Reading for the Day: God's Sense of Time

Do not ignore this one fact, beloved,

that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years

and a thousand years like one day.

The Lord does not delay his promise, as some regard "delay,"

but he is patient with you,

not wishing that any should perish

but that all should come to repentance.

2 Peter 3: 8-9

In today's Second Reading, it is Peter's turn to address the question of the timing of the Second Coming (oh so tempting to study the extent to which that phenomenon affected the writing of the New Testament). And here he is saying that God's sense of time is not like their (our) sense of time. With the Lord, one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like one day.

This reminds me of stories where the characters are immortal. The elves in The Lord of the Rings Series come to mind. At one point, Legolas says, ""Time does not tarry ever, but change and growth is not in all things and places alike. For the Elves the world moves, and it moves both very swift and very slow. Swift, because they themselves change little, and all else fleets by: it is a grief to them. Slow, because they do not count the running years, not for themselves." But even the elves could be killed and thus, for them, time could stop. 

When we are given the grace to see things from the point of God, it changes our perspective on time. And from that point of view, Peter tells us that God never delays his promises, God only has a different sense of time. May we be as patient with Him as he is patient with us.