{"id":4246,"date":"2013-07-25T00:05:52","date_gmt":"2013-07-25T07:05:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/?p=4246"},"modified":"2013-07-24T23:22:42","modified_gmt":"2013-07-25T06:22:42","slug":"just-in-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/2013\/07\/25\/just-in-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Just In Time"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There is a tendency for human beings to create God in their own image.  Many seem to picture him as an old man, like their grandfather with a white beard, sitting in a comfy chair somewhere.  But the Bible never easily permits such anthropomorphizing.  The author of Revelation and the author of Psalms, for instance, remind us in a profound way just how \u201cother\u201d God is.  In Revelation, we learn that Jesus  has been slain \u201cfrom the foundation of the world.\u201d (Rev. 13:8) while in Psalm 90:4 the Psalmist informs us that \u201cFor a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.\u201d  Peter picks up on this thought in one of his letters, writing, \u201cBut do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.\u201d (2 Peter 3:8)<\/p>\n<p>God\u2019s relationship to our universe, to us, is not quite how we might conceive it.  While we exist in time, experiencing time linearly, God\u2019s relationship is radically different.  The passage of time does not affect him like it affects us.  He does not experience it as we experience it.  His perception of it is even not like ours.  St. Augustine wrote that time is a part of this universe and had its \u201cbeginning\u201d with the beginning of the universe, so that it is remarkably ignorant to ask what was going on before God made the universe.  There\u2019s no before there; time is something we live with, not something God lives with, or in.  So for him, he sees the ends of the universe\u2014the beginning of time and it\u2019s furthest future, all in a glance.  For him, the panorama of human history is like a painting on the wall: the creation of Adam, the crucifixion of Jesus, and the Second Coming are all equally viewable and real, just like we can see any part of a painting.<\/p>\n<p>Below is the link to a clip from the first episode of <em>Star Trek: Deep Space 9<\/em> where Benjamin Sisko, the commander of the space station, first meets up with the &#8220;wormhole beings,&#8221; non-corporal, non-time-bound creatures who do not understand the concept of linear time.  For them, various points in time are like different places; they can see it all at once.  Unfortunately, the clip is incomplete; the entire segment is one of the best fictional presentations of the difference between God&#8217;s perspective and ours.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?feature=player_detailpage&#038;v=dJ33e9BK9aU\">Sisko on Human Existence<\/a><\/p>\n<p><center><strong>Stuff I Thought Was Interesting Today<\/strong><\/center><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/video.cfm?id=what-is-a-genetically-modified-food2013-07-24\">What Is Genetically Modified Food?<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/io9.com\/if-this-theory-is-correct-we-may-live-in-a-web-of-alte-896376482\">If this theory is correct, we may live in a web of alternate timelines<\/a><\/p>\n<div class='kindleWidget kindleLight' ><img src=\"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-content\/plugins\/send-to-kindle\/media\/white-15.png\" \/><span>Send to Kindle<\/span><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There is a tendency for human beings to create God in their own image. Many seem to picture him as an old man, like their grandfather with a white beard, sitting in a comfy chair somewhere. But the Bible never &hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/2013\/07\/25\/just-in-time\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[18,17,16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4246"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4246"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4246\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4249,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4246\/revisions\/4249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4246"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4246"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4246"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}