Knowledge?

WIKIPEDIA... 

Knowledge is a familiarity or awareness, of someone or something, such as facts (descriptive knowledge), skills (procedural knowledge), or objects (acquaintance knowledge) contributing to ones understanding. By most accounts, knowledge can be acquired in many different ways and from many sources, including but not limited to perception, reason, memory, testimony, scientific inquiry, education, and practice. The philosophical study of knowledge is called.. epistemology? 

"the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope. Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion."

Justified belief?

The "Here and Now" and the Presence of God

The "Here and Now" is where we pay attention. To pay attention means to consciously focus on one aspect of that which we are aware.

We can be aware of many things in the here and now and still not pay attention to them.

Definition: the process whereby a person concentrates on some features of the environment to the (relative) exclusion of others.

"Attention is the behavioral and cognitive process of selectively concentrating on a discrete aspect of information, whether considered subjective or objective, while ignoring other perceivable information"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention

"Attention is the cognitive process that makes it possible to position ourselves towards relevant stimuli and consequently respond to it. This cognitive ability is very important and is an essential function in our daily lives."

https://www.cognifit.com/attention

"Attention is a complex cognitive function which is essential for human behavior. Attention is a selection process for an external (sound, image, smell...) or internal (thoughts) event which has to be maintained at a certain level of awareness. It is not a stable but rather, fluctuating skill."

http://www.happy-neuron.com/brain-and-training/attention

From all this information we begin to understand that paying attention takes conscious effort.

Two Bible verses come to mind…

Romans 8:14 All that are led by the Spirit of God, they are the children of God.

John 10:27  My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.

And this one…

Matthew 10:19 When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour.

These verses speak of the present-tense indicative verb of paying attention to the Holy Spirit in the here and now. Not just acknowledging God's presence but recognizing Him and "choosing" to pay attention and to engage in your relationship with Him.

The enemy does not want you to do that. He will use distraction by trying to get you to focus, not on the present situation I call the "Here and Now" but on the past using condemnation/hopelessness or the future using speculation/fear... Or both.

Reality does not exist in the future or in the past.

We exist and have our being in the "Here and Now". It is where we make our choices and decisions that will shape our future. Do you trust in your limited perspective and understanding in your situation, or will you choose to pay attention to the Lover of your Soul and trust in His Guidance and Counsel? "Now" is the time, and "here" is the place we create the future God wants us to have.

Philippians 3:12 (NLT) I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. 13 No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead.

Proverbs 3:5 (CEV) With all your heart you must trust the LORD and not your own judgment. 6 Always let him lead you, and he will clear the road for you to follow.

Notes on "Time"

Time: A succession of moments demarcating change in the physical realm of our existence*

(*1. The fact or state of existing; being.
2. The fact or state of continued being.
Synonyms:  actuality, being)

Only the now exists. Ongoing existence is continually being created and held together by God. Creation was not a single act of God but is an on ongoing activity. 

Colossians 1:17 "He existed before anything else, and he holds all creation together."

The past is forever gone. The present now is where we exist and have our being. The future has not yet been created by our choices and God's deference to those choices. 

God has yet to exert his will completely, in hope that all will repent. Some of the future is determined and God knows it as a certainty, although it does not yet exist. Some of the future is open and God knows it as a contingency and it does not yet exist. Existence is the present now.

Now is the succession of moments demarcating Creation. Creation is continually held together by God and the concept of time is the result of the cause and effect progression of change in creation/existence. Creation is the ongoing task of God. He has chosen to share some of that task.

To some extent, we "create" our own existence by the choices we make. Our existence in the now is partly determined by the choices we have made in the past. Our future existence in creation is partly determined by choices we make in the now with the before ordained plan of God, manifested in Jesus Christ.

The plan of God finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ even before the foundations of creation/existence were laid.

Our present now is relative. Reality is comprised of a multitude of relative nows. The physicality of existence requires relativity in individual nows. My now is unique. No one else can experience my now except God.

Creation is created moment by moment. God is in the moment by moment, creating our existence. The future has yet to be created. Therein rests the Hope that motivates the Lover of our Soul.

You and I view existence from a particular perspective limited by our locale. This limited perspective inhibits our comprehension of reality as a whole.

Because God is outside the physicality of our existence, does that mean He is outside of time? To say God is outside of time makes no sense. Time is inside God. God creates and holds existence together as an ongoing activity. Existence is created by God moment by moment and is demarcated by change which results in the observance of time. To say it another way, time is the observance of change in existence as God creates it moment by moment. God is the creator of time.

It exists because of God’s ongoing activity of creation.

TIME exists because change is observed. Change occurs because things move. Things move because of the “Prime Mover” God.

The Past - Is Fact    
The Future - Is Potential
The present - God's ongoing act of creation enabling Existence.

The "Specious Present"?

Others have tried to explain "Now" in terms defined by clock time. Google "Specious Present" and see what I mean. They think time exists and they talk about duration. They speculate about Specious Present as a temporal equivalent of a sensory datum.

It's not complicated "Now" is where we reside.

I'm "Here" in the "Now".

"Here" is where my memory operates and my reason anticipates. My "here" is limited in the "Now" by the nature of the physical realm and I know very little.

Choices. The distraction.

Choices. The distraction.

Memory and reason are the foundation of an observer's ability to choose. It presupposses a comprehension of tensed facts created by previous choices. The truth condemns and choice proves to be my down fall. Why? I was not designed to rely only on my memory and ability to reason.

Two things make it more complicated. The accuser,  and the tense facts that I created.

It seems I am unable to foresee and comprehend the ramification of my choice and it's effect on the continuum.

"Now" is where I become.

Now is where I am. Where I am changes and that change is beyond my control, mostly. Try to stop the moment from passing by. Can you? It is just like your choices. Can you stop making choices? Try it...

See what I mean, you've just experienced the determinism created by the interaction of mass and energy.

Tensed facts are created in the the continuum of reality that I call "Now". In their creation they become unalterable. They are created by the temporal, dynamic cause and effect interaction of mass and energy.

The observer, you and me, are confronted by reason and memory. We remember the way things were and we anticipate how things could be. I say "could" because memory and reason give us the ability to make a choice. This, not that. It is the power to over-ride the determinism of the continuum.

All of us are becoming... what? It's up to us to choose. We can't stop making choices but we can decide what we will choose.

We can't stop making choices but our choices determine who we become. The dynamic cause and effect interaction of mass and energy can be overcome by choice. Our choices determine our destiny... or do they?

All of us are becoming.

Now is where I am. Where I am changes and that change is beyond my control, mostly. Try to stop the moment from passing by. Can you? It is just like your choices. Can you stop making choices?

Tensed facts are created in the now of the continuum of reality. In their creation they become unalterable. They are created by the temporal, dynamic cause and effect interaction of mass and energy.

The observer, you and me, are confronted by reason and memory. We remember the way things were and we anticipate how things could be. I say "could" because memory and reason give us the ability to make a choice. This, not that. It is the power to over-ride the determinism of the continuum.

All of us are becoming... what? It's up to us to choose. We can't stop making choices but we can decide what we will choose.

Presentism vs Eternalism

What exists resides in the now. What exists is temporal because it is dynamic and constantly changes and the change is tensed because cause and effect produces the change.

What exists in the now creates tensed facts that are unalterable.

The change is deterministic outside of the observer's ability to choose. The ability to choose comes from the capacity to remember what things were like and the ability to anticipate what things will be like. Memory and reason.

Choice creates the potential to break the bonds of determinism.

Once the choice is made it becomes unalterable.

The now is eternal. Divide infinity in half, what do you have? Calculate how many moments eternity holds?....

The truth is always simple.

Chaos Theory, Choices, Decisions and Actions.

Who we will become is determined by our choices, decisions and actions. The choices, decisions and actions that we take in the now create facts that cannot be altered.

In chaos theory, the idea that a butterfly's wings might create tiny changes in the atmosphere that may ultimately alter the path of a tornado or delay, accelerate or even prevent the occurrence of a tornado in a certain location, reveals that even a small action has the potential for an extraordinary consequence.

The "Now" is what exists. Reality is the cosmological temporality of tensed facts that are created in the "Now". A fact cannot be altered. Change is a constant in the "Now". The illusion of time is created by this observance of change brought about by movement. The movement is deterministic outside of our ability to choose. Choice is what gives us the ability to be creative. But it is also the ability to destroy.

Who we can be is not yet determined because we still have the ability to choose. Past facts cannot be altered yet potential still exists. We can choose to tear down or to buildup. There is no other choice before us.

All that exists in the Now.

The interaction of all that exists. How do we describe this interaction? Do we see it in its totality? No. Is any part separate from any other part? No.

The interaction of mass and energy going on in my brain as I write this is correspondent to the movement of stars in a far off galaxy. Any moment in the continuum of our Universe when viewed as a whole is unrepeatable and completely unique.

Unrepeatability. Nothing is repeatable. Nothing is repeatable. Nothing is repeatable. Everything happens in context to everything else. Everything, as a whole, is dynamic and temporal, Because God is dynamic and temporal. Our experience dynamically exists in the eternal temporality of God.

The eternal temporality exists in an uniqueness of tensed facts. These facts have causality that is determinate outside of the creative ability of life to choose. Choice can over-ride determinate causality. This choice creates the realm of "possibilities" for creative innovation.

As we see the uniqueness of each moment, as we understand this moment will never happen again, we can begin to fully appreciate the great value of the moment we are in.

Now we can take full advantage of the opportunity the moment is providing us.

God's Now and ours.

"Now" is reality. "Now" is what exists. What exists is the totality of all that interacts. The interaction of Mass and Energy plays out in the now and is the physical realm.

God's "Now" is the direct experience of all tensed facts as they come to exist in the now. For God, space is of no consequence. He knows everything because He is everywhere. He is the ultimate "reference frame" for the universe.

Our "now" is limited by location and the speed at which information comes to us. This limitation of information acquisition creates a "horizon". This event horizon is established by the limit of the speed of light that creates the illusion of time flowing with past, present and anticipated future.

What can contain God? Time? No. Eternity? No. Space? No. If God is eternal, that which is in Him resides in eternity. "Now" is eternal because the now is in God.

What exists is dynamic and temporal, because God is dynamic and temporal. Our experience dynamically exists in the eternal temporality of God.

Duration is the observed rate of change in a given inertial frame. Duration is subjective to the observer. Changes in the rate of change are undetectable for an observer in a given inertial frame.

The eternal temporality exists in an uniqueness of tensed facts. These facts have causality that is determinate outside of the creative ability of life to choose. Choice can over-ride determinate causality. This choice creates the realm of "possibilities" for creative innovation.

This physical realm exists as part of the Spiritual realm. Because of the limitations of the physical realm I cannot experience the totality of all that exists in the Now.