Escahtological Inbreaking of Time

Last night in the worship class I teach we discussed the significance of "God's time". It was very difficult to have this conversation without sounding like a dualist (a 4-letter word at Dordt college... I was waiting for the "dualism" police to break down my door...) We talked about heavenly time, divine time, and our time, all in the context of our visit to the Catholic church. Father Klein walked us through the Catholic mass, commenting and explaining, when he said something about the relationship between the book of Revelation and Roman Catholic liturgy. During the hour worshippers engage the liturgy - they are no longer solely experiencing temporal time... but they are mystically immersed in divine time. In this context worship becomes truly "catholic". The boundaries of minutes, hours, and years are shattered as the martyrs, the faithful - all of creation past and present- worships the one who sits on the throne and the lamb.

In class I referred to this as the eschatological inbreaking of divine time. The cycle of weekly worship. The liturgical year. Praying the hours. All glimmers of this eschatological inbreaking.

Wednesday I came home from a meeting and I could feel it in my knees. I was in trouble. Whenever I get sick I feel it in my knees first. I laid down "just for awhile"... and I was out for the count. Chills, aches...sleep. And sleep I did. I really hate being sick. Classes to teach, papers to grade, sermons to write... all of it comes to a screeching halt. The eery movement in and out of true consciousness - attempting to get up only to be sucker punched in the stomach. Down again.

I couldn't help but reflect upon the conversation from class... the eschatological inbreaking of divine time. Our culture is obsessed with time management. We break time into nanoseconds so we can squeeze out every ounce of productivity. Even at a college - which is supposed to be a place of reflection - our protestant utilitarianism merges with our capitalist tendencies and we cram as much stuff as we can into every ounce of time. Students and faculty alike...moving at warp speed. So maybe we should be thankful for colds...for those minor bouts of sickness that throw wrenches into the gears of our managed time - forcing us to stop whether we like it or not. Getting clubbed over the head with the eschatological time of God. Just a thought...