Have you ever given really serious thought to ‘forever’? I find it difficult to get my head around the word because ‘forever’ is an incredible concept. And I keep forgetting that forever does not mean no change. How can there be a changeable forever? Only One can make that claim and encompass change but not to forever.
I know that there are certain ‘things’ and people I would love to have around me forever, but…. there are also ‘things’ and people I really could do without. So where is our choice in the matter? How can we keep what we want/need and forget what we don’t want? Memories are one method of retaining. But these too can be both the keepers and the forgetters. Actually staying in contact with people you care about is another method. With today’s technology of email, facebook, twitter, text messaging – there really is no excuse for not maintaining contact.
What else would you like to hold onto… forever? Days of happy childhood? School days of accomplishments? College days of exploration and discovery? First love? A place? A person? Any one of those and others may prompt a thought of ‘wishing’ it had been forever. But…? Are these eternal kinds of forever wishes/needs/wants?
In scripture, forever is always in action. It is never a passive verb or a future promise. I’ve always appreciated that when God speaks or acts it is always a present verb: will, is, etc. It is never an equivocal verb: may, possibly will, etc. And once God speaks a word, it is a ‘done deal’. In Isaiah (55:11) He says that His word never returns to Him void, it accomplishes what He sent it to do.
For me, the best part of ‘forever’ is when God said… “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5) A promise, His word – forever!
