The Moment Between Time

In science fiction the present has been portrayed as a still moment stretched out over minutes, hours, and even years. Picture a man living in that kind of moment while everyone around him is frozen in space and time. That person then moves and walks among those people as if they were statues with mouths open in mid speech, stationary arms in mid swing of a walking stance, someone frozen in mid air as he avoids tripping by skipping over a running cat stretched out in full flight across his path — except everyone is caught in that moment without any movement at all. This is fiction because in reality we are captured by time. For us, our history-in-the-making cannot stand still.

In Romans 12:1-2 (see my paraphrase below), the renewal of the mind takes place in a moment between the old present, less than perfect, sinful world — and the transformed, resurrected, grace-recreated, new world.  These two verses picture a person trusting God with dedicated thought and action in the moment captured there. The thought and action caught in the scriptural photo that is portrayed in the still-frame of the motion is acted out according to what Paul is describing as the transformed future. How do we live in this grace-governed eternal moment?

In his exposition, Karl Barth uses the word “repentance” for this moment. “Repentance is — the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is the will of God, even what is good and acceptable and perfect” (The Epistle to the Romans, pg436). Repentance is a stretched moment between the world identified with Adam in the Garden of Eden and the world identified with Christ resurrected so that we are new creatures, citizens of Heaven, made perfect by grace.

I’ve lived through some of these extended and timeless moments of perpetual repentance. One such moment was in 1973 when I was called out to serve Jesus with my every moment and every thought. It was a six-month moment that has had ongoing implications since then. That is what Romans 12:1-2 is describing. Present your bodies — that is your every action. Present your taking a spoon to eat your breakfast cereal, your walking in the yard, and your watching entertainment. Present them as worship! Present your breathing in and out, your watching out windows at others, and the words you speak in a conversation. Present them as worship! Present your traveling to the next location, your involvement in the next action, and your next endeavor to complete the coming activity. Present them as worship!  Then stretch this out to all your thoughts and activities. Present them as worship! Make up your mind and present them as worship!

The Apostle Paul is right in his explanation of how we cannot excel to accomplish this in any other way than by way of a timeless living and acted out, thought out repentance. Repentance here has to mean our urgent grasping ahold of the full meaning of what Jesus has done for us by lifting us above our imperfect nature by saving grace — and then our putting our weight down in the step we are taking or the thought we are making by way of the vision of a transformed future completing who we already are by faith in what we think and what we do with our bodies. I’ve had many of these special moments in my life and my goal is to have the time and distance between these kinds of moments diminish into nothing so that the moment takes over my entire life from here on out. At that time, time will be no more and the lasting moment will be called eternity.

“I strongly urge you, therefore, brothers and sisters — through all these mercies God has given you, to make up your minds to give all you do with your bodies as a living sacrifice (your sleeping, eating, going-to-work or school, recreation, entertainment, and walking-around), make what you do a daily offering that is devoted and well pleasing to God. All the things you do will be your reasoned response of worship. Do not be squeezed into the shape dictated by the customs of this age (conforming to them), but continue to be changed by renewed thinking (transformation) that molds your minds in such a way as to pass the test of finding and following God‘s will; that is, what is good (valuable to God), well-pleasing to him, and complete (all that is required).” (My paraphrase — See Romans 2:1-2 in “The New Testament in the Language of the People, ESV, NASB, Phillips, NT for Everyone, NIV, The Message, NLT, and other translations and commentaries such as “The New International Greek Testament Commentary, The Epistle to the Romans,” by Richard N. Longenecker)

W. Stephen Williams © 7/13/2024