What does it mean that God is eternal?

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True Bible Answers · Accepted Answer

The eternity of God is one of the foundational truths of Scripture. It touches on His very name, His nature, and His relationship to everything that exists. Several threads run through the biblical testimony: God has no beginning and no end; He exists outside of and above time; He is utterly unchangeable; and He has revealed all of this supremely in the Person of His Son. The Name "I AM" — God's Self-Existence When God revealed Himself to Moses at the burning bush, He chose a name that declares His eternal, self-sufficient being. C. H. Mackintosh draws out the inexhaustible meaning of this name: "And God said to Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel, I AM has sent me to you." The title which God here gives Himself is one of wondrous significancy... when He calls Himself "I AM," it comprehends them all. Jehovah, in taking this title, was furnishing His people with a blank cheque, to be filled up to any amount. He calls Himself "I AM," and faith has but to write over against that ineffably precious name whatever we want. C. H. Mackintosh Mackintosh adds: There is, in the name "I AM," a height, a depth, a length, a breadth, which truly pass beyond the utmost stretch of human conception. The Hebrew and Greek Words for "Eternal" Morrish's Bible Dictionary traces the key biblical terms and shows how each applies to God Himself: 1. ad: very often translated 'for ever'... also 'eternity;' "the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity." Isa. 57:15. 2. olam, signifying 'everlasting,' 'never ending'... "the everlasting God." Gen. 21:33; Ps. 90:2; Ps. 93:2. 3. qedem, 'ancient, that which is before.' "The eternal God is thy refuge." Deut. 33:27. "Art thou not from everlasting?" Hab. 1:12. And in the New Testament: aionios, signifying 'ever enduring.'... This word is applied to God Himself as "the everlasting God." Rom. 16:26. The dictionary concludes: "The above passages show that the same word is used for the existence of God Himself; for the salvation and blessedness of the saved; and for the punishment of the wicked." Jehovah — The Ever-Existing One The dictionary entry on God unfolds the meaning of the name Jehovah: This is a name of relationship with men, especially with Israel, taken by God in time. It is derived from havah, 'to exist,' and may be expanded into 'who is, who was, and is to come.' God thus reveals Himself in time as the ever-existing One: that is, in Himself eternally, He is always the same: cf. Heb. 1:12. And on "I AM THAT I AM": God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM... where the word is Ehyeh, which is from the same root as Jehovah, the Eternal existing One; He that was, and is, and the coming One. The entry lists eternity as the very first of God's attributes — followed by immutability, omnipresence, and omniscience, all flowing from the fact that He is the ever-existing God. It concludes: God's eternal power and divinity may be known in creation, Rom. 1:20; but He has revealed Himself in the person of Christ, the Son, the eternal Word. eternity The Eternal Word — Before Time, Before Creation Hamilton Smith opens his notes on John's Gospel by carrying our thoughts back behind all creation to the One who simply was: The gospel opens with the sublime statement, "In the beginning was the Word." At once our thoughts are carried back into eternity, before time commenced or creation existed, to learn that the glorious Person Who is called "the Word" had no beginning. In the beginning of everything that had a beginning, the Word was, not "began". "'In the beginning was the Word' is the formal expression that the Word had no beginning." Hamilton Smith He draws out a fourfold glory: In the fewest and plainest words the Spirit of God in these opening verses has presented the Godhead glory of our Lord. The Word is an eternal Person, a distinct Person in the Godhead, a divine Person, and an eternally distinct Person. On the incarnation — the moment the Eternal entered time: We have learnt Who He is in Person, Who He was in eternity; now we are told what He becomes in time. It is not said that He became the Word by incarnation, but that the Word became flesh. This immense event — the incarnation of the everlasting Word — would lead us to expect great and blessed results. And when the Lord Jesus declared "Before Abraham was, I am" (John 8:58), Smith notes: The Lord's answer fully discloses His glory as a divine Person. Before Abraham He ever existed as God — the I AM. From Everlasting to Everlasting — The Son in the Father's Bosom J. G. Bellett meditates on the eternal relationships within the Godhead — particularly the Son's eternal dwelling in the bosom of the Father: The bosom of the Father was an eternal habitation, enjoyed by the Son, in the ineffable delight of the Father "the hiding-place of love," as one has called it, "of inexpressible love which is beyond glory; for glory may be revealed, this cannot." J. G. Bellett He presses the point that God's eternity is not abstract — it is the eternity of love between the Father and the Son: It is delight in Him, equal and full delight, all along the way from everlasting to everlasting: no interruption, no pause, in the joy of God in Him, though various and changeful joy; the same in its fulness and depth, let the occasions proceed and unfold themselves as they may. And the unchangeableness that eternity implies: That One was alike unsullied through the whole path from everlasting to everlasting; as holy in the virgin's womb as in the Father's bosom; as spotless when ending His journey as when beginning it; as perfect as a Servant as a King; infinite perfection marking all, and equal complacency resting on all. A Child of Days, Yet the Father of Eternity A. J. Pollock highlights the stunning paradox of Isaiah 9:6 — how God's eternity is revealed precisely in the incarnation: Would any uninspired writer in his wildest dreams pen this verse? It sounds apparently contradictory to speak of the same Person as a Child of days and the Father of eternity. How could both statements be true? And yet we know from Scripture that the Child of the virgin, begotten by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, as to His deity was God manifest in the flesh. A. J. Pollock On Micah 5:2: Here is a Babe born in a defined place, Bethlehem, and yet we are told that the One so born, was from EVERLASTING. In taking up Manhood our Lord had a beginning at Bethlehem, but the One, who had that beginning, was God from everlasting, who never had a beginning. days And on the eternal relationships within the Godhead: There ever was the Father. There ever was the Son, the "only begotten" Son of God. As the old divine put it: "LIFE — the Father from all eternity gives it; the Son from all eternity receives it." There ever was the Holy Spirit. Synthesis That God is eternal means, first, that He has no beginning and no end — He simply is. The name "I AM THAT I AM" declares a self-existence that depends on nothing outside Himself. Every creature receives its being; God alone has being in Himself. Second, it means He is above and outside of time. Time began with creation; God "inhabiteth eternity" (Isa. 57:15). Before anything was, the Word already was — not as a dormant force, but as a living Person in the joy of the Father's bosom. Third, it means He is unchangeable. Because He is eternal, He cannot grow, diminish, learn, or forget. "In Himself eternally, He is always the same" (Heb. 1:12). His love, His holiness, His purposes — all rest on this unshakeable foundation. And finally, God's eternity is not cold or abstract — it is the eternity of relationship and love. Father, Son, and Spirit have dwelt together "from everlasting to everlasting" in a communion of infinite delight. When the eternal Son entered time at Bethlehem, it was not to become God, but to reveal the God who always was — so that creatures of a day might share in the life that has no end.

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