What’s So Important about Tense and Language?
Under differing circumstances, we exercise both hope and faith, just as we benefit from both promises and facts, as they are explained below. For none of these terms is it “either/or” but “both—and.” However, I emphasize faith in the following because it has been misrepresented as hope by so many preachers, a misunderstanding reinforced by our emotions.
I am neither a Greek scholar nor a grammarian, but I am aware, as my readers are or will soon be, that “tense” matters when it comes to faith in Jesus. By “tense” I mean the way verbs may point to past, present, and future events (I ran yesterday, I run or am running today, and I will run tomorrow).
When we pay attention to the past tense in the Bible, we see that God is already aware of our needs before we pray. Will also see that much of what we pray for has already been provided by Jesus. The past tense redirects our attention from ourselves and our circumstances to God’s awareness and provision. Faith does not involve us reminding God of his promises. Rather, faith reminds us of God’s preparation. We are the one’s getting up to speed and not the reverse.
Note the past tense in the following passage, one of the most concise and profound teachings on prayer in the Bible.[1]
Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. (Mark 11:24)
Who, in fact, would have guessed that the key to faith is to believe you have already received what you are about to ask for? Yes we are instructed us to believe that we have already received whatever we ask for and then we shall have it.[2]
Many of us have read this verse all our lives and have not caught its meaning. Its meaning, however, points directly to the one to whom we are praying: the eternal creator who knows everything and stands outside of time. If you are not praying to this being, you are probably praying to someone created in your own image, most likely a “god” who is occasionally forgetful and sometimes indifferent. Listen to Jesus’ words on his our Father’s timeless understanding: “Do not be like them [those who keep repeating prayers], for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” (Matthew 6:8, NIV). As we trust that God already knows and cares, we are living in faith.
The next passage reveals that not only does God know our needs before we mention them, but that God knew our needs before time itself began. Grace is nothing to be begged for or worked for, but only to be recognized and received.
He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. (2 Timothy 1:9-10)
We must live in terms of the past—in terms of what Jesus has already provided. Paying attention to how God has provided in the past what we need in the present stirs our faith. Faith looks at things unseen, not at things that are seen. It opens our minds to the God for whom nothing is impossible, the God who resists the proud but who reveals himself to the humble, to those who come to him with the trust of children. As we yield to faith, we are able to hear for ourselves what Jesus said to the blind men: “According to your faith let it be done to you…” (Matthew 9:29).
Past Facts and Present Promises
The present and the past are not separate for the eternal God. We live in time, but God does not. When we pray to the one who already knows everything, we are addressing the real God, wholly unlike ourselves in respect to time. What we experience today, God already knew about. What God did in the past may have full consequences for us today, especially when we rely on those consequences.
Speaking in strictly human terms we can, I think, agree that the past seems stable, while the present may be daunting, and the future remains uncertain.
If the present is difficult (such as with ill health, bad circumstances, or demoralization), we will find more consolation in learning that something for our benefit has been done in the past than we will in finding something may be done for our benefit in the future. It is my wish that the readers of this post will walk away with increased confidence that our Father has already foreseen and addressed the majority of their needs in the past. This revelation will result in peace for the believer who will be free to respond with thanksgiving instead of with worry.
Both hope and faith are important, each having a different role in our lives. Usually, hope looks to the future, while faith accepts in the present that we have what we need even though we do not see it. Also related to time, promises refer to future events (I will marry you), while facts refer to past accomplishments (I married you).
While promises are valuable, facts are often ignored. Think of our redemption as it is explained in Romans: we have died with Christ (fact), we have been forgiven (fact), we are dead to the law (fact), the spirit of life has set us free from sin and death (fact), we are more than conquerors (fact), and nothing can separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus (fact). To pray for any of these things is to pray in vain. Pray instead that the eyes of our heart may be opened to see these things, to accept them, and to be thankful for them.
Most of us feel comfortable with promises. Promises and hopes for the future come to us naturally. We grow up with caregivers who make promises, and if a caregiver is both capable of fulfilling the promise and trustworthy, we can hope for its fulfillment. Similarly when the scriptures provide a promise such as “no good thing will God withhold from them that walk uprightly” (Psalm 84:11, KJV), we are right at home. We put our hope in the promise for future fulfillment and assume we will receive its fulfillment so long as we walk uprightly.
But we are less used to hearing a divine fact about a past accomplishment and accepting it as being done. For this difficulty there are at least two reasons.
First, the facts to which I’m referring are not obvious to natural observation. These must be revealed in the scriptures and by the Holy Spirit. This is why Paul prayed that believers would have a spirit of revelation and, I assume, why Jesus said “Whoever has ears, let them hear,” and the admant “At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. 26 Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do” ( Ephesians 1:18, Matthew 11:15, 25-26).
The second reason we think in terms of God responding in the future instead of the past is that we have been misled by poor sermons. Much that consists of hope is passed off as faith. Much that is already accomplished as a fact is misrepresented as a promise for the future. Fuzzy preaching leads to fuddled minds. Instead of resting on divine facts we are treading water by thinking only in terms of an uncertain future. The history of the Christian church includes a theology of disbelief that must be replaced by a theology of faith if we are to experience a kingdom that comes not in word only but also in power (1 Thessalonians 1:4-5).
It’s fine to hope for fulfillment in the future—and some things, such as one’s wedding date or our new, heavenly bodies, are reserved for the future and are proper objects of hope. Other things—indeed many of our greatest needs—have already been known by God, addressed by God, and accomplished by Jesus. To use a crude analogy, the check is not in the mail, it has been deposited before we knew we needed the money and awaits only for us to draw upon the account.
We often pray as though God is a hopefully caring individual who will assist us if we can just get his attention, and this, frankly, indicates we are already living in disbelief. It’s essential to believe in the present that God both understands and has provided for this moment’s needs. He knows before we ask what we have need of (Matthew 6:7-8, KJV). We do not “remind” God of anything. We remind ourselves that God has already numbered the hairs on our head and knows what we need (Luke 12:6-7, KJV). We never make God aware of our needs. We wake up to his constant awareness.
In short, when we pray, we are not called to beg that God makes an exception, we are called to agree that God is our provider. Prayer is closer to praise than we often realize.
If you are indifferent to what I’m pointing out, please know that the difference is immense. Trusting what God already knows, what God already intends, and what Jesus already accomplished delivers us from a life of fretful worry to a life of peace and joy. We may not instantly experience much, but the knowledge that the matter is in hands greater than ours creates trust. I’ve found peace and resolution by assuming a gift from God is mine, even when it isn’t visible or sensible.
Assurance without tangible evidence may be considered the foundation of faith, which, as we learn in Hebrews 11:1 is “the substance [in the present] of things hoped for [in the future], the evidence [in the present] of things not [yet] seen” (KJV]). The litmus test of prayer is whether, when we are done expressing it, we walk away with assurance that it’s being taken care of or whether we feel it all remains up to us to accomplish. We may have to remind ourselves that we’ve been heard; we never need wonder whether or not our Father has listened.
This assurance comes by being convinced that we know God’s will, that it is good, perfect, and acceptable, that it is for our welfare and not our destruction, and that it is full of grace and mercy. We must rid ourselves of institutional disbelief—teachings and practices that reduce God to a lesser being. Among the worst examples, God is an inexplicable being that prefers to teach through sickness rather than healing, through punishment rather than forgiveness. Other institutional disbelief portrays God as a weak, memory challenged being who requires many reminders in order to act—if indeed this God acts at all. We are taught to keep confessing sins that are already, once and forever, forgiven—which is one example of how disbelief puts us right under the law again. If the good news is anything, it is good and, yes, even at this late date, it is still news.
A Final Sampling of Scriptures
Once you are keyed into the importance of the past tense as a gateway to faith, you find it throughout the gospel.
The great scripture that is so often quoted as to become a mere jingle to our ears epitomizes the role of the past tense for conveying divine truth: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16, NIV). Note that the deed has been done in the past; we need not pray it happens nor can we make it happen: “he gave his one and only son….” Note, also, that we who live in the present can believe in this son: “whoever believes in him….” And, finally, observe that the effect of this past deed believed in the present will result in future effects for they “shall…have eternal life.”
Another wonderful scripture highlights the role of tense:
You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him!
(Romans 5:6-9)
The “right time” is the historical past, about 33 AD. This is followed by the literary (or eternal) present, “God demonstrates his own love.” And, again, “While we were still sinners,” refers to the past in two respects. First, the author, Paul the Apostle, was alive and sinning (by his own confession) when Christ died for him. Second, those who were born after the crucifixion (that’s us) discover that, while we may be still sinning in the present, Christ already died for us in the past. As a result, whether a person lives in in the first or twenty-first century, “we have now been justified” (past perfect tense—to indicate that one event happened before another in the past).
In a final example, the apostle Peter applies the past tense to the majestic prophecy of Isaiah 53:
“‘He himself bore our sins’ in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; ‘by his wounds you have been healed'” (I Peter 2:24, quoting Isaiah 53:5. Peter changes Isaiah’s text from “by his wounds we are healed” to “by his wounds you have been healed—past perfect tense. Either the present “are” or the past “were” denote some kind of healing has taken place. Peter’s “were” reminds us that what was done in the past had real effects in the past. Before we were born, the drama of our rebirth into Christ had been transacted.[3]
More can be said for living by faith in what God has already achieved and accomplished. Not only does it put us in tune with God. It also makes our part in the process perfectly clear. We are recipients. We cannot brag about things someone else achieved, especially if they achieved it in the past, most especially before we were born. We can only be grateful. When we realize that the vast majority of our needs have already been met by Christ—through his sufferings and his resurrection—we have nothing to boast about, to anxiously work for, to fear concerning, or to earn. We are already home:
It is because of God that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.” (I Corinthians 1:30-31, NIV)
God has already placed us in Christ. We are neither waiting to gain entrance to God’s presence nor to be near Jesus. We are there, feel it or not. We are not waiting for Jesus to give us wisdom, righteousness, holiness (sanctification), or redemption. We now have them by virtue of already being in Christ. All we need are the eyes to continually see this and the heart to insist on it when this life tells us we are on the outside, far away from Christ.
____Footnotes____
[1] The teaching on prayer here is crystal clear. The cursing of the fig tree is puzzling to most of us who see Jesus as constructive and the fig tree as innocent (it was out of season according to the passage in Mark 11). Without pretending to know why Jesus did it, I can only point out that the cursing of the fig tree and the cleansing of the temple occur on the same day, an extremely emotional one that demonstrates both the misuse of the temple and the impending death of Jesus, who, like the fig tree, would die prematurely.
[2] The past tense in Mark 11:24 is undeniable. The Greek text reads πιστεύετε ὅτι ἐλάβετε καὶ ἔσται. “ἐλάβετε” is the aorist (past perfect) of “λαμβάνω” (to take or receive). The New International captures the tense (believe that you have received it, and it will be yours). The New American Standard captures the tense (believe that you have received them, and they will be [granted] you). The Revised Standard version, too (believe that you have received it, and it will be yours).
Many translations hedge slightly, such as King James (believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them). “Ye receive” is present tense. Perhaps the translators could not believe the past tense was intended.
[3] The word “healed” can refer to physical or spiritual healing, and spiritual healing can refer to emotional healing or spiritual rebirth. It’s all wonderful, but is confusing for us who see healing limited to physical and emotional events. Peter’s reference to sin attaches his meaning to spiritual rebirth. However, as I write in another post (Two Sides of the Same Loving Coin: Healing and Salvation), Matthew quotes the previous verse in Isaiah, applying it to physical healing.
We discover that time is and is not important in Christ: it’s extremely important because everything has to be worked out, experienced, achieved. Jesus had to suffer on a specific day under the authority of Pontius Pilate. Yet the intentions, the obedience, the supernatural power were expressed “since the foundation of the world” (Hebrews 4:3).
This is the original April 22, 2024 version of the post (17 minutes), which included what is now a separate post on healing and forgiveness:
Publishing Info
This post was first published on: April 22, 2024 at 15:00. Revised Apr 8, 2025. If this article is significantly updated, the publication date beneath the title may change in order to bring current posts to the top of the directory.