Lesson 16: Promise’s Permanence Through Himself
“…whoever does the will of God abides forever" 1 John 2:17.
The third demand of man is for permanence. That also is secured by those who dwell wholly within the Will of God.
The argument may be simply stated like this: God's Will is perfect, because HE IS, and the Eternal alone can make laws which include the past, present, and future, so as to secure eternity.
Nothing is more restful to the heart of man than the sense of the eternity of God. The thought is utterly beyond our complete comprehension, for the mind of man cannot grasp the thought of eternity.
The very fact, however, of our inability to do so is the reason for the security we feel when we remember that God Himself is eternal. The secrets of the past, all unknown to us, are ever present to His omniscient mind. Upon the mystery of the future the light of His perfect knowledge rests; and the problems of today that fret and trouble us are seen by Him in their relation to the past and to the future, and for that reason cease to be confusing to Him, as they are to us.
In the eternity of God, time has but one significance, it is always and unendingly "Now." The name by which He revealed Himself to Moses at the burning bush is full of significance. He is the "I AM" (Exodus 3:14). Combining this fact with those considered in previous lessons, of His Creatorship and His love, we argue at once that the laws He makes for the creatures of His hand and the children of His love, are laws that will take in the sum of things, and so condition the present, that it shall hold within it the power and the promise of the future.
Every present law of God for man is based upon the fact of the past and moves towards the purpose of the future. What He wills for each person today takes into account all the forces and facts of the past. Previous failings in the individual life; tendencies inherited from the generations that have gone; the accumulated forces that propel men from the dead centuries are all present to the mind of God, when He arranges the program of individual lives.
So also the future is known to Him: the true line of life's development, with all the lines that cross and disturb it. Words that we often have to make use of are never required in the vocabulary of God. We speak of possibility, necessity, accident. He cannot be surprised. Nothing happens in the sense in which we use that word. He marks the approach of every foe, knows from where it comes, sets the limit of its opposition; saying always to Satan, as He said in the case of Job, "So far may you go; only here and there you shall not place your hand" (see Job 1).
It follows, necessarily, that where life is governed only within the Will of God, every date and every event become links in the chain of a perfect whole. All contribute to a finality. It is impossible here and now for us to discover the relation of the present moment either to the past or to the future. But that relation is always present to the mind of God. We are permitted occasional glimpses of light upon this truth as the years of our life pass on.
Question: What is every present law of God based on?
Let’s pray: Lord, You have promised us that if we do Your will, we will abide forever. We ask that You would help us abide in Your will. We can only abide in Your will with Your help! Thank you for helping us. In the name of Jesus we pray, Amen.