stars | LiveForgiven

God may be indescribable, but He is not unknowable. As we’ve already considered, God has revealed Himself to us through creation. Theologians call this “general revelation”. He is seen “in general” throughout all of creation. Through it all we catch a glimpse of who He is. Creation reveals who He is- His character, His beauty, His “bigness”, and I think how “small” He can be as well. God reveals Himself in “general” terms through His creation so that humans will simply humble themselves before Him and then partner with Him in to accomplish His purposes. God doesn’t reveal Himself for kicks. He reveals Himself “on purpose”, or even “for His purpose”. Simply put, God’s job is to do the revealing, ours is to do the responding. We respond to His revelation by humbling ourselves before Him and surrendering our lives to Him.

So, the logical question is this: What does creation say about who God is? And regardless of where you are in your faith journey, doesn’t it seem logical that God created all that is? Remember, it is scientifically impossible to get something out of nothing. In regard to the Aristotlean logic of “cause and effect”, there must be a cause for every effect. Ultimately you are led to an “Uncaused Cause”. What does creation reveal to us about who God is? What can we know about Him?

Throughout all He has made God shows us how wonderfully creative He is and how thoroughly involved He is with His creation. He cares for His creation and in ways and in places that we have never seen or think about. When the Discovery Channel presented its series, “Planet Earth”, it quickly became a favorite in our family. Taking years to make, a group of British scientists and photographers put together, what was for me at least, one worship sequence after another. As they show us places and practices in creation never before seen, we’re reminded that much of God’s creation and caring seems, at times, gratuitous, unnecessary, even extravagant.

For instance, why didn’t He stop at 100 billion stars? Why did He create billions of galaxies with trillions of stars in each one? Why didn’t He stop at 2,000 mammals? (There are 4,260 different types of mammals). There are 6,787 species of reptiles, nearly 10,000 different types of birds and 28,000 species of fishes. And of course, invertebrates outnumber all the vertebrates put together. There are 80,000 species of mollusks and a million different kinds of insects. Why didn’t He stop at 1,000 types of insects? I read recently that there are 300,000 species of beetles and weevils alone! What’s up with that? And again, what does this say about God? As a piece of art expresses the heart of the artist, God’s artwork, His creation, is an expression of who He is.

Why the extravagance, the lavish and seemingly excessive creativity? Some scientists have now added to their reasons for the existence of such a vast universe this interesting thought: The Universe exists so that we might explore it and in so doing find the One who is the Creator of it all. Again, He’s not just “out there”. He wants to be found by us.

It’s as if He is trying to say to us throughout His creation that He is the One in control of all of life, not us. It’s as if He wants us to know who’s in control, as if to say, “You’re going to need a God like me. You’re going to need a God who creates and cares for His creation in ways that you don’t even see. You’re going to need a God who gives and blesses and sustains and loves for seemingly no reason whatsoever.” That’s the kind of God He is. He loves because that’s who He is and we see His heart in creation.

If you’ve studied astronomy you know that the Universe is made up of billions of galaxies and within each of those galaxies are billions of stars. We also know that the universe is a like a giant clock- in other words the planets- for instance orbit in patterns that can be mathematically predicted. We know exactly where planets will be and where they’ve been. A common example is this: We know, for instance that Halley’s comet, last passed in 1986 and the next time will be in 2061. we know what’s happening with mathematical precision. And now, with computer tracking, we can see what the skies looked like from any place on earth at any time in history- on any date, from any spot on our planet, looking at any direction in the sky.

You would think then that we could go back to the point where the Magi were looking into the sky and we could see what they saw. So, modern day astrophysicists can re-create what took place at the time of Christ’s birth. (If we knew when the Magi showed up). Guess what? We can know pretty closely- based on Herod’s reign, which is referenced in Matthew 2. In fact, because of some challenges in calendars and dating through the years, it might be that the stars and the planets can get us closer to the time of Christ’s birth than our own calendars. Astrophysicists can go back and look at a window of time- (say a 5/6 year window and see if anything unusual happened in the skies that would have been unique. Matthew says the Magi came from the East- most likely Babylon (modern day Iraq) and they studied the stars. Many scholars believe that these Magi were descendents of those referenced in Daniel- many of the exiles stayed there.

So these Magi see a star move over Bethlehem and “stop”. Do stars stop? No. In fact, neither do they “move”. We know it’s not that stars move but the rotation of the earth causes them to appear as though they move. Stars don’t move, but planets do as they rotate around the sun. The Ancient Greeks called them “wanderers”- (planes) which is where we get our word for them: planets. They were called “wandering stars”. (Remember they didn’t have telescopes. All that they saw was with the naked eye- planets/stars, it was hard to tell the difference). In fact, planets weren’t known to be planets until relatively recently- Uranus was discovered in 1690, though first thought to be a star. Neptune in 1846, and Pluto in 1930- though earlier this year, poor Pluto was demoted in status. But do planets stop? Yes, they do- or they appear to. It’s called retrograde motion. Based on the rotation of the earth- a kind of moving platform, a moving observation deck and the movement or orbit of a planet, it would appear to freeze in the sky for period of time- amazing. And what we’ve discovered through computer tracking is- sure enough, Jupiter was in full retrograde motion and aligned with Venus, and they formed the brightest “star” any human alive would have ever seen. So bright, in fact, for anyone looking, with knowledge of the night sky (like the Magi), it would have been quite obvious. They followed it to Jerusalem and then to Bethlehem.

But here’s what hit me, and this mind-blowing: When God flung the Universe into existence and set all things in motion (and remember- mathematically, you can follow the stars and the planets) it means that before anything was created, God knew exactly when His Son Jesus would be born. He knew when Venus would align with Jupiter (in full retrograde motion) and multiply their light together. He knew when the Magi would come, looking for the star of the Messiah. No wonder the prophets foretold His coming- it had been set in motion before anything was even made! No wonder Scripture says:

“He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” 1 Peter 1:20

Check out computer animation of retrograde motion online. You can also learn more at sites like www.bethlehemstar.net

Category Archives: stars

General Revelation (from “Live Forgiven”)

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