Declaring The End From The Beginning

by Ian E. Penn, Nottingham, England | Category: The Eternal God Revealed | Oct 1994

Limitations of Created Beings:

The Lord Jesus touched on a universal truth of human experience when He said, "This man began to build and was not able to finish" (Luke 14:30), because we are all required to make such calculations. The force of the saying, however, is that the best of us have only limited success. Our shortcoming is that none of us can see the end of a matter from the beginning. 'Man knoweth not what shall be; and that which shall be after him, who can tell him?" (Eccles. 10:14).

It is no different in spiritual matters. If we agree that ability and gift bring men to be leaders of their fellows, then we see that the great ones of the earth do not possess the ability to see the end from the beginning, else they would not have crucified the Lord of glory (1 Cor. 2:8). Though powerful, the Devil and his agents do not possess it, else he would not have miscalculated over Job (Job 1:9-11; 2:4,5). Angels do not possess it, because there are things which they desire to look into (1 Pet. 1:12). It is an attribute of the Godhead.

An Attribute of Deity: Old Testament:

The ability to see the end from the beginning derives from God's self-existence. As revealed to Moses, but known all along, He always is (Ex. 3:14); past, present and future are present to Him. So much is this so that, under the Old Covenant, being first and last is a defining attribute of Godhead. "I am the first, and I am the last: and beside Me there is no God" (Is. 44:6). But, at this moment of stating His superiority to man and all else in these words, the Lord proved this ability by using it as a means, graciously, by which He could make Himself known to man His creature, and a fallen creature at that. To Him who knows the end from the beginning it is as nothing to declare it so; in short, to foretell. "Who, as I, shall call, and shall declare it and set it in order for Me, since I appointed the ancient people? and the things that are coming, and that shall come to pass, let them declare" (Is. 44:7). It is no surprise, then, that God of old time spoke unto the fathers in the prophets (Heb. 1:1), that men spoke from God and that what they said constituted the very Word of God, and that the written Word comprises, in a large part, the word of the prophets (2 Pet. 1:19-21).

A companion scripture (Is. 48:1214) shows that associated with being first and last is God in His power. That is to say, He knows the end from the beginning, not only by being allpresent and all-knowing but by calling into being the very events themselves; that is, by His omnipotence. Since what is revealed in Scripture concerns events that have occurred not by accident, but by divine plan and effort, we can be confident that what He has begun, He will finish. Hence the poignancy of the Lord's observation of men beginning to build and failing to finish. He is not so.

An Attribute of Deity: New Testament:

Knowing the end from the beginning as a defining character of the Godhead is to be known and understood by all believers today, as may be seen by the fact that this theme is taken up at both the beginning and the end of the last book, a great prophetical book, of the Scriptures. Here (Rev. 1:8) a title, the Alpha and the Omega, is used to perpetuate the knowledge of the same attribute. Composed of the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, the language of the New Covenant Scriptures, it is hard to imagine a title which more aptly combines the truths of first and last. It embraces knowing the end from the beginning and declaring it, as well as the divine practice of bringing things to pass, into being or to an end by fiat, that is, by the word of power.

It is well known that the Scriptures, though so diverse, bear the imprint of a single hand. Like all writers, the Great Writer of the Scriptures planned His work, knowing the end from the beginning. He has planned and caused men to write as writers themselves, the books, the "paragraphs", the sentences, the very words. All the range of thought which He has revealed concerning Himself is expressed by these few individual letters, ranging from alpha to omega. Even so, the events which make up time and eternity are known from start to finish, in the minutest detail, by Him, are decreed to be by Him, and brought to pass by Him. It is knowledge and power beyond ours. But in choosing this title and metaphor, God shows His great interest in men and women by declaring Himself to them in their own language, and by doing so from the merest detail to the grandest and greatest truth of divine purpose. Thus it is not just that He knows the end from the beginning, or has decreed both, but that He wishes men to know it.

But that is not the end of it either, because when heaven and earth are done away, He is still the Alpha and the Omega (Rev. 21:6). The end that He knows, has decreed and in power will bring to pass, is beyond anything

the human or any other mind can envisage. Nevertheless, though things may be different then, there will Still be more of Himself to declare throughout the New Heaven and the New Earth, and He will do so in a way that all who occupy that happy realm will understand.

An Attribute of Christ:

In the days of His flesh, the multitudes recognized the Lord as a prophet (Mat. 21:46). Some, who saw His supernatural power, saw Him as a great prophet (Luke 7:16) to rank with Elijah (Mark 6:15); while His enemies saw this status as a threat to their position (Luke 7:39). Some saw further and perceived that He was not only a prophet but the Prophet, the one to outrank Elijah (John 1:21), as predicted by Moses (Deut. 18:17-19). Although accepted so by multitudes (John 6:14; 7:40), the experience of the Samaritan woman (John 4:16-42) may typify the individual's experience. The Stranger's intimate knowledge of her shameful life convinced her that He was a prophet. As the conversation developed, His comprehensive knowledge of things past, present and future, and the scale of it as He more than satisfied her long buried interests in spiritual things, convinced her; it led her to persuade others to come and see that this was the Christ, the Saviour of the World.

The disciples had daily demonstrations of the same thing. When displaying His creatorial power in turning water into wine, He knew what would happen (John 2:4). When displaying His redemptive power, He knew that the Pharisees would reason in their hearts that only God could forgive sins. Hence He provoked their questioning by first curing sin and then curing the palsy (Luke 5:17-26) rather than the other way round. The Gospels are packed with incidents like these which show, in His ability to tell the end for the beginning, that He was God manifest in flesh. Indeed, on at least three occasions in the Upper Room prior to going to Calvary, the Lord deliberately told the disciples that He was telling them the end from the beginning in respect of His departure, and the sufferings they would subsequently endure in testifying for Him (John 13:19; 14:29; 16:4).

One of them tarried long in his suffering for Him and was rewarded in Patmos, as we have seen, with the revelation of God as the Alpha and Omega. As that Revelation began, He met His Lord who, as the First and Last and Living One, would do the revealing (Rev. 1:17-19). Part of that revealing concerned the display of this attribute in judging disciples in churches of God (Rev. 2:8), but the end of it all capped it all. His Lord was revealed, finally, as none other than Himself the Alpha and Omega (Rev. 22:13). Thus, all that has been said about the attribute of Deity in knowing and declaring the end from the beginning is to be found also in Christ. But to John, who waited, and disciples who also wait, the Alpha and Omega has worked out their reward and longs to bring it (Rev. 22:12).

Christ's Unique use of this Attribute:

Meantime, we can be certain that what the Lord has begun to build He will finish. He who said, "I will build My Church" (Mat. 16:18) knew that He would begin on the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit descended as He, knowing the end from the beginning, said the Spirit would (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:5). When He said, "the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it" (Mat. 16:18) we can be certain they will not. Both of these actions demand, not just all-knowledge, but all-power. They happen not only because He has decreed them but also because He has caused them. They are actions which demand complete control over the natural and spiritual world for all time and more, because , this building was decreed in eternal counsels before the world was (Eph. 3:9). But they demand more than creatorial power because the Church which He is building is composed of believers, baptized since Pentecost in the Holy Spirit. For a sinner to become a believer demands the power that is in the gospel, the power of God unto salvation, the power that springs from His completely and utterly dealing with sin and sins at Calvary. This is an ongoing work which, despite the necessity of men to bring the Word of the gospel to their fellows, is done directly in the human heart by Christ Himself. Those who know by experience that He has begun this work will know that the Lord is not like the man of Luke 14. They know that when He has begun He will finish, even as He knew and will ensure that the end will be' when He will present that Church, a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing (Eph. 5:27). He is not a Builder to be mocked.

Ian E. Penn, Nottingham, England | Oct 1994
The Eternal God Revealed