Time And Beyond Time

“If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn.” –C. S. Lewis

"He has put eternity into man’s heart.” –Ecclesiastes 3:11

It’s interesting how we have to grow into the concept of time. As far as I can tell, time for our one year-old exists in two dimensions: now or never. One or the other. No in-between. I think Esme believes with all her being that if I am not giving something to her immediately, she is never her whole life ever going to have it—the concept of “wait a minute” doesn’t exist, much less waiting until tomorrow. Thus the frantic, frenzied screams of utter despair if she doesn’t get something now.

In Revelation there are many references to God as being outside of time: he was, and is, and is to come; he is praised forever and ever. With him one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day (2 Peter 3:8). He is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you (2 Peter 3:9), which is eerily similar to how it feels when I’m trying to tell a screaming Esme that she has to wait so I can cut up her fruit before giving it to her.

Time even for us contracts and expands depending on our experiences and perspective, but God is beyond time itself. C. S. Lewis gives the example of how God is outside of time the way an author is outside of the timeline of the story he writes. He may put the book down and think about the character without it taking any time within the storyline of the book itself. Only, of course, God does not hop from one time-series to another; he is not in a time-series at all.

This means he can be infinitely with me in my now; that he is with me in my moment in a more infinite way than anyone in my own time-world could be. In a sense, he feels my momentary pains and joys forever, and thus he understands me, knows me more deeply and fully, than anyone else could.

On the other hand, he has the long view in mind. How can I explain the concept of years or decades to Esme? Yet that is how God sees us. How can you even quantify our earthly lives in the context of eternity? Is it a nanosecond, or less? Certainly significant, but almost relatively obsolete? Yet here we are, viewing our lives in hours or weeks or years, when what God is about is suiting us for eternity. We complain about not getting what we want, when God cares about changing us into who we will be; we feel that suffering is unbearably unending, when God sees the reward, the crown and glory, the new bodies, that will be ours forever. If we really understood that, what would not be worth going through?

We are born into an eternity of forever-nows. But I see how two year-old Elijah asks “after nap?” and four year-old Eric asks “tomorrow morning?” and six year-old Ellie can count down the five weeks of summer left. We become increasingly self-absorbed in our time-worlds until we cannot conceive of anything outside of it, yet God was, is, and is to come. He is the first and last, the source and end, the creator and consummator, he is all of our time-world and yet outside of it. He is forever with us in our moments, yet infinitely patient as only one outside of time can be.