I recently had an interesting conversation with the young daughter of a good friend. Now, this young lady is an avid reader but she described herself as “dumb” in math and science. I tried to encourage her not to use such language to describe herself and to encourage her to try a little harder to understand these subjects. Funny thing about certain conversations… they continue in your own head long after they have ended; and this has been one of those!
As a child, I did well in math and science. We lived in a very rural area and in the 1970’s light pollution was hardly a thing, so a clear night sky would be filled with stars. My parents had bought us a small telescope and I loved using it to look at anything in the sky I could find. I also read all the books in our very small library about astronomy I could find (which wasn’t that many.) Obviously, my primary interests moved on to other things, but my interest in science and especially in astrophysics has always remained. Which brings us to my ongoing conversation with myself.
Why is it important to pay attention to advances in science? It is hardly to fully understand things, that is the job of my PhD brother, the famous physicist Steven Remillard, but we need to understand This is My Father’s World! When Galileo first put together his simple telescope and turned it toward the night sky, what he saw rocked the world. And with each advancement we went on to discover Saturn’s rings, and much later Neptune’s rings. Then we found Jupiter’s moons. And we kept looking deeper and deeper into the cosmos. Last century the Hubble telescope was launched. Once all the bugs were worked out and repairs made we saw things never seen before. One particular picture was of an area once assumed to be largely empty. What we found was quite the opposite! It was full of uncountable galaxies! Our understanding of our Father’s world grew exponentially. And then… the James Webb telescope was launched! Within a few short months of going operational the astrophysics apple cart was good and well overturned!
I am no scientist. When I read the abstract of my brother’s dissertation, I understood some of the participles but the words between them were a mystery. But I do understand my brother stood on the shoulders of those who came before him, just as every scientist and mathematician does. All of these people, whether they are studying the really big stuff like galaxies millions of light years away or the really small stuff like subatomic particles are like blind men trying to understand an elephant. Each may think they understand their particular corner. That is until some new discover changes everything… again. This is My Father’s World! Every discovery teaches a new marvel to behold! A new wonder of its Creator. Nothing discovered disproves the Creator of the creation, but more fully reveals His wonder.
Now we come to the crux of the matter. If these giants who stand on the shoulders of giants of science and math struggle to understand their small corner of this vast created universe, what does this say about our ability to understand the Creator? If His creation is marvelous beyond our understanding, how much more is the Creator?
To our simple minds we have been given simple instructions, to love God with all of our heart, mind and spirit and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. Studying our Father’s world should lead us first to humility and then to our knees.
And as we enter the coming crazy season, we should carefully consider what Jesus had to say about who is our neighbor.
