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Choosing Life Now to Keep Alive Forever

KEEP alive forever? Is that possible? Yes, it is, because God, the Creator of the universe, is loving, wise and almighty. He created the earth in the first place so that man might live on it forever, for only if he disobeyed was man to die. Since we are assured that “the earth remains for ever,” that God created the earth to be inhabited and that his purposes never fail, we must conclude that some day persons on earth will live forever.—Eccl. 1:4, RS.

So that he might realize his purpose even though man disobeyed, God provided his Son as a ransom and purposed a kingdom by means of which the benefits of that ransom can come to humankind. According to Revelation 11:15-18 God’s kingdom began at the time that the nations became angry, which history shows to have been 1914. We are therefore living in the days of the establishment of God’s kingdom through which Christ will rule until he has destroyed even the enemy death.

Because of these facts Jehovah God is now saying to those living on earth: “I have put life and death before you, the blessing and the malediction, and you must choose life in order that you may keep alive, you and your offspring, by loving Jehovah your God, by listening to his voice and by sticking to him.”—Deut. 30:19, 20, NW.a

How do we choose life now? Merely by doing what we think is right, by being sincere? If sincerity were all that is required, then there was no need to give us the Bible, for many, many who have never heard of God and his Word are very sincere. But we are plainly told that it takes ‘the truth to set us free,’ and that to gain everlasting life we must keep on ‘taking in knowledge of the only true God and of Christ Jesus.’—John 8:32; 17:3, NW.

So to choose life to keep alive forever we must take time and effort to study God’s Word, to become acquainted with him, his attributes, his purposes and his will for us. This should not seem burdensome. We take time and effort to provide for the needed material things to sustain life a few short years, how much more willing should we be to obtain spiritual things that will sustain our lives forever?

However, for this knowledge to give us everlasting life we must act upon it, thereby being like the “discreet man, who built his house upon the rock-mass.” And that requires more than merely not harming our neighbor, it means heeding Jesus’ counsel to the rich young ruler, it means putting God first in our lives and following the example Jesus set for us. By continuing in that course we are choosing life now to keep alive forever in God’s new world where his will will be done on earth as in heaven.—Matt. 7:24; 19:16-22, NW.

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