THE CREATOR OF TIME AND SPACE
Some Facts about the God Who Has Revealed Himself in
Scripture
By Gary Ray Branscome
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
Genesis 1:1
While
the first words of Genesis are often only seen as an introduction to what
follows, and they do introduce what follows, those words are not only the
introduction to the first two chapters of Genesis, but to everything else that
the Bible says. However, because those words are an introduction, readers often
pass over them without grasping the full significance of what they say.
In the Hebrew language the words, “heaven and earth” mean “all that exists”,
the entire universe. In other words, in the beginning God created the entire
universe. And, the fact that He did not create the sun, moon and stars until
the fourth day tells us that in the beginning He created space itself. Space
did not exist until God created it! Furthermore, because time cannot exist
without space, the beginning spoken of in Genesis 1:1 is the beginning of both
time and space.
If you find what I have just said hard to follow, let me explain it this way.
For time to exist there must be a place where time is passing. If time was not
passing anywhere, how could we say that it was passing at all? Likewise, if
space existed without time there could be no movement in it, for movement takes
time. And, if no movement was possible, how could we say that space exists? The
idea of space without movement seems absurd, and the idea of time passing
without a place to pass seems equally absurd. Therefore, it seems obvious that
space and time must exist together.
Consider also this fact:
Time
must have had a beginning point. If it did not have a beginning point, we could
never have arrived at this point in time.
If that idea is new to you, if you think that time has always existed,
you might just assume that no matter how many “billions” or “trillions of
billions” of years have passed before this point in time, the present is just
where we are now in time. However, that idea assumes that time had a beginning
point “billions” or “trillions of billions” of years ago. In reality, if time
has truly existed from infinity, and you could somehow go back “billions” and
even “trillions of billions” of years into the past, then the amount of
time that would be still further in the past would still be infinite. And, if
it was infinitely distant in the past, then it would take an infinite amount of
time for the present to reach that point in time, even longer to reach this
point in time. And, an infinite amount of time means FOREVER. It
would take forever to reach this point in time! And, that is why time must have
had a beginning point. Otherwise the present could not exist.
In the beginning of time God created the heaven
[i.e. space] and the earth. That, along with the details recorded in the rest
of the Genesis record, is the profound truth that underlies all that we
believe. Our God is the creator of both time and space! And, the words, “The
invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being
understood by the things that are made,” tell us that both time and space were
created to reveal invisible truths about God. Truths such as the fact that He
is present everywhere, and has no beginning or end. In short, our God does not
exist somewhere in space. On the contrary, time and space are His creations. He
exists in another dimension, a spiritual dimension, which transcends both space
and time. And, because His existence transcends both space and time He is not
limited by space and time. That may explain why He is able to exist as both
three and one. It is perfectly reasonable for us to expect a being whose very
existence transcends space and time to be totally different from beings limited
by space and time. In fact, it would be unreasonable to expect otherwise.
Because time and space were created by God, they both illustrate His triune
nature. Like God, space consists of three parts (three dimensions) often spoken
of as length, width and height. Likewise, time consists of three parts past,
present and future. In both cases the three are one! In fact, it is impossible
for space to exist without all three dimensions. Those who want to dispute this
may try to imagine a two-dimensional existence where everything is as thin as a
piece of paper. However, they forget that paper has thickness. If you take all
of the thickness away nothing will remain. Space must exist as both three and one
or it will not exist at all.
Conclusion
The God of the Bible is the Creator of the entire universe and everything in
it. Moreover, He created all things in six days, a little over six-thousand
years ago, just as the Bible says. Those who reject this God, those who have
created for themselves another god, a god that grew up on another planet, or a
god who used evolution (with all the death and suffering that entails) to
create life; are worshipping a false god. Am I saying that everyone who believes
in evolution is lost? Not necessarily. Believing in evolution is a sin that can
be forgiven like any other sin. However, the words of John
Because they have rejected the true God (the God who created time, space and
everything in it in six days), the words, “God gave them up to vile affections:
for even their women exchanged the natural use for that which is contrary to
nature,” (Romans 1:26) may explain why homosexuality is so common in churches
that have rejected that God in favor of a “god who used evolution”.