Do you want to know God better?  Do you want to trust Him more?  Taking the time to understanding the many Hebrew names for God is an important way to gain insight into just who our great God is and to know Him better.  God's many names describe different aspects of His character.  By learning what these names mean we grow in our appreciation and adoration of the Lord.
 
I want to focus upon one of the names for God  that is compounded with the name El, El Olam. El refers to God and means prominent, out front, dominating.  Olam means everlasting or eternal.  It also carries the concept of hidden.  
El Olam is usually translated Everlasting God or the God of Eternity.

The Hebrew word olam also speaks of a vanishing point. When you see the horizon in the distance and you cannot see any farther, that is the vanishing point.  The concept is that when you get to the farthest place, the vanishing point, El Olam will be there.  He extends beyond our farthest vision.  He is not limited by time nor space.  He will be there in our future, wherever we go.

Think back to Sarah and Abraham when they were called by God to leave the city of Ur.  God called them to unknown territory, to a place He would show them. They had no idea of even which direction they were going.  They couldn’t pull up the internet and do some research to see how they liked the sound of the city to which they were being “transferred”.  In fact there would be no city, the only city they would ever know on this earth was the city they were leaving.  They would live in tents for the rest of their lives, moving from place to place.

When Abraham and Sarah had already been in the Promised Land living in tents for quite a while Abraham had an encounter with Abimelech and his commander, Phicol.  There was a dispute over a well of water.  Water in the arid Middle East means life.  A situation that could have meant big trouble for Abraham was peacefully resolved. In thanksgiving,  “Abraham planted a tamarisk tree at Beersheba.  There he called on the name of the Lord, El Olam, the everlasting, eternal God.” (Genesis 21:33)  Abraham and Sarah had sojourned a long time in an unknown land. When they got to the vanishing point El Olam met them there.

I remember years ago when our three children were little and my husband travelled a lot for his job.  If he was coming home late at night and the weather was bad, I was tormented by thoughts about the plane he was in crashing.  My thoughts took off in the darkness of the night.  Before I knew it I was planning what I would wear to his funeral.  I could get so carried away so fast by the lie that he was about to die.  And then one day I had a very profound thought that came from, my guess is, El Olam Himself.  The thought was “I will be there.  No matter what happens I will be there to carry you through.”  And with that thought came the most incredible sense of peace, that peace that passes understanding.  And do you know what?  Those tormenting thoughts stopped, well maybe a couple of times more they entered my mind. But as soon as the thoughts popped into my mind, I would think, “No.  No matter what may happen, God will be there and He will carry me through.”  The peace of the Lord returned to my heart.

Isaiah 26:3-4 describes what happens to a person who trusts in El Olam and keeps their focus upon Him.  “Thou wilt keep in perfect peace him whose mind is stayed on Thee, for he trusts in Thee.  Trust in the Lord forever for in God the Lord, we have an everlasting (olam) Rock.”  El Olam is the Rock of Ages, the everlasting rock who is our firm foundation in troubled times.  No matter what we are facing, when we fix our gaze on Him, when we stay our mind on Him, He will keep us in perfect peace.