Time

All of us have been struck by the puzzling nature of time. We say that "time flies," or that time just "drags on." I remember as a schoolboy how summer vacations were endless, drifting from one hot, hazy day to the next... September and the restart of school was an "eternity" away. Now, it seems as if those days were just "yesterday," and no time at all has passed since those lazy days, yet decades have come and gone. Where did they go? Time has some strange qualities, both qualitative and quantitative. This section looks at some of the qualities of time from both a Biblical and experiential perspective. Intermingled in this brief look at this timely subject is my own interest in the "space-time continuum" and in science in general.

We know, of course, that God created time. It was part of the creation that took place on the fourth day. This is "dynamic" or moving time... the motion of the earth on its axis defines the day; the (lunar) month is defined by the revolution of the moon around the earth, and the year is defined by the earth in its orbit around the sun. By virtue of the fact time was created, God must exist outside and apart from time. He is "the high and lofty one, who inhabits eternity" (Isaiah 57:15). The picture illustrates that "time" is a finite period, and God exists outside of time. The arrow indicates that (for us) time is a one-dimensional experience, always moves forward to its consummation, and is irreversible. Scientists call this "Time's Arrow."

Clocks that we are familiar with are a fairly recent development, only coming into use about the 1500s. Over "time" they have improved in accuracy and changed in form. The clocks we use today indicate dynamic, or moving time. But there is another clock, known to scientists as an atomic clock that also keeps time. If scientific "constants" are indeed constant, then dynamic time and atomic time would be in agreement. There is increasing evidence, however, that some of the "constants" that have been regarded as unchangeable (such as the speed of light) are in fact decaying. If this is true, as I believe it to be, then atomic clocks and dynamic clocks will not be in synchronization. This has profound ramifications for both creationists and evolutionists.

Time is also viewed differently in various cultures. In Eastern religions such as Hindu, time is viewed as cyclical. This was especially true in the Vedic era (about 1500 - 600 BC). The Babylonians, ancient Chinese, Aztecs, Mayans, and the Norse had cyclical calendars. Hindu time cycles range from hundreds (for humans) to trillions (for the gods) of years with all life reincarnating in this endless cycle. It is important to note that reincarnation finds no support in the Bible (see Hebrews 9:27). In Jewish culture, time is seen more in relation to events, including the weather. The Old Testament talks about rain, hail, seed time and harvest time, and special event days such as feasts and holidays. For example, Ruth and Naomi arrived in Bethlehem at "the beginning of the barley harvest" (Ruth 1:22). The special feast days have tremendous significance, not just for the Jews but also for the church. Hebrew thought views the passage of time as more-or-less linear: time had a beginning, it runs a course, and it is proceeding to some sort of end. The Hebrews relate time to events and to occurrences in their lives much more than to a clock or to dynamic time. In the present day western hemisphere, time takes on a multi-dimensional role. Our schedules say we don't have enough time, but we have all the time there is. It is a matter of priorities, and we need to change our paradigm of time. Surely in that certain day of final accounting, we will learn of time wasted and opportunities lost.

God has not revealed all we would like to know about time. The Bible begins the creation account with the words "In the beginning God..." and God does not reveal a timeline to us. All we know is that it was in the distant past. The Gospel of John opens with the words "In the beginning was the Word..." The beginning in John's Gospel is actually an earlier period of time than the beginning in the Genesis. There is evidence in both archaeology and in astronomy for both a young and an old universe, and the battle between creationists and evolutionists continues. It is my conviction that this battle will never be satisfactorily resolved and that the actual age of the universe is indeterminate. Solomon said this:

When Jesus left his disciples forty days after his resurrection, he left (dynamic) "time" and entered back into "eternity." He crossed the time barrier - and His disciples were anxious to know when he would return. Jesus told them directly...

Clearly, there are things directly related to time that God has not revealed, and we are wasting our 'time' trying to find out.

When I was a consultant I would review technical business plans. The first section I would examine - sometimes the only section - would be the 'assumptions' page. If the assumptions were wrong, then everything going forward is in doubt. Many times I questioned the assumptions and sometimes, with further clarification they could be substantiated; other times the assumptions were clearly wrong. In a few cases, it was deliberate error designed to hide or conceal facts. The majority of time, it was an honest mistake resulting from lack or knowledge or understanding. From my brief (several weeks reading everything I could get my hands on) study of time and my limited knowledge, it seems modern science has made some serious - and possibly erroneous - assumptions. One of these is "uniformitarianism" which teaches that the fundamental laws of physics have never changed. One can therefore - they say - study 50 years-worth of data, determine a theory and then backwards extrapolate that theory to determine what happened in the distant past. This may apply in a uniform, closed system, but we are specifically told in 2 Peter 3:3-5 that all things have not continued as they were from the beginning of creation.

It is my conviction that the fall of Lucifer and his angels, and the Fall of man has had a devastating and far-reaching effect on every aspect of life throughout the entire universe. I find it difficult to find words to convey just how far-reaching and destructive this effect has been - simply stated, nothing has been unaffected. This includes every aspect of man: his will, his intellect, his personality, his intelligence, his emotions and so on. It includes all of the creation from distant galaxies to planet earth. Everything on earth has been affected - the plant and animal life, the oceans and deserts, even the rocks and the soil. We will have more to say about this later, but nothing is unaffected. I believe this view is supported in scripture, as we read in Romans 8:20-21 -

For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope thatthe creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

By looking more closely at what the Bible has to say - or what it does not say - we can learn more about the mysteries of time!

The Old Testament gives us a selective record of kings and patriarchs, of nations and kingdoms, with a focus towards the blood-line leading to the Messiah. Israel is center-stage. All directions are measured from Jerusalem. The relationship between Israel and their God determines their prosperity or failure. The record shows a repeated pattern of deterioration and failure - but always an intervention from God to restore the nation. The Old Testament records little about other nations, except where they impinge on Israel. Again, not much is said of natural disasters or about wars or the rise and fall of nations - except where they impact Israel. The purpose of the record appears to be mostly moral and ethical. Because God is a personal God, He is clearly more interested in the people and in helping them to know Him, than he is in teaching about wars and geography. But there is another purpose to the record. Paul states in 1 Corinthians 10:11 that:

"These things happened to them (to the Old Testament patriarchs and others) as types, but they were written down for our instruction, upon whom the end of the ages has come." Paul also says in Romans 15:4 that "Whatever things were written in former times were written for our instruction, that through patience and the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope."

Well, what does this have to do with time? The Old Testament contains a record of divine interruption to the normal flow of time. In Joshua 10 there is "Joshua's long day" where the sun apparently stood still for about a whole day so Joshua could continue his battle against the wicked Amorites. At the same time, enormous hailstones fell. Are the two related? We do not know, nor do we have any way of finding out. But that God could simply stop the rotation of the earth for 24 hours is mind-boggling indeed. Intellectually, of course, we have no doubt about God's ability to control the forces that would be present during a "stopped rotation event," but the implications are staggering. The same God who created time can also stop it for His divine purposes!

There also is an event recorded in 2 Kings 20 where God graciously extended the life of King Hezekiah by 15 years - and moved the sundial backwards to confirm it. God does not tell us how he performs these events - apparently it's just not important for us to know.

We don't usually stop to think about it, but there are various "dimensions" to time. The schoolboy account at the beginning of this article is about subjective time. We go for a drive, and it seems we get home far faster than the time it took to get there. We dream for hours during sleep, yet find we've napped for only a few minutes. These are examples of subjective time. There is biological time - migratory bird patterns, the monarch butterfly returning to Mexico, and animal hibernation cycles are illustrative of biological time - and some of these relate to dynamic time, to changes in seasons and cycles, and to changes in light and temperature.

The biblical view of earthly time is very clear. It depicts time as having a certain beginning, a history accurately recorded by God, and an approaching day of consummation when all people will be evaluated justly by their Creator. The fact that "books are to be opened" on judgment day means God keeps track of detail. He will see to it that truth and justice ultimately prevail.

The real world in which we live today is governed by a law of physics that we know as the Second Law of Thermodynamics - a law familiar to most high school students. This law can be stated in several ways, but basically it refers to the tendency of things to rot, rust, decay, wear down and fall apart with the passage of time. But from the standpoint of the Bible, the Second Law is not a "feature" of the universe as it was originally created; it is a result of the subsequent introduction of fatal flaws into the universe by an Enemy of God and of man. These flaws were not part of the original design. The clues to this catastrophe begin in Genesis 3. A rebellion among the angels took place in the early history of things, and the angels play a major role in God's government of nature as well as nations. In addition to introducing sin and death into the human race, the angelic rebellion wrecked the delicately-tuned and finely-designed mechanisms of the physical and spiritual realms, setting into motion an irreversible downhill course towards decay, disorder, and the increasingly unavailability of energy resources. As we use energy, the total amount of available energy decreases and things tend toward disorder and chaos. Both outside energy and outside organizing intelligence are required to bring order out of chaos. In physics, this principal is known as "entropy" and entropy always increases. Entropy is a measure of the amount of unavailable energy in a system or the state of disorder in a system. It has been shown that energy from the sun alone is insufficient to lower the overall entropy of the earth or to drive biological organisms in the direction of increasing complexity.

Understanding time in the Bible necessitates an understanding of the original languages - an understanding I do not possess. But, thankfully, computerized lexicons can be a great help! There is a word in the book of Revelation that used to puzzle me. It is found in Revelation 1:1-3 -

"The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testifies to everything he saw—that is, the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near."

"The time is near!" And I would think, well, if the time was near when this was written about AD 97, what is it now, some 2000 years later? I recall thinking that God must not view time the way we do! And of course He does not, but what I failed to realize was the different terms used for time in the New Testament, which principally are chronos and kairos - meaning (dynamic) time and the time of 'seasons,' respectively. The meanings of the original New Testament words for times and seasons add more to an understanding of the complex nature of time in our universe. Chronos (Strong's Number 5550) means quantity of time, space of time, duration or length of time, or a period of time, such as what we have herein referred to as dynamic time. Kairos (Strong's Number 2540) refers to the quality of time or a season, an epoch characterized by certain events, an opportune time, or a fortuitous moment. We can now understand the term "the time is near" much better - it is referring to kairos time - meaning this is the next great event or epoch on God's Messianic timetable. It does not mean the event will soon take place in terms of dynamic, or clock time.

The New Testament continues to provide additional insights into the nature of time. First Corinthians 15:51-52 -

Some have attempted to estimate the time duration of a "twinkling of the eye." Years ago a study by General Electric attempted to measure the speed of the "blink" of an eye and determined it to be 1/63,000 of a second, (although I would have guessed it would have been much slower). There are many references to time or to appointments on God's calendar... Paul announced to the Athenians: -

The Biblical view of time found in the New Testament is that time in the heavenly places, that is in the spiritual world, is multidimensional. For example, in the Book of the Revelation we see scenes taking place on earth in human history (dynamic time) and scenes in the heavenly places going on at the same time (eternal time - which sounds very much like an oxymoron). Time in heaven apparently moves in the forward direction as it does on earth. For example Revelation 8:1 describes a period of silence in heaven lasting "about half an hour." But time in heaven has a quality and a pace different from time on earth.

A good example of an event occurring in "eternity" is found in the Gospels: Jesus was transfigured before His frightened disciples, Peter, James, and John. Appearing with Him (about 30 AD) were Moses (from about 1400 BC) and Elijah, (who was translated into heaven without seeing death about 850 BC). All were alive and well, as if contemporaries, oblivious to the years that had separated them by our way of reckoning time. This incident (recorded in Luke 9:28-36; Matthew 17:1-8; and Mark 9:2-8) shows that all the usual rules and constraints of time (as we commonly think of them) were momentarily lifted. Thus, it was not only possible for men from ancient times to appear alive in the presence of the disciples of Jesus, but also for Jesus to assume His glorified body - all at the same "time." In other words, we have a man from about 1400 BC and a man from about 850 BC appearing with Jesus about 30 AD who are suddenly visible to men who exist in dynamic time.

Most of us are preoccupied with worldly things and have difficulty adjusting to different kinds of time and different clocks in heaven as compared to earth. In our fallen world, for instance, everything is "broken" and our ability to experience and enjoy events in life has been severely damaged. For one thing we can only experience one-dimensional time - the flow of events from past to present to future. Time in heaven is very likely to be multidimensional. That is, there may be more than one "time-corridor" we can travel in! God, for instance, sees our past, our present and our future as a panorama which is always "now" in God's experience. He always knows the beginning from the end and directs everything that happens from outside the space-time continuum we are trapped in. He is not constrained at all by time as we are.

Even though we are connected to eternity and to heaven here and now - through Jesus Christ - time for us has not yet been repaired and restored. We still "waste time," we work inefficiently and we fall short of obeying the call to "redeem the time because the days are evil." Our happiest moments are tinged with sadness. The best of our interpersonal relationships are lacking to some degree. We have dreams and aspirations that are unfulfilled. As we age our bodies creak and groan and give out, and the memory fades. Our friends and loved ones leave us at the wrong time - and God does not always explain His actions.

Let's make time "personal." Each of us, as a created spirit, began his or her existence at a point in historical time (at conception or at birth - the debate continues - take your choice - I choose conception). Having been created and brought into existence by God we were made immortal beings, so we shall all continue to exist forever. If we choose not to dwell with God as a member of His family, our only other option is to be cut off forever in conscious separation from Him. Love and forgiveness of sin and eternal life are freely offered to us till the day we die, but we are each free to decline the offer and say "no." We have the clear teaching of Jesus, -

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.’ …. Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ … Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life. (Matthew 25:31-34, 41, 46 NIV).

The Bible does not teach cessation of consciousness nor annihilation after death, nor the possibility of reincarnation. All of mankind ends up in one of two possible states: living forever apart from God or living in union with Christ as part of God's family. This great gulf is fixed at the point of physical death. We have only the here and now - "time" - dynamic time, clock time, in which to make this once-and-forever choice.

It is my prayer you will choose to be a part of God's family; God, in fact, commands it: "... I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life ..." Deuteronomy 30:19.

I hope you will choose life and that you will do so while there is still "time." To learn more, go here.

Seven quick facts, for those interested, about time and our universe - with supporting verses!

1. God existed before the universe. God exists totally apart from the universe, and yet can be everywhere within it (Genesis 1:1; Colossians 1:16-17).

2. Time (for the universe) has a beginning. God's existence and activity precede this created time (2 Timothy 1:9; Titus 1:2).

3. Jesus Christ created the universe. He has no beginning and was not created John 1:3; Colossians 1:16-17).

4. God created the universe from that which cannot be detected with the five senses (Hebrews 11:3).

5. After His resurrection, Jesus could pass through walls in His physical body, an evidence of His extra-dimensionality (Luke 24:36-43; John 20:26-28).

6. God is very near, yet we cannot see Him, a further evidence of His extra-dimensionality (Exodus 33:20; Deuteronomy 30:11 - 14; John 6:46).

7. God designed the universe in such a way that it would support human beings (Genesis 1, 2; Nehemiah 9:6; Job 38; Psalm 8:3; Isaiah 45:18).

Some Ruminations on "Time"