Lesson 10: God’s Will is Eternal
III. Permanence.
“He has put eternity into man’s heart...” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
 
The last demand is that of Permanence. Man is everywhere, at all times, in every way, at war with decay. The hatred of death, and the dread of the grave, mark the fact that man has the capacity for life, and therefore feels rebellious against the smallest suggestion of its stopping.
 
How men struggle for the eternal! We cry out for the beyond. Horizons are always a menace to our peace. We crave the infinite. Deeply conscious of the perishing nature of everything around us, seeing the dark sentence "passing away" written large on our most valued treasures, and feeling ourselves ceaselessly moving through. the pages of our life's story to the dreaded word FINISHED—we sigh, and sob, and fret, and demand some place that passes not; some treasure that will not vanish away; some secret of being that will enable us to say, “We abide, masters of death.”
 
It is true that thousands of us seem to float easily through the days, unconscious of these cravings, content to drift and not to know. Yet this is a false seeming. Carefully observe the first ordinary man in any crowd anywhere. Keep close to him, so you may watch him. Presently, in a moment of loneliness, when the things unseen come near in overwhelming reality, or when he faces death and feels it imminent, or when some cherished hope is suddenly destroyed, that man will lift his eyes and gaze wistfully toward the future. In those eyes shine the light of his true being, and the passion for permanence is revealed as being the true and perpetual sub-consciousness of his life.
 

That law of life which could answer that demand and make man master of all the forces of disintegration and decay is surely the highest and the best; and when we find it, to it we will give ourselves with whole-hearted devotion.
 
Standing within the realm of my own being, turning a deaf ear for the moment to all outside voices, I hear the speech of my true life, and learn its deepest demands; and I solemnly and positively declare that if the Will of God for man to be, as the Bible declares it to be, the highest philosophy of human life, it must meet this threefold demand, and secure for me the perfection of my being, the highest and abiding pleasure, and that victory over the elements of death and decay which shall ensure my permanence.
 
In three following sections we shall seek to show that this is exactly what the Will of God does, and what any other law of life fails to do. In concluding the present study, it will be sufficient to summarize the subjects of the next three thus:
1. God's Will is perfect, because by Him man was created, and He alone is therefore able to make such laws as shall ensure man's perfection.
2. God's Will is perfect, because He is love, and Love only can make laws for man which will provide him with perfect pleasure.
3. God's Will is perfect, because He is, and the Eternal alone can make laws which take in all the past, present, and future, so as to secure perpetuity.
 
Question: What is man’s biggest dread?
Let's reflect on, even memorize: “He has put eternity into man’s heart...” ‒ Ecclesiastes 3:11