When I Consider the Heavens

Football player, policeman, or G.I Joe… these were the things I dreamed about being “when I grow up.” I don’t ever remember even considering being an astronaut. Maybe it was from growing up in the city where I could hardly see the stars at night. Maybe it was because I did not like science in school. For whatever reason, from childhood until now I have never taken much of an interest in this big universe we live in. It wasn’t until I began to browse through some of the latest pictures from the Hubble telescope that my interest began to grow. The more pictures I saw the more amazed I was. I began gathering facts about the different things I was looking at, and the facts just piqued my interest all the more.

I don’t know if it makes me a nerd, but I have taken several of the latest Hubble pictures and made them a screensaver on my computer. One of my favorites is the Helix Nebula. The Helix Nebula is a dying star that is somewhere around 450 light years away from earth (that’s 5,865,696,000,000 miles times 450). As it dies it shoots out brilliantly colorful gases. Scientists estimate that from one edge of the gas ring to another is 1.5 light years across.

Another of my favorites is the Red Supergiant Star v838 Monocerotis. Given its name, you can imagine it is one huge star. It is thousands of times bigger than our Sun, and out of nowhere in 2002 it spent several months lit up more than 600,000 times brighter than our Sun. Scientists are still trying to figure out what made the star put on such a dazzling display.

When I look at pictures like these, and when I start thinking in numbers as big as light years, I start feeling really small. Did you know that our solar system in relation to our galaxy is about the same size as that of a quarter in a space the size of North America? And our galaxy is just one of billions of galaxies in the known universe? The truth is that I don’t just feel small…I am small.

I know these are not the kinds of things one should be thinking about to boast his or her self esteem, but these thoughts are biblical. In Psalm 8 the psalmist says, “When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained; what is man that You take thought of him, and the son of man that You care for him?” In a world that has a default setting resting on ‘me-centered living,’ verses like these seem odd. In a society that preaches a self-love gospel (so you can be healthy and function, of course) this would seem like heresy.

The sad thing is that me-centered living does not just affect our society or unbelievers. Me-centered living is alive and well within the Church. Listening to some of today’s most popular sermons and reading the most popular Christian books, one would think God’s sole reason for existing was to serve us. However, the teaching of Scripture and creation stand in stark contrast to this.

For the thousands of years that the universe has been in existence, there have been stars dying with stunning brilliance like the Helix Nebula. There have been Red Supergiants that have been shining with inconceivable radiance. The only difference between those then and the one now is that, for the most part, they went completely unseen. We would not know that the Helix Nebula even existed without extremely powerful telescopes. Scientists would not have been trying to solve the flare up of the Red Supergiant v838 a thousand years ago because they would never have seen it happen. It makes me wonder what amazing objects of beauty are living out their lives right now that we just can’t see yet. It also begs the question of why.

If we as human beings are intended to be the center of the universe, why in the world is it so big? Why are there thousands, millions, billions, and even trillions of stars, planets, solar systems, and galaxies that exist so far away that we can’t even see them? Truth is, if the universe was created for us, then it is way too big. But if the universe was created for God, then it is just the right size.

All those stars, planets, and galaxies that exist far beyond our ability to see them do not go unnoticed, for they were not created for us but for Him. In Isaiah 40 we are told that God brings the stars out one by one, and that He knows them each by name. This universe was not created for us, nor was it intended to center around us. This universe exists for God. It is declaring His glory, and He has not missed a second of its powerful declaration.

So this week as we all fight the sinful desire to put ourselves in the center of the universe, may we remember that we are indeed very small. As we read God’s Word and think of His amazing love for us, may we remember that God does not exist for us, but we exist for Him. His making much of us is not proof of our bigness, but of his awesome grace. There is only one person big enough, worthy enough, and great enough to be the center of all things. May our lives be spent this week, alongside the rest of the universe, declaring His praise.

Eric Flintoff