Sunday Snippets: The Dazzling Heavens

Psalm 8:3-4 When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?"

Well, contrary to my statements in last week's post, I was not able to do either a guest post or a personal one during the week. ;) I do apologize for that. On either Wednesday or Thursday there is going to be a very special guest post, however! :) I'm really looking forward to putting in on here, and I think all of you will like it as well.

For my topic today, I chose something that I find so fascinating: the vast expanse of space and the beauty that fills it. As I was researching for this post, I found out some incredibly cool stuff about stars:

• Every star that you see in the night sky is bigger and brighter than our sun.
• On a clear night, you are able to see 20 quadrillion miles, at least. (I'm going to say this the next time someone asks me how my eyesight is. ;)
• There is a "hyper-giant" star named Pistol that shines ten billion times brighter than our sun. Wow. It emits such massive amounts of radiation that even if humans could travel to it, life could not be sustained in any place even close to it.
• Galaxies often collide with each other. Due to the vast space between the stars within them, the stars themselves don't usually crash. However, the gas clouds and dust will, forming even more new stars.
• There are around 400 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy alone. 
• How many galaxies are there? No one is exactly sure except the One who created them. However, scientist have estimated that there are potentially more than one hundred and sixty billion galaxies. So we're talking billions of trillions of stars in the observable universe.

So now that you've been overwhelmed with all of these mind blowing facts, lets look at the place in the Bible where it talks about God creating the stars. Here we go...Genesis 1:16c "...He made the stars also." That's it. He made the stars also?? I mean, that almost just sounds like it's thrown in as an afterthought--oh yeah, by the way He also made those billions of trillions of inconceivably massive and innumerable celestial beings too. That to me says something of the absolute power and authority that God has. He knows each of those stars by name, and holds them in their exact positions in the sky. They are so regular and precise, that we can predict their patterns for hundreds of years into the future. 

All of this makes me feel pretty insignificantly tiny! As the Psalmist considered these things, he felt like that as well. And he asked the question, what is man? According to God's Word, man is the crowning glory of the creation! Not the stars or the sun, or the trees or oceans or animals, but man. Mankind is the only creation that Jesus Christ came to die for! The only part of this vast creation that God made in His own image. That is...incredible! 

As we look up at the stars this week, let's take time to thank God for considering us--tiny, microscopic specks in the scheme of the universe--and loving us enough to send His precious Son for our salvation. What a mighty God we serve!
Mykaela