How can confusing points in Christian doctrine be explained from God’s existence beyond our four dimensional spacetime? God’s transcendence, after all, is predicted by both modern cosmology and the Bible.
For example, how can God hear the prayers of billions of people all at once? We live in one dimension of time–our time line. But God may live in at least the equivalent of two time lines
that cross at right angles, like two sides of a square. Both lines can extend infinitely far and still only cross at one point. At any one instant in our time, God could spend an eternity listening to everyone’s’ prayers individually. Then, He could move a tiny instant further along our time and spend another eternity there.
Another confusing topic is the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. What does it even mean to have Trinity in unity and Unity in trinity? As an analogy, imagine tiny flat people that live on a piece of paper–they have no concept of up or down. They can only comprehend left-right and forward-backward. To them our third dimension of depth would be unimaginable. If we wanted to reveal ourselves to them, we could pass our 3D hand through the paper. First, they would see five separate circles as our fingers passed through the paper. Then, four of those would merge into one oval as our palm passed through. Finally, as our wrist went through they would see a more circular oval. It would blow their minds that the original five circles were part of one hand. Perhaps some other flat people would make fun of them for believing something that seemed impossible!
Talking about God’s transcendence of dimensions can help make sense of other topics, too, such as free will and predestination, Heaven and Hell, and the New Creation to come after this creation has finished its purpose. Beyond the Cosmos: What recent discoveries in astrophysics reveal about the glory and love of God is a book by Christian astronomer Hugh Ross that dives into much more detail about these issues.
The above analogies certainly fall far short of reality. As Job 26:14 (NIV) says, “And these are but the outer fringe of his works; how faint the whisper we hear of him! Who then can understand the thunder of his power?”
