What is eternity? Infinite or unending time? The widely accepted Big Bang theory points to the beginning of the universe approximately 13.8 billion years ago. Before the creation of the universe, there was no time since time is an artifact of the Big Bang! But if that is the case as science suggests, then eternity, prior to God’s act of creation, did not exist since our concept of eternity is embedded in time and eternity past was before time began. Confusing? Yep, at least it is for me! My astrophysicist friend Dave Bradstreet suggests only the fingerprint of God is present in the beginning. Scripture teaches that “in the beginning, God”. God is described as eternal, everlasting, the Beginning and the End, the One who was and is and is to come, the Alpha and Omega.
But so much for the esoteric aspects of time. What is time to you? Where, on the “timeline of time”, do you focus your attention? Are you a person mentally living and dwelling in the past and much of the present has moved beyond you? I often use the statement “one day at a time” to describe my life in the present. But what do I really mean? Some of my friends live for their next big adventure. For some, life is a travel log — where they have been, and where they plan to go next. Others largely ignore the present as they focus on the future – life after graduation, a coming marriage, their dream job. Time, for some, is linked to the seasons – for skiing, fishing, and gardening. Seasonality defines food availability for many cultures as described eloquently by Robin Wall Kimmerer in her best-selling books Braiding Sweetgrass and more recently, The Serviceberry. Prior to the arrival of the European culture, the lives of tribal folks followed the food – when to dig camas bulbs, the arrival of the salmon runs, the fruiting the berry species…. She eloquently speaks of gift – that all we depend upon is a gift from Creation. Gifts are to be shared and responded to. Reciprocity describes one’s life. We receive and we give back. Human lives are intimately linked to Creation as we share with the other non-human “persons” of Creation. Such intimate relationships break down when everything is commodified and commercialized. Gifts are not a commodity! When toilet paper becomes scarce, we do not share, we hoard.
But what about your life and mine? We each face different challenges; we are each at different places on the timeline of our lives. Some of us have severe limitations set by age, health, and other factors beyond our control. Yet each of us, as Christ followers, are living in God’s Kingdom today as we await the Kingdom to come. We are challenged on this daily walk to focus on God (Romans 12:2, Ecclesiastes 12:13-14, Hebrews 3:1); to focus on what is good (Philippians 4:8, Proverbs 4:23), to be led by the Spirit (Romans 8:14, Galatians 5:18), and to respond to Creation’s call which is — waiting for each of us to participate in Creation’s liberation from its bondage to decay as it is brought into the glorious freedom of the Children of God (Romans 8:21). It is “the now, but not yet”. Today, can our path be one of love, and grace as we seek to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God!
My prayer today focuses on 2 Cor. 5:17-19. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come the old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation”. Let us therefor participate with Christ to extend His loving care to a broken Creation!
Thanks for listening.
— Joe Sheldon
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