I AM - II

2. I AM – and not I WAS, I WILL BE, or I AM NOW

I hope that in this sequel the words I write will not confuse you (it’s a difficult subject matter), but rather that they will inspire you to look at this world and our existence with different eyes

As I have explained in part one by means of the analogy of a three-dimensional object passing through the vision of a two dimensional creature, the idea of time as a dynamically changing, evolving phenomenon is a very stubborn illusion, but in my opinion, an illusion it is.

Time past does not exist for us just as future time does not exist.

Even the time zone of the NOW, often used by self-anointed gurus to promote their solution to the world’s problems, ‘staying in the NOW’, is elusive; just try to grab hold of the moment, the NOW: it is not there.
The instance we try to pinpoint the moment it has already ceased to be, so it’s the equivalent of chasing the rainbow. And yet, we can see the rainbow.

The same is true for the past: how does it exist?
Although history can be recorded on the pages of history books, it is nothing more than the subjective obituary of a timeline which does not exist anymore.
And of course the future is nothing more than a possible timeline waiting to unfold and pass our field of existence, it does not exist either.

The only thing which REALLY is, is expressed in ‘I AM’, YHWH.
This is why Yahshua stated: “Before Abraham was, I AM”.

I AM expresses a state of being as opposed to a state of existing on the pages of time as expressed in time past, time present and the future time.

I AM expresses the absolute stillness contrasting with a state of motion, such as the motion of time. That which we call progress or regress is simply an expression of movement for which there would be no need if we truly acted from the absolute stillness.

God describes Himself as the One who remains eternally the same and does not change, because He is the absolute stillness.

Malachi 3:6: "For I YHWH do not change"

The stillness characteristic of God's being is the reason why throughout the whole Bible the importance of being still before God is stressed, because to be still and learn to stand back from involvement in the (e-motional) movement is brought about by learning to be centered in the stillness of God.

The (e-)motional involvement with our time-based existence to the extent that we become glued to the pages of time (we derive our identity from the force acting through the motion rather than having an identity derived from the center of stillness) brings as a consequence that we become part of the reality created by the motion of time (like being usurped into the screen of a motion picture), and when time runs out due to its temporal character contrasting with the eternal character of the stillness of God (the movie ends), we disintegrate together with time and end up at the opposite spectrum of peace, joy and stillness, which is hell

The problem with a lot of gurus is that although they may emphasize the need to be still, they leave God out of the picture and seek to bypass Him.
But seeking the answer in stillness without God is just another form of denial (escapism), even a form of idolatry. Transcendental Meditation is a nice illustration.
To involve yourself with all these types of Eastern oriented meditation garbage is quite dangerous, because it can completely deaden your mind and turn you into a disabled zombie living on a deserted isle in your head.

When I speak of the illusion of time as a dynamic phenomenon you may say: “Well, if I look in the mirror throughout the years I DO see a changing countenance, wrinkles appear as evidence that for me time IS real and dynamically affects my body”.

Is that so?
Our bodies, being made of the substance of time, are like dried paint glued to the canvas. It cannot move because it is stuck to the canvas just as our bodies are like dried paint on the canvas of time.
The movement is caused by us, the observers (of the painting), moving our heads across the canvas of time thereby creating an illusion of time passing.

So when we look in the mirror throughout the years and we see a changing countenance, we are like observers looking at different locations on the painting as we move our head from left to right, which causes the illusion of time (paint) passing.
Or, to remain in lockstep with the original example of an orange passing a two dimensional field of vision, the painting is moving from right to left, passing the field of our soul’s vision.

It does not mean we have a zillion different bodies in our lifetime as the analogy with a painting might indicate, from a young growing body to an old decaying body.

Compare it to a computer game where the fabric of each moment is predetermined in the source code. Our bodies are part of that source code and as such predetermined for each moment of the ‘game’.
The direction of the game depends on the choices we make in life, and the reflection in the mirror of an ‘aging’ body is simply the result of ‘code-execution’, the progress of the game.

How about photographs, movies, are they not proof of the fact that time exists and dynamically evolves?
What are photographs other than time-based matter reflecting matter in time?
The same it true for a movie, which is nothing other than a collection of slides rapidly being projected on a screen, creating an illusion of motion.

Think of how cartoons are made, by drawings of movements in sequential order so that if one e.g. takes photos of each of these movements and paste the photos in the frames of a film, the illusion of motion is created by playing back the film so that for instance 20 frames per second pass our eye and create the illusion of motion.
Time is no different than that, I tried to make that clear with my allegory illustrating our dimensional limitations.

I believe that the phenomenon of time as a dynamic phenomenon is an illusion created by the fact that God put our souls into a vessel which is part of (glued into) the time-based creation, and just as a movie is a portrait of a scenario, our time-based Creation and the story of mankind is the portrayal of God’s scenario.
The experience of time as a dynamic phenomenon is the result of living in the reality unfolding from the code, but in God’s eyes the scenarios contained within the code are already known from the beginning until the end.

Our souls rooted in God’s stillness are the only REAL elements which are NOT derived from the reality created by the time-based ‘program-code’, and our participation in God’s time-based screenplay is like the participation of an individual in a play.
God did not create it for entertainment purposes because He was bored and had nothing else to do, He created it for us as a learning environment, the equivalent of a diamond cutter’s workshop where the diamonds (souls) are cut. Just as our bodies need a womb to develop to the stage where we in our matured physical bodies can enter the world, our souls need the womb of the world to develop to the stage where we can enter God’s reality.

The many drawings of time-scenarios are like pages in a book, a book written by God, and it is already completely finished from beginning to end, just as the orange in the example I mentioned is a completely finished object.
That is why visions of the future are no mystery to God, He simply lights up a few pages of His creation book.

So, from the perspective of God in the spiritual realm, I am born, I have lived and my body died already in one instance outside of time, just as the entire painting is already finished the moment it is exhibited.

This is why a child of God should not allow Satan to point his accusing finger at past sins in order to make us feel unworthy, because God does not only know the past, He also knows what we (from our perspective) WILL be, and He sees in us the complete finished portrait of who we are as His children.

The past is to God just a stage in the creation of us as His perfected children, and that stage is not the measuring rod to God by means of which He will evaluate us.
Surely a piano builder does not judge the instrument when he is still in the designing stage, that would be utter folly, but rather he looks at the finished result and THEN makes an evaluation.

Trust me, ALL God’s children are perfect in their finished design, and this is where God focuses on, just as a piano builder focuses on the finished piano and chisels away to arrive at that desired end result.

When we sin God provides correction and lets us face the consequences of our sin, so it is not as if God allows us to indulge in a lifestyle of sin ‘because He knows what we will be in the end’.
Without such correction we would never arrive at the stage of God’s intended end result. The correction He provides leads us closer to the finished end result.

But He yearns to forgive sin, and when He forgives sin, it no longer exists for Him.

Isaiah 43:25: "I, I am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins."

Past sin is only made a stumbling block by the one who likes to prevent us from becoming true children of God, and accusations over past sins come from the source who would like to glue our eternal souls to the canvas of time and obstruct our development as God’s children. That source seeks to sabotage and lock us into the designing stage so that we never develop into the souls we were intended to be.
But in His wisdom God uses that source as a chisel to work on our souls.
God looks at the complete person of His redeemed, not the (ugly) stages he/she may have gone through.

Just as one can move one’s hands to the left of a painting, then to the right and back again, putting one’s finger on certain places in the painting, God is able to move forward and backward into what we refer to as history (the painting, or the novel).
This enables God to be at a million different locations at what we perceive to be the same moment in time, simply because the painting is static and God can return to the same spot in the painting a million times over.

The observer moving his head from left to right in front of a painting creates an illusion of motion in the mind of the observer; likewise, the passing of time is really caused by the painting moving from what we refer to as ‘the past’ to ‘the future’, which are directions in time, and the 'unfolding of time' is nothing other than the execution of the reality containted within the source code of creation, based on our decisions.
This unfolding seems dynamic to us because we are locked into the time-based reality, but it is static in the sense that each scenario is already present within the source code.

The way I see it, time itself is static, glued to the pages of God’s novel, it is a completely finished source code executing the program we refer to as God’s creation.
It’s like a virtual reality, and the irony is that people are so caught up with this time based creation that they tend to regard this illusion created by dimensional limitations as the ultimate reality, while the truth is that the spiritual, that which they tend to regard as the outcome of man’s imagination, is the reality.

The moment that we, through sin, begin to identify with the image of us presented on the film of time, we begin to be part of the movement of time AWAY from the I AM (YHWH, the source of the state of being of our souls), and we become partakers of the temporal character of time, as expressed in the Bible when it speaks of ‘the END of time’.
Just as when an elastic is stretched this results in a tension, our movement away from God creates a tension in us, and God designed this tension as a warning signal which should drive us back to God in order to relieve that tension.

Our identification with a time-based identity is the equivalent of moving away from the domain of the I AM, which exists OUTSIDE of time, and can be compared to us becoming plastered to the frames on the film of a movie through our sinful identification (our ‘state of denial’).
Our existence in the identity birthed by YHWH is eternal just as our existence in the identity birthed through sin is temporal and leads to eternal death.

Just as the eye of the hurricane is a center of stillness contrasting with the devastating movement around the eye, we need to center ourselves in the stillness of God at the center of creation lest we be swiped away by the devastating outer motion of the hurricane.

On the holodeck of God’s creation, our souls are the only real, lasting elements.

God designed this holodeck as a womb for our souls.
On this holodeck our souls are afforded the opportunity to get to know and love our Creator by means of contrast with what God is not, the binary nature of creation as I have outlined in the 'Image of the Tree' series of posts.
During our stay and growth in this womb of creation we can rely on Him to the fullest because He is the Master of time, and He knows the end from the beginning. All His children are known by name and receive His loving attention in every detail of their lives.

Isaiah 43:1: "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine".

What more can we possibly hope for other than to be known and loved by our wonderful Creator?

Isaiah 46:9-10:

“For I AM God, and there is no other,
I AM God, and there is none like Me,
Declaring the end from the beginning
And from ancient times things not yet done,
Saying, My council shall stand,
And I will accomplish all My purpose”

Click here for part three.