Out in space - Hope 103.2

Out in space

Morning Devotions is for those curious about the Christian faith and who want to explore Christian issues that relate to their daily life.

By Chris WittsSaturday 28 Feb 2015Morning Devotions with Chris WittsEntertainmentReading Time: 0 minutes

Transcript:

If you went to the movies a few years ago to see “Apollo 13”,you might remember the part played by Tom Hanks. He played James Lovell who today still flies planes and works for NASA’s space program. He’s is a well known public speaker in the US. Yes,here’s been on his way to the moon and back,on board Apollo 13 back in April 1970,in a tiny space capsule with 2 other crew members,200,000 miles from earth. Can you imagine what that must have felt like? But things went terribly wrong. Apollo 13 was the third American manned lunar landing mission,part of the Apollo program. Two days after launch,the Apollo Spacecraft was crippled by an explosion,caused by a ruptured oxygen tank. The crew watched in horror as their air and power gauges went down drastically,and they knew they had to shut down all electricity and power to preserve their life support and manoeuvring system. This had to be done if they could ever reach earth again.
Houston Mission control also saw this happen and realised it was hopeless,and said to the crew “At current conditions,there is no way you can return to earth”. Jim Lovell in talking about this awful time said one day “That’s when the lead weight dropped to the bottom of my stomach,that searing sensation you get when you know you are in big trouble,and don’t know how to get out of it”.

This amazing true story sees Jim Lovell steer the ship manually without instruments,and he did so safely arriving back to earth. He is a committed Christian and shares his story with people wherever he goes. “God is as present on earth as He is in space. What we went through is an example of how God’s work must truly be our own.”. He thanks God for saving him and the other crew,and spoke of the day he saw earth suspended in the heavens. “When I looked at earth and thought of all the problems and worries,then saw how I could cover up our planet with my thumb,I thought of how vast the universe is,how seemingly small we are,and how fortunate we are to have the capacity to think about our place in it”. He never got to stand on the moon but said when he arrived back on earth,he learned that literally millions of people had been praying for him. Amazing story,isn’t it.

Have you lost the wonder of God’s creation? Do you just take all the beauty and extravagance of the world for granted? When was the last time you enjoyed a beautiful flower or sunset? Many of us have little balance in our life when it comes to enjoying God’s creation,and we miss a great deal when we ignore the wonder of creation. You know,David was a man after God’s own heart,and one reason was he never lost the wonder of God. He wrote: “When I consider your heavens,the work of your fingers,the moon and the stars which you have set in place,what is man that you are mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him?” (Ps. 8:3-4) Another verse from the Bible says “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands” (Psalm 19:1)  You see,when we lose the wonder of God’s creation,we lose a lot of the wonder of who God is.  He created this unfathomable universe where we live. Our galaxy has over 100 billion stars and He knows everyone of them by name. No wonder Jim Lovell was amazed at what he saw in outer space back in 1970.

As Romans 1:20 says,we are without excuse if we deny God,”For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen,being understood by the things that are made,[even] his eternal power and Godhead.”

In the book ” My Search for the Ultimate”,research scientist Lambert Dolphin Jr. writes,”Confronted every day with the mysteries of space and the atom,I continue to be amazed at the complexity and order of our universe. From the sub-microscopic realm of the atom to the expanding reaches of the galaxies,our universe runs like intricate and well-oiled clockwork according to great physical laws which never change or falter. “Our sun,which is the nearest star,a hundred earth diameters across,is 93 million miles into space. Each day the sun supplies our solar system with heat,power and light at the rate of a million billion,billion horsepower! Yet it is only an average star.

“Our island universe of stars which we call the Milky Way is 100,000 light years across. If we could travel at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second),it would take us 100,000 years to traverse the Milky Way! Yet this is only one of a billion or more such island universes stretched out in every direction from our earth to distances measured in billions of light years.”

“You ask me how I know it’s true
That there is a living God –
A God who rules the universes,
The sky – the sea – the sod;
A God who holds the creatures
In the hollow of His hand;
A God who put Infinity
In one tiny grain of sand…

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A God whose mighty handiwork
Defies the skill of man…
For no architect can alter
God’s perfect Master Plan –
What better answers are there
To prove His Holy Being
Than the wonders all around us
That are ours just for the seeing.”  (Helen Steiner Rice)