Living Intentionally For Eternity (L.I.F.E.)

Living intentionally for eternity is about viewing everything, certainly every life experience, from the context of eternity—as in, how each and every event will be reviewed—in what light—when we grace the courts of heaven? More and more, consequentially, the way we live life is influenced by this perspective.

It is about living for truth, upholding justice, and investing in love.

It is seeing life from a post-physical-death viewpoint; doing what we do now with the very end in mind.

Importantly, it is not viewing life fearfully for judgment.

This is one of the barriers we need to overcome; worry for judgment. We know we do bad things. How will God view them? At this point we must be reminded, if we are saved, that we have already been forgiven. Grace covers all our sin; past, present, and future. Therefore, we do not tread with fear when approaching heaven. We should not fear judgment. But in the same way we should live for truth.

As we operate from this perspective we are employing wisdom, for we take counsel from God with the aim of living for him. The more we can shift our motives in viewing life from this perspective the less psychological indifference we will suffer.

Living intentionally for eternity has impact on how we handle:

Truth and Lies – we have additional reasons, and maybe the ultimate reason, to side with truth. Truth and lies play themselves out in our relationships. There is no benefit in siding with non-truth. And if there is no benefit in siding with non-truth in this life, we can taste even a little of the gravity of siding with non-truth for eternity. Whilst we shouldn’t fear judgment, we will face only truth in eternity—the inflow of God’s perfect justice.

Justice and Injustice – flowing on from truth, because truth informs equity and fairness, justice is another chief test. We learn a lot about God’s thoughts on justice and injustice through reading Proverbs. God loves justice and hates injustice, and we are to be the same, advocating social justice issues and fighting the good fight of faith upon areas of injustice.

Love and Fear – we, as normal human beings, experience both in copious quantities. Rare it is that people would experience no love, but sadly it still happens all too often. A human being not loved is a horrible travesty in a world God created. Yet we are vessels for love, and we contain the material and the motive to love. Still again, we are bitten by fear and our own sense for rejection. At many levels fear spurns love; it spoils our experience of life. Yet some fear is good—it warns us of danger. If we are heading to eternity, and there’s nothing more certain, our fear should convert into an awed respect for God and life.

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Life is a one-day-at-a-time adventure, mystery and challenge. We can be sure that life leads to death and, therefore, eternity. Living intentionally for eternity is about planning for that eventuality and living life accordingly.

© 2012, 2015 S. J. Wickham.