Week 13: The Eternal Perspective — Chapters 22–23

1.Packer argues that present-day knowing of God, profound as it can be, is still a partial and mediated knowing — "we see in a mirror dimly" (1 Corinthians 13:12). How does that acknowledged incompleteness affect how you hold both your theological convictions and your unanswered questions?

2.Packer describes the hope of heaven not primarily as escape from suffering or reunion with loved ones (though those are real) but as the perfection of what has been begun here: unmediated, unhindered knowledge of God face to face. How does framing heaven as the completion of knowing God change how it feels as a hope?

3.Packer insists that the hope of eternal life with God is not a privatistic, escapist hope but a world-transforming one — people who genuinely live in light of eternity relate to the present world differently. In what ways does an eternal perspective actually motivate justice, generosity, and sacrifice rather than passivity or indifference?