Welcome back readers to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. We’ve been discussing the doctrine of God and tonight, we’re going to be going over more of eternity and this time discussing aeviternity, which I’m sure is a new expression to several readers. This is part of our study and our guide is the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. If you do not have one of those, then pity you. Just kidding! Then you can go to newadvent.org and read one online for free. We’re in the tenth section right now. Before I begin the blog, I wish to offer my prayer requests. First, my Christlikeness as I seek to get my thoughts under control and replace them with better ones. Second, I ask for prayers for my financial situation. Finally, I ask for prayers that a third situation related to these two in my life will work out well.
What is Aeviternity? It’s the halfway ground between eternity and time. Eternity is an existence without a beginning or an end. Time has a beginning and an end. Aeviternity has a beginning but no end. This is the kind of existence that spiritual beings dwell in other than God, such as angels.
Aquinas was known as the angelic doctor. He wrote quite extensively on the nature of angels. We in the Christian world do need to learn more about the doctrine as well. Too often, we’ve had our image of angels colored by shows such as “Touched by An Angel” and movies that depict human beings as becoming angels when they die and the idea of simply playing a hard for the rest of our existence while wearing a halo. No wonder some people think Heaven is boring!
This will help us in our study of angels some mainly. When angels are made, they are made unchangeable in their substance but they can change in their place. What happens with a fallen angel is that its apprehension is tied to its will. We can go for particular goods, but angels on the other hand can only go for the good or not.
Thus, when the angel makes a choice to go for evil, then he is locked in that choice of evil and he cannot come out of it. It is the same with the angels that chose good. They are locked in it and they cannot come out of it. They are incapable of sin. If you are one who thinks you could pray for the repentance of the fallen angels, it is a wasted effort.
We as Christians do need a doctrine of angels and how they experience time. The Bible does speak about these creatures and we cannot be harmed by learning all that we can about them. Of course, it is not essential to our salvation to know these things, but it can enrich our spiritual lives. It can also increase our confidence in the world when we know that God has his angels watching over us and that we are not alone in our fight.
We shall continue tomorrow.
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