God’s prophecy for you is eternal life

Prophecy is not fate

There is a strong tendency to view prophecy as merely a prediction of events, rather than as warnings and instruction to make better choices. If prophecy is merely a prediction of events, then God must control all influences, including our choices, to make sure that the events come to pass and the decreed results happen. However, prophecy is not predetermined fate. It is not predestination in the sense that a person or a nation has a fixed destiny which is impossible to change.

In this section and the next we will see that faith, hope, and love are still the overarching principles driving history. As we saw in book one, Zero to Eternity, the basic motives of free choice prompt every choice. Therefore, prophecy can do nothing but predict choices and the consequences of those choices. Therefore, prophecy can change just as destiny can change. Nobody is inescapably predestined to life and nobody is pre-sentenced to death.

The Infinite Good Person who sits on the throne of the universe set everyone up for success. Before our creation as a world or as individuals, God’s predestiny for us was everlasting immortality of the most exalted kind. Humanity’s selfish choices, not God’s, have plunged us into death and darkness and suffering. The purpose of prophecy is to tell us the big picture from eternity past to eternity future so that we can use it as a roadmap back to heaven, if we choose.

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth. (Genesis 1:26-28)

Humans were made in the image of God. Nowhere in Scripture is it recorded that we were made to cover up someone else’s failure or to fill the gap caused by others‘ deaths. We are not second-string substitutes coming in off the bench because the star players are tired. We are the star players. We were all to be born in the Garden of Eden until the world was filled with kings and queens taking care of all nature.

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it: for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die. (Genesis 2:15-17)

God commanded humans to obey and live. It was certainly not His will for any of us to die. Before our creation we were destined to live forever.

And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. (Revelation 21:3-4)

Sin, suffering, and death is but an interruption in God’s great plan of life. It was never part of the plan itself. God never dooms anyone to an evil fate.

You are the anointed cherub that covers and I have set you so: you were upon the holy mountain of God; you have walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. You were perfect in your ways from the day that you were created, until iniquity was found in you. (Ezekiel 28:14-15)

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit of it and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. (Genesis 3:6)

Sin entered the universe, not by God’s decree or plan, but by creature choice. Finite beings thought they knew better and so chose against God’s plan.

Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it is better for him that a heavy millstone be hung around his neck, and that he be drowned in the depths of the sea. Woe to the world because of its stumbling blocks! For it is inevitable that stumbling blocks come; but woe to the person through whom the stumbling block comes! (Matthew 18:6-7, NASB)

Even though sin is now inevitable in this sinful earth, the sinner is held responsible for his/her choice to sin. If God had planned or predestined any of us to be sinners, then He would be guilty of causing us to stumble. He would then be subject to the laws of justice that would require Him to cease existing. He puts no stumbling blocks in front of anyone, ever, not in a perfect world and not in an imperfect world.

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. (Romans 8:28-30)

God is omniscient. He foreknew everybody. God is also omnipotent. Therefore, He fore-planned and pre-destined everybody. In Adam, He called us to be fruitful and have dominion. After Adam’s fall, He still calls us back to repentance through Christ to be justified and glorified once more. God would “have all men to be saved.” (1 Timothy 2:4) But no one is forced to respond favorably to His call. (Matthew 22:1-14) Also, among those who do respond favorably, anyone can change their mind at any time and leave God. (Hebrews 6:4-6) If perfect angels and perfect people could reject God’s destiny, then so can fallen humans.

According as he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will. (Ephesians 1:4-5)

In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who works all things after the counsel of his own will: That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ. (Ephesians 1:11-12)

Some interpret these texts to mean that only Christians were predestined to be adopted into God’s family, but that would mean that some of God’s precious children were predestined to be in and others were predestined to be out—before the foundation of the world, before sin. That cannot be, if God is an infinite good person He would never pre-fate any of His perfect children to death. And even after sin entered the world by human choice, God’s will is to have “all to be saved.” (1 Timothy 2:4)

[God] has saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. (2 Timothy 1:9)

We, who were born in sin and have known evil all our lives, often think we must earn our salvation and work hard to create a new life. However, the truth is that God calls us to return to the holy life that He already has planned for us. We earn nothing. We create nothing. Our job is to accept by faith the life He already has created for us that we wandered away from.

In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began. (Titus 1:2)

We do not hope for something that God might do for us in the future. We hope to receive that which God has already created for us in the past and still offers freely to us.

Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man. (James 1:13)

From within and from without, we are often tempted to think that God does not love us and that He has no use for us. Those temptations never come from God. He has already created an eternal life for us. He has already made for us a perfect position in a perfect place. That is our fate, our predestined reality, if we want it. God made His choice long ago and acted on it and died to convince us how much He wants us to take it. He is completely good and tempts us, entices us, inspires us, to do good and to accept His eternally real goodness.

The fact that you were born is a prophecy that you will live forever.