“And He took him outside and said, “Now look toward the heavens and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be…….” Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the wrongdoing of the Amorite is not yet complete……..” On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I have given this land, From the river of Egypt as far as the great river, the river Euphrates:” Genesis 15:5, 16, 18 NASB2020 https://bible.com/bible/2692/gen.15.16-18.NASB2020
The story of God is promise made to men, promise fulfilled much later than thier lifetimes. Abraham did not see the promise of God fulfilled in his lifetime. God told him it would take 400 years before He completely fulfilled the promise He was making to Abram. But Abraham did receive remnants of the promise. He lived in the promised land and was blessed in it. Abraham did have a son from his own loins through whom the multitudes like the stars in the sky would come. Promise made, promise not fully realized though promise experienced in a small way. So too with our Christian life. The Holy Spirit is in me, He is around me, revealing Jesus to me. Here and there, now and then, sometimes more obvious than other times but confirming His promise of eternal life to me and in me. Heaven awaits me because intimacy with God awaits me. I have not seen heaven but again, i have ‘seen’ the God of heaven and so know His promise to be true. Now we wait, now we work to help others believe the future promise, now we experience in part, some day we shall fully realize the promise of God, that we shall live forever with bodies that never wear out or suffer any harm, with God and men who are always good and where there is always an abundance of all we need to live and enjoy life eternal. The promise is now, the fulfillment later, but today we can experience a bit of that blessed future because God is here today with us and around us wanting to accomplish by us His purposes until He brings all of us into His eternal kingdom.
