A light is placed inside an empty train car on one side. Across the car on the opposite inside wall is a mirror which reflects the light back across from where it came. A man stands inside the car and records the time it takes for a flash from the light to reflect in the mirror and return to its original side.
The same experiment is repeated, only this time, a man also sits outside the train car as the car rolls slowly by him at the speed of one mile per hour. This man also records the time it takes for the light to cross the car and return.
The time recorded by the second man outside the car is longer by an infinitesimal amount than the time recorded by the first man who was inside the car even though they both time the same flash.
Why? Because the light for the second man, who views a moving car, must travel at an angle that is slightly longer than the distance the light must travel for the first man. Thus the second man records a longer interval though timing the same flash.
This experiment demonstrates Einstein’s theory of relativity; a theory that states that time can expand and contract resulting in variable measurements depending upon ones perspective. (For more on this concept, see the website: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/einstein/relativity/ and http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/einstein/
Should this knowledge affect our understanding of time in theology? Men view time from within the time/space continuum ( as though we are in the train car), but God views time from outside of the time/space continuum (as though he is outside the train car). Is this concept the solution to the tensions we find in scripture between the sovereignty of God and the free will of man? For instance, when the scriptures say that “Pharoah hardened his heart” and then also say that “God hardened Pharoah’s heart”, must we reconcile these two statements or relate them to one another in a hierarchy? Perhaps we can learn from Einstein’s conclusions that the two statements differ and cannot be reconciled, yet both are true.
