Articles
Time Change
Hopefully, you have adjusted well to springing forward. A few weeks ago, we all moved the hands on the clocks. Since then, the days seem to have gotten much longer. Different people have different thoughts on it. Some like it, and some don’t. It seems to me that springing forward ought to put a little extra spring in our step, but I always feel kind of sluggish.
Whether or not you look forward to the time changes in this life, there is a time change that we ought to be looking forward to. It is called eternity. Time will change. Our word eon (sometimes spelled aeon) is related to the Greek word for eternal. To refer to something as eternal is to imply that it is in contrast with something that is quick and fleeting.
Things which are eternal are not bound by the constraints of time. We say to “set your clocks” (although nowadays, many clocks set themselves) because we live a life within the constraints of time. We have seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, and decades. As such, all of these units of time have a beginning and an end. If you start a stopwatch and let it run for 10 seconds, there is a beginning and ending to that time. This helps us to order our lives and make sense of the world around us. We are able to know when to arrive at destinations, when to leave, when to take particular medicine, when to wake up and go to bed, and so on.
Eternal life will not involve springing forward or falling back. We will not be bound by the constraints of time. Some translations of the Bible will use the word everlasting. If it is everlasting life, then it is life that lasts forever. It is worth considering that eternal life is not just a future thing. Eternal/everlasting life is spoken of in the present tense.
“He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” John 3:36
“Truly, truly, I say to you, the one who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.” John 5:24
“Truly, truly, I say to you, the one who believes has eternal life.” John 6:47
Ephesians 2:6 says that when we are raised up (this is language used for baptism in Romans 6:4 and Colossians 2:12) God “seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” If Jesus does not return in our lifetimes, we will die. All of us will. However, this is not the end of the story. For those with who have everlasting life, physical death is not truly death. It is the start of the next chapter. The one who has everlasting life will live in a time with no time. And there will be no clocks to change.
