{"id":21256,"date":"2017-01-08T00:10:22","date_gmt":"2017-01-08T08:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lccredding.com\/lcc\/?p=9848"},"modified":"2017-01-08T00:10:22","modified_gmt":"2017-01-08T08:10:22","slug":"january-8-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/2017\/01\/08\/january-8-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"January 8, 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\u201cFor thus says the high and lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: \u2018I dwell in the high and holy place\u2026\u2019\u201d<\/em> Isaiah 57:15<\/span><\/p>\n

Cultivating Awe and Reverence for God, Day 8<\/span><\/em><\/h3>\n

Inhabiting Eternity<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

I was the new kid in school only three times before my high school graduation. The worst \u201cfirst day\u201d was when I was 16, having moved to a new county where I knew no one. Everything I did that first day was wrong. I wore the wrong clothes, sat on the wrong side of the lunchroom, and said the wrong things. I actually raised my hand to answer a question in class\u2014wrong, wrong, wrong!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

God never moves to a new home. He inhabits eternity. Where He always was, He still is, and He will forever be. He continuously exists in that place we call \u201ceternity.\u201d Inhabiting eternity doesn\u2019t mean He has \u201clots of time\u201d but rather that He is outside the dimension of time. For man, \u201ctime\u201d is a sequence of events, like watching a parade from a chair on the curb. For God, Who is high above, that same sequence of events can be seen all at once\u2014both the beginning, middle, and end. He can, if He chooses, intervene at any point in the parade.<\/span><\/p>\n

God, the Ancient of Days, has always inhabited eternity\u2014both a place and a time (if the concept of \u201ctime\u201d can have no beginning or end) so far backward and forward in our limited ability to think or imagine that it just disappears into something like mist. Though we don\u2019t comprehend it now, we\u2019ll be in it one day!<\/span><\/p>\n

What is it like where God lives? I went on a search to find out what eternity is like. I found very quickly that I was in way over my head. My finite mind can\u2019t fathom the splendor, holiness, majesty, greatness, excellence, and sovereignty of God\u2019s dwelling place. I have nothing to compare it to, and no words we can relate to would explain it. I got bogged down in God riding on the heaven of heavens. I can\u2019t imagine living in a place where His voice is regularly heard with the ear. A place where His strength is shown in the clouds, where He sits enthroned in praise, and where He sat enthroned\u2014on the same throne\u2014during the Flood of Noah\u2019s day, very present, and watching judgment take place.<\/span><\/p>\n

I get wound up in my thoughts trying to imagine all the host of heaven standing by His throne; ten thousand times ten thousands of angels around Him, and thousands more besides, plus living creatures and elders, plus more thrones that belong to the elders; clouds and darkness surrounding Him; righteousness and justice being the actual foundation of His throne; the train of His robe filling the temple; earth as His footstool; the firmament appearing as a sapphire; with seven spirits before His throne, and lightnings and thunderings and voices proceeding from the throne, with a rainbow around it that somehow looks like an emerald. Lamps of fire burn in front of the throne, representative of His Holy Spirit in His manifold activities. There is a sea of glass like crystal before the throne, and in the midst of the throne and around the throne are four living creatures unlike anything we\u2019ve ever seen.<\/span><\/p>\n

And God Himself has a garment as white as snow, hair like pure wool, a throne like a fiery flame, a voice like many waters, and an appearance like a jasper and sardius stone.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though I cannot understand all I read about God\u2019s habitation of eternity, I can understand and experience the reality of His dwelling with me and in me (John 14:17). It was a great moment when the truth of this came to me\u2014since He dwells in eternity, and I am an eternal being, then He can dwell in me if He chooses. (And He does choose.)<\/span><\/p>\n

I can\u2019t do justice to the sights of eternity. There are countless other scenes to consider for a fuller picture, but mere mortals such as ourselves cannot pull it all together. It remains out of our reach for now.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFather, thank You for the glimpse of Your dwelling place, though we know it is so much more than we think. We are in awe.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

For more information, references are found in: 1 Kings 22; Psalm 22, 29, 68, 97; Isaiah 6, 66; Ezekiel 1, 43; Daniel 7; Revelation 1, 4.<\/span><\/em><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cFor thus says the high and lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: \u2018I dwell in the high […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-women"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p92wjD-5wQ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21256\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}