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Abstract

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I
Chapter  1
Chapter  2
Chapter  3
Chapter  4
Chapter  5

Part II
Chapter  6
Chapter  7
Chapter  8
Chapter  9

Part III
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13

Appendixes

Journey Out of Time

 

FOREWORD

     In C. S. Lewis' well known Narnia series he describes how several quite ordinary English children, playing
hide and seek, enter a quite ordinary English wardrobe and, pressing deeper into the familiar garments,
suddenly find themselves in a strange and mysterious land. To read Journey out of Time is apt to give the
reader a somewhat similar experience. It begins with familiar concepts of space and time which may even
seem a bit dull and prosaic. But as one reads on, the walls silently move back, the commonplace begins to
glow and soon one is aware of a new dimension of thought that startles and captivates the fancy.
     I first became familiar with the writings of Arthur Custance through his self-published Doorway Papers. The
help I gained through his meticulous research in themes from Genesis 1—10 led me from one exciting
Doorway Paper to another. In the course of this, I came across his Paper on Time and Eternity which gave me
the first satisfying answer I had found to the conundrums gathering around the biblical themes of the
resurrection body and the return into time of Jesus Christ.
     This in turn led to a memorable week in 1973, I believe, when Dr. Custance consented to visit us in California and share his devout scholarship with us in evening and daytime lectures.
     This present volume, I believe, will prove an open door into fresh and startling new views of many familiar
Bible passages.

Ray Stedman  

Peninsula Bible Church   
Palo Alto, California    
April, 1981    

     pg.1 of 5    


We must
not use reason,
or knowledge gained
by scientific means, as a
basis for our Faith, since that
kind of knowledge may prove to
be in error.   But we may indeed use
reason and scientific knowledge to explore
what we already abelieve. The point is important.

 

     pg.2 of 5    

 

 

 

INTRODUCTION

 

     We are great travellers these days. Every one is "going somewhere else" — to England, to Europe, to
South America, to the Caribbean. So exciting to most people is the prospect of travel that the destination
itself is scarcely important! The great thing is to be on the move and to be going "first class" if possible.
Probably Americans are the most mobile people in the world — with the exception of nomads!
     But there is one journey we are reluctant to think about — at least, we want to postpone it as long as
possible. It is the journey out of time into eternity. Yet we know we shall all, or nearly all, have to make it
in the end, and at a time not altogether of our choosing. . . .  
    What can it mean to pass out of this world of space and time and find ourselves in a timeless, spaceless (?)
world in which to move from one "place" to another will neither occupy time nor require passing through
the intervening space between? How "long" will it take? How does one "go" there?
    A propos of the matter of the "time" taken for this journey, I once presented a paper to a very small
Toronto audience on Einstein's theory of the relativity of time. This was in 1939. Present in the audience

     pg.3 of 5    

was a Christian man of mature years who also happened to be a lawyer of some consequence, the legal
advisor to one of Toronto's largest newspapers.
     After the lecture, he came up to me and said: "This is all nonsense! How can you say that where there is no
space there is no time either? Existence without time is inconceivable!" But then he added, "I'd still like to
have a copy of your paper."
     So I gave him one. But I hardly felt encouraged by his response to a truth I had only a little while before
perceived as having a profound relevance to what happens when we pass out of this world and go to be
forever with the Lord.
    Some weeks later, I had a phone call from him. "What did you mean," he asked, "by the statement. . . ." and
he read to me a couple of sentences that were really the crux of the matter. And I could see that he had
been mulling over the subject and was in fact on the verge of seeing the whole point. Indeed, about three
months later he was explaining it all to his wife and invited me to come over and help him along! He had
gotten the point. And you may imagine how rewarded I felt.
     Anyway, you may very well find yourself wondering, as he did. I only hope you will stay with it. I believe it
provides an answer to a very profound problem that has been unresolved for centuries but is now within
sight of resolution and the prospect is indeed an exciting one.

     Someone said that it takes two to tell a truth, one to speak it and one to hear it spoken. There are truths
that we only grasp after we have given them verbal expression for the benefit of someone else. We may think we understand a truth, but when we try to share it with another person we often discover that we only half understand it ourselves. Then the attempt to communicate it clarifies our thoughts and the would-be teacher becomes his own pupil and learns from himself by the effort of telling.
     I believe that the reader will profit most from this study if he will try to share it with a friend with whom
rapport has already been established, and will then discuss it so as to clarify its implications. These implications are profound and far reaching.
     There is much to comfort those who have fears about the journey that is to be taken from time into eternity when we come to crossing over Jordan. Moreover, some centuries-old questions regarding the

     pg.4 of 5    

nature of the intermediate state between death and resurrection are answered in a new way.
     Although it seemed necessary to begin with certain aspects of time upon which recent research has
shed an entirely new light, the perceptive reader will soon begin to recognize the relevance of this
research to a number of more puzzling passages of Scripture, the meaning of which has hitherto
remained somewhat obscure.
      New light may also be shed on the phenomenon of expectancy of the Lord's soon return, an expectancy
that seems so clearly indicated in the New Testament and has always been dear to the Lord's people in
spite of centuries of "delay." Indeed, so long has this delay continued that many believe such expectancy
is both unreasonable and improper. This study, however, will help to show that such a negative conclusion
is entirely unwarranted. The Second Coming of the Lord in glory can indeed be looked for, expectantly, by
every believer.

     If you find the going difficult here and there, don't give up. You will be amply rewarded in the end. Press on, and gradually the picture will become clearer until suddenly the light will shine and you will say, "Oh, I
see!" and you will rejoice in the Lord.
     This is a foray into territory that is not usually explored by the Christian reader, and it stretches the mind
in new directions. It is an adventure in ideas that may at first seem to be foreign to the things that matter
most to us the Lord's people. But eventually you will find that the Word of God has been marvelously
illuminated in an entirely new way as the old Faith becomes doubly reassuring about one of the greatest
mysteries of life, the journey out of time into eternity.

 

     pg.5 of 5    

Copyright © 1988 Evelyn White. All rights reserved

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