Just listened to a short but very interesting and somewhat provocative talk on TED about social networking http://video.ted.com/talk/podcast/2011G/None/AdamOstrow_2011G.mp4 and I got to thinking about how we wrestle with a concept of a “God” who is aware of everything that goes on. Every thought, action, intent – even the deep, unconscious meanderings of the heart. An amazing thought indeed.
What a headache!! I can’t imagine what it could be like. Billions of people, whether asleep or awake each having billions of thoughts. Conscious or unconscious. Feelings, emotions, plans, humour, silliness, brilliance, stupidity …. and everything in between. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be God. With all due respect, I wouldn’t want God’s job?
And the narrative suggests that we want to take the place of God. Evict God and elevate ourselves as the supreme rulers of our destiny. …. another amazing thought indeed.
And then this short talk suggests the amount of data we are generating all the time and the potential it may have as we ride this exponential wave or virtual reality …
I can’t help thinking about what goes through the mind of a dog when it eventually does succeed in catching it’s own tail?
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ha ha the dog and the tail! ouch!
The snake eating it’s tail was the picture for cyclical time in the ancient world. Another potent metaphor.
The Bible narrative presents a view of time from Genesis to Revelation… but does it rule out cyclical time? There is nothing new under the sun, says Ecclesiastes. There is Christ, the second Adam.
The Biblical concept ot time therefore is less like a line, but more like a spiral, ascending.
Nietzche’s concept of “eternal return” – every moment has it’s eternal feedback, a loop, an unending echo… spinning in space…
God is outside of time – from the perspective of God’s eternity, each thought, action, word is accessible and assessed on it’s own, as he approaches us in love, outside of the noise and din. Judgement is therefore predicated on God being seperate from our reality, being all-seeing, and all-knowing.
We’ve created our own simulacrum of eternity through technologies of the written word, the latest and most succcessful being the internet. The internet is the most fragile ontologically, depending as it does on electricity (and our capacity to sustain the production of electrical energy); however it has made us feel powerful in our ability to step outside of chronological time more radically than ever before.
But what exactly are we trying to prove? No-one has the lifespan to take advantage of all this information made public – our mortality makes sure of that. And as already shown on this blog, esp. in the twitter experiment, it’s all so self-indulgent and so self-promoting in any case.
God is however completely interested in us. He doesn’t bombard us with his status updates! His word is “forever established”. He has no need to be recognized by us, but out of His love, He reaches down to us: mostly in a silent, subtle way.
Living in our crazy post-modern world, the “sure foundation, solid rock, mighty fortress” that is our God, is more appealing to me than anything the net has to offer. But that’s not to say I haven’t been seduced by the virtual reality, the escape into a fake eternity.
The heavens declare God’s glory, but our city’s lights obscure our sight. Oh to be again in awe of Him that is the fullness filling all in all…
instead of wasting so much time in front of a computer…