When the Nation Looked Up, What Did They See?

In an article for the online news magazine, The Stream, on August 22 (a day after the solar eclipse) Tom Gilson writes: “My wife said it well: ‘He probably thought it was cute.’ Neither of us caught the NBC news reporter’s name, but we did hear how he signed off his report yesterday on people gathering for the Great Eclipse: ‘One nation indivisible — under one sun and moon.’ There’s something to be said for anything that will bring us all together. Grand events like the eclipse remind us of how much we have in common. We are indeed one nation, and may the sun and moon hold us together that way!
 
Gilson continues: “Not much chance of that, is there? The next eclipse is seven years away, and they sure don’t last very long when they do come. More to the point, we aren’t so much into astrology here.  I’m sure that NBC reporter isn’t   either. It was a cute quip. There’d be no reason to make a big deal about it, except he missed a great chance to tell it the right way: ‘One nation under God, viewing His glory!’ Whether we all knew it or not, we were looking up at the glory of God on display.
 
Gilson is right in observing that heavenly events such as a solar eclipse point to a God in heaven. It is a natural event, but it points strongly toward an intelligently designed intention behind the ‘coincidences’ that make its amazing features possible.”
 
Jay Richards, also writing for The Stream, observes: “A rare alignment of events allows Earthlings to witness not just   solar eclipses, but what we might call perfect solar eclipses. Our Moon just barely covers the Sun’s bright photosphere. Such an eclipse depends on just the right sizes, shapes, and relative distances of the Sun, Moon and Earth. There’s no law of physics that dictates this layout. There are 65 major moons in our Solar System, and many smaller ones. But only we enjoy perfect solar eclipses. If there were Martians or Uranians, they wouldn’t see such eclipses. The Moon is about 400 times smaller than the Sun. But the Moon is also about 400 times closer to the Earth than is the Sun. As a    result, the size of the Moon on our sky matches the size of the Sun. And since they appear as round disks, they match in both size and shape.”
 
Tom Gilson continues, “We were a nation looking upward yesterday. Sadly, I know this reporter never could have said we were looking at the glory of God on display; the network wouldn’t have allowed it, even if he’d wanted to. The rest of us, though, can remember never to allow the moon, the sun or anything else to eclipse Him from our hearts and minds.”
 
To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing” (Isaiah 40:25-26).
 
Working together with you to shine for Jesus,
 
Tyler

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