1 John 2:17: Delighting in the Eternal

1 John 2:17.. "And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever."

Let me ask you a question. If I were to offer to give you either $500 today, or $100 for every single day of the rest of your life, which would you choose? Surely you would choose the $100 for the rest of your life, right? For after only six days, it will accumulate more value than the $500, and it lasts forever, at least until you pass away. This illustration points a beautiful picture: the importance of delighting in that which is lasting. Nevertheless, each and every one of us choose the temporal delight of sin rather than the eternal delight of God. We throw away the $100 a day and grab the $500 right in front of us. Let us find out what John has to say on this topic this morning.

In a beautiful section admonishing his audience to not love the things of this world, John concludes by writing that "the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever." John's point here is that sin (that is, the "desires" of the "world") is temporal, but God is eternal. Therefore, if we wish to "abide forever" as God does, we must love the things of him and not the things of this world. Sounds simple, does it not? Yet each and every day we choose the temporal over the eternal.

Hebrews 11:25-26 offers us great insight into this topic by referencing the story of Moses: "By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin." In this verse, Moses chose the eternal pleasure of God rather than the fleeting (or temporal) pleasure of sin. Sin sounded good in the moment, but he had great enough faith that God was better in the long run. He chose to love that which was eternal rather that which was temporal, and I surely hope we can do the same.

So, do you delight in the eternal? Or do you delight in the temporal? If you delight in the temporal, realize that that which you take pleasure in will soon fade away along with you if you don't repent and turn to the One who lasts forever. For those that love the things of this world are not of the Father, but those that love the things of the Father are of the Father (1 John 2:15). If you delight int the eternal, keep it up. The temptations of the temporal are relentless--don't let them overtake you. Delight in the eternal today, and join that which lasts forever, that you might last forever as well in the eternal life of Christ.