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perspective
Perspective
Let us grant for a moment that the Bible is true, as this author believes. Not only true, but pure and living. The very words of almighty God. We are therein taught that in the last days people will run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased. This is a snap-shot of us … the people alive on the planet earth today. This increased travel and knowledge cannot be said of 5,800 years of human history back to Adam. We are that prophesied generation running to and fro, and the astounding increase in our knowledge appears to have no end in sight. Easily the greatest gift that this increase in knowledge has yielded, is a perspective unparalleled in human history.
At today’s blistering progress in discovery and knowledge, we now know that there are trillions of galaxies out there in the universe. Now a galaxy is no small thing. Recall that one light year equals @ 6 trillion miles. We can’t even wrap our brain around one trillion miles, let alone six trillion. Our milky way galaxy …. Where we live … is estimated to be @ 200,000 light years in diameter, and holds billions upon untold billions of stars. And though we are large beyond our wildest imagination, we are still but a single galaxy … and a medium sized one at that.
The entire history of humanity has never had this knowledge of the endless largeness we find ourselves afloat in, nor the humbling perspective that comes with it. We fade to microscopic insignificance in such vastness. What is beyond amazing is that of all the uncountable stars in all of the uncountable galaxies in this universe, Jesus selected our sun … our star … as the center of our obscure nine-planet solar system. On the orion arm of our mid-sized milky way galaxy, we are smaller than a single grain of sand amongst all of the sand in all of the seas and seashores upon the earth. Furthermore, on the third rock from the sun in that tiny solar system, Jesus shined light into the darkness, and breathed life into the Earth. Life, of all things, in an infinite lifeless universe. Out of trillions and gazillions and untold billions of lifeless galaxies, stars, planets, black holes and empty space, he chose here on this Earth to create life. How precious and rare then, life is. Even the lowly blade of grass is to be celebrated.
Having chosen this obscure Earth, and creating the astounding variety of plant and animal life around us, he then created the most magnificent being imaginable: man. The only form of life able to grow in knowledge, enter into perspective, and behold the extreme greatness of my Lord, and the blessed rarity, and beauty, and sheer masterpiece of God, that earth life is. No wonder He beheld everything that He had made and declared it all to be “very good.”
That pure and living word also suggests that there are at least as many invisible, spiritual sons of God as there are galaxies and stars and planets. That spiritual world, where my Lord now abides, is infinitely more populated than the Earth ever could be. And this infinite cloud of witnesses can all see this rare blue jewel we call life on Earth. What a spectacle we must be to them.
So at the resurrection of Jesus, the Christ of God, the dizzying heights he reached when he disappeared in the clouds can scarce be told. Higher than every son of God, every angel and spirit and four-sided beast, and every elder and cherub and seraphim, Jesus Christ is King of all Kings, and Lord of a trillion Lords.
But these amazing revelations in all of this perspective pale in comparison to a single event. In our milky way galaxy tucked away in an immeasurable universe, God chose here on Earth for the birth of His only begotten son. What a miracle: not only that this happened 2,000 years ago, but this last generation has grown to a perspective to understand its significance. Life alone was already the rarest of rare in an infinite, lifeless universe. But now the creator of the vast infinity chooses here, on our tiny blue dot, for the birth of the only begotten son of God. Amongst the uncountable number of the sons of God who assemble for meeting before His throne, only one is begotten. What a marvel to behold from the angelic seats. He is risen, He is glorified, and He calls all the stars by name.
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