The night's sky is one of nature's greatest reminders of just how grand God really is. The psalmist wrote, "The heavens declare the glory of God the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard" (Psalm 19:1-3, NIV). These words came alive this past weekend at the recent youth group retreat. As a leader, I took the group out to look at the stars. I invited the group to just listen to what the stars indicate about who God is and how big He is compared to our problems.
After a time of lying out under the stars, we came back and discussed what we saw. Several youth saw shooting stars. We saw bright objects in the sky that looked like planets. Orion was very visible in the winter sky. The students and leaders talked about how the sky put them at peace. They lost their problems for a moment just appreciating the shear size of God's nightly extravaganza. Some talked about feeling connected to something larger than themselves.
One teen boy said that the sky almost seemed too massive that he felt insignificant compared to it. But that's the amazing thing about God - He is so big, yet He cares about the smallest detail of His creation.
One female leader talked about how she used to gaze at the stars as a kid. She talked about what it felt like to be free from worry or concern because you knew somebody was looking out for you. She said that the sky helped remind her of that feeling even though she is now an adult.
I talked about how the sky has been used throughout time for navigation, keeping time, telling the future and developing mythology. In the Bible, God used the sky as a point of reference for Abraham to help him understand just how big his family legacy would get. Stars show the grandeur of God's design.
According to Psalm 147:4, God determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. When you consider that scientists have been able to identify 70 sextillion stars in the known universe, that makes you wonder just how big, intelligent and infinite God really is. It can be real easy to throw around words like "infinite", "omnipresent", "omniscient", "majestic" without understanding how indescribable these concepts tend to be. Let's put the number of known stars in perspective. According to an article on CNN.com, 70 sextillion stars (7 followed by 22 zeros) is about 10 times as many stars as grains of sand on all the world's beaches and deserts.
In a typical night's sky, the human eye can only see a few thousand starts. But in reality, there are billions of stars in the Milky Way galaxy. And our galaxy is far from the largest one out there. This kind of puts a little more meaning to the thought of God's shoe size. Wow, God is really, really big. He is greater than any of our problems or temptations. God is greater than our sin. God is greater than our own understanding and knowledge. God is greater than our successes. God is greater than our sickness. God is greater than our questions and doubts. God is greater than science. God is greater than.....
