Such
humor is another form of acknowledgment of His presence in our lives. If we
cannot appreciate the humor in some things, we are nothing but a self-righteous
sourpuss, yes? There’s a time to cry and a time to laugh (Eccl 3:4a). It is
analogous to Him possessing love and anger. Many see Yahweh as a killjoy, serious
at all times that humor is perceived as sin. Such people are wound too tight
for me. Merriment is spiritually medicinal (Prov 17:22)!
If
we cry before Him, shall we not also laugh before Him as you would laugh among
friends and family; clean, harmless laughter, that unstresses the spirit within
man? If we are to love Him with all of who we are (Mk 12:30), humor has to be
part of the package; it’s called having fellowship with the Almighty: talking,
listening, laughing, crying, even a comfortable silence in His presence.
Should laughter be banned as sin in Christendom because people are going to
hell every second of the day? How could we laugh about anything as long as
people are dying and going to hell? Is there any room for wise, holy humor? I
think so; I know so.
Anyway,
after that creature notification to the Creator, I straightened up my back and
smiled when I remembered one of the things that Moses said of Him in Psalm 90,
…from
everlasting to everlasting, You are God, and I didn’t say that in my head
either,
“I’m
thankful, Yahweh, knowing that from everlasting to everlasting, You are God!”
In
the Psalms, you will see at times the psalter talking about the dreary
wilderness experiences of God’s people then speak of the glory of Israel and
the nations – dreary to glory! Here in Psalm 90:1-17, Moses, under inspiration,
paints a dark picture of the effects of sin, frailty, and brevity of life
(1-10) and prays for God’s intervention in behalf of fallen man (11-17). But in
so doing, He reveals things about Yahweh that are glorious, uplifting, and really
challenging to comprehend, like, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are
God [Heb.,
El]. He was; He is; and He will always be God. Halleluyah! Halleluyah!
Another
way of “understanding” these prepositional phrases, from everlasting to
everlasting,
is “without beginning or ending.” Without beginning or ending, You are God. From eternity to
eternity, You
are God.
From vanishing point to vanishing point, You are God!
This
strongly speaks of His eternality, yes? Yahweh has no inception or termination,
no point of origin, no ending point. Ironically, my brain easily embraces His never-ending, but when it comes to getting my arms around God never having a starting
point, truly, my mental engine stops dead in its tracks! I quickly sense my
finiteness in attempting to comprehend the infinite God!
Allow
me just to mention a duh-factor; every person, place, or thing in creation has
a beginning. Revelatory, yes? Look at the illustration below.
This E2E is a unique expression that can only be rightfully applied to Yahweh (cf. 1 Tim 6:16), yes? We have, excuse another alpha-numeric designation – B2E, a beginning to eternity. God created us to live forever, but just note that His from everlasting to everlasting is without change. We not only have a beginning, but we are constantly changing as we move toward eternity to be more like Him, hopefully, who absolutely has no change. Our changing will end upon our glorification in heaven.
Don’t be fooled at the world’s understanding of death; it’s not over when
a person dies. Death in Scripture is only a separation, not a cessation of
human consciousness. We all will live forever in one of two eternal destinies:
heaven or the lake of fire. That is not a very popular doctrine for a vast
number of people who do not know Yahweh. They are repulsed by the thought of an
unbeliever’s eternity and scared to death of the thought of it though they will
not admit to it.
This
was the very reason I accepted Christ back on 1.19.1976 because I feared an
unbeliever’s eternity. Jesus paid the penalty for our sin, eternal separation
from God, so we wouldn’t have to personally experience the penalty for sin.
Jesus died on the cross for you and for me (cf. Jn 3:16)!
When
I received Jesus through faith, my enormous sin debt was paid in full the very
moment Christ came into my heart. If you step out into eternity without Him,
you pay your own unfathomable sin debt forever in the lake of fire, separated
from God forever. To be clear here, for by God’s mercy and grace was I saved.
Oh, the power of forgiveness I experienced that day. By the way, Jesus, the God-Man,
who I prayed to was the off-the-cross God and arose from the grave on the third
day (cf. Acts 4:12; Jn 14:6; Eph 2:8-9; Titus 3:5; 1 Cor 15:3-4, 17).
His
sacrifice was the only sacrifice that satisfied the just and holy demands of God
the Father (1 Jn 2:2; 4:10). We could not see the proof of God the Father’s satisfaction
on the cross, but we see the physical proof that the Father was satisfied by
the sacrifice of His Son by the witnesses to the physical resurrection of Jesus
Christ! Because He lives, we, too, who have faith in Him, shall live also! Halleluyah!
Glory to God!
The
question remains; are you satisfied with the sacrifice that satisfied the
just demands of God for your sin? If you are trying to get to glory through another
way than the way provided, it is quite evident you are not satisfied
with the sacrifice of God’s Son for your salvation!
Here
is the dire warning, if that is your case – for if you do not believe that I am He,
you will die in your sins (Jn 8:24b). Meaning? If you die without Christ, you will
spend an eternity separated from God in a really, really terrible and
frightening place. It is not a love issue with God (Rom 5:8); it is a holiness
issue. Who is going to pay for the penalty of your sin? This is the fundamental
issue in salvation. If through faith you let Jesus pay your sin debt, you are
judicially declared righteous instantly before God in Christ! If you step out
into eternity without Christ, you will pay the debt of the penalty of your sin
– eternal separation from God forever.
Nobody
goes to heaven by mistake! I knew that I did not want hell to be my eternal
destiny. It has and will always be the best decision I had ever made: past,
present, and future, unequivocally! I mean that sincerely.
When
we speak of having eternal life as believers, this eternal life has a beginning
with no end spiritually. We were created to live forever. Before Jesus lived
within me, I was dead in trespasses and sins (Eph 2:1), but ever since that day when the Son
came into my heart to live, I will forever have eternal life (being
intentionally redundant). There is no eternal life without the Son of God, my
dear friend (1 Jn 5:12). Our eternal life is in a Person (cf. Jn 3:36; 14:6; 1
Jn 5:12); Yahweh’s eternal life is in Himself. He is the eternal way,
the eternal truth, and the eternal life, yes! Selah.
Isn’t
this such a comforting truth, God’s eternality! Moses spoke of the unsearchable
and unimaginable complexity of the attribute of the eternality of Adonai with simplicity
and splendor. I don’t quite understand this attribute, but nevertheless, I
rejoice in it based on the authority of the Scriptures.
This
amazing God has been our dwelling place, our den, our refuge for believers in
all generations! How is that possible you might ask? Think of it! It is because
even from everlasting to everlasting or eternity to eternity or from vanishing
point to vanishing point, He is God! I don’t get it; but I love it and go with
it!
You
are God (Heb., El)1
El is a prime root and often combined with other words to reveal
some description or designation of Yahweh. The Bible is God’s self-revelation
to man, right? Some examples are
these: Elohim (plural in form, emphasizing majesty) // El Shadday (God
Almighty) // yo’el, Joel, Yahweh (is his) God // miyka’el,
Michael, who (is) like God) // Bethel, house of God, et al.
What
creature can receive this exaltation from another creature, “from everlasting
to everlasting, You are God?” No man, angel, or demon can make that claim for
all were created! God Almighty is the only uncreated Being. All of mankind
experiences birth and death (cf. Rom 3:23; 5:12; 1 Jn 1:10): here today, gone
tomorrow, physically speaking. Angels are spirit beings. The “death” of demons should
be understood as being separated from Yahweh for eternity in the lake of fire as well.
Only
two men escaped physical death, Enoch and Elijah, but there will be a whole
slew of believers who will also escape physical separation from their bodies in
the future when Jesus comes back for His church in the next eschatological
event – the rapture. What a reason for being faithful to Him (cf. 1 Jn 3:2),
yes!?
Have
you ever looked out over one of God’s infinity pools, a very large lake, sea,
or ocean at one time or another? It looks like it could go on forever beyond
the horizon, but we know that it only has the look of being infinite due to the
curvature of the earth and does not go on forever. It is a neat perspective,
nevertheless.
Scientists believe outer space is infinite and ever-expanding, but I am of the opinion from a theological perspective that the universe, though seemingly infinite, has a boundary like the bodies of water on earth. Before creation, there was God. Isn’t this what Moses declared in Psa 90:2,
Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever You had formed
the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.
It is as if Yahweh carved out a section called creation, which implies a
perimeter, or He went interdimensional!? Anyway, every person, place, or thing
had a genesis within the matrix of creation. The only truly eternal One who was,
who is, and who will forever be is Yahweh. <><
