4:3,34)
- God’s righteous laws are described as “eternal” (Ps 119:160). Incidentally, this means that if you flout God’s principles and patterns for living, you are flouting eternal principles.
In the light of the Bible’s teaching about eternity, it’s not surprising that people ask what it is they have to do to be part of it. This was also the case in Jesus’ time. Let me read a bit from the gospel of Jesus’ life written my Mark:
As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life? (Mark 10:17)
It’s a good question, isn’t it? Sadly, too many of us don’t switch off our mobile phones long enough to think seriously about it.
Arthur Malcolm Stace (1885 –1967), known as Mr Eternity, was an Australian soldier. He gained fame as a reformed alcoholic who converted to Christianity and spread his message by writing the word “Eternity” in copperplate writing with chalk on the footpaths of Sydney. He did this from 1932 to 1967 — thirty-five years!
This one word that he wrote has since become part of Sydney folk-law. It was the word Sydney’s civic leaders chose to be emblazoned in lights across the Harbour Bridge at the turn of the millenium. It is a disturbing and powerful word. It is one that challenges society’s pursuit of meaninglessness, lack of boundaries, self-obsession and hedonism.
As I reflect on the Bible’s teaching on eternity, the one thing it gives, more than anything else, is Hope. It gives us hope when faced with the obscenity and finality of death.
The existence of eternity also gives us dignity. Its existence means that we are created for more than collecting toys and tee-shirts from Bali. To simply content yourself with doing that is a woefully shallow/pathetic/inglorious mode of existence.
Whilst we have the nagging suspicion that eternity exists, we have to ask whether this belief is significant or whether it is simply a reflection of our inability to cope with the meaninglessness and hopelessness of death. In other words: is it true? What evidence is there that eternity exists?
Yuri Gagarin was said by some to have made the remark “I see no God” when orbiting Earth aboard Vostok 1 in 1961.
Christians were not surprised. No Christians thought he would literally be there in space. The laws of physics teach us that time and space are inseparably linked. This means that if God exists and is not physically there in space, he’s also not physically constrained by time. In other words, he must logically live in eternity.
It is significant that the ancient writers of Scripture described God as an eternal Spirit. They didn’t describe him as some sort of animal.
I think there are two reasons why we can take the existence of eternity seriously.
- The first reason is the reasonable belief that God exists. Many of the greatest scientists of the past, including Newton, Darwin and Einstein have believed this, and many contemporary cosmologists e.g. Paul Davies, have also been convinced that there is a mind behind the cosmos. The beauty of the universe’s mathematical order and the ridiculously unlikely fine tuning of factors necessary for it to exist have persuaded them that the universe has meaning. So, if there is an eternal mind behind the cosmos, then we have to take the existence of eternity seriously.
- The second reason we can take the existence of eternity seriously is because of the historical life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus not only taught about eternity, (particularly as it exists as “the kingdom of God”) but he also gave us a sneak preview into its reality by appearing to his disciples in his eternal resurrected form.
The Bible teaches that it is not the physical that is eternal, but the spiritual. It is worth noting that when we talk about the spiritual reality of eternity, we are not describing an existence of disembodied phantoms. Rather, we are talking about a world which is real and embodied but which is spiritually driven. After all, Jesus’ eternal resurrected body was real enough to eat with his disciples and to go fishing!
So there we have it: Eternity.
May I suggest that if there is even a faint possibility of it existing, that you seek out how Jesus can make you eligible for it.
