To Be in Awe of God's Wondrous Creation

Photo by Donna Pyle

 "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." Genesis 1:1

That's how the Bible starts. With God creating. And separating.

He separated light from darkness (the first day), sky from water (the second day), and land from the sea (the third day).

It might seem an odd way to begin, but not when you think about it. Just picture your garage. If it's anything like my family's garage when I was a child, your parents couldn't even get a car in there. When it was time to organize the mess, we had to separate first. Gather like things together. Prioritize.

That's exactly what God did. He had to separate and organize before He joined and filled. Once it was all organized, God created the sun, moon and stars (the fourth day), birds and fish (the fifth day), and animals and mankind (the sixth day).

Do you notice an intentional pattern?

The things God created in Day 4 (sun, moon and stars) fill in Day 1 (light and dark).

Day 5 (birds and fish) fills in Day 2 (sky and water).

And Day 6 (animals and mankind) fills in Day 3 (land and sea).

Pretty cool, huh? God spent three days separating, then three days filling what He had previously separated.

And God's creation is magnificent!  In April 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was unveiled. Scientists were blown away by what they discovered - and continue discovering to this day. One scientist went so far as to say, "One of the most stunning things is not what we can see, but all that we still can't."

They know more incredible discoveries await. And with God, there's always more than meets our limited vision.

Our latest technology only scratches the surface of discovering the vast heavens God created. Astronomy is turning hard core skeptics into faith-filled believers.

Plato once said, "Astronomy compels the soul to look upward." And Augustine uttered, "The very order, disposition, beauty and motion of the world and of all visible things silently proclaim that it could have only been made by God."

Ralph Waldo Emerson once posed an interesting question: "What would we do if stars came out once every thousand years?"

We'd be enraptured and unable to sleep. We wouldn't want to miss out. We'd be ecstatic by the wonders God created. Instead, the stars come out every night and we look up momentarily before heading inside to watch TV or jump on the computer.

The psalmist once wrote, "When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him?" (Psalm 8:3-4)

I just returned from Alaska and enjoyed extraordinary time gazing into the heavens. If it's been a while since you've done likewise, how about setting some time aside? Gather your family one evening and sit in the unparalleled theater of God's stunning creation.

You can do it right from your own backyard.

When is the last time you spent uninterrupted time gazing into the sky? Watching a sunrise or sunset? What did you see? A shooting star? The Big Dipper? Vivid colors?
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