What happened before the creation of the world? This is a question that reaches into the deepest recesses of eternity, touching upon the very nature of existence before the fabric of time and space was ever woven into being. In the first epistle of Peter, chapter 1, verse 20, we are given a profound insight: that Christ was chosen before the foundation of the world, though He was revealed in the last days. For our benefit, the book of Genesis chronicles the beginning of creation within the scope of human history, yet it purposefully leaves the events of eternity past unrecorded, as Moses, under the guidance of the Spirit, chose to omit them. Before the physical creation of humanity—before the material world was shaped—there existed a history entirely independent of the created order. God existed before the concepts of energy, time, space, and the universe were spoken into existence.
The rest of the scriptures offer us vital clues about this history of eternity past, a time that preceded human life and the constraints of our reality. Before the creation of the earth, there was God, and God possessed majesty. With His Son, Jesus, He revealed the truth of His identity before the world began. Jesus shared many mysteries with us, including events that transpired before creation. The prayer that Jesus offered in John 17 remains one of the most significant and profound chapters in the entire Bible. It is widely considered the most powerful prayer ever uttered by the greatest person who has ever lived. Through this prayer, we are granted the privilege of feeling the heart of Jesus as He speaks directly to His Father.
The Bible contains many remarkable prayers. We look with admiration upon the prayers of Solomon, the intercessions of Abraham, and the pleadings of Moses; however, this specific prayer stands out as the most extraordinary recorded in the scriptures. In John 17:1–5, Jesus speaks eloquently about the splendor and the greatness He shared with God the Father before the world was created. Jesus said these things and, lifting His eyes toward heaven, prayed,
“Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, just as you gave him authority over all humanity, so that to all whom you have given him eternal life—and this is eternal life—they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent, to glorify you on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify yourself with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.”
Before the earth was created, God was present, and God shared majesty with His Son. While the book of Genesis commences with the creation of man and the other living creatures, it is evident that God’s existence did not begin there. According to the testimony of the Bible, God was present at the beginning when the universe was brought into being. God existed long before the dawn of creation. In the account of the universe’s creation, He is portrayed as an eternal being who has always existed and will always continue to exist. This reality is supported by various verses throughout the entirety of Scripture. In Genesis chapter 1, the word “El” is replaced by “Elohim,” a plural noun that translates to “gods.” This grammatical nuance implies that God is three in one. Although this grammatical structure might appear incorrect from a secular linguistic perspective, it is theologically profound and signifies the triune nature of the Godhead.
Authentic prayers often serve as a mirror, revealing a person’s deepest thoughts, emotions, and intentions. John 17 provides a rare and intimate opportunity to witness the true nature and heart of Jesus. Through this prayer, Jesus addresses several central themes that are explored throughout the Gospel, including the nature of glory, the concept of being sent, the necessity of belief, the nature of the world, and the overwhelming reality of love. Jesus asked to be glorified, saying, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you.” Previously, the hour of Jesus’ glorification had not yet arrived, but now, the moment had come. Jesus prayed first for Himself, yet this request was entirely devoid of selfishness. His concern for His own glory was intrinsically linked to a concern for the Father’s glory. The Son can only glorify the Father if the Father first responds to Him, establishing a cycle of mutual glorification.
Regarding the prayer of the glorified Son, we must understand that Jesus did not wait until His work on the cross to glorify God the Father. Throughout His entire life, He glorified God on earth. Jesus glorified the Father through every action of His life, from His circumcision and dedication in the temple to His silent, faithful obedience in Nazareth. Jesus brought glory to God the Father through His unwavering faith, His absolute obedience, and His diligent, tireless work throughout His earthly ministry. Every sermon He preached, every blind or sick person He healed, every instruction and training He provided to His disciples, every confrontation with corrupt religious leaders, every difficult question He answered, and every loving touch He bestowed upon the broken—all of these served to glorify God the Father.
Then we read, “I have finished the work.” Jesus, with divine confidence and absolute assurance, viewed the work on the cross as already completed. Jesus asked the Father to glorify Him with the Father’s own glory. This was a prayer of complete dependence upon God the Father, not one of independence. While many individuals in this world crave praise and attention for themselves, their requests for glorification are vastly different from the prayer of Jesus. Jesus prayed, “Glorify yourself along with me.” The fundamental difference lies between dependence and independence. We also read, “with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” Jesus was fully aware of His preexistence and the nature of that existence. He knew that there was a time in eternity past when God the Son and God the Father shared glory.
Jesus could not have honestly or healthily prayed those words if He were not Yahweh Himself, equal to God the Father. In Isaiah 42:8, Yahweh proclaimed that He does not share His glory with anyone. If God the Father and God the Son share this glory, they must both be Yahweh. A biblical commentator once observed that Jesus had a primary request: that the Father receive Him back into the glory He had momentarily relinquished to fulfill His earthly mission. This request for a return to pristine glory unmistakably implies His preexistence and His absolute equality with the Father. This confirms His bold claim that He and the Father are one, as recorded in John 10:30. The Gospel of John emphasizes the glory of Jesus throughout the entirety of its narrative. John was diligent in recording the many ways in which Jesus referred to His own glory. In this prayer, the events leading up to the crucifixion had already begun with the betrayal. The phrase, “now the Son of Man is glorified,” refers to the very reason Jesus came into the world: He would die and subsequently be resurrected as a substitutionary sacrifice. The Son would glorify the Father, and the Father would glorify the Son. They would promote each other’s glory, effectively highlighting the absolute greatness of God. In fact, this is precisely what Christians are called to do. Everything we do—in thought, in word, and in deed—is meant to be for the glory of God.
Jesus does not merely pray for Himself; He also prays for us. In John 17:24, Jesus says, “Father, I desire that those you have given me may be with me where I am, so that they may see my glory, the glory you bestowed on me because you loved me before the creation of the world.” Everything we are or will ever become in our spiritual lives is due to the Savior who gave Himself for us, who prayed for us so that we could be one with Him, and who established a beautiful pattern for us to follow in our own prayer lives.
Finally, we see Jesus and His glory manifested again in the book of Revelation. In that book, John was commissioned to document the things he had seen. John saw a powerful Jesus, one who was unlike any typical man. In Revelation 1:12-13, he wrote,
“Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me. And when I turned, I saw seven golden lampstands, and among the lampstands was someone like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest.”
This is what John saw: the Son of Man, the honored and exalted Jesus. John described the voice he heard as distinct and striking, resonating like the sound of a trumpet. This powerful voice belongs to the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, He who is at the beginning and the end of everything, because Jesus identified Himself with those names in Revelation chapter 1. We know for certain that this was the powerful voice of Jesus. The title “First and Last” belongs exclusively to the Lord Yahweh, the God of Israel. The title “Alpha and Omega” carries that exact same connotation of being the beginning and the end. This is one of the pivotal passages in the New Testament where Jesus clearly and unequivocally claimed to be God.
We can only imagine what must have raced through John’s mind when he turned toward the sound of that voice. The resonance of the sound probably did not perfectly match how he remembered Jesus’ voice from their time together on earth. John described it as being like a trumpet. However, he knew it was Jesus because of the voice’s own self-description as the Alpha and the Omega. After spending significant, intimate time with Jesus during His earthly ministry, John finally had the opportunity to meet Him face-to-face in His heavenly glory after all those years. The robe and the sash may evoke images of the high priest in the Bible and may also imply that Jesus serves as the eternal high priest for His people. The only other occurrences of sashes in the book of Revelation are found in chapter 15, verse 6. They are also described as golden, a priestly image used for angels in the heavenly temple. Thus, Jesus appears not only as a King but also as a Priest—a combination of imagery that became quite familiar to the Jewish people during the Maimonides period.
John then continues, “His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze, polished as though refined in a forge, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters.” This description of His eyes is remarkably similar to the narrative we receive of an angel in the book of Daniel. The description of His limbs is also similar to the narrative we receive of an angel in the book of Ezekiel. These angelic characteristics that appear in John’s vision of Jesus do not lower Him to the level of angels; rather, they serve to emphasize the immense, transcendent greatness of Jesus. He cannot be portrayed as less glorious than a glorious angel. Eyes like fire describe passionate eyes in Greek literature, but they can also portray the supernatural, blazing eyes of divine beings or angels. Shining metal can also represent the glory of God as seen in Ezekiel 1:27. However, other characteristics suggest that while John portrays the glory of Jesus as no less than that of an angel, it is undoubtedly greater than any angelic glory. The face of Jesus also shines like the sun. Greek texts sometimes portray divinity as shining with the radiance of the sun, similar to lightning. Jewish texts did the same for angels and other beings, but they also used this imagery for God Himself.
John then continues in Revelation 1:16-17, “In his right hand he held seven stars. From his mouth came a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. He laid his right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last.'”
Even though John was an apostle who intimately knew Jesus while He walked the earth, John was utterly amazed after witnessing that incredible vision. Even the three years that John lived on earth with Jesus did not adequately prepare him for the moment when Jesus appeared to him in His heavenly majesty. At that pivotal moment, John understood the divine power and majesty that Jesus had voluntarily relinquished while living on this earth, as described in Philippians 2:7. At that moment, John knew what a miracle it was that Jesus could conceal His true glory and authority while walking among us. In Revelation 1:18, Jesus says, “I was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the Keys to Death and Hades.”
Jesus is the One who lives; He was dead, and now He is alive forever. He possesses the credentials of resurrection and lives never to die again. The victory Jesus achieved over sin and death was eternal. He did not rise from the dead merely to die again. Jesus is the only One who possesses the keys to Hades and death. Some people mistakenly believe that the devil has the authority or the power to decide who lives and who dies, but they are clearly mistaken, as only Jesus holds the keys to Hades and death in their original form. The book of Revelation was known in ancient Greek as “Apokalypsis,” which means “revelation” and “unveiling.” The book of Revelation is the revelation of Jesus Christ in the sense that it belongs to Him, and He is the One who brings about the revelation. Jesus is the person about whom the book tells us.
We might ask why we need a revelation from Jesus. The scripture tells us that He gave it to show His servants. This is a significant reason why God chose to reveal this information about Jesus Christ to humanity. The creation of the children of God raises many questions among those who read the Bible, particularly regarding the mysterious identity of the children of God. The story of the Nephilim is captivating, appearing in Genesis 6:1 and the book of Job. In the book of Job, there is a righteous man named Job who lived in the land of Uz with his extended family and vast flocks. Job is renowned for being upright and righteous, always striving to live a moral life. He maintains a deeply disciplined relationship with God. However, Job soon loses all his possessions and suffers greatly. This suffering impacts Job deeply, making him feel bitter, anxious, and fearful. Job desires to confront God and protest his condition. Eventually, God intervenes in the situation. Job asked God to speak to him many times, and finally, he receives his wish in Job 38:4a-5:
God asks, “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding, who determined its measurements? Tell me if you know, or who stretched the measuring line over it, on what its foundations are set, or who laid its cornerstone, while the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy.”
The purpose of this statement is to make it crystal clear that when God created the foundations of the earth, Job was not present. These questions also serve to remind Job that there were many things he did not know. We read, “While the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy,” revealing that beings referred to as morning stars and sons of God witnessed the creation of the earth and celebrated its glory. The power and wisdom of God were intimately involved in the process after creation. Accounts of marriages between the “sons of God” and the “daughters of men” emerged, which was considered ungodly during a time of rapid population growth, mainly due to long life expectancies in the pre-flood world.
In Genesis 6:1-4, we read, “When men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they took wives for themselves whom they chose. Then the Lord said, ‘My Spirit will not strive with man forever, for he is flesh; his days will be 120 years.’ The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward. When the sons of God came to the daughters of men and they bore children to them, they were the heroes of antiquity, men of renown.”
But who were these sons of God? Both pre-Christian Judaism and the early church believed that the sons of God were spiritual beings or angels who took human wives and fathered giants known as the Nephilim. The three main perspectives on the identity of the sons of God are: one, they were fallen angels; two, they were powerful human rulers; or three, they were the godly descendants of Seth who married the ungodly descendants of Cain. The traditional belief is that the sons of God were supernatural beings who had children with human women, resulting in the Nephilim.
There are several reasons that support this view. The fact that the phrase “sons of God” always refers to angels in the Old Testament supports this idea, as seen in Job 1:6 and 2:1. In those cases, the sons of God are angelic, spiritual beings, including Satan. The use of the phrase in Job suggests that the account in Genesis 6 also refers to angelic, spiritual beings. Genesis 6 contrasts the sons of God with man, implying that they are non-human beings. Genesis 6 says that man began to multiply and daughters were born to them. The Hebrew word for man is the generic term for humanity, as used in Genesis 5:1. The sons of God are contrasted with man; therefore, the sons of God were distinct from man and married the daughters of humanity. As a result, the sons of God must be non-human beings of some kind.
The context implies that the Nephilim were the resulting offspring of spiritual and human beings. The Nephilim, or “the fallen ones,” in Genesis 6:4 are mysterious figures—the heroes of antiquity, men of renown. The text does not explicitly explain how the Nephilim arose; it only states that they were on the earth in those days. But when the Nephilim are mentioned in Genesis 6 along with the marriage of the sons of God and the daughters of men, it is not clear how these men of renown arose if they were not the result of that union. Jude probably understands Genesis 6 as referring to the marriage between spiritual and human beings. In the book of Jude, there is a reference to angels who abandoned their place of authority and proper dwelling. It is believed that this verse refers to the angels who left heaven to come to earth, as mentioned in Genesis 6.
This interpretation has traditionally been understood to mean that the sons of God had children with human women, resulting in the Nephilim. Although this may seem unusual to us today, we must remember that the Bible is full of extraordinary events. Truth is often stranger than fiction, and the world created by God is far beyond our limited understanding. Jude 6 speaks of angels who did not maintain their position of authority but abandoned their proper dwelling. Unless Jude is referring to an unknown event, it seems to be referencing the angels who left heaven to live on earth, as mentioned in Genesis 6.
These arguments support the traditional view that the sons of God united with human women and gave birth to the Nephilim. Although this may sound strange to modern ears, the same can be said of the entire Bible. The truth is stranger than fiction, and the world God created is far from what we commonly believe. It is more accurate to see the sons of God as demons—angels in rebellion against God—or men exclusively possessed by demons, and the daughters of men as human women. Regarding Jude 6, it states, “And the angels who did not maintain their own place of power but abandoned their proper dwelling are chained in eternal darkness for the judgment of the great day.” It also explains what God did with these evil angels. The first epistle of Peter 3:19-20 informs us that Jesus proclaimed His victory on the cross over them.
Fallen angels are rarely mentioned in the Bible since the vast majority of angels in heaven never fell from grace and went to the dark side. However, some chose to do so. The fallen angels did not maintain their principle, which means they did not follow the path for which they were created. Angels were created to be in heaven with God, praising Him and doing His will. They, like humans, were created to glorify God, but humans were created to live on the earth, not in the angelic realm. However, these angels left their beginning or starting point in heaven. They chose to reject God’s plan for their lives, exercising their free will. According to the Bible, these angels are “fallen” because they abandoned heaven. What happened to these angels? According to the Bible, 2 Peter 2:4 says that if God did not forgive the angels when they sinned but cast them into hell and delivered them into pits of darkness reserved for judgment, then the leader of these angels is Satan, who transforms himself into an angel of light.
The devil conspired against God, his Creator, and he and the angels who followed him lost the battle. What happens after the fallen angels leave heaven? According to Matthew 25:41, eternal fire—hell—was prepared for the devil and his angels. In other words, hell was never planned for just one person. Although Judas and others will certainly end up there in the end, ultimately Satan and the fallen angels were the intended recipients of hell. Hell was created in heaven as the final punishment for the leaders of the great rebellion, but the Lord allows others in the nations He judges to go there as well, due to election, free will, and the responsibility given by God to man to choose his eternal destiny, either heaven or hell. And it is to hell that Satan and the fallen angels, a third of those who rebelled alongside him, will go.
At the end of all things, God will exercise His wrath. Those who rebelled against Him, Satan and the fallen angels, will not escape unscathed. We have seen here that fallen angels exist. Although the idea of being fallen from grace is a difficult concept for some of us to grasp—we would like to believe that angels cannot fall—biblical history proves otherwise. Fallen angels are known to be a third of the angelic army who followed Satan in the great rebellion and tried to overthrow God and His throne in order to take over heaven. We also know that the attempt was a colossal failure and that Satan and his rebel angels were expelled from heaven. Some fallen angels are now in hell, and others are on earth following separate paths. According to Genesis 6, fallen angels married humans and had giant children with human women. As we can see, Satan is much more than a red figure with horns and a trident; he is an ancient being with real spiritual power that he uses for evil and selfish ends. He is particularly hostile to Christians and seeks their annihilation.
Therefore, here are three crucial truths to keep in mind as we navigate this spiritual reality: First, it is a grave error to consider God and the devil as polar opposites. This gives Satan far more credit than he deserves. The disparity in power between God and Satan is that of an infinite Creator and His work. No matter how cunning, shrewd, or powerful Satan becomes in his rebellion against God, he will never be able to match the power of the One who created him. Simply put, no being—angelic, fallen, or righteous—can compete with the power and strength of Jesus.
Second, on the other hand, underestimating Satan’s power is an equally dangerous error. He is not stronger than God, but he is stronger than you. For millennia, Satan has devised dark and evil schemes. He is a skilled liar and manipulator with power unmatched by any mortal human. But although we must be vigilant against Satan, we need not fear him. We don’t even know his true name, which I believe is intentional. It is a subtle hint that he is not a great enough threat to God to warrant knowing his name. Satan’s defeat was foretold from the beginning. We can see the end from the beginning in the early chapters of Genesis: God declares the serpent defeated even after it led Adam and Eve astray. Here is what God has to say to the serpent, and we see that promise fulfilled in Jesus’ sacrifice. Despite suffering the fatal blow, Jesus crushed the serpent’s head by giving up His spirit, and we eagerly await the day when that promise will be fully realized.
Third, be prepared for spiritual warfare. Many of us raised in modern times often become blind to spiritual realities and the unseen forces at work. We learn about them in books, we talk about them, but few of us actually participate in them. By doing so, we can expose ourselves to spiritual attacks. The quickest way to lose a battle is to be unaware that you are involved in one. The power of Jesus is much more than words on a page or a hope for after death. Spiritual battles happen every day around us. To be effective spiritual warriors, we must deepen our prayer life, tune our hearts to God’s very real presence, and cultivate discernment as we seek to do our Father’s work. Our adversary is formidable, but our God is even more so.
Spiritual warfare is happening now, affecting everyone on the planet. It is a confrontation between two kingdoms: one led by Almighty God, the Prince of Peace, and the other led by Satan, the prince of the power of darkness. A spiritual world surrounds us, far more populated, powerful, and resourceful than our own visible world of human beings. Spirits, both good and evil, move among us, traveling from place to place with incredible speed and silence, living in the airspace around us. Some are concerned for our well-being, while others are intent on harming us. There are two kingdoms: one of God and the other of His great adversary, Satan. One represents good, and the other evil; one represents light, and the other darkness; one represents blessings, and the other curses; one represents life, and the other death. These two antagonistic kingdoms cannot coexist; they are in constant conflict.
When did the spiritual conflict begin? What were the root causes? After being expelled from the Third Heaven, Satan and his followers became entangled with one another and formed the Rebel Kingdom, which still exists today and will continue to exist until it is destroyed by the supreme power of God. Paul warned us to keep our main objective in mind so that we might resist the devil’s schemes and not turn against one another. He emphasized that our adversary is not flesh and blood, but the evil ones and their agents. This event occurred before the creation of the world. Many people ask, “What happened before the foundation of the earth?” Several events occurred, but there was one event that involved you before the foundations of the earth: God chose you.
In Ephesians 1:3, we read, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love.” Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is distinct from many of his other letters found in the New Testament. Like Romans, Ephesians was not so much designed to address concerns in a specific church but rather written to clarify some of the great principles that permeate the New Testament. While the letter to the Romans focuses more on God’s work in the individual Christian, Ephesians encompasses the great themes of that work. When considering the enormous and glorious ideas presented in Ephesians, it is essential to remember that Paul wrote this epistle while in prison.
Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2:9-10, “But as it is written, ‘What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived’ are the things God has prepared for those who love him, because God has revealed them to us by his Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.” We read that He blessed us. “We” includes Jews and Gentiles in the church in Ephesus and beyond. It was essential to emphasize that these blessings were available to both Gentile believers and the Jewish people of the first century. The Jewish people of the first century had a deep understanding of what it meant to be blessed, to have a calling, and to be predestined. Paul, however, showed that these gifts are now available to Christians.
We read, “with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” These blessings refer to spiritual, not material, blessings and are located in the heavenly places in Christ. They are superior to and greater than the spiritual blessings in the earthly realm. They are more valuable and secure than earthly blessings. A famous preacher once observed that a new heart is better than a new coat; feeding on Christ is better than having the finest earthly food; being an heir of God is better than being an heir of the greatest noble; having God as our portion is infinitely more blessed than possessing vast tracts of land. If we cannot recognize the benefits that spiritual blessings provide, then we are reduced to the condition of animals. Animals live only to eat, sleep, entertain themselves, and reproduce. However, we were created in the image of God, and God has something far better in store for us. Many people prefer to live at the same level as animals, but God wants us to know every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. The possession of every spiritual blessing is as certain as being chosen by Him and chosen before the foundation of the world.
What Paul says in this passage is too essential to be minimized. God chooses believers. This word means to choose, to select. The meaning of this term implies choosing for oneself, and in its general use, it is choosing one thing out of many. This word is used when Jesus chooses His disciples, calling them to be His inner circle of followers in Luke 6:13. But its primary use in the New Testament is to refer to God’s election of us to believe in Christ for salvation. We are called out of the world to belong to Christ, as stated in John 15:1. Paul continues in Ephesians 1:5-6, “He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, by which he has made us accepted in the Beloved.”
The words “holy” and “without blemish” are a metaphor taken from the perfect and spotless animals that the Law required the people to bring to God’s altar. We read, “having predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself.” This is the plan the Father has for those He has chosen: to be adopted. Not only will we be saved and undergo personal transformation as part of God’s unfolding plan for us, but we will also develop a close and trusting connection with the Father. In Roman law, when adoption was complete, it was truly complete. The person who had been adopted gained all the rights of a legitimate child in his new family, but he lost all his rights in his previous family. After the adoption was finalized, he was considered a completely different person by the legal system. Starting over with his new family, all debts and obligations associated with his previous family were canceled as if they had never been incurred.
We read, “To the praise of the glory of his grace, by which he has made us accepted in the Beloved.” The relational aspect is emphasized again, as Paul describes the state of acceptance granted to every believer due to the grace of God. The Father’s acceptance of Jesus was total. Everything He was, everything He said, and everything He did was praiseworthy in the eyes of God the Father, and at that point, we are accepted in the Beloved. Ephesians 1:7-8 states, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace that he lavished on us in all wisdom and understanding.”
We read, “In him we have redemption through his blood.” Only in Him and in no one else can we find redemption. There is no possibility of redemption apart from Jesus and the blood He shed. On the cross, observe that redemption is not by His power, but by His blood. The Greek word “apolotran” implies the act of completely liberating. In Ephesians 2, we understand that we need redemption because we were dead in our trespasses and sins. We are all sinners who fail to attain the glory of God. Outside of Jesus, we all deserve death, but in Jesus, we can have life. It is not because of who we are that God chooses us, but because of who He is. God also chooses us so that we can join in His work in the world. Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Moses explains to the children of Israel in Deuteronomy 7:7 the reasons why God chose them as His people. God did not choose Israel out of necessity, since He already had everything He needed within Himself, even before creation. However, He created the kingdom for His Son and His people, whom He intended to bless. The ultimate purpose of salvation is to glorify God, but it is important to note that it also results in our glorification when we place our faith in Jesus Christ. According to the Bible, God’s existence precedes that of the universe, and He exists beyond the physical laws that govern it, as declared in Psalm 90. Moses understood that God’s perspective is eternal. It is this eternal perspective that allows us to find hope in the midst of our temporary circumstances.
When we consider the vast timeline—from the moments before the world was founded to the spiritual battles occurring around us today—we are reminded of the grand narrative of God. From the choosing of the saints before the foundation of the world, to the incarnation of Christ, to the spiritual conflict with fallen angels, to our own adoption into His family, every piece is connected by the thread of God’s glory. We are part of something much larger than ourselves. The history of eternity past, which Moses alluded to and the Apostles revealed, is not just a collection of facts or ancient stories. It is the foundation of our present reality. It explains why we exist, why there is evil, and why there is hope.
The realization that we were chosen before the world existed shifts our understanding of our own worth and purpose. We are not accidents of nature; we are intentional creations, chosen for a relationship with the Almighty. This truth is the anchor that holds us steady when the spiritual storms of life threaten to overwhelm us. We recognize that our adversary, though powerful, is already defeated. The victory won at the cross is final and absolute. The keys to death and Hades are in the hands of the One who loves us.
As we look toward the future, we can be comforted by the promise of the glory that is to come. Just as Jesus prayed that we might see His glory, we await the day when we will stand in His presence, fully revealed, and experience the fullness of the kingdom of God. Until that day, we live as those who have been redeemed, those who have been bought with a price, and those who have been given the responsibility of carrying out the work of the Kingdom. We are the hands and feet of Jesus on earth, continuing the work that He finished, walking in the grace that He lavished upon us.
In every trial, we can look back at the beginning of all things and realize that God was there, and He is still here. His faithfulness is not dependent on our performance, but on His character. His plan, which was set in motion before the foundations of the earth, will certainly come to pass. We are invited into this story—a story that spans from eternity past to eternity future. We are invited to be the bearers of His light in a world that is still experiencing the echoes of the rebellion of the fallen.
Let us, therefore, live with the confidence of those who know the end of the story. Let us walk in the wisdom of the Spirit, understanding the times we are in and the battles we face. Let us hold fast to the truth that we are loved, chosen, and accepted in the Beloved. Let us never lose sight of the cross, the place where the love of God met the justice of God, and where our redemption was secured. And as we move forward, let us always remember that our ultimate purpose—the reason we were created, the reason we were chosen, and the reason we have been given life—is to glorify the Father, just as the Son glorified the Father in everything He did.
This life is a journey, a unfolding of a divine plan that began before time, and will extend forever. We are, at this moment, living in the space between the promise and the fulfillment. We are the witnesses of His glory, the recipients of His grace, and the participants in His eternal Kingdom. May we live in a way that reflects this high calling, and may our lives, like that of our Savior, be a testament to the greatness and the majesty of our God. As we conclude this reflection, let us carry the weight of these truths with us. Let them shape our prayers, our actions, and our hearts. For we are not just people living in a material world; we are spiritual beings living in a world that is, in every sense, under the gaze of the One who created it. We are secure in His hands, kept by His power, and guided by His love. And that, truly, is the greatest reality of all.
