Does God exist outside of time?

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Desdichado

Senior Member
Feb 9, 2014
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#21
Speaking of Einstein, General and Special Relativity are interesting factors to consider.

Okay, you want details. Albert Einstein's theory of the space-time continuum states that without matter, time does not exist. But visible matter is not the only matter. There is also dark matter that is completely invisible to us. That dark matter: I can't get my head around that. How this all fits together I don't think our finite minds could understand. We can't even comprehend the Holy Spirit which is God's omnipresence and omniscience. That is what allows Him to hear all those prayers at once.



 

crossnote

Senior Member
Nov 24, 2012
30,704
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#22
Time (chronos) is dependent on the planets stars sun movements. Without them how are we to measure time.

Yet without them, time will still exist (although we can't measure it) but it will exist as one event AFTER the other; or one step follows another...Oh no, here comes that Fiddler song, 'Sunrise-Sunset' lol.
 

BillG

Senior Member
Feb 15, 2017
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#24
Thread title says it all. I don't know which way to go on this one.

Give reasons why/why not.
Nor me.

I've been a Christian 35 years.

It was only about 7 years ago that someone told me that God exists outside of time.
It has messed with my mind but it should not.

I love quantum leap TV series.
Going back in time to put right what once went wrong.

But we know God works good in all things to conform us to the image of Jesus.

Does he have to go back in time to work good in all things that have happened to us or is that time not time to him and he is already in it.

Can I ask God to go back in time to answer the prayer I wanted to pray for my grandad who died to believe in him but I was not told he had died until months later?

I couldn't go see him in hospital but as I heard nothing I assume he was ok. Even when i asked my mum if he was ok she says yes, but out of love but spite (won't go into it)

I regret not going and not knowing.
 

tourist

Senior Member
Mar 13, 2014
41,243
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Tennessee
#25
Nor me.

I've been a Christian 35 years.

It was only about 7 years ago that someone told me that God exists outside of time.
It has messed with my mind but it should not.

I love quantum leap TV series.
Going back in time to put right what once went wrong.

But we know God works good in all things to conform us to the image of Jesus.

Does he have to go back in time to work good in all things that have happened to us or is that time not time to him and he is already in it.

Can I ask God to go back in time to answer the prayer I wanted to pray for my grandad who died to believe in him but I was not told he had died until months later?

I couldn't go see him in hospital but as I heard nothing I assume he was ok. Even when i asked my mum if he was ok she says yes, but out of love but spite (won't go into it)

I regret not going and not knowing.
Perhaps we will go back in time in our next life to right the wrongs. It does say in Hebrews to forget to show hospitality to strangers because we might be entertaining angels unawares.
 
Apr 15, 2017
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#26
Its kind of crazy to think that the Holy Spirit could hold a million, if not a billion, (or infinite) conversations at the same time and not be impeded with discussion. To think He can speak to me at the same time He is speaking to believers around the world, and maintaining cognizance with each person, is fairly mind-blowing.
I thought that too, for everything that goes on, and has gone on, God knows about it and will never forget it, and He even knows the very number of hairs on our head, and since God assembled everything, and of course He knows all there is to know, He knows everything broken down to the smallest particles, and even knows how many atoms exist.

It is mind boggling how He can keep track of everything, and never loses any information, and never has memory loss, for how can He for His intelligence is not like our intelligence.

For in our mind we can lose information, but God cannot for all of creation is in Him and readily available to know, even those that have died and are lost.

And our mind is located in our head, but it appears that God's intellect is as big as His Spirit which is infinity, so while He has what He has going on in this little section, for it is little to God, He knows 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000 light years away what is going on here in this little section.

For God knows His Spirit is for infinity, so His mind can understand everything for infinity, for God to know His Spirit does not end.

God said is there a God beside Me, yea, there is no God, I know not any, and before Me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after Me, so He is saying I searched for infinity and I cannot find another God, and how can there be another God when God is infinity, and also it means supreme being, and everything else is made of the material world which God can disassemble at any time.

God can have a conversation with everybody at the same time, and not ever get confused about what He is saying to them.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
24,167
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#28
It has nothing to do with space or locality.
Evidently you have not heard about the Space-Time Continuum.

Space-time is a mathematical model that joins space and time into a single idea called a continuum. This four-dimensional continuum is known as Minkowski space.
Combining these two ideas helped cosmology to understand how the universe works on the big level (e.g. galaxies) and small level (e.g. atoms).

In non-relativistic classical mechanics, the use of Euclidean space instead of space-time is good, because time is treated as universal with a constant rate of passage which is independent of the state of motion of an observer.


https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-time
 
Last edited:
Dec 28, 2016
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#29
Ima stick with the fact God is omnipresent and keep it simple! :D
 

joaniemarie

Senior Member
Jan 4, 2017
3,198
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#30
Nor me.

I've been a Christian 35 years.

It was only about 7 years ago that someone told me that God exists outside of time.
It has messed with my mind but it should not.

I love quantum leap TV series.
Going back in time to put right what once went wrong.

But we know God works good in all things to conform us to the image of Jesus.

Does he have to go back in time to work good in all things that have happened to us or is that time not time to him and he is already in it.

Can I ask God to go back in time to answer the prayer I wanted to pray for my grandad who died to believe in him but I was not told he had died until months later?

I couldn't go see him in hospital but as I heard nothing I assume he was ok. Even when i asked my mum if he was ok she says yes, but out of love but spite (won't go into it)

I regret not going and not knowing.


I can read what you guys are talking about and can go just so far. I tried to read C.S. Lewis many years ago but his brain works differently than mine. :) I could only follow part of the way. His book "The Screwtape Letters" I did enjoy and understand alright. But the others he wrote were very hard to grasp.

I used to get very frustrated at how I couldn't follow these kinds of conversations and thoughts about God with other believers., but today it's OK. I know God is always good and in Christ I'm accepted in the Beloved. One on one.

There's a Bible verse that speaks of things about God and His ways being TOO WONDERFUL FOR ME TO COMPREHEND. AMEN!!. So although I can follow this "Time question thread" just so far and have to admit it gets toooo complicated., I'm thankful God is bigger than my mind can comprehend in so many many things but it's OK. Even if other Christians understand something I don't., it's ok.

The Bible also says (and I can attest to this) Whatever things I don't understand now., He will reveal it to me later. WOW. He does! Things I didn't "get" 3 years ago., the Holy Spirit showed me later. No condemnation.


Phil. 3:15

[SUP]14 [/SUP]I press on toward the goal to win the [supreme and heavenly] prize to which God in Christ Jesus is calling us upward.
[SUP]

15 [/SUP]So let those [of us] who are spiritually mature and full-grown have this mind and hold these convictions; and if in any respect you have a different attitude of mind, God will make that clear to you also.
[SUP]

16 [/SUP]Only let us hold true to what we have already attained and walk and order our lives by that.
 

maxwel

Senior Member
Apr 18, 2013
9,261
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#31
Evidently you have not heard about the Space-Time Continuum.



https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-time


In the Minkowski spacetime model, time is one of the things he plotted on the model... but time is still just time.

Time is still time.

Time isn't some kind of space you can put in your cupboard.



Please gather up a handful of 12:05PM, put that in a box, and bring it over to my house.
We'll give that a look, and I'll make you dinner.
 

Desdichado

Senior Member
Feb 9, 2014
8,768
837
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#32
Leave it to P4T to slice the Gordian Knot.

Another way of stating it- rather than exist outside of time, he transcends time.

Ima stick with the fact God is omnipresent and keep it simple! :D
 

crossnote

Senior Member
Nov 24, 2012
30,704
3,649
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#33
God may live outside of time, but as created beings we don't... and never will. :)
 

AMIKIND

Junior Member
May 16, 2018
15
3
3
#35
Well said. I agree 100%, MattforJesus
 

Noose

Senior Member
Apr 18, 2016
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#36
God describes Himself as the beginning and the end, so saying God knows the future is somehow wrong (IMO), rather, the future is part of God and indeed all reality exists within a conscious mind called God.

Time is nothing but a measurement and measurements don't exist outside a conscious mind.
 
A

AuntieAnt

Guest
#37
Time is an illusion so there is no "outside of" it. RIGHT NOW is all that ever exists.

God's name is I AM because He's always Present RIGHT NOW.
 

AMIKIND

Junior Member
May 16, 2018
15
3
3
#38
Well, God is also the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End. God only made time for mankind. He set the Earth in motion and created the sun to mark the days.
 

AMIKIND

Junior Member
May 16, 2018
15
3
3
#39
"And kGod said, "Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred TIMES, and days and years."
 

Laish

Senior Member
Jul 31, 2016
1,666
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#40
Here is my two cents .
I see time as part of God’s creation. We can see that it is affected by things like gravity and velocity.( gravitational and velocity time dilation) These things can be measured,and so are a part of God’s universe.
So if it is a part of creation it must be subject to God .
This may sound weird but think . The way I see it is that God is outside of his creation and can see all of it at once . So looking at it (us) He sees yesterday tomorrow,and today all at once if He so choses . All the attributes of His creation are subject to His will . I can’t see it any other way.
Nehemiah 9:6You alone are the LORD.
You have made the heavens,
The heaven of heavens with all their host,
The earth and all that is on it,
The seas and all that is in them.
You give life to all of them
And the heavenly host bows down before You.
Blessings
Bill