[by Dean Smith] I won’t pretend to understand anything these guys are talking about, but I am always fascinated when scientists talk of Quantum mechanics. In a recent study, a scientist has suggested that contrary to our personal experience time runs both forward and backwards.

Our experience with time is that it goes from the past to present to future and only the past and present can affect the future. However, professor Kater Murch from Washington University has been looking at quantum mechanics and discovered that time in the quantum world seems to run both ways.

And by doing so, the future has the ability to change the past.

As odd as this sounds, I sometimes wonder if these strange theories may help us understand some puzzling statements made by Jesus in the Gospels. But before we get to those verses, let me explain a bit more about Murch’s theory.

Quantum mechanics, also referred to as quantum physics, studies physical phenomena at nanoscopic/subatomic scales — basically the inner workings of an atom.

In his study to be published in the Physical Review Letters, Murch was looking at the quantum properties of a single particle. Here is where it gets odd, the quantum properties of a particle do not exist until you actually try to measure it. When you do, its quantum properties suddenly appear.

Murch and his team sent in single photons of light into a microwave box. When they interacted with the circuitry, they were able to determine the quantum field of the photon.

They did some initial testing and tried to calculate what its quantum field would be. When the group did this, they had a 50% chance of guessing it accurately.

Now they can also run these calculations backwards essentially guessing what its quantum properties would be and after doing it that way, a procedure called ‘effect matrix’, they were right 90% of the time.

In order for this to happen, Murch concluded time must be running from the future to the past allowing the particle to change its past properties for it to arrive at its present result.

Murch summed it up best when he said:

“It takes 20 or 30 minutes to run one of these experiments, several weeks to process it, and a year to scratch our heads to see if we’re crazy or not.”

Does the Bible talk about the future changing the past?

Now if that hasn’t completely confused you, you are probably still wondering about those statements of Jesus I was talking about of how future events changed the past.

In fact, there are a few of them.

¹⁸ Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. (Matthew 18:18 NASV)

As we study this verse in Matthew look at the verb tenses. Jesus says what we bind now, will have previously been bound. What we loose now, will have been previously loosed. This means a present or future act is changing the past. Time is running backwards, not forward.

But notice in both cases the binding and loosing takes place on earth and the change — the past binding and loosing — will have taken place in heaven or the spiritual realm. Jesus repeated this analogy in Matthew 16:19, and in doing so I believe the Lord was trying to re-emphasize this point.

Jesus then made another statement along these lines, but this time on forgiveness.

²³ If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.” (John 20:23 NASV)

Whoever we forgive now, will have been previously forgiven. And whoever sins we retain — don’t forgive — will have been previously retained.

Present and future earthly events changing the heavenly past. Time running backwards?

The best way I can explain this is that time as we know it does not exist in the Kingdom of God.

While we live in a time-controlled dimension floating on a linear line moving from past to present to future, there is no sense of time in the spiritual realm.

Here is how the Apostle Peter explained it:

⁸ But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. (2 Peter 3:8 NASV)

Peter suggests the principles of time governing the spiritual realm differs from our physical world. First he says with the Lord one day is like a thousand earth years leaving the impression heaven is not affected by passing time. Most have no problem envisioning that.

However, Peter doesn’t stop there and throws a second idea into the equation stating a thousand years in the spiritual realm is like a day to humans.

When we bring these two thoughts together, it suggests God exists in a timeless dimension — where past, present and future merge and linear time (moving from past to future) simply does not exist.

So while we are stuck in a time dimension, God isn’t, so as a result, an earthly action today can affect the spiritual past, at least from our perspective.

I wrote an earlier post on this subject, God Standard Time, where I look at the time theories of Physicist Itzhak Bars of the University of Southern California and a few more verses that seem to support these ideas.

Are there any applications for this?

Maybe.

If you are praying for the salvation of a friend or family member, an important part of this process is forgiving them for any offenses they may have caused you. They do not become Christians, but are forgiven for the offense — maybe even going back to the original moment it took place.

I believe this releases them from any previous negative spiritual effects of the act allowing the person to be more open to the Gospel today. Perhaps this can be applied on a broader scale to a city or even a nation.

I call it my “effect matrix” gospel theory.

But then again, it may be just a “crazy” theory.

Read more:

• Can the past be changed by the FUTURE? Bizarre quantum experiment suggests time can run backwards: Daily Mail
• Time runs bizarre in quantum world where past is changed by the future: International Business Times