The concept of God being outside of time and space…

6 years ago • August 26, 2020 • by ourCOG

The concept of God being outside of time and space is problematic on a practical level.

God is a God of order, not confusion.
No, I am not changing the Bible, nor adding to it. I am making a statement, that by coincidence, shares two words with a Biblical phrase. It is difficult to speak about God and not do that, every once in a while.

Anyway, If God is outside of time, then for him, there is no chronological order, everything is just, NOW.

This means that all he did, every thought, every interaction was done at one time.

Like Space, time is not created. We invented a manner to measure it and God gave us the moon, sun, and stars, as well as daylight and the darkness of night TO MARK the passage of time.

And he made us in his image.

It also means that we cannot count on God, or the past, or trust in him for the future!

IF God does not exist in time, but we do, then his participation in our lives CAN be jumping around, back and forth, according to time. thus we cannot know that the past and its included good and bad events actually happened or if we are altered in some way to THINK they did, or that God did change the past for some, and maybe not for others.

While I find it nearly impossible to conceptualize a past that is not universally changed, meaning that in history an event happened, it happened for the whole planet, but maybe not. What is to stop him from making two histories that meld into one, since time does not exist for him?

It gets
CONFUSING
and God is not a god of confusion! This leading idea is the Mandela effect.

Go and look it up, Not going further here.

The Bible told us that God did things in order, which is logically the order, chronologically the order and physically the order.

The best way, for me and at this moment, is to think like all events are written on a very large piece of paper, and the page is blank, here comes the printing press and in one motion, ALL the things are events, thoughts, etc… are printed at one moment. the printed work contains a chronological order, but their printing does not.

This leads to God being the author of all things, for it cannot be ANY other way.
There can be no reality, no freedom, no good nor evil.

Lex Luthor is the Bad guy in Superman stories, but he is just ink on a page, and so is superman.

If God IS outside of time, then we actually do not exist.

Isn’t this confusing?
If you think so, then understand this is not God.

Categories: #ourCOG

Discussion

63 comments

Dustin Kelly says:

May 29, 2020 at 8:53 pm

God is eternal. He existed before He created time. He exists within His creation and outside of it. In time and outside of time. Our finite minds can’t fully comprehend the infinite God.

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Randy Mahabir says:

May 29, 2020 at 8:53 pm

God is not limited to time because He is eternal and has no end therefore never needed to have a beginning but we are so he interacts with us and rules our affairs within our boundaries of time.

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Jeremi Taitt says:

May 29, 2020 at 8:56 pm

Are there books or resources I can read on this subject?

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Jono Wolnizer says:

May 29, 2020 at 8:59 pm

Isaiah 55:8-9 my thoughts are higher than your thoughts and my ways are higher than your ways. Understand that human intelligence cannot really conceive God in his fullness.

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Randall Grosvenor says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:00 pm

So if God is not outside of space, time, and matter to create them, how did all three of those come into existence?

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Dustin Kelly says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:01 pm

In the beginning(time) God created the heavens(space) and the earth(matter).

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Nickole Santiago says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:01 pm

This happens when we try to comprehend and rationalize God, it’s something that cannot be done nor will we understand.
For his ways are above our way and his thoughts above our own.

Deuteronomy 29:29

“The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law.

I’m completely okay with believing that God exists outside of time. I don’t try to comprehend it, he just is.

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Randy Emmons says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:02 pm

God the Son stepped into time.
God the Father is outside of time.

That’s why it says in Revelation that Christ was slain before the foundations of the world.

I agree that God is not a God of disorder but he is so far beyond us that I don’t think your logic can follow.

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Erinda van Zyl says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:04 pm

What things can and can’t the human mind comprehend? I think that question would fit neatly into this topic. Your use of “NOW” (references present *time*) in reference to timelessness made me think of that.

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Christi Fay Shiflett Williams says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:08 pm

Just think, we could already be in eternity watching our lives happening at this moment. Mind blown ?

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Alicia M. Vermillion says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:08 pm

You said God does not exist in time… He did as Jesus Christ.

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Ngadan Kuh Jonathan says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:12 pm

Your writing is as much as confusing as your mind.

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Ramon Torres says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:14 pm

The Bible affirms that God is omnitemporal. This means that he is both temporal (within time) and atemporal (outside time). This is a paradox beyond human comprehension.

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Yehoshua Marion says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:16 pm

Your concept of time is wrong all together.
Research RDT equations.
Time is only a measurement of distance and rate, nothing more.
Distance is only a measurement of rate and time.
ECT.
Define time without using rate or distance inside the universe empricaly. You can’t.
The point here is that the concept of time your using is flawed.

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Darren Stephens says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:22 pm

One of your early statements in defining where you were taking this is problematic:

“Anyway, if God is outside of time, then for him, there is no chronological order, everything is just NOW.”

By saying “NOW ” you’ve just assigned a finite human descriptive of time on an eternal God.

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Katie Clark says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:29 pm

So if God didn’t create time, is time equal to God? Time is a concept created by God. God is not a God of confusion, but he’s also infinitely greater than our minds can fully comprehend.

If God is outside of time, it doesn’t mean that everything he’s ever done is happening now. Now is a concept in our minds due to the creation of time. If God is outside of time, he is unaffected by whether things are happening ‘now’ or ‘later’ because he is bigger than the concept of time.

Don’t take this as biblical truth. Just my thoughts.

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Mong Santiago says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:29 pm

I would somehow agree, the term God being outside of time seems to be misleading. I think what it should be instead is “God is not bound by time”

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Deborah Lewis says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:34 pm

I would say, your understanding of God is way too small. He is limitless. You and I aren’t. That’s why it’s hard for us to understand some things.

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Mark S. Phillips says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:40 pm

Or, one could spend a little while studying A and B theories of time, and not being confused.

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Megan Chrismon Becker says:

May 29, 2020 at 9:55 pm

My favorite illustration is that there is a timeline in the middle of a room that shows the earthly past and future and God is in the room. He is at the beginning, the present, the future, yet he also exists outside of all of that too. When we enter eternity with God, it’s like we step off the timeline and are just in existence, not bound by time anymore… It’s the best way that my simple human mind can imagine it.

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Glenn Smith says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:09 pm

Time is not a state of existence. Rather, it is just a measure of change. “15 minutes” is actually a measure of earth rotation (sun movement). Since God does not get older, He does not experience time. Saying God experiences time suggests He gets older and changes, which is problematic.

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Tommy S. Hancock says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:19 pm

we

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Tommy S. Hancock says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:21 pm

We’re talking about the Creator of all we know.

It’s perfectly Ok to understand that you don’t understand.

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Walter Brown says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:36 pm

To say God exists outside of time only implies our experience of physical time. It does not mean that God does not exist in some kind of metaphysical temporal experience. We simply don’t know, but we can reason that God most probably transcends our temporal experience to be able to initiate it.

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Jam Pineda says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:44 pm

If God is “inside” time, it would only mean that He did not created it. And if God did not created time, He also did not create space and matter. Why? Because space, time, and matter exist all at the same time. So, whoever created space, time, and matter should be spaceless, timeless, and immaterial, as well as intelligent, powerful, and moral for us to have the world that we have right now.

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Daniel Yargo says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:48 pm

The expression that God exists outside of time and space is not meant to mean that He is not present and at work in the universe and this world. It only means He is not confined to it in the same sense that we are.

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Nikki Sheppick says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:50 pm

Human reasoning in no way stands …. in the Light of that which is Spirit-ual …. and the human imaginations that are not enlightened with such …. by God Himself, how then can they reason rightly?

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John Bennett says:

May 29, 2020 at 10:52 pm

“In the beginning God…” The beginning of what? Time! Yes God created time as we know it. God knows our future, how? He is the Master and creator of what we call time.

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Luke Brown says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:01 pm

Say no to drugs

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Patricia Frazier says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:23 pm

Everyone please take 2 minutes to watch this clip. It’s called “Where did God come from? Best answer. Forward to 1:26 and Kent Hovind explains this subject and he makes sense!!

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Brooke Gerlach says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:29 pm

the very fact that God is outside of time means 1. he’s not confined to it and 2. he is in control of it and all that is in it.

if you’re confused, continue asking and seeking answers!:)

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Terrie Molina says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:38 pm

To say that everything to God is “now” is to deny His omniscience. He know everything, which means He also knows what was in the past vs. what is in the present vs. what will be in the future. He knows what time is. He simply isn’t limited by it.

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Chuck Moore says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:40 pm

William Lane Craig wrote a book about that very subject. It’s called TIME AND ETERNITY.

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Javier Ortiz says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:58 pm

Outside of Space , Time and Matter ….we can’t comprehend it . It’s not so confusing as you say , and the fact that you are trying to find a theory of how to explain it in a simple way is impossible for we have limits of understanding , and you are missing the whole purpose of the Gospel . Gods love for you is expressed in his creation and what was done in the cross .

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Tru Lea says:

May 29, 2020 at 11:58 pm

Time, as we know it, was created by God, for our exsistance. Our universe. As Creator God, he is capable of much more than we can think or imagine, including this!

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Linda Ann Wolfenbarger says:

May 30, 2020 at 12:16 am

He created space, time matter & energy. You don’t create something that yoy’re already in. He us infinte–had no beginning or has end. If that ‘s hard to understand it’s because He’s God and we’re not.

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Matthew Burns says:

May 30, 2020 at 12:19 am

Perhaps rather, God can see the future accurately.

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Matthew Ellis says:

May 30, 2020 at 12:52 am

To a human who only operates within the laws of time and space it gets confusing. However to God, no such confusion can exist. Physicists have been looking into possibilities that the universe might actually be made up of more that length, width, depth and time. They theorize that many more dimensions could mathematically exist….does that confuse people? Sure. Is it plausible? Sure!

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Melvin Issac says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:08 am

By this logic it would be necessary for God to create a timeline for Him to act which is absurd.

The chronological order is in human perspective. Infact, everything is explained in such a way.

Another question would be, when God commenced the creation process, in which language would have He had commanded?

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LS Munzhelele says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:51 am

This is an easy issue,God doesn’t have the beginning because he is not created, everything that is that created is confined with time ,space and matter.

Think about this if God is was confined by space,where would he be before he creates the Universe? For him to be the creator he can’t be time,space and matter dependent

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Alan Parsons says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:56 am

If God is inside time then He had a beginning logically so then who created God?

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Cl Ing says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:57 am

It is not problematic for God, only difficult for times finite minds.

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Erek Cyr says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:59 am

“8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.

9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

Isaiah 55:8-9

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William Tanksley Jr. says:

May 30, 2020 at 1:59 am

//Anyway, If God is outside of time, then for him, there is no chronological order, everything is just, NOW.//

No. If God is outside of time, it would follow that our chronological order is just “a” chronological order for Him, one particular order of things. It doesn’t mean there’s _no_ order, and it doesn’t mean He cannot see our order of time.

//This means that all he did, every thought, every interaction was done at one time.//

No, it means it’s not done at a time. That’s literally the opposite of all being done at one time.

//Like Space, time is not created.//

“nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation…” Past, present, height, depth… are are things in creation.

//We invented a manner to measure it and God gave us the moon, sun, and stars, as well as daylight and the darkness of night TO MARK the passage of time.//

This is all true, but doesn’t mean God didn’t create time.

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Franklin J Guerrero says:

May 30, 2020 at 2:21 am

God exist but not in our natural world or reality. Not bounded by our physical time frame. We can imagine Him now or in the future or many years ago. He does not age. He is in a spiritual world, ?

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Mazi Godwin Anthony says:

May 30, 2020 at 2:31 am

God put us humans in the first heaven.

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Tim Henderson says:

May 30, 2020 at 3:59 am

Arthur Adam Haglund your opening statement is false. God created time and space. He must therefore be outside of time and space. 5th grade science. Anything creating a system must exist outside of the created system. Everything else you said is just noise. Your thesis is debunked.

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Jono Rosie says:

May 30, 2020 at 5:03 am

The statement that if God is outside of time then there is no chronological order is not correct. We are outside the time of a novel. We hold the beginning to end in our hands at the same time and can travel through the story independently from the story’s time. But there is still a chronological order. We can see and understand the chronological order.

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Arthur Adam Haglund says:

May 30, 2020 at 5:05 am

Nobody considering this:
Isa_57:15 For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.

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Eric Jose says:

May 30, 2020 at 5:26 am

I believe that God can exist outside our physical world and time. He knows our future and the end of it. The best to do this is that He can existoutside our realm.
Did anyone find its maker is inside their creation. A watchmaker in watch or a computer manufacturer inside the computer. We can only see their seal or signature in their creation that proves they are the creator.

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Roc Molina says:

May 30, 2020 at 6:21 am

God’s ways & thoughts are NOT the same as yours.. ?

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Steve Davies says:

May 30, 2020 at 6:36 am

This is the problem when we use our little puddle of a brain to work out God. We come up with the most outlandish conjectures. Like a strand of hair on the side of an elephant trying to figure out not only the elephant but it’s place in a bigger world, which is but one planet in a vast universe.

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Francis Inametti says:

May 30, 2020 at 6:37 am

You can’t set boundaries and limits to what God can or can’t do.

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Arthur Adam Haglund says:

May 30, 2020 at 6:41 am

The real kicker is that there is no benefit to pretend knowledge that he is outside time and that there is no knowledge that he is inside time.
There is no added powers that he gains!
There is no new knowledge that he gains.

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Mike Cresswell says:

May 30, 2020 at 6:43 am

Not problematic at all … the only problem is his ways are higher than our ways because the infinite, immortal and invisible God is beyond our grasp to conceive.

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Nikki Sheppick says:

May 30, 2020 at 7:28 am

There would be no “time” …. except God Gives it to be so …. especially, in the human imagination of such.

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David Allan Deik says:

May 30, 2020 at 8:19 am

God is not outside of time, in the sense that he’s looking at this thing called time.

Time is inside of God. Everything is inside of God because God is everywhere

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Ronald McWood says:

May 30, 2020 at 9:07 am

Alas. The “god” you imagined is too small.

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Jamie Bennett says:

May 30, 2020 at 9:08 am

Well, I think there is some confusion here, friend. When people say God is outside time, it means that His essence is not time-bound. But to suggest we can’t count on Him in the past or future doesn’t follow. Why would that be? If He created time as we experience it, what would prevent Him from being involved in it. In fact, this is what Scripture is all about. God’s involvement in history. Further, God steps into an experience of time through the incarnation of Jesus.

Also, why would you say that time doesn’t exist for Him? That doesn’t seem to follow from God being “outside time.” Just because He doesn’t experience it the way that we do (although He has in the incarnation), it doesn’t follow that time doesn’t exist for Him; quite the opposite, He created it.

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Nicholas Garrett says:

May 30, 2020 at 9:54 am

You are right – God is a god of order, and who says we are his only ant farm? Why is God being outside of time and space problematic? It’s only problematic in our current systems of analysis and understanding. Meaning it’s only an academic problem because modern academia is built on naturalism. As far as space we don’t know enough about it to even define it. According to our systems of analysis it is infinite yet we can only put a man up to within 450 miles of the earth safely.

If you look at it through the lens of supernaturalism even as a philosophy then it is not a problem. Albert Einstein has great writings on supernaturalism that I recommend. As well as aquinas on primary and secondary causation.

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Christopher S. Poore says:

May 30, 2020 at 10:30 am

We, as humans never experiencing eternal structure, cannot explain a concept of time not existing. It’s an impossibility for us because we have nothing to base it on. There are things about God that you just accept and believe.

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John Foster says:

May 30, 2020 at 12:02 pm

Time was created by God for us. Space is defined by time and distance. It continually expands from the singularity from which it began. We can only define our reality, not God’s, because we have never experienced the supernatural reality. God exists in and out of His creation in a way that we cannot understand. He is at once everywhere in time and outside of it. At the end of our physical existence, we will experience moving to where He is but we may never have the capacity or ability to understand it.

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Dominick Mcgrath says:

May 30, 2020 at 4:48 pm

GOD IS ETERNAL:

There are Christian people and people of no faith

who have an issue with TIME and how old the earth

might be. I suggest you do not fret / worry because

God has everything under control.

We mortal humans are born and destined to die, just

as a flower blossoms and blooms then its beauty fades

and it dies. But we can have eternal life by belief

that Christ Jesus is God and is our salvation and that

our spirit which resides in our body will return to God

when our mortal body takes its last earthly breath and

dies. Our spirit will have eternal life in God’s heavenly

kingdom if we have faith in Christ Jesus our Lord God.

God exists in the realm eternity and we mortals live

in the realm of time.

God is not bound by time like we humans. We are

prisoners of time. We mortals have a beginning and

end. The concept of time is a like chains which limits

our understanding of God’s ways.

Once we realise that time is the creation of God and

we mortal humans are bound / chained by time, we are

limited by time in our human form and anything we store

or build on this earth is futile.

God is eternal and is bound by nothing. God created

everything including TIME. The planets and all livings

things therein are bound by the laws of physics GOD’S

LAWS.

Like a clock everything has a cycle, everything has a

BEGINNING & END = TIME.

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The concept of God being outside of time and space…

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