God Is Eternal

God Is Eternal

The triune God of Scripture is without beginning or end.

And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’” Exodus 3:14, 15

The formal name of God was known throughout the period of the patriarchs, throughout the book of Genesis. It was known, but it was not understood. The Hebrew word, Yahweh, appears to derive from a form of the verb, “to be.” God says that His name is “I AM.” The sense of this seems to be that God always is. He never was and never simply will be. He is eternally existing as He is in Himself, as He was before the beginning of all things, and as He was known to the fathers of Israel.

God is thus eternal and unchanging. Nothing comes before Him. He will never come to an end. His purposes will never be altered, abandoned, or overcome by any other purposes or powers because He always exists to ensure that what He has purposed shall be fulfilled. The One-in-Three God will always be.

The people of Israel, long captive in Egypt, must have looked back through the stories of their fathers and longed for the God of their fathers to be with them, so that they might hear His promises, know His presence, and realize His purpose for their lives. Now Moses was being sent to tell them that, in fact, this was exactly what had always been but was now about to become more manifestly clear.

Concerning the worldview which the eternal God has promulgated, beginning in His Law, we can be certain that, because He is eternal and unchanging, He will not change His mind about His will, and nothing will be able to prevent Him from realizing what He has purposed forever in this Covenant and worldview. God does not change. Nothing precedes Him in being or power, and nothing can arise without Him or above Him. He is eternal, unchanging, and ever-present with His people, to accomplish for them all that He has promised, without fail.

The eternally present God of the Covenant is with His people to give them rest (Ex. 33:14). This aspect of the divine worldview, first promised in the Law, but only partially fulfilled, would await the coming of Him Who is Immanuel—God with Us, the incarnate Word—and the outpoured Spirit of the Three-in-One God Who spoke to Moses from the burning bush.

For more insight to the nature of God’s Covenant, order a copy of T. M.’s book, I Will Be Your God, from our online store. Visit our website, www.ailbe.org, and sign up to receive our thrice-weekly devotional, Crosfigell, featuring writers from the period of the Celtic Revival and T. M.’s reflections on Scripture and the Celtic Christian tradition.

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T. M. Moore, editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.