Impatience with God...
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Impatience with God, the feelings of those addressed in the first century by the lesson, is the human condition. John Calvin put it well while commenting on the text: "Men wish to anticipate for this reason, because they measure time according to the judgment of their own flesh; and they are by nature inclined to impatience" (Calvin's Commentaries, Vol. XXII/2, p. 418). In fact, God does not tell time like we do.
Augustine and Martin Luther describe God's sense of time in a manner compatible with Einstein's Theory of Relativity -- the hypothesis that because time is relative, at the speed of light there is not time. This entails that in the presence of God who is the light of the world there is no time and that all events are simultaneous.
God's mind does not pass from one thought to another. His vision is utterly unchangeable. Thus he comprehends all that takes place -- the not-yet-existing future, the existing present, and the no-longer-existing -- in an immutable and eternal present (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 2, p. 216).
As John Wesley has said regarding God's sense of time, "... no delay is long to the eternal God" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 589). "To the eye of faith it appears as done already" (Ibid.). Reinhold Niebuhr offered a prayer that well says what these insights about time might mean for us in everyday life:
O Lord, who holds all our yesterdays, todays, and tomorrows in your eternal presence, we thank you that in imaginations and reason we are fearfully and wonderfully made, transcending time and thus becoming creators with you. Give us grace to know we do not share your foresight into the future or your power over it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
What is often said in the black church is true: God may not come when you want him, but he's always on time!
Augustine and Martin Luther describe God's sense of time in a manner compatible with Einstein's Theory of Relativity -- the hypothesis that because time is relative, at the speed of light there is not time. This entails that in the presence of God who is the light of the world there is no time and that all events are simultaneous.
God's mind does not pass from one thought to another. His vision is utterly unchangeable. Thus he comprehends all that takes place -- the not-yet-existing future, the existing present, and the no-longer-existing -- in an immutable and eternal present (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 2, p. 216).
As John Wesley has said regarding God's sense of time, "... no delay is long to the eternal God" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 589). "To the eye of faith it appears as done already" (Ibid.). Reinhold Niebuhr offered a prayer that well says what these insights about time might mean for us in everyday life:
O Lord, who holds all our yesterdays, todays, and tomorrows in your eternal presence, we thank you that in imaginations and reason we are fearfully and wonderfully made, transcending time and thus becoming creators with you. Give us grace to know we do not share your foresight into the future or your power over it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
What is often said in the black church is true: God may not come when you want him, but he's always on time!
