Your assuming Time exists...

If it doesn't..it all happens at once and is instantaneous...

These are concepts, that Romans, and such, wouldn't understand.

While its nice to try and decipher the bible as a text..

There is no accounting for science, spirit, and other phenomenons, you, or those in the text, dont understand...

For the thief...it might very well be TODAY. Who are you to say otherwise?

Heaven obviously exists outside of time, or is timeless...its ALWAYS present..So Jesus didn't lie to him.