The Problem With TIME.

[ScottA]

I posted this in the Blogs...but it is just so important that I thought I would post it here too. Which I do, because the issue and misunderstanding about Time with regard to God and the scriptures, i.e. Bible Study-- Is, I find myself stating facts against the comments and beliefs of many good and faithful Christians. Things get ugly sometimes. However, this information, this increase of knowledge, was foretold to occur just before the end (Revelation 10:5-7)--we would do well to embrace it.



It’s not that there’s not enough time, but too much of it.

Time was created. Yes, the subject and problem with time is a religious issue. Which is likely to leave many if not most, out of their element—even the religious.

One must first understand that everything—including time—exist within God. That is, within God who is timeless, or eternal. Meaning that time exists within a greater timeless context like an internal component in God. Actually, time is an incremental creation of eternity into bite-size pieces for the purpose of gradual revelation of the otherwise overwhelming and unlimited knowledge of God. Quite the mouthful—and that’s the point. The whole thing all at once would kill a child of God.

Is that not similar with knowledge and our own children, although not as extreme? Sure it is!

Still, the greatest amount of proof available to those within the time bubble, would say otherwise. Making time principles as experienced within the bubble, the common understanding and belief. Understandably.

Yet, what has that got to do with the greater context in which time exists (in God)? Nothing, actually. So, it becomes an impassable wall between us and our Creator, as long as we hold on to it, or die. You see, dying is a point of transition out of time and back to that greater context of God from which we were created. That is why there are some who see their whole life pass before their eyes in a near death experience.

So, what’s the problem? Can’t we just live with it until we naturally die? Isn’t that the plan of creation? The problem is that time was created to be a time of revelation, not of just living with time as if it were actually otherwise important. It’s not. Time, is for revelation. That is the purpose of time. So we are eventually suppose to get that last little bit of information and knowledge that finishes the need for time-based revelation: The understanding of time itself.

What then is the great volume of information and knowledge that ends with understanding time? It’s God—the complete revelation.

How is it attained? It is attained by removing the component of time from all the previous revelations…which are the Holy Scriptures from God. When you do—they have different meaning—that timeless meaning of Him who has incrementally been releasing it all down through the ages “precept upon precept. line upon line, here a little there a little.” Isaiah 28:10-13

When was this last bit of knowledge supposed to be revealed in the revelation process? In simple terms: Near the end. But here is what is written of it:

“And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven,​

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6 And swore by him that lives for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that are therein, and the earth, and the things that are therein, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer:​

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7 But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets.” Revelation 10:5-7​

When we begin to “no longer” consider everything according to “time”—the complete “mystery of God” is “finished.”

 

[APAK]

Ahah....the problem with time is really the problem with our limited functioning brains by design, that click/fire off neurons of energy as ordered samples of 'time' intervals of space, to try to capture the entire past, present, and for the future. It cannot, impossible to correctly perceive the true nature of physical reality, also done by design.

Time is really not a dimension alone, along with the volume of space. Time is therefore not absolute. And time is never really in itself examined. Time is the ORDER of motion of materials in space as one dimension combined - of the spacetime dimension. And our brains cannot measure it. Time is actually the timeless order of the infinite motion of space-matter, always in motion, dynamic or in constant vibration - aka eternal conservation of energy of life.

ok...enough of the rant.....an interesting topic when it's associated with our Creator! And he must be included and discussed as he created this view of reality for us.

 

[Behold]

The problem with Time is that we never seem to have enough of it, while it seems to be speeding up.

And it is speeding up.
And that is because God is "bringing it all to a close"., and that is Good News for the born again, who are going to rule and reign with Jesus The Lord.

"coming soon".

 

[APAK]

@ScottA as you said in your last line of the OP...
"When we begin to “no longer” consider everything according to “time”—the complete “mystery of God” is “finished.”

Yes, because we will not have to use our primitive brains anymore when we are truly in God, immortal - having the complete view of reality of God.

 

[O'Darby]

Eternity, of course, is not a dimension of time. We really can't get our minds around the notion. As ScottA does above, I have often used the phrase "time bubble" to describe our reality - meaning a created bubble within God's eternity wherein time operates because the bubble began and will have an end. I don't have any analytical problem with this notion, but William Lane Craig, who has done extensive work on time, seemingly does. As I understand it, he sees God as existing within an eternal now before the creation but entering into time with the creation.

The notion of all reality - ours and the heavenly realm - being a mental construct of God seems to be to avoid some of these issues without being "outside the box" of conventional Christian thinking at all. What does "time" mean in the context of a dream?

A Possibly Useful Way of Thinking About the Nature of God

Idealism as a model of God and His creation.

www.christianityboard.com

 

[APAK]

Eternity, of course, is not a dimension of time. We really can't get our minds around the notion. As ScottA does above, I have often used the phrase "time bubble" to describe our reality - meaning a created bubble within God's eternity wherein time operates because the bubble began and will have an end. I don't have any analytical problem with this notion, but William Lane Craig, who has done extensive work on time, seemingly does. As I understand it, he sees God as existing within an eternal now before the creation but entering into time with the creation.

The notion of all reality - ours and the heavenly realm - being a mental construct of God seems to be to avoid some of these issues without being "outside the box" of conventional Christian thinking at all. What does "time" mean in the context of a dream?

A Possibly Useful Way of Thinking About the Nature of God

Idealism as a model of God and His creation.

www.christianityboard.com

To extend that thought a bit, of you last sentence in the 1st paragraph. God extended, projected his power and intelligence (word) of himself with his Spirit, aka the Spirit of God, or Holy Spirit, into this reality for us to understand him....in creation..

 

[O'Darby]

Here, I'll let Craig speak for himself. Fortunately, the interviewer in this series is excellent.

He does at least acknowledge my view of a timeless God with our reality being a time-bound bubble, but he disagrees.

In at least some sense, the nature of time is one of the keys to What It's All About.

 

[APAK]

Here, I'll let Craig speak for himself. Fortunately, the interviewer in this series is excellent.

He does at least acknowledge my view of a timeless God with our reality being a time-bound bubble, but he disagrees.

In at least some sense, the nature of time is one of the keys to What It's All About.

God the timeless and infinite is both in and out of spacetime. He created this spacetime via his word and extended spirit for his own desire to create spacetime intelligent images of himself. And when those created of his Spirit move out of this spacetime permanently ( when he moves us out as a rapture),, this temporal reality we and its reality will never exist anymore, it will be literally destroyed and with no record of it ever existing.

We are then indeed in God and he is us, totally, with his Son.

 

[ScottA]

Here, I'll let Craig speak for himself. Fortunately, the interviewer in this series is excellent.

He does at least acknowledge my view of a timeless God with our reality being a time-bound bubble, but he disagrees.

In at least some sense, the nature of time is one of the keys to What It's All About.

Oh--that was painful to watch! I only watched the first one, and will go back and watch the second. But thought I would comment at this halfway point, then perhaps revisit after part 2.

Thank you--those are all good points... BUT, if you can imagine, that would be like two of the best of earthworms discussing the possibility of the unavoidable tree roots in their known world, extending beyond into the unknown. Just painful.

The problem, although Craig has done extremely well, is that his and our perspective is backwards.

Example: Cyberspace (the mind portion, not the brain or physical portion) came into being out of physical origins. In that order. But in this case of God and time, that's backwards...and that perspective is more or less Craig's backward hypothesis. To the contrary, the origins of time and the physical world came into being from Godspace which is spirit. Each being a completely opposite perspectives, by origin.

Thus, the things discussed in the first Craig video addressed how God might fit into the past, present, and future, or perhaps that He even doesn't. Again, that is backwards. Those considerations of past, present, and future, are not limits to God that He might need to conform to in order to fit into this seemingly better time-context-- No, but they are limits to our own understanding and our ability to fit into that actually greater and better spiritual context of God. Time, from Craig's (or his interviewer's) perspective seemed to be a necessity for fulness of life. Again, that is backwards, and absurd--those are limits!

In other words, removing the limits of past, present, and future, is perfection--the perfection of God, all at whim. While time is captivity.

 

[APAK]

Oh--that was painful to watch! I only watched the first one, and will go back and watch the second. But thought I would comment at this halfway point, then perhaps revisit after part 2.

Thank you--those are all good points... BUT, if you can imagine, that would be like two of the best of earthworms discussing the possibility of the unavoidable tree roots in their known world, extending beyond into the unknown. Just painful.

The problem, although Craig has done extremely well, is that his and our perspective is backwards.

Example: Cyberspace (the mind portion, not the brain or physical portion) came into being out of physical origins. In that order. But in this case of God and time, that's backwards...and that perspective is more or less Craig's backward hypothesis. To the contrary, the origins of time and the physical world came into being from Godspace which is spirit. Each being a completely opposite perspectives, by origin.

Thus, the things discussed in the first Craig video addressed how God might fit into the past, present, and future, or perhaps that He even doesn't. Again, that is backwards. Those considerations of past, present, and future, are not limits to God that He might need to conform to in order to fit into this seemingly better time-context-- No, but they are limits to our own understanding and our ability to fit into that actually greater and better spiritual context of God. Time, from Craig's (or his interviewer's) perspective seemed to be a necessity for fulness of life. Again, that is backwards, and absurd--those are limits!

In other words, removing the limits of past, present, and future, is perfection--the perfection of God, all at whim. While time is captivity.

Right, the view is from a human limited perspective where we want God to fit into a reality of our current state, that is not his, although he created it. And that somehow he also must conform to our concept of the past, present and future. I say that his Spirit possesses the perfect protocol that translates his reality or view into ours and visa versa. The great supreme communicator of life.

 

[ScottA]

Here, I'll let Craig speak for himself. Fortunately, the interviewer in this series is excellent.

He does at least acknowledge my view of a timeless God with our reality being a time-bound bubble, but he disagrees.

In at least some sense, the nature of time is one of the keys to What It's All About.

Craig video #2--is even more painfully wrong. Even in principle, denying the gospel of Jesus Christ.

But--hey, ya gotta start somewhere. I get that. Good work. Just ultimately wrong.

 

[ScottA]

Right, the view is from a human limited perspective where we want God to fit into a reality of our current state, that his not his, although the created it. And that somehow he also must conform to our concept of the past, present and future. I say that his Spirit possesses the perfect protocol that translates his reality or view into ours and visa versa. The great supreme communicator of life.

"Perfect" is indeed the word.

 

[ScottA]

I am glad to see the discussion going on here.

The takeaway message is: "That there should be time no longer" Revelation 10:6-- and is the last thing to come before the end.

If you will notice...it is proclaimed as a command.

 

[O'Darby]

For those who can't get enough, these are comprehensive discussions of the diverse philosophical models of God's relation to time:

Eternity in Christian Thought (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

God and Time | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

iep.utm.edu

They are headache-inducing, but more because the subject is highly complex and no model is entirely satisfactory. To be realistic, someone like Craig, who is an acknowledged world-class philosopher and has dealt extensively and academically with God's relation to time, is surely to be taken more seriously than internet goofballs, including me. Serious philosophy is a serious academic discipline, not just some sort of "thinking out loud." With all due respect, @ScottA, I have to agree with @Mr E that your zeal to point out everyone else's "errors" and "misunderstandings" - even at the level of dismissing someone who is repeatedly included in both secular and religious listings of the most influential living philsophers - does a disservice to your position.

I was interested to see in Craig's discussion slight hints of Process Theology and to see PT specifically discussed in the Stanford Encyclopedia entry linked above. PT is basically the view that humans have genuine libertarian free will and that God does not have foreknowledge of the decisions they will make or what the future of His creation will look like. (Well, actually, PT is much more than this and what I just described is more in the vein of Open Theism than PT - see Process Theology & Open Theism: What’s the Difference? - Greg Boyd - ReKnew.)

This has great appeal to me because it makes the creation far more interesting and meaningful from God's perspective. I see God as omni-creative, and with PT or OT the creation becomes much more of a genuine work of art and less of a paint-by-numbers kit.

In my little non-academic notion, the bubble we call creation is God's work of art. It is entirely temporal, with a genuine (tensed) beginning and eventual end. It is a mental construct of God (Bernardo Kastrup's idealism as described in my blog entry). The same would be true of the heavenly realm - a temporal mental construct of God. God is essentially an incomprehensible Timeless Wholly Other whom we cannot grasp except as He reveals Himself. Whatever the New Heaven and New Earth will be, they likewise will be mental constructs of the Timeless Wholly Other. Again, nothing more than my attempt to make sense of what is an unfathomable mystery.

 

[ScottA]

With all due respect, @ScottA, I have to agree with @Mr E that your zeal to point out everyone else's "errors" and "misunderstandings" - even at the level of dismissing someone who is repeatedly included in both secular and religious listings of the most influential living philsophers - does a disservice to your position.

The respect missing is that respect owed to God.

I have not boasted. But He has established the criteria...and it is not that of "the most influential philosophers", but a donkey, or a king, or a prophet. To the contrary, "philosophers" are biblically associated with "vain deceit."

And the message is simply one previously declared in the word of God, which is not debatable, but "shall be." Therefore, I have only corrected what shall not be. Is correction wrong? No, it is a biblical measure given for just such a purpose.

 

[APAK]

The respect missing is that respect owed to God. I have not boasted. But He has established the criteria...and it is not that of "the most influential philosophers", but a donkey, or a king, or a prophet. To the contrary, "philosophers" are biblically associated with "vain deceit."

And the message is simply one previously declared in the word of God, which is not debatable, but "shall be." Therefore, I have only corrected what shall not be. Is correction wrong? No, it is a biblical measure given for just such a purpose.

Noted, that we have to bring into this subject scripture as your OP suggests. This cannot be missing in any part of this discussion. and even our conclusions along the way must be painted with the Spirit's brush, and not our own. Else this may well turn into a secular discussion of just secular ideas.

 

[ScottA]

Noted, that we have to bring into this subject scripture as your OP suggests. This cannot be missing in any part of this discussion. and even our conclusions along the way must be painted with the Spirit's brush, and not our own. Else this may way turn into a secular discussion of just secular ideas.

Yes, and how soon things turn ugly.

 

[APAK]

From a Philosophy site that distinguishes God as timeless or temporal. God and Time | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

a. What it Means to be Temporal: A First Pass​

The majority position today, at least among philosophers, is that God is everlasting but temporal. That is, God never began to exist, and he will never go out of existence. God does, however, experience temporal succession. That is, God experiences some events (for example, the first century) before he experiences other events (for example, the twenty-first century.) If God is temporal, his existence and his thoughts and actions have temporal location. He exists at the present moment (and he has existed at each past moment and he will exist at each future moment.) In August, he was thinking about the heat wave in the mid-west. In the thirteenth century, he listened to and answered Aquinas’ prayers for understanding. His dealings, like those of the rest of us, occur at particular times.

b. What it Means to be Timeless: A First Pass​

The claim that God is timeless is a denial of the claim that God is temporal. First, God exists, but does not exist at any temporal location. Rather than holding that God is everlastingly eternal, and, therefore, he exists at each time, this position is that God exists but he does not exist at any time at all. God is beyond time altogether. It could be said that although God does not exist at any time God exists at eternity. That is, eternity can be seen as a non-temporal location as any point within time is a temporal location. Second, it is thought that God does not experience temporal succession. God’s relation to each event in a temporal sequence is the same as his relation to any other event. God does not experience the first century before he experiences the twenty-first. Both of these centuries are experienced by God in one “timeless now.” So, while it is true that in the thirteenth century Aquinas prayed for understanding and received it, God’s response to his prayers is not something that also occurred in that century. God, in his timeless state of being, heard Aquinas’ prayers and answered them. He did not first hear them and then answer them. He heard and answered in one timeless moment — in fact, he did so in the same timeless moment that he hears and answers prayers offered in the twenty-first century.
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I believe he is everlasting of both Temporal (via his power, his Spirit extended into this world and then exists in the present, of every moment of time) and Timeless (by the use of his word or inner expression to queue up his commands and self-expressions set for action/execution in his/our Temporal state of reality by the power of his Spirit) qualities as scripture supports my view, imo. This support imo, especially when John speaks in John Chapter one, concerning 'the beginning' and creation. And his Son is part of this plot, as the key performer in the last acts of the 'new' creation of believers for this temporal world, especially for it destruction and restoration, for God's people, in his Spirit.

 

[amigo de christo]

The problem with Time is that we never seem to have enough of it, while it seems to be speeding up.

And it is speeding up.
And that is because God is "bringing it all to a close"., and that is Good News for the born again, who are going to rule and reign with Jesus The Lord.

"coming soon".

EVEN NOW is it AT THE DOOR . many will soon wail , beg plead and holler
but they rejected the love of the truth whereby they could have been saved and thus believed a lie
a love that came to unify them as one right under a lie and the liar .
THE LAMBS GO HOME ON THAT DAY , but WOE UNTO THE WORLD who loved a lie and rejected the love of the truth .
AND THAT DAY IS NEAR . THE SIGNS have never been clearer . THE COMING OF THE KING draws nigh .

 

[amigo de christo]

Craig video #2--is even more painfully wrong. Even in principle, denying the gospel of Jesus Christ.

But--hey, ya gotta start somewhere. I get that. Good work. Just ultimately wrong.

IF it denies the gospel , THERE SIMPLY IS NO GOOD IN IT . A dear and heavy price unto all who did so
will soon come , in a day and an hour when no man knows .
TO DENY THE GOSPEL of JESUS CHRIST is nothing more than a message o anti christ no matter how much or often
it says the word love . The day wherein many will wail is coming . The day of the LORD when HE ARISES
to judge the world and all who had loved a lie and rejected the truth whereby they could be saved will WAIL without end .
ITS THAT SERIOUS SCOTT . TIS THAT SERIOUS . i am long wore out with this message that omits the DIRE NEED
to BELIEVE ON JESUS THE CHRIST . It wont be saving a one of them , not a one of them . IT WILL DAMN THEM ALL
and worse it will be for them than ever it was for sodom . TO DENY JESUS IS CHRIST IS ANTI CHRIST .
TO DENY HIM is OF ANTI CHRIST . THAT IS THE LIAR , THIS IS ANTI CHRIST . ITS THAT SERIOUS SCOTT . always remember that .