30 January 2011

Tom's midnight garden

From Tom's Midnight Garden (p. 169, the Oxford Edition) by Philipa Pearce:

After discussing theories of time, Tom says:

"I've heard a theory too...while his uncle paused to drink some tea, 'I know an angel--I know of an angel who said that, in the end, there would be time no longer'

"An angel!" His uncle's shout was so explosive that a great deal of tea slopped down his tie, ..."What on earth would an angel have to do with scientific theories?" Tom trembled and dared not explain that this was more than a theory, it was a blazing angelic certitude.

Interestingly, this related to the book's using Revelation 10:1-6, where the angel refers to "him that lives for ever and ever, who created heaven...and earth..." surely a secure credential for unifying thinking about the created order and the revelation of the one who created it!

Ironically, discussion on Michael Jensen's blog, treads the very same territory as the uncle: there is a separation between the creator (theology) and his creation ('science' and the world of theories), yet the Bible, in the account of creation, the tying of creation to the Son and by extension the incarnation, and our being in the creation as the place where we encounter God, and in which God covenants with us, brings them together!