Sometimes, when I want to feel smaller than I already do, I walk outside to the night sky and look up.

First, my eyes are distracted by the steady-moving unblinking low-orbit satellites that constantly crisscross our modern skies. Yeah, Elon, you’re pretty impressive! Mankind has taken some giant leaps, indeed.

But I’m looking for something better.

I’m reaching for the stars tonight. Their tiny points of light above me wink back at my smallness. Any random part of the night sky I gaze upon are myriads of swirling worlds, billions of light-years away. (or so, they tell me). Vast galaxies and suns that dwarf our own.

I scan the horizons, which are hemmed in by hills and houses and polluted by nearby city lights in my part of the world, But I can picture in my mind our blue-green planet spinning in space. Zooming out from my own perspective, I can see my small form rapidly lost in the darkness, and the horizons being quickly expanded into the curvature of our terrestrial ball.

The yellow blinking gridwork of human infrastructure appears as a bit of glitter sprinkled over a dark canvas. Soon earth itself is just a speck as we move outward at a speed much faster than light (for to travel at such a plodding pace would require too much time for my little mental exercise).

Now I have escaped the little playground of our solar system and wave goodbye to Pluto (poor little ex-planet) as I dodge through the protecting Ort Cloud and make a beeline to our nearest star, Proxima Centauri, just over 25 trillion miles away.

Then on I travel until our Milky Way galaxy looks like a little toy pinwheel thrown carelessly from a child’s hand. Next destination is its nearest Galactic neighbor, Andromeda. They tell me that travelling at the speed of light,(which is impossibly fast in reality…just ask a certain wild-haired German physicist) would take us 2.5 million years to reach Andromeda. But I’ve already arrived and am still hurtling onward. From here, the Milky Way would be just a very hazy smudge to the untrained alien eye. It’s suns, our solar system, and beautiful little earth would be invisible.

From here I see billions of galaxies, each teeming with billions of stars and shrouded in secrets. From here, giant supernova sparkle, and colorful nebulae tower upward through incomprehensible dimensions. From here, black holes loom ominously- even light rays shuddering at the thought of entering those gaping dark doors.

Although I’ve barely crossed the threshold of my dwelling for a proper tour of the universe, I’m ready to call it a day. I feel quite small. Actually- incredibly and distressingly insignificant.

When I consider the heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained- What is man that your are mindful of him, and the son of man that you visit him? (Psalm 8)

Me too, David. Me too!

Over three thousand years ago, the son of Jesse was lying on his back staring at the night sky, feeling small. When did he write this psalm? Was it on a dark hillside on the outskirts of Bethlehem with his dad’s sheep? Was it a moonless wilderness midnight, as a hunted fugitive, surrounded by his snoring group of 400 ruffians? Or was it later in life as king, at peace in Jerusalem, gazing from his rooftop palace vista?

We moderns are often guilty of “chronological snobbery”; looking down our noses at the ignorant ancients who knew nothing of rotating planets, ort clouds, and swirling galaxies. Or did they?

I expect the night sky in 1,000 B.C. declared the glory of God’s handiwork far louder than my polluted view does today. Whatever the case, David knew enough to know that he didn’t know much at all. What’s important however, is that David turned his feelings of smallness into the largeness of praise. He worshiped.

What’s important however, is that David turned his feelings of smallness into the largeness of praise.

O Lord, our Lord! How excellent is Your name in all the earth!

A few nights ago, after being awakened in the wee hours of the morning by our two-year old climbing into bed with us, I struggled to fall back to sleep. I sipped a bit of water from our nightstand and glanced out the window. I caught my favorite constellation, the mighty Orion, resting on his side upon the Blue Ridge mountains in the east.

Lying down again, my mind fired up a rowdy pinball game, gleefully bouncing around tomorrow’s impending conversations, stress and responsibilities. Deep sleep evaded me.

For some reason, in that strange transitory period between wakefulness and slumber, I suddenly wondered what God’s conversation with a modern-day Job would sound like.

You see, Job got grilled. Big time. God spoke out of the chaos and talked directly to him, which is kind of a big deal on its own merit, if you know what I mean.

But instead of answering Job’s desperate pleas for somebody to make some sense of his suffering, God instead took him on a virtual tour of the universe, peppering him with unanswerable questions.

“Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” God asks. In everyday terms: Who are you to question My wisdom and authority with ignorant words?

Prepare yourself like a man and answer! Gird your loins, Job. Buckle up!

Many of the questions God asked Job still cannot be answered today:

Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Can you bind the bind the cluster of Pleiades or loose the belt of Orion? Can you lift up your voice to the clouds that an abundance of water may cover you? Have you given the horse strength? Does the hawk fly by your wisdom?

Job: [crickets]

But one could argue that some of the questions asked by God, would have a ready answer from today’s enlightened intellectuals. For example:

Have you entered the springs of the sea, or have you walked in search of the depths? Have you comprehended the breadth of the earth? Have you entered the treasury of the snow, or have you seen the treasury of the hail? Do you know when the time when the wild goats and deer bear young? Can you number the months they fulfill?

Well, yes. Mankind has spent thousands of years accumulating vast knowledge of science. Our insatiable curiosity of how our universe functions, backed by the deep gnawing questions of meaning and purpose drive us to observe, research, calculate and theorize to this day.

But under every turned rock of scientific discovery is a horde of creepy crawly questions that we just can’t seem to stamp out.

Under every turned rock of scientific discovery is a horde of creepy crawly questions that we just can’t seem to stamp out.

In fact, I would argue there is direct correlation between our gained knowledge and the awareness of how much we don’t know. The more you learn, the smaller you become.

And so, the other night at 4 AM, I pictured a long line of the Enlightenment’s brightest minds, secular and religious alike, being questioned by Almighty God.

Prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me.

Congratulations, Sir Isaac Newton! I heard an apple fell on your head and got you thinking. You’ve discovered the law of gravity. Now tell me- how does gravity actually work…and from where did it come from?

[Silence]

Mr. Einstein, step right up! I’ve heard a lot about you, and I’m expecting some brilliant answers. E=mc2. Pretty impressive! Now tell me- what is this stuff called dark matter, that “invisible glue” that holds together the galaxies? And the dark matter, that is instrumental in acceleration the expansion of the universe? Where did it come from? Where you there to help me fashion it?

[Shrugs]

Mr. Watson and Mr. Crick, it’s your turn. You’ve figured out that the cell is slightly more complex than the “microscopic lump of jelly-like substance” that your forefathers ascribed it to be. You’ve discovered the double-helix coil of deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA!
Excellent! Now tell me- where were you when I designed this biological replicating marvel? Can you explain how such a fined-tuned, intricate system can begin? Put on your big boy pants and answer me!

[Shifts feet]

Francis Collins! You headed up the Human Genome project and successfully mapped it entirely. You discovered the longest word known to man; 3 billion letters of coded information embedded within each DNA cell of every person who has ever lived. Each one a complete instruction manual to the function and development of human life. Were you there when I wrote the code of all living things? Tell me- can you speak life into existence from inorganic and inanimate substances?

[Bows head]

We’ll stop there, but the list could go on and on. All of the brilliant men mentioned were instrumental in world-changing scientific discoveries. Their religious views ranged from atheist to deist to Christian. One thing is sure: their discoveries didn’t answer all our questions. If anything, they’ve uncovered many more.

I once heard the late, sharp-witted atheist Christopher Hitchens talking about a conversation he had once with his own child, who wondered how the “Big Bang” started. His answer went something like this.

“Picture everything that ever was and ever will be in the universe…picture all matter and all energy compressed into a small, black travel suitcase. And it’s about to burst open. That’s what happened in the Big Bang”

Of course his child had a comeback ready: “What was outside the suitcase?”

Hitchens gave a rare chuckle when recalling this interaction. He accurately observed that our “poverty-stricken vocabulary and poverty-stricken capacity” succumbs to the most basic analogies to describe things that we were never meant to understand. He consoled himself that he didn’t think any other parent has ever had a better answer than his, though.

Hitchens clung to his little black suitcase until his dying breath. I’ll stick with an unfathomable God.

Hitchens clung to his little black suitcase until his dying breath. I’ll stick with an unfathomable God.

The voice from the whirlwind ceased, and Job cautiously raised his head.

"Behold, I am vile; What shall I answer You? I lay my hand over my mouth. Once I have spoken, but I will not answer; Yes, twice, but I will proceed no further"
I know that You can do everything, and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You
Therefore I uttered what I did not understand, Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
I have heard You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You. Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."  
(Job 40 and 42)

Do you feel small enough, yet? I do.