May 27, 1950

2 Peter 3:8, Psalm 90 – I have been considering the greatness of God this morning and am quite amazed that my thoughts of Him have been so human before now. Particularly I am impressed with the eternality of the Godhead. When Peter says that one day is as a thousand years to the Lord, he does not mean that God is on a slower time scale than we are; that is, that 365,000 years of man’s time would equal 365 days of God’s ‘time’. He means only that, in relation to men, God represents Himself as One with whom the passage of time has no effect. “A thousand years are in Thy sight as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.” (Ps. 90:4)

The real significance is that god is timeless in His relations with the universe. Eternality is not the length of passing myriads of ages; it is above, beyond, and utterly unrelated to any measurement. This settles much talk of foreknowledge and election. God does not think a thing, and then do it. He can think nothing but it is done instantaneously. Further more, there is no succession in His mind. To Him, eternity is a single act, having no cycles, starts, or ends. What God has become in Christ, God IS from everlasting. It is not that God stooped to become a man and decried to remain such in Christ. God created man in the image He Himself already sustained; this is meaningless unless I believe that God does not become anything. I AM. That settles all possible change. God can neither reverse, go beyond, nor step beneath His eternal mode of being. Thus, none can frustrate His design, for His designing is part of His eternal doing, and those are forever occurring because of His eternal being . . . . He begins, sustains, carries out, and fulfills His every decree—from our point of view. In Himself, however, it is a single act, even as though my entire life were a single breath.

– Jim Elliot