Jaw Dropping
I used to imagine that we had a transporter machine like the ones I saw on our black and white television set watching mom’s favorite afternoon show. It was the early-to-mid 1970’s and it was Star Trek.
The opening tune and spoken word are still stuck in my head: “Space: the final frontier…to explore strange new worlds…to boldly go where no man has done before.”
Yesterday it was about “time”, today I want to talk about space.
Job 26:7 tells us that our Creator God stretched out the north over the void and hung the earth on nothing.
Pause for just a second. Close your eyes for one minute and try to imagine that moment.
Out of nowhere, time, space, and all the living whirl forth as God speaks the universe into existence. With the utterance of His voice, creation takes form, chaos yields to order, light eclipses darkness, and emptiness fills with life…” - The Voice bibletageway.com
The moment ‘The Word’ spoke, it became so.
I follow The James Webb Space Telescope group on Facebook. I don’t follow for the conversation because it can be a bit over my head, such as the expansion of space and, there is much discussion leaning towards evolution. I follow for the images that are being captured by this amazing telescope.
According to NASA, The James Webb Space Telescope (sometimes called JWST or Webb) is “an orbiting infrared observatory that will complement and extend the discoveries of the Hubble Space Telescope, with longer wavelength coverage and greatly improved sensitivity.”
This $10 billion telescope shared its debut image with the world on July 12, 2022. I am sharing that image with this post in case you missed it last year. Since then, it has captured the most amazing photos!
When you hear sayings like “Jaw dropping pictures” you can count on it to be something like you have never seen before. And I cannot help but think of 1 Corinthians 2:9 “…Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.” NKJV
JWST has peered deeper into the universe than any other telescope prior, capturing the mystery and beauty of the cosmos in image after dazzling image.
I found this by one of the group’s members and I think it speaks volumes about what is happening in the world right now:
“The imagery from JWST is simply stunning. The evidence for organized galaxies and structures dating to very early in the history of the universe makes me wonder about entropy…The science and math surrounding the concept are very robust, and yet, it's obvious that the universe is not only highly organized, but continuously reorganizing itself. Stars continue to form, whole galaxies dance through clusters, and every living thing creates order and passes it on into the future. It just seems to this layman that there ought to be corollary scientific and mathematical laws explaining the anti-entropic manifestations of the physical and biological universe. With over 13 billion years of galactic evolution, and about 3.7 billion years of organic evolution here on earth alone, the concept of entropy seems insufficient to explain the spontaneous creation of order evident everywhere around us.”
Entropy is “the degree of disorder or randomness in the system”, and here is a guy that believes in evolution and yet, he is questioning the concept of entropy.
And this is why, “because the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.” Psalm 19:1 ESV
He looks at these images and he realizes his smallness and the vastness around him, and he thinks, “there has to be more.”
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Astronomers have discovered 12 new moons around Jupiter, putting the total count at a record-breaking 92. That's more than any other planet in our solar system. Saturn, the one-time leader, comes in a close second with 83 confirmed moons. – Marcia Dunn AP Aerospace Writer Feb 3, 2023
Did you know, I did not until today, that we have explored numerous planets? Everyone knows about the moon. Most are familiar with mars, but there are many others.
The Surface Of Planets And Moons That We Have Explored!
• Venus – USSR Venera 1961 and 1984 ...
• Moon – USSR 1959, And USA 1969 (first manned landing) ...
• Mars – NASA, Mars Curiosity Rover (6 August 2012) ...
• Titan – NASA-ESA-ASI, Cassini-Huygens (July 1, 2004) ...
• Mercury – NASA, MESSENGER (March 29, 2011) ...
• Galilean moons (Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.) ...
• Enceladus- NASA-ESA-ASI, Cassini-Huygens (2005) ...
• Mimas – NASA-ESA-ASI, Cassini-Huygens (February 13, 2010) ...
What are we looking for? Why this desire to explore?
According to NASA, humanity's interest in the heavens has been universal and enduring. Humans are driven to explore the unknown, discover new worlds, push the boundaries of our scientific and technical limits, and then push further. The intangible desire to explore and challenge the boundaries of what we know and where we have been has provided benefits to our society for centuries. (Source: nasa.gov)
Isaiah 40:26 NKJV “Lift up your eyes on high, and see who has created these things, who brings out their host by number; He calls them all by name, by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power; not one is missing.”
Amos 5:8 says, “He who made the Pleiades and Orion, and turns deep darkness into the morning and darkens the day into night, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out on the surface of the earth, the Lord is his name;” ESV
Job 9:9 “He made the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the chambers of the south;”
We have this deep desire, whether conscience or not, to know that we were made for more. I believe we also have this longing to know and understand the Creator of these things.
Psalm 8:3 ESV “…I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,”
Space.
He determines the number of the stars; He gives to all of them their names. Psalm 147:4
Our God is an awesome God! We cannot wrap out minds around who and what He is, but if we investigate space, we can begin to get a very small idea of how big He is.
Let’s talk about just one galaxy. The Whirlpool Galaxy, “The Darling of Astronomy”, is a mere 31 million light years from us.
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.” Genesis 1:1, 3
In the beginning God created light.
Louis Giglio breaks it down. “That was a phenomenal moment when that happened because light came out of the mouth of God traveling at 186,000 miles per second…a light year is how fast light travels in one year…I’ll do the math for you, it’s 5.88 trillion miles is a light year…if we wanted to visit the Whirlpool Galaxy, we would take 31 x 5.88 trillion miles and that is the distance we would need to cover…or look at it this way, you would only need to travel 186,000 miles a second for 31 million years and you would arrive at the Whirlpool galaxy”
In that one galaxy there are 300 billion stars. And there are hundreds of billions of other galaxies in the known universe. Our God is enormous and powerful!
The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork. Psalm 19:1
Do an online search and look at some of these photos coming back from that telescope and then imagine yourself someday exploring that and remember also “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”. 1 Corinthians 2:9 NKJV
I don’t know much, but I know, for a fact, we do not want to miss out on that!
“By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.” Hebrews 11:3 ESV
by Jeanette Stark – Friday, February 17, 2023