Eternity

In today’s Gospel (Jn. 8:51-59), our Lord messes with the minds of his opponents in a big way:

“Abraham your father rejoiced to see my day;
he saw it and was glad.”

So the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old and you have seen Abraham?”

Jesus said to them,
“Amen, amen, I say to you,
before Abraham came to be, I AM.”

Part of what blows their minds is the glimpse our Lord gives of what eternity is.

Eternity, of course, is not just the name of a cheap cologne.

Nor is eternity just an infinite continuation of Time.

God does not continue: God is -- God exists in what some call "the eternal Now."

Augustine puts it nicely

"For He does not pass from this to that
by transition of thought,
but beholds all things
with absolute unchangeableness;
so that of those things which emerge in time,
the future, indeed, are not yet,
and the present are now,
and the past no longer are;
but all of these
are by Him comprehended
in His stable and eternal presence."

Ille quippe non ex hoc in illud
cogitatione mutata,
sed omnino
incommutabiliter uidet;
ita ut illa quidem, quae temporaliter fiunt,
et futura nondum sint
et praesentia iam sint
et praeterita iam non sint,
ipse uero haec omnia
stabili ac sempiterna praesentia
conprehendat.
The City of God, Book XI, chapter 21

For believers, this glimpse of eternity doesn't mess with our minds: quite the contrary.

When we struggle with the innumerable little things of life,
with the slow pace of progress,
with the rapidity of deterioration,
or with the stresses of change,
we have comfort and even joy
in the hope that comes from faith
in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
who is preparing for his faithful servants
a dwelling place with the Blessed
in Eternity.