THE PARODOX OF TIME

KEY VERSE: Therefore, sent he (the King of Syria) thither horses, and chariots, and a great host: and they came by night, and compassed the city about. And when the servant of the man of God (Elisha) was risen early, and gone forth, behold, an host compassed the city both with horses and chariots. And his servant said unto him, “Alas, my master! how shall we do?” And he answered, “Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.” And Elisha prayed, and said, “Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see.” And the Lord opened the eyes of the young man; and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha. (2 Kings 6:14-16)

  I have written many times that rebirth is the first step to salvation is the interval between a condition of “safety” and finally “saved.” In the key verse, Elisha opened the eyes of his young helper to see that Israel was not alone, but were quite SAFE! Invisible to the man previously, but now seen, was that the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire.

  Christians are never left alone. God keeps them safe. Although Christians are blind to it, there is an army encircling Christians to protect them from the evil one. God never leaves righteous men to contend with evil alone. The best example of that is with Moses and his seventy “judges” when God said, “I will take of the spirit which is upon thee, and will put it upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with thee, that thou bear it not thyself alone.” God provides for those who are His. It’s that simple!

  Israel belonged to God, and He provided safety against their adversary, and they were certainly not pure! God wanted them to be safe for His purpose – as the place where Jesus was born!

Likewise, God keeps Christians safe for His purposes – that they be saved. Job had a spiritual “hedge” about him to keep him safe from evil (Job 1). There seems to be an invisible presence that cannot be seen, except with bright eyes. In the key verse, God gave the young man bright eyes so that he could see the safety that God provided!

  This commentary, however, is not about conditional or eternal security; it’s about the unseen. Faith is two-fold: (1) Seeing God in the creation, and (2) seeing the unseen, as evidenced by two passages: (1) “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse,” (Rom 1:20) and (2) “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Heb 11:1).

  The young man saw the creation (for instance, the mountain). He knew it was real, and being with Elisha he surely believed in the Creator God as most Israelites did. Many, on the other hand, believed in many creator gods. “God” for them was not personal, but were those of wood, clay, silver, gold, and so forth. The young man was about to see that God was a personal God. He needed to trust that God, indeed, would take care of them. When the young man showed fear at the magnitude of the enemy, Elisha knew that the young man needed an increase in faith. Elisha prayed and God revealed to the young man the “hedge of safety” which protects God’s people even when they don’t deserve protection.

  The young man’s faith was increased, because God gave him evidence of things not seen. He saw a Holy Mountain with horses and chariots of fire. It can be assumed that he saw Jesus on his white horse, as was written much later from John’s vision: “And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer” (Rev 6:2). Well, the young man saw Jesus ready to conquer on behalf of his people - Israel.

Jesus always protects his chosen people. Although they at times deserved a loss of protection, in the end Jesus has kept Israel safe for all these thousands of years because they are his chosen (peculiar) people as Christians are! Note that Israel is not saved yet, but shall be saved. Israel’s salvation comes at the end of time (Rev 21) when they are saved from the adversary forever.

  Previous to that, chariots of fire came in the whirlwind to take up Elijah (2 Kings 2:11).

Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand… A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run. Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. (Joel 2:1, 305)

  The young man saw what Joel saw! Incidentally, Isaiah saw into the future the vision of chariots of fire as well. “For, behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire” (Isa 66:15).

  Isaiah saw Jesus leading the armies who will someday defeat the world-wide armies of Satan at the Battle of Armageddon (Rev 16:6). The young man saw the army of God who would eventually win the war of all wars when Jesus himself comes to lead the angelic army!

  The future army was prepared in the days of Elisha. The spiritual horse and chariots of fire are still around God’s peculiar people. As the young man, they are the safety of Christians, but that takes trust in Jesus. Do you believe Jesus will keep you safe? Do you believe that you will remain safe until the Adversary is put down? Being born again (John 3:5) is seeing what the young man saw. He trusted God for salvation, just as the Hebrews trusted God to keep them safe from the poisonous vipers as they are reminded by Jesus (John 3:14).

  In my book, On the Origin of Man and the Universe, I hypothesized that “heaven” is not out there, but coexists with us. Enoch wrote of the ten heavens, and the first heaven was the avenue of both men and spirits. (2 Enoch 4). There are “layers” of heaven with various substances and beings in each of the ten heavens. Enoch saw into them as the young man did, but angels actually took him there. Enoch was translated into the heavens. Enoch was taken to heaven on angels’ wings (2 Enoch 3:3 where he saw the “ether” and “great sea” greater than the Earth’s sea.

  Firmament is often taken to be a dome in various translations. The “curtain” of the firmament of Genesis, I wrote, is the celestial sphere which appears flat from any point on Earth. Its volume is its infinite radius times the area of the sphere. However, the content of the firmament is “ether.” “Shamayim” (heavens) in Genesis 1:1 is defined as the visible arch in which the clouds move, as well as the higher ether where the celestial bodies revolve” (Strong’s Dictionary).

  Strong’s definition for the Hebrew aligns well with what Enoch saw! Enoch saw the ether – the cosmos – on one side of the firmament – and a great sea, or sky, on the other side.

  The firmament seems to be a barrier between the Earth and the heavens which can only be crossed with special vision or with special causes; those which God gave to the prophets, the young man to increase his faith, and to those glorified. “Glorification” is more than it seems; it is the ability to cross the firmament in bodily form. The rapture is a trip just as Elijah and Enoch made in bodily form. It took trust in Jesus for the young man to see into the heaven, and trust of Jesus for Christians to obtain Heaven.

  I use the word, “obtain,” rather than “go to” because Heaven is just another existence which does not take time to be there. How is that known? Jesus told the thief on the cross beside him, “And Jesus said unto him, ‘Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise’” (Luke 23:43). “Today” was that evening when they both had died. They needed not travel any distance because Paradise shares the same space as Jerusalem.

  Human eyes only see the physical Jerusalem. It is “the foundation of peace.” Those who see what John the Revelator saw see more than the mountain on which the Temple stood, but the City of God where New Jerusalem exists now!

  People look to the sky and to the celestial map for Heaven. “Heaven is existence; the seen and the unseen.” They co-exist, it seems, in the same place. How silly it must be that the people of Babel built a tower to see Heaven, and that scientists seek knowledge of heaven from the stars. Why can’t they find Heaven? They look in the wrong manner in the wrong direction. The Kingdom of God is everywhere! It is where God Is, and it is now in the hearts of men. Christians know that Heaven exists because we sense God’s Presence.

  The proof of Heaven and God is known through Christians’ relationships with God. The Way to Heaven is through the straight gate. That is the Holy Mountain whereon Christ was crucified. It is the Holy Mountain where Jesus ascended, the Holy Mountain whereon Elijah was taken in a whirlwind, and the Holy Mountain whereon the young man saw into Heaven.

  Jesus was transfigured on a Holy Mountain. He was readied for his short journey. When he ascended into Heaven, he disappeared into the clouds. He did not “go” anywhere. He was translated into a different realm. John revealed where Jesus went in his Revelation. He remained in Jerusalem, and is still with us! (Acts 2).

  People find it difficult to understand God’s Presence. God’s “Person” – Jesus – is in Heaven; that is another realm. His Holy Spirit remains on Earth. That essence is the Holy Ghost of Jesus. Jesus is still in earth as He is in heaven. He remarked that, that is how we should pray: “When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth” (Luke 11:2).

  TransIators got that right; they did not capitalize “heaven and earth” because it does not refer to places but realms (existences).

   I always had trouble with the phrase “in earth.” That either meant in the material “earth” or in “Earth.” We think of ourselves as “ON Earth.” Our material consists of two things: the elements called “earth” and God’s Spirit. The “dust” and the “spirit” co-exist, not ON Earth, but “in the elements “earth.”

  That co-existence, of course, does not mean that we are already IN Heaven, though. Heaven must be obtained (Luke 20:35) as a reward for trusting God that it exists. Take God’s Word for it: The Creation is real, and it is both the seen and unseen. You must trust God that that is so!

Hell is in the “heavens” as well. It is a spiritual place. We know that from both Enoch’s tour of the ten heavens, and from the New Testament story of Lazarus and the rich man. There was a “great gulf” between Heaven and Hell (Luke 16:26).

  Neither is Hell a physical place, but existence in the heavens, but isolated entirely from Heaven. Hell is for real. God generated that as well. Lucifer and the angels existed therein before we existed in earth. As scripture indicates, our “cup” (the soul) existed before the foundation of the world (Ephes 1:4).

  With that said, human souls were created concurrently with the spiritual world, including the angels and Lucifer! What period was that? It was on the second “day” or the second process when God created Heaven in the heavens. On the next day, God formed the Earth from the “earth” (particle matter) that was generated in the first process.

  Christians understand that Lucifer and the angels are created beings, but neglect when they were generated. There was an interval of what is called “time” when Lucifer and the demon angels rebelled. Human beings were similar to the angels, but us a little lower (Psalm 8:5) since Jesus was made in human form, we also are a little lower the angels.

  Angels are created beings that were created during the same process in which human souls were. That was in the second process before the “dust” for the physical body of man was made as the foundation in the third process. That dust would provide the elements into which the heavenly soul and the physical body were joined together in the sixth process. (Gen 2:7).

  We should cease looking at “heaven and earth” as distinct existences, but as two substances created in the first process. It was when the seen and unseen were generated together, in the same space; one of invisible material and the other invisible. Scientists call that matter and antimatter. God called it “earth” and “heaven” and like matter and antimatter, they exist together, but matter is seen and antimatter remains unseen, although it has been detected.

  As an engineer, I always had trouble reconciling the paradox of time. The idea that “warming” and “cooling” for “days” and “nights” pertain to thermodynamic processes resolved that in my mind, with all the processes created before the “clock” (the Sun) was in use by mankind!