{"id":38551,"date":"2019-09-29T17:44:00","date_gmt":"2019-09-29T17:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/how-long-is-trillion-seconds\/"},"modified":"2019-09-29T17:44:00","modified_gmt":"2019-09-29T17:44:00","slug":"how-long-is-trillion-seconds","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/how-long-is-trillion-seconds\/","title":{"rendered":"How Long is a Trillion Seconds?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n\t\t\t<em>The New York Times <\/em> published an article explaining large numbers like a million, billion, and trillion. The article was titled &ldquo;Just how long is a trillion seconds?&rdquo; In a letter to the editor, Dorothy C. Morrell from Seattle explains a trillion in terms of time.<\/p>\n\n<p>I asked myself, why not think of it in terms of seconds? A trillion seconds would have to be years, probably many years. I made a wild guess. As it turned out, I wasn&#39;t close. I found that 1,000 seconds ago was equal to almost 17 minutes. It would take almost 12 days for a million seconds to elapse and 31.7 years for a billion seconds. Therefore, a trillion seconds would amount to no less than 31,709.8 years. A trillion seconds ago, there was no written history. The pyramids had not yet been built. It would be 10,000 years before the cave paintings in France were begun.<\/p>\n\n<p>Was I alone in not knowing how long ago a trillion seconds was? I asked some of my neighbors what they would say if they were told they could have $1 trillion in one-dollar bills, so long as they agreed to initial each bill. Their answers were very similar. &lsquo;No!&rsquo; they said. When I asked why, they said, almost without exception, &#39;&rsquo;Because it would take me the rest of my life!&rsquo;&rdquo;<\/p>\n\n<p><strong>Preaching<\/strong> <strong>Angles<\/strong>: <strong>1) Forgiveness; Justification; Redemption <\/strong>&#8211; This illustration is good for explaining just how much we have been forgiven by Christ Jesus as in the story of the ten thousand talents (Matt. 18:21-35). <strong>2) Debt; Finances; Money<\/strong> &#8211; It can also use it to explain any type of large number, like the national debt. <strong>3) Eternity; Heaven; Time <\/strong>&ndash; Our short time in trials on earth will fade compared to the eternal rewards that are to come.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"is-style-article-source\"> <\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[410,411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3451,3528,3719,3741,3888,3991,4010,4011,4088,4134,4317,4488,4782,5159,5160,5266],"tax_ctp_topics":[392],"class_list":["post-38551","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-atonement","tax_ctp_tags-budget","tax_ctp_tags-cross-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-debt","tax_ctp_tags-eternity","tax_ctp_tags-finances","tax_ctp_tags-forgiveness","tax_ctp_tags-forgiveness-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-grace","tax_ctp_tags-heaven","tax_ctp_tags-justification","tax_ctp_tags-money","tax_ctp_tags-redemption","tax_ctp_tags-time","tax_ctp_tags-time-management","tax_ctp_tags-wealth"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Long is a Trillion Seconds? - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/how-long-is-trillion-seconds\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Long is a Trillion Seconds? - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The New York Times published an article explaining large numbers like a million, billion, and trillion. 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