Since my earliest memories, I have been gazing at the stars in wonderment. Oh, the sights I have seen on jet black nights; full-moons, comets, falling stars, The Milky Way galaxy and constellations of all sorts in all seasons over the years.
God has made such a wonders in this existence of ours that any reasonable person will marvel at both their beauty and complexity. As I consider these things, I remember God’s own comments on his creation from Genesis…
Genesis 1 ( World English Bible )
31 God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. There was evening and there was morning, a sixth day.
And then there are these words from the Psalms…
Psalm 8 ( WEB )
1 For the Chief Musician; on an instrument of Gath. A Psalm by David.
Yahweh,
our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth, who has set
your glory above the heavens!
2 From the lips of babes and
infants you have established strength, because of your adversaries,
that you might silence the enemy and the avenger.
3 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained;
4 what is man, that you think of him? What is the son of man, that you care for him?
In the New Testament, we find Paul preaching at Athens…
Acts 17 ( WEB )
16 Now
while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within
him as he saw the city full of idols.
17 So he reasoned in the
synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the
marketplace every day with those who met him.
18 Some of the
Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also were conversing with him. Some
said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Others said, “He
seems to be advocating foreign deities,” because he preached Jesus
and the resurrection.
19 They took hold of him, and brought
him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching
is, which is spoken by you?
20 For you bring certain strange
things to our ears. We want to know therefore what these things
mean.”
21 Now all the Athenians and the strangers living
there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to
hear some new thing.
22 Paul stood in the middle of the
Areopagus, and said, “You men of Athens, I perceive that you are
very religious in all things.
23 For as I passed along, and
observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with
this inscription: ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’What therefore you worship
in ignorance, this I announce to you.
24 The God who
made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and
earth, doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands,
25 neither
is he served by men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing
he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things.
26 He
made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface
of the earth, having determined appointed seasons, and the
boundaries of their dwellings,
27 that they should seek the
Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though
he is not far from each one of us.
28 ‘For in him we live,
and move, and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have
said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’
29 Being then
the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature
is like gold, or silver, or stone, engraved by art and design of
man.
30 The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But
now he commands that all people everywhere should repent,
31 because
he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in
righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has
given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the
dead.”
In every culture that has ever existed, there have been those who sought after the divine, those who longed to understand God. The apostle Paul recognized this, for virtually every thoughtful person recognizes that human beings are special among all of God’s creation. Realizing this, it is a small step ( for most of us, anyway ) to want please God by doing HIS will. When we obey that will, as exhibited by the Gospel, we become a newly created spiritual being as is exemplified by the following verse from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians…
2 Corinthians 5 ( WEB )
17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
So, once again we are back to creation, this time a spiritual one. Jesus has made this possible and we should obey his will to make this possible. ( see also Matt. 28:18-20; Rom. 6:1-11,23; 8:1,2, 10, 11; 12:5; Gal 3:24-28; Col 2:12; 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 ) And I ask you, isn’t that the most wonderful thing that you can think of? More magnificent than that the picture above with its wonderfully colored sky. Why not obey God’s Gospel and be created anew; trust me- You will shine more than any scene in any sky ever has!