[ChessExpert]

I found your entire post to be interesting. But here is one thing I want to comment upon:

“for the photon, no time elapses at all”

I’d never heard that before. Like relativity and quantum mechanics, it opens up new ways of thinking about things.

Loosely speaking perhaps, it is one of those every day miracles that is always available for inspection, contemplation, or perhaps even experimentation.

[Alamo-Girl]

Yes indeed on all points.

It is awesome to me that God chose light as the metaphor for His glory.

For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to [give] the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. - 2 Cor 4:6

Since the photon is timeless, it travels a "null path" - no time elapses from the perspective of the photon.

Likewise, the illumination God gives us is timeless.

For thou wilt light my candle: the LORD my God will enlighten my darkness. - Psalms 18:28

All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. - John 1:3-4

Jesus is the "brightness of the Father's glory!" (Heb 1:3)