Q.

When you say “time does not exist” is this the best way of stating your thesis? Time is a way that we speak of measuring something that is real, the way in which we experience reality as God’s creatures. God created us to experience this world in time.

A.

Time does not exist in the same way as the chair you sit in or the device (computer, smartphone, etc.) you are reading this on.  It does exist in the same way as measurements, numbers, language exists.  The thesis is about ontology.  Does the past have ontology?  Does the future?  I have come to the conclusion that they do not.  I can also find no scripture that would support the idea that time has ontology, that God extends his “being” to time in the same way as he does to you and I, or (back to the chair) the chair you sit in. 

Yes, God created us to experience this world in time.  What I am trying to do in the first third of the book is to explain just what time is (or probably more precisely what time is not).

Q.

Do you agree with these statements: Yesterday really did happen. Tomorrow really will happen unless the Lord returns.

A.

Yes, yesterday really did happen and tomorrow will happen (even after the Lord returns).  But does yesterday exist now?  Does tomorrow?  That is the point I am trying to make.  Yesterday exists only as a memory in a mind that can remember it (as God’s mind can remember everything, all yesterdays of every person, animal, all creation – it is all remembered).  Tomorrow has not happened yet.  For God it is a plan of action that He will do.  It is the same for you and I (except we cannot know all the consequences of the choices we will make).  Let us imagine that I am planning on visiting my sister tomorrow.  But that has not happened yet.  It is possible (because of circumstances I am unaware of) that I do not visit my sister.  My visit (the one I have planned but not yet done) has not happened.  It does not have ontology.

Q.

How do we guard against what the WLC 105 warns us about: “bold and curious searching into God’s secrets” (Deuteronomy 29:29)? Why not say that yesterday and tomorrow are not places you can go? You begin the book critiquing time travel, where I think you make a strong point. But why go further than this? 

A.

There are many things that would break WLC 105, and I confess my book might be one of them.  I do not think so, but I am willing to acknowledge the possibility.  “Why not say that yesterday and tomorrow are not places you can go?”  Well, that is exactly what I am saying. I am just taking a few chapters to explain what that means.  The reason I felt compelled to write is that many (if not most Christians) with whom I have had a conversation about this have a view of God and time that (to me) is not presented in the bible.  They also define the word “eternal” often to mean “outside of time”.  That God is “above” time in some special way that we mere creatures cannot understand.  I do not find this in the scriptures (I have searched very hard for this concept).  Others have tackled this topic as well.  It may in fact be in the realm of “God’s secrets”, but the concept of time is so woven through scripture (the first verses of Genesis speak of a “beginning”) that an understanding of what time is for both us and God might be helpful.  It is my hope that what I wrote will be helpful (at least for some).

Q.

Is it really helpful for Christians to think that time does not exist? Would you discourage Christians from thinking about things in terms of time? Scripture encourages us to think in terms of time. See the following:

Genesis 1:14-15 “And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.’ And it was so.” 

Psalm 31:15 My times are in your hand; rescue me from the hand of my enemies and from my persecutors!

Psalm 90:12 So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;  a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;  a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;  a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;  a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;  a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

Acts 1:7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.

2 Corinthians 6:2 For he says, “In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.” Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

Galatians 4:4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law….

Ephesians 1:10 As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

Ephesians 5:16 Making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.

Colossians 4:5 Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time.

1 Thessalonians 5:1-3 Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

Hebrews 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

James 4:13-15 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” 

2 Peter 3:8 But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. (See also Psalm 90:4.)

When Moses (Ps. 90) and Peter speak of God’s relationship to time, they do not encourage us to abandon the notion of time. I understand that your title is provocative, but it seems to imply that Christians should not think in terms of time, rather than thinking the way Scripture would encourage us to think about time: that God does all things with perfect timing and we are to think wisely about our limited time and make good use of it. It seems that Scripture would have us think of time as something that we steward.

A.

Throughout the book I am very much encouraging others to think about just what time is.  Both for us and God.  Yes, I think this is very useful. It is helpful for Christians to think of time not having otology (i.e. existence) because “now” becomes very important in our relationship with God.  If we view God’s “now” as “every moment of time at the same time” then God becomes a distant “otherly” being.  This view also has a lot of issues like the creation being eternal (having no beginning) because God is always (from his point of time) creating.  Jesus is always dying on the cross (from God’s “now” point of view).  One of the points I make is that the Arminian view of foreknowledge requires a view that time has ontology.  You will find this discussion in chapter 15.

Therefore, I am NOT discouraging “Christians from thinking about things in terms of time”.  Quite the opposite.  As you read the book (in many ways) you are being encouraged to think in terms of time. 

So, I am not encouraging Christians to “abandon the notion of time”.  Instead, I am encouraging us to have a biblical view of time.  All the scriptures quoted in this question support the view of time outlined in this book.  I agree with the thought “God does all things with perfect timing and we are to think wisely about our limited time and make good use of it.”  We are to steward our time well.  We should carefully make decisions and actions.  Once made they cannot be unmade.  That is the very premise of this book.  The past does not exist.  So, we must be careful stewards of our “now”.  Once an action is completed it is part of that non-existent past.  The future is something we are planning.  It is the “time” we are stewarding.