Some years ago Paulette and I were very fortunate to be able to take a trip to Australia. It was a great trip, and while there we visited the outback, staying in the small town of Alice Springs. A highlight was seeing the vibrant colors of Ayers Rock at sunset while sipping champagne, but surprisingly we enjoyed going on an Aussie barbecue almost as much. They took us about thirty miles out of “town” to what seemed like the middle of nowhere, and when we got out of the vans it looked like the sky was alive. The stars were super bright and inevitably our eyes looked up. Several in our group commented that they had never seen so many stars, and we were all in awe at the dramatic sight. I recall being reminded of my childhood. I grew up in rural northern Indiana before the time of yard lights, and there were no other houses nearby; if we went in the field behind our house, the sky looked just as bright as it did in Australia over fifty years later. The stars are still there, but we rarely have a chance to see them without them being obstructed by ambient light – light pollution.

Until the last two centuries almost everyone’s view of the night sky was like the one I saw in Australia, and almost every culture was captivated by the brilliant night sky. People looked to it for guidance. It probably always has been an aid to navigation, and I’ve read that the first maps were of the night sky and not of the earth. In the northern hemisphere, we can always determine the northerly direction by looking to the North Star. In the southern hemisphere there is no such stationary star, but if we look at the Southern Cross it always points to the south, even though it moves through the sky. People looked to the stars for guidance in other ways, also. Most cultures had names for the common constellations and gave them mythical properties. The Greeks even found some of their gods in the sky. Some of this continues today; most papers publish astrology columns.

We as Christians, when we’re lucky enough to get a view without light pollution, still look to the stars with awe and wonder; they remind us of our omnipotent, loving God. The Psalmist felt the same way. In Psalm 8:3-5 we read, “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.” What a wonderful way to remember God’s unconditional love for YOU and me.

Jim