BIOLA RADIO PROPHECY MESSAGE
by Dr. Ralph L. Keiper
GOD’S TIME IS ETERNITY
I t is interesting to hear a skeptic ex plain his logic by saying, “I am will ing to grant that God created the world, and perhaps that His Word is even true. It may be that He caused the earth to be flooded so that the wicked people of that day would be destroyed. It may also be that there is a coming judgment. (Certainly the world needs some kind of judgment.) But if these things are all true, how do you explain God’s silence; why hasn’t He done something before now.” I think this is a legitimate question. The world’s history has existed for. many years without God’s specific and visible intervention. Our basic problem is, however, that we count time by 24 hours, by a turning of the globe, by the changing of the seasons. We are not at God’s vantage point. God Him self created time and as a result He is not a victim of it. This is what the Apostle Peter had in mind when he wrote, “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (II Peter 3:8). God is not limited to a time table. Our impatience is due to the fact that we have only limited vision with our finite minds. When, our Lord Jesus Christ was hanging on the cross He uttered, “I thirst.” It is interesting to note, how ever, the important context. Before He declared what is known as the “fifth word from the Cross,” Scripture de clares, “Now when Jesus saw that all things were fulfilled He said, I thirst.” Time was only right when all things had been accomplished according to God’s holy plan. Certainly, God’s time is not our time. But someone will still persist, “Why hasn’t He come back, things certainly look right; nothing seems to be unful filled.” Humanly speaking we would have to agree, however, we must make our basis the Word of God. Listen,
“The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slack ness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (II Peter 3:9). How wonderfully this truth reveals God’s love and mercy. This is why it seems to us that He is slow. Every time an individual challenges God, every time he mocks and curses God, he does it with the breath that could enable him. to live for the Lord. Life is very fragile. It is in Christ that we live and move and have our being. God has supplied the very air we breathe. This is why we can live. But in a coming day, mercy will be replaced by wrath, and grace by judg ment. God is holding back the dam of His judgment by divine and sovereign grace. That dam is going to break and the day of judgment will come. This is explicitly told us as we read, “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fer vent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” (verse 10). This terrible day will come without warning. Newspapers carried the account of a tragic flood which hit an eastern city. At nightfall the people went to bed in security and comfort. But during the night a dam broke and the rivers of water overflowed the banks and took a toll of lives. The people had trusted the dam and took it for granted. But it had its breaking point which re sulted in both loss of lives and prop erty. Will the dam of God’s judgment break upon you? Today, this moment, you can determine where you are going to live. W ill it be in the lowlands of the world and eternal death, or in the highlands of God’s grace and eternal life? (Message Series continued on page 25) 19
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