Time has no specific smell or taste, but it has a specific sound. Or it did from the 13th century until about 1956, when D. E. Protzmann patented the first digital alarm clock.
During those seven centuries, “tick tock” became synonymous with traditional mechanical clocks. The sound, which came from the precise, regulated movements of the clock’s gears, was emblematic of the passage of time, marked by methodical, predictable intervals.
In a broader sense, “tick tock” symbolizes what could be called Mechanical Time. This form of time characterizes the modern industrial era’s emphasis on accuracy, punctuality, and the segmentation of time into uniform, measurable units. It reflects a period in history when time became a crucial factor in organizing society and work, leading to a more structured and scheduled way of life.
Mechanical Time didn’t disappear, but it now sits alongside Digital Time. This type of time is represented not by a sound but by a social media platform—TikTok. Just as the ticking of the second hand on a clock reflected the mechanized era, TikTok encapsulates the fluidity and immediacy of time perception in the digital era. Unlike the constant and predictable nature of mechanical clocks, time on TikTok is fast-paced, quickly fading, and largely free of any broader context. Videos are short, engaging, and designed for quick consumption, mirroring the rapid, often nonlinear flow of digital information and entertainment.
The TikTok app has been downloaded more than 3 billion times (on a planet of 8 billion people), making it a fitting symbol of how time is perceived and valued in contemporary global culture. In an age where the tap of a finger brings a cascade of momentary images and sounds, TikTok epitomizes the ephemeral nature of our digital interactions. For billions of people across the globe, this social media platform provides a torrent of never-ending content, where each video is but a momentary ripple soon lost in the stream of ceaseless novelty.
Even if you don’t use the app, TikTok represents the experience you’ve likely felt living in an era that emphasizes momentary engagement and instant gratification. TikTok reflects a societal shift from the rigid, though uniting, structures of Mechanical Time to a more fragmented, individualistic, and flexible understanding of time in the digital world.
Culture of ‘Now . . . This’
While TikTok wasn’t the first social media platform to take control of our attention spans, it’s the preeminent example of an era where information isn’t only transient but intentionally so.
This social media platform provides a torrent of never-ending content, where each video is but a momentary ripple soon lost in the stream of ceaseless novelty.
Social media platforms are designed to promote what many of us seek today—a ceaseless flow of fleeting experiences. Videos on TikTok, often mere seconds long, are optimized to capture attention momentarily before another swiftly takes its place. This rapid turnover is a hallmark of today’s digital culture, where trends change overnight, and what’s viral today becomes passé tomorrow. The only element that remains the same is the endless pursuit of novelty.
This relentless pace and constant change in content reflects a broader societal shift towards a preference for what’s immediate and ephemeral. The shift in preference isn’t a recent innovation, of course. Humans have always craved new content, which is why gossip has stayed atop the leaderboard of our activities for millennia. What has changed, though, is the speed at which new content can be disseminated to the average person.
In a world increasingly geared toward instant gratification, the transient nature of social media is both a symptom and a catalyst of our society’s ever-shortening attention span—the length of time we can concentrate on a task without becoming distracted. This shortening in the length of attention is often the factor we most lament. But the problem with decreasing our attention spans isn’t just that we can’t focus for long periods but that it makes it harder to focus on context.
Context involves understanding the broader circumstances, background, and implications of information. It requires time, effort, and expertise to discern, which is often lacking in the fast-paced, immediate nature of modern information consumption. Context is necessary for wisdom, as the Christian media critic C. John Sommerville noted, since wisdom has to do with seeing things in their largest context. But much information today—from cable news to TikTok videos—is conveyed through channels that strip away necessary context.
Media critic Neil Postman once wrote that the media has given us the conjunction “Now . . . this,” which “does not connect anything to anything but does the opposite: separates everything from everything.” He continues,
“Now . . . this” is commonly used on radio and television newscasts to indicate that what one has just heard or seen has no relevance to what one is about to hear or see, or possibly to anything one is ever likely to hear or see. The phrase is a means of acknowledging the fact that the world as mapped by the speeded-up electronic media has no order or meaning and is not to be taken seriously. There is no murder so brutal, no earthquake so devastating, no political blunder so costly—for that matter, no ball score so tantalizing or weather report so threatening—that it cannot be erased from our minds by a newscaster saying, “Now . . . this.”
Postman wrote that in 1985. A study in 2011 found the median length of a network TV news package was about 2 minutes and 23 seconds. In contrast, the average TikTok video for videos produced by accounts with up to 500 views is around 34 seconds, and the average user spends 95 minutes per day on the app. That means within the hour and a half the person spends on TikTok, he or she is changing context—experiencing a “Now . . . this” change—about 48 times. (Because most users scroll past the videos in their feeds before fully watching them, the number is likely to be much higher.)
The implications of this ephemeral context-switching are far reaching. It affects how we consume information, how we interact with each other, and even how we view our lives. In this endless scroll of content, moments are quickly consumed and just as quickly forgotten, creating a sense of impermanence and a detachment from the continuity of our experiences.
The transient nature of contextless information on platforms like TikTok can have a profound effect on our worldview. When the ephemeral is the celebrated norm, and the lasting is overlooked and avoided, we may value quick successes over long-term achievements, instant pleasures over enduring joys, and surface-level interactions over deep relationships. This not only influences our personal lives but shapes our societal norms and expectations.
For Christians, this poses a significant challenge. The short-term nature of information conveyed in TikTok time stands in stark contrast to the eternal truths of Scripture. We therefore must question and reflect on how we engage with media and information that operate on TikTok time and how we let them shape our perceptions and values. We need to find the proper balance between engaging with the world and maintaining our focus on what’s everlasting.
Biblical Perspectives on Time
The Christian perspective on time, rooted within Scripture, offers a stark contrast to the “Now . . . this” culture. As we see throughout God’s Word, time isn’t merely a chronological passage of context-free events but is imbued with sacredness and purpose. Time is portrayed as a sacred gift from God, entrusted to humanity for stewardship and purposeful use.
When the ephemeral is the celebrated norm, we may value quick successes over long-term achievements and instant pleasures over enduring joys.
Within the Old Testament, the Genesis account of creation sets the stage, introducing a rhythm to time—days, seasons, and years—all ordained by our Creator (Gen. 1). This rhythm underscores not just the passing of time but its inherent order and sanctity. Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 poignantly captures this divine orchestration of time: “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.” These verses articulate a truth about the divinely appointed timing for every aspect of life, suggesting our moments aren’t random or contextless but are part of a greater, God-ordained tapestry.
The New Testament expands on this, introducing a nuanced understanding of time, differentiating between chronos (quantitative, chronological time) and kairos (qualitative, opportune time). The concept of chronos and kairos as different aspects of time is a profound element within the New Testament, although the terms are implicit in the text rather than explicitly defined.
The Greek word chronos refers to chronological or sequential time. It’s the word from which we get “chronology” or “chronicle.” It represents time as we typically measure it: in seconds, minutes, hours, days, and years. In the New Testament, chronos is used in various passages, but it isn’t always explicitly highlighted as a theme. It’s more about the ongoing, everyday passage of time, such as in Matthew 25:19: “Now after a long time [chronos] the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them.”
In contrast, kairos is used in the New Testament to denote a more qualitative aspect of time. It refers to an opportune moment, a “right time,” or a “God-appointed time.” It’s about critical moments that hold significant potential or opportunity for action or change. A key passage where kairos is explicitly mentioned is Mark 1:15. Jesus announces, “The time [kairos] is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Here, Jesus refers to a specific, divinely appointed time when significant events in God’s redemptive plan are unfolding.
When we examine Jesus’s ministry in the Gospels, we can see many of his actions and teachings as occurring in kairos moments. These were times ripe for significant spiritual revelation or transformation, such as his baptism, transfiguration, crucifixion, and resurrection. In these events, the divine timing was crucial, and they were far more than mere chronological entries; they were pivotal moments in the history of salvation.
Thus, while the New Testament doesn’t explicitly lay out a theology contrasting chronos and kairos, the narrative and teachings within it certainly embody this distinction. The way Jesus’s life and ministry unfold, and how the early church understood and responded to these events, reflects a deep awareness of both the ongoing flow of time and the critical, opportune moments within it that held spiritual significance. Modern believers need to recover this awareness of the two types of time—and understand how it sets us apart.
This distinction between chronos and kairos is a difference between a worldly, temporal perspective (mere chronos) and a supernatural, eternal perspective (divinely infused kairos). The Bible continuously points us toward and calls us to adopt this eternal perspective. Throughout Scripture, the temporal is juxtaposed with the eternal, urging believers to focus beyond the immediacy of the physical world bound by chronos. For example, in 2 Corinthians 4:18, Paul encourages us to fix our eyes not on what is seen (the temporal) but on what is unseen (the eternal). This isn’t a call to disengage from the world but to engage with it through the lens of eternity, infusing our earthly time with eternal significance.
Understanding time from a biblical perspective therefore has significant implications for how Christians should live. It calls for thoughtful stewardship of our time, recognizing each day as a precious and purposeful gift from God. This stewardship involves personal disciplines like prayer and Bible study, and it affects how we engage with others and the world around us.
Embracing the biblical view of time inspires us to look for those kairos moments in our lives—opportunities for growth, service, and witness. In a culture that often glorifies the immediate and ephemeral, the biblical perspective on time challenges us to seek depth, purpose, and eternal value in our daily lives.
The contrast is sharp and clear: while the digital age, with platforms like TikTok, accentuates the fleeting nature of time, the Bible invites us into a deeper, more purposeful understanding of time as a sacred gift from God. For Christians, this presents a challenge: how to be in a world that moves at the speed of TikTok time without losing sight of our eternal focus.
How to Engage Within TikTok Time
How, then, should Christians engage within TikTok time?
A necessary step is to adopt a bifocal perspective on time. As humans, we were designed to live in chronos, to experience time as the “continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future.” Yet as Christians, we’re also in Christ, and thus in kairos. As Paul tells us, “‘In [Christ] we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).
The Bible continuously points us toward and calls us to adopt an eternal perspective.
Because we’re temporal creatures, we exist—and must focus on—the moment-to-moment experiences of our lives. Because we’re eternal creatures that exist in union with an eternal being (Jesus Christ), we must also focus on that which is everlasting. For disciples of Jesus, these two perspectives overlap and intersect within the revealed will of God. As Jesus tells us, “The world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever” (1 John 2:17). A key way we change our mindset on time is to be focused on God’s will by frequently asking, How much of my time does God want me to spend on the trivial and ephemeral and how much on what’s truly significant and eternal?
Asking this question can help us rediscover the sacredness of time. It won’t require us to eliminate trivial and mundane information and activities, but it can help us find a more appropriate ratio between temporary chronos and everlasting kairos.
It will lead us to prioritize time for prayer, reflection, and community, recognizing each moment as a gift from God to be used wisely. It can help us better see the need to offset our consumption of ephemeral content with engagement in enduring spiritual practices. In doing so, we embrace the biblical call to be stewards of our time, using it for personal edification as well as for the service of others and the glory of God.
While TikTok time defines much of our current cultural landscape, it doesn’t have to define our individual or collective experiences of time as Christians. By embracing the biblical perspective of time as a sacred gift and seeking to live out this understanding in our daily lives, we can navigate the challenges of the digital age with wisdom and purpose. This approach allows us to use the tools of the age without losing our eternal focus and provides us a way to witness to the watching world the transformative power of living in God’s time.
The Gospel Coalition