When we use the word “forever”, we usually have a future-leaning mindset, ie., if something will last forever then it will continue eternally into the future. But, the Old Testament word that is often translated “forever” doesn’t only have the future in mind. The word is עולם (olam) and we see it as early as Genesis 3 when God curses the man and the woman for their sin in the garden. God says, “lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever (olam)—therefore the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden…” (Genesis 3:22-23) In this passage, the true sense of the word is future. However, when Asaph wrote the 77th Psalm, he used the word in the complete opposite sense. In his anguish, lying awake in the middle of the night, he writes, “I consider the days of old, the years long ago (olam).” (Psalm 77:5)
The word itself doesn’t mean endlessness, but rather a temporal reality in the very distant past or very distant future. It’s a “time hidden from present sight” according to Chad Bird, a Hebrew expert from whom I learned how to understand this word. When the Hebrew wanted to communicate eternity or endlessness, it would often double the olam, such as in 1 Chronicles 29:10 (which was in our Scripture reading last Sunday): “Blessed are you, O LORD, the God of Israel our father, forever (olam) and ever (olam).” God is not blessed or glorious only in eternity figure, but also in eternity past. The olam looks both forward and behind, placing us in a very small place called “the present” that is swallowed up in the always-existing-and-never-ending blessedness of God.
In Sunday School last weekend, we talked about having a larger outlook to help us navigate the stresses and fears of life. When we face hardship or uncertainty, our window of perspective often shrinks to include only what is facing us in the immediate present. While that may aid us in making quick decisions, it excludes all the ways that God has acted in the past and will continue to act in the future. We were discussing how David was so brave as he faced Goliath. One reason is that he understood the past victories of God and expected that God would repeat those. Another reason is that he knew the future promises of God upon Israel, and knew that no Philistine who “defied the armies of the living God” (1 Sam. 17:36) would be enough to stop what God had planned for his people. David had a true olam and olam perspective and it enable him to trust God in the immediate present.
Are your current anxieties causing you to forget all that God has done in your life before today? All the ways that God has answered your prayers? Forgiven your sins? Sustained you?
Are your current anxieties causing you to forget all that God has promised to do in the future? To never leave you or forsake you? That Christ will come to restore all of creation? That you will live forever with Christ as an heir of God?
The Christian who is at peace in the present has zoomed out to remember and anticipate the past and future goodness of God.
- Joshua Light
The word itself doesn’t mean endlessness, but rather a temporal reality in the very distant past or very distant future. It’s a “time hidden from present sight” according to Chad Bird, a Hebrew expert from whom I learned how to understand this word. When the Hebrew wanted to communicate eternity or endlessness, it would often double the olam, such as in 1 Chronicles 29:10 (which was in our Scripture reading last Sunday): “Blessed are you, O LORD, the God of Israel our father, forever (olam) and ever (olam).” God is not blessed or glorious only in eternity figure, but also in eternity past. The olam looks both forward and behind, placing us in a very small place called “the present” that is swallowed up in the always-existing-and-never-ending blessedness of God.
In Sunday School last weekend, we talked about having a larger outlook to help us navigate the stresses and fears of life. When we face hardship or uncertainty, our window of perspective often shrinks to include only what is facing us in the immediate present. While that may aid us in making quick decisions, it excludes all the ways that God has acted in the past and will continue to act in the future. We were discussing how David was so brave as he faced Goliath. One reason is that he understood the past victories of God and expected that God would repeat those. Another reason is that he knew the future promises of God upon Israel, and knew that no Philistine who “defied the armies of the living God” (1 Sam. 17:36) would be enough to stop what God had planned for his people. David had a true olam and olam perspective and it enable him to trust God in the immediate present.
Are your current anxieties causing you to forget all that God has done in your life before today? All the ways that God has answered your prayers? Forgiven your sins? Sustained you?
Are your current anxieties causing you to forget all that God has promised to do in the future? To never leave you or forsake you? That Christ will come to restore all of creation? That you will live forever with Christ as an heir of God?
The Christian who is at peace in the present has zoomed out to remember and anticipate the past and future goodness of God.
- Joshua Light
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