Are the stars countless? There have been attempts to count stars over the ages. Every time technology permits looking further, the number goes up. The famous deep space image from Hubble that was taken a few years ago shows thousands of galaxies. Each galaxy as millions of stars; each galaxy is a city of stars. Estimating the number of sand particles on all the seashores is a task that is somewhat equivalent. Even with estimating techniques that attack the problem from estimated sizes of particles and volumes of sand (also estimated), the numbers are beyond comprehension.
On a recent evening in April my wife and I had an opportunity to look at one galaxy, one city of stars. It is mind boggling to consider the intricacies of God’s hand in making the atmosphere transparent so we can see the stars and how He made us to be curious about His heavens. He also gave humans an ability to develop optics to see outside the local neighborhood, our own galaxy, and view other cities of stars. We sketched just one of those galaxies, which is one of a popular pair for amateur astronomers that is found in Ursa Major. M81 is a beautiful face-on spiral galaxy. We viewed it for an hour and a half using an astro video camera attached to a telescope with a 12.5 inch primary mirror. Here is Linda’s sketch:
I did my sketch with plain white paper and a pencil, so it looks quite a bit different. But we both captured the major spiral features and called it a very good night to give thanks. Here is my sketch:
When you consider God’s statements about the stars in Genesis or the Psalms or the prophets but observe a city of stars like this, one cannot escape the sense of majesty of our God. It gives a visible but plain hint about His greatness, yet He also makes clear that He has love for each person. Only God can embrace greatness but precise individual love. It is like fathoming one star as compared to trillions of stars, yet knowing both completely. The grand plan of God is to embrace a people that love Him and believe Him….and how many of those people there will be!! So here is one galaxy with millions of stars. Yet, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, says the way is narrow to life and few will find it. While His house and kingdom in eternity will have so many people, the people that choose not to acknowledge Him, avoid contact with Him, or deny that He has anything to do with the universe or life on earth, will also be numberless.
How big is our God that He can know the least to the greatest, the inclination of every heart, the bent and direction of every soul, and know it from the beginning to the end? How can He be so perfect that He create us and give us an unfettered opportunity to choose Him or not…through every age of time and in every place?
So when you stand beneath the heavens, think of what you see. Consider the greatness of our God to give us an opportunity to acknowledge Him. For those who do, receiving Him in their heart, they will discover the greatness of His love–one that is large enough to take us to Himself at the proper time, where we will be joined with Him in a great company.
Referenced scriptures:
Jeremiah 33:19-22, Matthew 7:13-14
