Present – Cosmology seems to agree with Christianity
My Word of the Year is present. I have been challenged to live in the present moment as well as consider the gifts of the present and the gifts of God in general. This month, I was encouraged to look beyond my own knowledge of ‘present’ and into the Wikipedia understanding of the word. And it is quite interesting.
Relativity and Christianity
To being looking outside of my own thoughts on this word, we looked at Bible verses about ‘present’ and today we will consider other theories of ‘present’. Shall we begin with Einstein? The idea of special relativity apparently states that the present ‘only refers to things that are close to us. Einstein phrased this as “People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion”. Would you not agree that the present we are in is an illusion? Do we not believe, as Hebrews 11:1 says, ‘Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see,’?
This verse implies that there are things that we do not see right now in the present. What are these things? Surely, ‘things’ would include events and actions that we cannot see all around us. What we participate in is only a limited view of the present, past and even future. Just as the universe was ‘formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible,’ (Heb 11:3). We believe that God is outside of time, in the eternity. So,, what is this past, present and future except a way to define memory and hope? If God is not in time, then what would give meaning to the past or the future, if I can only be with God and worship him, now? He has a different view and that view is the one I yearn to see.
Cosmology and Christianity
In cosmology there is a well-established theory that the universe is expanding, thanks to Hubble of the telescope fame. Some of you may be ready to ask what that has to do with Christianity or the Bible. Many articles about the Big Bang theory and that discuss the idea of the universe expanding point to the verses that say God stretches out the heavens. I find this word ‘stretch’, usually also has the associated ‘contraction’ that comes with it. We stretch out the curtain, we stretch out our arms; those actions do not go on, cannot go on indefinitely.
Instead, I look to the verses that speak of Jesus holding things together and the earth literally falling apart at the end of time. Consider Colossians 1:15-17, ‘The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.’ Why would Jesus need to hold things together if they were not trying to fall apart. The very thought of ‘falling apart’ means that things are expanding, moving out of place. But Jesus himself is delaying the final falling apart by holding things together for us now.
Jesus described the end times in Matthew 24, saying that wars will increase, that earthquakes and famines will too. To me, these ‘signs’ indicate that the earth is falling apart. He warned that it will be difficult if the end comes in winter. Doesn’t this speak of the earth going to pieces and the pieces are in the wrong place? The place where the tectonic plates belong, the places where the rains should fall and crops should grow, where the sun should shine and winter be bearable, these places are being held together now by Jesus. His love keeps us close and keeps the end at bay.
It seems to be the force of sin that Jesus is working against, holding out of the universe. As his co-heirs, we too are working against sin. Sin has caused everything to go off-kilter. Sin introduced darkness to earth, and it only seems to proliferate. We are instructed to be the faithful and wise servant of God when these things come to a head and Jesus returns (Matt. 24:45). Frankly, that brings me back to the idea that we need to be in the present. It is our actions in the present that interest God, certainly not our past, which cannot change, nor our future which would only lead to worry, or perhaps building storehouses or living in despair. It is the present that matters, it is our present, our thoughts and actions now, that glorify God, that worship him as he is due.
relative Conclusions
I have not attempted to explain how the bible and science may respond to each other here. I have merely considered that the word ‘present’ is part of the discussion of relativity and part of the conversation of cosmology and asked myself what I may say to a specialist in that field if she were sitting with me over a cup of coffee or a glass of wine. I have done this with the information that comes from wikipedia, so not the depth that a scientists has, but my understanding of what someone has written to describe the phenomenon in relation to ‘present’. I have often considered that when science and the Bible do not agree, it is simply because the scientists haven’t gotten far enough yet. I guess that could be accurate since we are in the present and can only yearn to know more, do more, see more, as God does.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Present, accessed 18 Sept. 2023.
