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Created for an Eternal World: How Will You Spend Your Now?

Created for an Eternal World: How Will You Spend Your Now?

Last updated on: November 11, 2026 at 9:52 am by Benjamin Raven Pressley

Created for an Eternal World: How Will You Spend Your Now? 2026-11-11T09:52:13-05:00 Benjamin Raven Pressley

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Mystery and Value of Time

Much has been pondered and said about this thing called ‘TIME’. Philosophers, sages, theologians, and fools have had many thoughts regarding this mystery of all mysteries. Yet as elusive and fleeting as it is, to some it seems irrelevant and taken for granted and assumed it will always be there…until it isn’t. The young in particular seem to think they have an endless supply. They look at those old and dying and don’t seem to consider that those old and dying ones were once young like them.

I watched an old Ryan Reynolds movie recently called The School of Life in which he played a young and very popular teacher named Mr. D. He was a very creative teacher and made learning fun. The students loved it, but many of the other teachers resented him because it made them look boring. Unbeknownst to any of them, though, he was dying of leukemia. He asked the students from time to time ‘How much time do we have?’ which just confused the students at first, wondering what he meant, as in, ‘does he mean how much time till class is over or what,’ he then answered their puzzled expressions with, ‘Not very long’. And after a while, the students knew to answer him, ‘Not very long’. It was his way of saying to live life to the max every day and every moment because you really don’t know how much time you have and he showed them by example how to live life out loud and make the most of it. As I said, they didn’t know he was dying of leukemia until one day they learned he had died. But they always remembered the life he taught them to live, for unbeknownst to anyone he lived modestly and frequently gave to the homeless and befriended even the gangs in his neighborhood. He lived life to the fullest and helped those in need.

Listen to this article:

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The Legacy We Leave Behind

There is a dimension of life that many of us never consider and it is that of legacy. What will we leave behind when we are dead and gone? What inspiration will we leave behind? What will people remember about us?

One of my favorite movies is the 1981 fantasy film Excalibur, directed by John Boorman. There is a line that is spoken by the wizard Merlin (played by Nicol Williamson) to King Arthur’s knights following their decisive victory at the Battle of Mount Badon: “Look upon this moment. Savor it! Rejoice with great gladness! Great gladness! Remember it always, for you are joined by it. You are One, under the stars. Remember it well, then… this night, this great victory. So that in the years ahead, you can say, ‘I was there that night, with Arthur, the King!’ For it is the doom of men that they forget.”

Another quote that emphasizes this is: “The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interrèd with their bones,” the speaker said, lamenting how everyone remembered the betrayal but forgot the years of loyalty that came before.—Mark Antony in Julius Caesar (Act 3, Scene 2). Here, he reflects on how people’s wrongdoings are remembered after death, while their good deeds are often forgotten.

The Ripples of Our Choices

How we live in the years given to us is important. It is certainly not all frivolity. Yes, life is to be enjoyed, but all that we do affects others. As a stone dropped into a pond, there are ripples that proceed from even the smallest of stones.

Life is like an ether all around us and everything we do affects everything else like ripples in a pond.

Life is like an ether all about us and in every living thing. It is a vast invisible ocean that fills us all with life and connects us to the Creator. Within it there are often storms, but it is always filled with the ripples caused by each created being’s choices, good and evil and even those things that are basically neither good nor evil. The most peaceful and enlightened among us still send forth a steady ripple, an energy that stabilizes the instability in the ether. We are all connected. All we do affects every other thing. Our actions cause the greatest ripples of all, but have no doubt our very thoughts also affect all living things and all creation. For all actions are preceded by thoughts. Potential actions present themselves every day to the courtroom of our minds to be tried by us, then we make our choices. It all begins with a thought. Some would say there are some things that affect our world more than others and it may seem so, but the reality is every thought, every action, every choice has no less effect than another. How can it? We are all created and began as a thought in the Creator’s great mind. Every ripple eventually ceases and the pebble becomes part of the still water, so it shall be with us.

Understanding the Eternal Now

Time, as we know it, consists of past, present and future. Yet it is only the present that we have any control over.

“Time is asymmetrical. We can know about the past, but cannot change it. We can influence the future, but cannot know it. We are all locked together in the split, split-second that is the present. The literal time machine of our dreams still waits for its own invention.”—Steve Watts

“Remember then: there is only one time that is important — Now! It is the most important time because it is the only time when we have any power.” –Leo Tolstoy (“Three Questions”)

Now, consider this: you are walking along a road. All you can see is what is before you, or you can turn around and see what is behind you. Now think about another person up in a tower looking down on you. They not only see where you have been and where you are going, but they see the whole road all at once, simultaneously. They see no past or future as you see it. This is a glimpse of our eternal God and Creator who sees things from an eternal point of view. Time experiences existence piece by piece (past, present, future), whereas God possesses the whole of life all at once. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis explains that God is not bound by the timeline of the universe. Humans experience time sequentially—moment by moment—leaving past moments behind to move into future ones. God, however, operates outside of time entirely:

“If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn. We come to the parts of the line one by one: we have to leave A behind before we get to B, and cannot reach C until we leave B behind. God, from above or outside or all around, contains the whole line, and sees it all.”

Because God is outside of time, He does not have a “past” or a “future”. For Him, every moment in human history—from the creation of the world to a pilot praying in a crashing plane—is occurring in an “Eternal Now”.

God doesn’t “foresee” what you will do tomorrow as if He is looking ahead; He simply sees you doing it in His timeless present. God created time: Augustine argued that time began with creation. Therefore, asking “What was God doing before He made heaven and earth?” is a nonsensical question, because there was no “before” prior to creation. Augustine noted that the past no longer exists and the future does not yet exist. Only the present is real. Since God is pure existence, He lives in a timeless present.

Living with Eternity in Mind

I hope I am not getting too esoteric for you. My point is, as limited finite beings with a definite beginning and end. There is a moment in our lives that touches and gives us a glimpse into the consideration that there is more than the finite life we live. There is a moment that intersects with eternity and that moment is the PRESENT.

Humans were formed from the very dust of the earth, infused with life when the Creator breathed His own breath into us. That breath carried life-giving and creative capacity—the power to speak words that build up or tear down. Rather than creating automatons, the Creator gave humanity a free soul. We were equipped to gaze simultaneously into the infinite and finite, designed to walk in effortless harmony.

“They grow up so fast!” As humans we express surprise at time’s passage.

Yet human beings are perpetually shocked by the passage of time—we constantly express surprise at how fast children grow up or how quickly years pass. I propose that our awkwardness within time is evidence that we were created for an eternal world outside of it. What we do in this present moment is but paving a highway for those that come after us. Our life, whether we want it to or not, will leave a trail to follow, good or bad. We as humans were created to view life through the lens of eternity. Jonathan Edwards (October 5, 1703 – March 22, 1758) was a prominent British American Puritan theologian, philosopher, and Congregationalist pastor who said he lived his life as if eternity was stamped on his eyeballs. His goal in life was to live a life in which every moment, every day and every human mattered in eternity.

The scriptures have much to say about time and eternity:

Seasons, Timing, and Divine Order

Ecclesiastes 3:1–8: Emphasizes that there is an appointed time and season for every activity under heaven (e.g., a time to plant, a time to reap, a time to heal).
Ecclesiastes 3:11: Teaches that God makes everything beautiful in its time and has placed eternity in the human heart.
Galatians 4:4: Speaks of the “fulness of time” when God sent His Son into the world.

The Brevity and Frailty of Human Life

Psalm 90:10–12: Highlights the fleeting nature of life and asks God to “teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
James 4:14: Compares human life to a mist or vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
Psalm 39:4–5: Reflects on how short human life is in light of eternity.

Making the Most of Time (Stewardship)

Ephesians 5:15–16: Exhorts believers to walk wisely and “redeem the time” (or make the most of every opportunity) because the days are evil.
Colossians 4:5: Encourages wise conduct toward outsiders, making the most of every opportunity.

God’s Relationship to Time (Eternal Nature)

2 Peter 3:8: Reminds readers that with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.
Psalm 90:4: States that a thousand years in God’s sight are like yesterday when it passes.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%201%3A8&version=NIVRevelation 1:8: Describes God as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, who spans past, present, and future.

Christ’s Victory Over Time and Death

The Scriptures declare and record that God, in the fullness of time, sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to break through the barriers of time and space for all humankind. He spent three days in a borrowed tomb and during those three days he descended into the depths of the earth and took the keys to death, hell, and the grave:

Revelation 1:17–18

“Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.”
Ephesians 4:8–9

“Therefore it says, ‘When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.’ (In saying, ‘He ascended,’ what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth?)”
1 Peter 3:18–19

“For Christ also suffered once for sins… being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison”

Jesus shattered time as we know it as he made a way for all to cross over into eternity

He took away the sting and the limitations of death (1 Corinthians 15:55) so that we too may cross over through death and be eternally with him. He ascended on high to prepare a place for us to live eternally in his very own house:

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.” (John 14:1–3)

He triumphed over death for us and now death is nothing more than passing from one life into another. As a baby being born crosses over from the mother’s womb into this life, we are born again and will not die but merely pass from this life into his eternal presence, where we will forever cast off the shackles of time, sickness, pain and death to live forever in the presence of the Creator. (2 Corinthians 5:8)

Laying Up Treasures for Eternity

Even the mystics got it right when they said, “The present moment is the only aperture through which the Infinite enters the Finite.”— Mystical Cosmology. Past is memory (mental construct); future is anticipation (mental projection). The actual doorway to the transcendent universe exists solely in the infinitesimal boundary of Now. How will you spend your ‘NOW’? As the song of old says, “Only one life, so soon it will pass. Only what’s done for Christ will last.” (classic poem by C.T. Studd adapted into a gospel song by the Lanny Wolfe Trio). You can spend your life laying up riches and all the comforts this life has to offer, but you can’t take it with you. Jesus said, in **Matthew 6:19-21, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

How do we do this?

Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Commit yourself to live according to his teachings.
Giving to the Needy: Sharing resources and offering financial support to the poor and vulnerable.
Acts of Service: Serving others, practicing kindness, and doing good deeds.
Prioritizing God: Living righteously and putting spiritual devotion above the pursuit of money and possessions.

Conclusion: A Life That Echoes

Time is far more than a ticking clock; it is the single thread connecting our fleeting, finite lives to the vast expanse of eternity. Though we cannot change the past or foresee the future, we hold divine stewardship over the present moment—the only place where our choices, thoughts, and actions create ripples that reach far beyond our lifetime. By choosing to live intentionally, serve others, and align our daily walk with the eternal purpose of the Creator, we ensure that our brief stay in this world leaves a lasting legacy. In the end, time will fade, but a life lived with eternity stamped upon the heart will echo forever in the presence of God.

I hope you enjoyed this week’s article. Please share it with your friends and social media. Thanks.

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About Benjamin Raven Pressley

Benjamin Raven Pressley is an author, teacher and spiritual guide. He is of Cherokee heritage. He has been a follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ and the apostles since 1975. His independent studies include the Holy Bible as well as other holy books of other religions. He is ordained by the Universal Life Church. He is a self-taught naturalist and his love and respect for nature is evident in many of the things he writes. He has authored several books on spirituality as well as a fantasy series and books on survival skills. He does not consider himself to be a religious person but believes true spirituality is an all-encompassing view of life and invites open discussion on matters of spirituality. You can read more about the author here.

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