A Thousand Years As One Day

“But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness.” – 2 Peter 3:8

One curious thing about infants is that they only have two conceptions of time: now, or never. I remember when our children would sit in their high chairs banging their spoons for food; I would say, “wait a minute,” and they would burst into tears as if I meant “I’m never going to feed you anything ever again.” Waiting five minutes, I suppose, seemed like waiting an eternity; it may as well never happen.

How often I’m like that! God, I want this now. I really can’t wait a day, a week, a year. Asking me to wait years may as well be asking me never to have it at all. I become bitter, resigned, impatient, distracted. Yet to God, a thousand years is like a day. Part of faith is learning to live according to the reality of what will surely come, even if it seems a long way off to us. 

Will Jesus ever really come? That’s what Peter’s readers were asking. We don’t see anything happening. Nothing’s changed since the beginning of creation (slight hyperbole). Peter senses the hurt and resignation behind those questions; his tone is one of tenderness here, like the one of a parent explaining to their infant—wait. Your food is coming. It may feel like forever, but I promise it will happen, and you can trust my promise. 

“Delay,” wrote Charles Ellicott, “is a purely human conception.” To the Lord, “a thousand years… are but as yesterday when it is past” (Psalm 90:4). We are prisoners of our conception of time, but if we know who God is, if we trust Him and His word, the same word that created the world, then we must trust that He will indeed fulfill his promises to us. We must in faith live according to that reality. We must be patient as he is patient with us (verse 9).