You and I don’t always live what we say we believe. There is often a disconnect between our confessional theology and our street-level functional theology. There is often a separation between, on the one hand, the doctrines we say we have embraced and, on the other hand, the choices we make and the anxieties that we feel. One of the places where this disconnect exists for many of us is the biblical teaching about eternity. We say we believe in the hereafter. We say that this moment in time is not all there is. We say that we are hardwired for forever. But often we live with the compulsion, anxiety, and drivenness of eternity amnesiacs. We get so focused on the opportunities, responsibilities, needs, and desires of the here and now that we lose sight of what is to come.

The fact is that you cannot make sense out of life unless you look at it from the vantage point of eternity. If all God’s grace gives us is a little better here and now, if it doesn’t finally fix all that sin had broken, then perhaps we have believed in vain: “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied” (1 Cor. 15: 19). There has to be more to God’s plan than this world of sin, sickness, sorrow, and death. There has to be more than the temporary pleasures of this physical world. Yes, there is more, and when you live like there’s more to come, you live in a radically different way. When you forget eternity, you tend to lose sight of what’s important. When you lose sight of what’s truly important, you live for what is temporary, and your heart seeks for satisfaction where it cannot be found.

Looking for satisfaction where it cannot be found leaves you spiritually empty and potentially hopeless. Meanwhile, you are dealing with all the difficulties of this fallen world with little hope that things will ever be different. Living as an eternity amnesiac just doesn’t work. It leaves you either hoping that now will be the paradise it will never be or hopeless that what is broken will ever be fixed. So it’s important to fix your eyes on what God has promised will surely come. Let the values of eternity be the values that shape your living today, and keep telling yourself that the difficulties of today will someday completely pass away. Belief in eternity can clarify your values and renew your hope. Pray that God, by his grace, will help you remember forever right here, right now.”

Here’s the danger for me and for you: sin doesn’t always look sinful to us. It’s hard to admit it, but sometimes sin actually looks beautiful to us. The man lusting after the woman in the mall doesn’t actually see something ugly and dangerous. No, he sees beauty. The guy who is cheating on his taxes doesn’t see the moral danger of deception. He sees the excitement of having additional money to satisfy his desires. The woman gossiping on the phone doesn’t see the destructiveness of what she’s doing because she is taken up with the buzz of passing a tale. The child who is rebelling against the will of her parents doesn’t see the danger that she’s placing herself in because she is captivated by the thrill of her temporary independence.

Part of the deceptive power of sin in my heart is its ability to look beautiful when it is actually terribly ugly. So we need help, and God in grace has met us with that help. This help doesn’t come to us first in a theology or a set of commands or principles; it comes to us in a person. God knew that my struggle with sin would be so great that it would not be enough to forgive me. That forgiveness is a wonderful thing, but I need more. So God not only forgives, but he also gets inside me by his Spirit. The Spirit that now lives inside me is a Warrior Spirit, who by grace does battle with my sin even in moments when I don’t care to. His redemptive zeal is unstoppable. Think of Peter, who denied any knowledge of Christ. Was it the end of his story? No, but not because Peter had the sense to pursue Jesus; it was because Jesus, in unrelenting, forgiving grace, pursued Peter (see John 18: 12– 14, 25– 27; 21: 15– 19).

In our battle with sin, are we called to wrestle, run, fight, and pray? Yes, we are, but our hope is not in our ability to do these things, but in the God of grace, who will war with sin until sin is no more. He never grows tired, never gets frustrated, and never gives up. Now, that’s hope!”