I just returned from a wonderful twelve-day trip driving through the Canadian Rocky Mountains. Whenever I think with a bit of care about the gorgeous beauty, vast expanse, and intricate detail of God’s creation, I stand utterly amazed.
I am trying to learn a little more about this astounding creation. Oxford University Press publishes a wonderful set of books written by scholars on a host of complex issues—each one beginning with the title, A Very Short Introduction To… I’m currently reading the ones on physics, chemistry and genetics.
The introduction to particle physics amazes me, with how modern science enables us to know a lot about the astoundingly tiny things at the base of all reality. Each of us at every moment has 1 million billion billion atoms of oxygen in our lungs. Each dot at the end of a sentence in a book contains some 100 billion atoms of carbon. (But, as the wise guy says, “Never trust an atom because they make up everything.”)
I also plan to read the Oxford introduction to astronomy and learn a bit more about the vastness of the universe. Astronomers tell us that there are at least 100 billion galaxies (and maybe 100 trillion!) in the universe. Each galaxy has anywhere from a few hundred million to 100 trillion stars! That means that the universe is astoundingly huge, beyond anything I can imagine.
Whenever I think with a bit of care about the gorgeous beauty, vast expanse and intricate detail of God’s creation, I stand utterly amazed.
To think that the Creator of this vast universe actually knows and cares about even tiny me is beyond mind-boggling. But I do plan to ask the Lord, when I live in my resurrected body in Christ’s future Kingdom, to let me do inter-galactic travel for a few million light-years!
What a world. What a Creator.
Ron Sider is the Founder and President Emeritus of Christians for Social Action. Subscribe to his free blog here!
