Yesterday, Today And Tomorrow?

2011-02-28 20:19

It is said that yesterday is the past, today is the present, and tomorrow is the future. Before God created the heavens and the earth, there were no yesterday, today and tomorrow--the past, the present and the future. God who created time is not inside time.

Time--the past, the present and the future--is applied only to the heavens, the earth and everything in it, which God created. Because the only true God is without beginning, without end and without image, we cannot see Him inside time.

The way to see God is only in faith in Jesus Christ who according to the will of God came into time and put off time. The faith in Christ, who put off time, is the substance of putting off time.

The Bible refers to the man inside time as the old man, and the man outside time as the new man. The man inside time is still in the flesh, but the man outside time is not in the flesh but in the Spirit.

There is no rest inside time. And so, Jesus said when he was inside time, "...My Father has been working until now, and I have been working." (John 5:17).

God sent His son into time so that those who love Him can put off time and enter the rest of God with His Son by faith in His Son. The way to accomplish it is the message of the cross. The Bible refers to it as the confession of faith.

The eternal rest of God is in God "I AM" Himself. The rest that does not belong to time is destined to be given only to those who are conformed to the image of His Son.

It is written, "Therefore, holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess. He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God's house. Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything. Moses was faithful as a servant in all God's house, testifying to what would be said in the future. But Christ is faithful as a son over God's house. And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast. So, as the Holy Spirit says: 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion, during the time of testing in the desert, where your fathers tested and tried me and for forty years saw what I did. That is why I was angry with that generation, and I said, 'Their hearts are always going astray, and they have not known my ways.' So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.' See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness. We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first. As has just been said: 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.' Who were they who heard and rebelled? Were they not all those Moses led out of Egypt? And with whom was he angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the desert? And to whom did God swear that they would never enter his rest if not to those who disobeyed? So we see that they were not able to enter, because of their unbelief. Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. For we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith. Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God has said, So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.' And yet his work has been finished since the creation of the world. For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words: 'And on the seventh day God rested from all his work.' And again in the passage above he says, 'They shall never enter my rest.' It still remains that some will enter that rest, and those who formerly had the gospel preached to them did not go in, because of their disobedience. Therefore God again set a certain day, calling it Today, when a long time later he spoke through David, as was said before: 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.' For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience." (Hebrews 3:1-4:11).

We all wish that we were united with Jesus Christ His Son, and put off time by faith working through love, and entered the rest of God without time. "But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit." (1 Corinthians 6:17). Amen. Thank you, Lord.