Unlike our 50.6 degree evening right now, on one 15.2 degree evening this last weekend my lab and I were out enjoying the crispest and clearest of winter nights. The sky was so deeply black I am sure one could have seen a 7th magnitude star though we are only supposed to see 6th magnitude stars with our unaided eye. But this night we were stunned by Sirius. Even having once lived on the equator in a land with no light pollution, I have never seen it brighter. Normally Sirius is -1.46 magnitude but this night it must have been brighter. It is our 6th closest neighboring sun at 8.6 light-years distance. If the moon had not been at half, I think Sirius would have cast a perceptible shadow. The light that filled our eyes this night in 2011, left Sirius in September, 2002. It might have exploded last year and no longer be there but we will not know that until 2019!
I find myself thinking if God turns on the light and the heat it must be for some creature’s benefit other than us. To think God made the stars for us is about the most egocentric thing we could think in our self-conceit. My do we ever think WE are important! Yet, I have actually heard that from a pulpit.
Hebrews 1:2 is one of my favorite verses about Jesus. It says, “In these last days (God has) spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; . . .” Our Jesus, our creator, the one who took responsibility for us after we disappointed all heaven, made Sirius. If that was all He made He would be worthy of our worship. But He also made the other 100 trillion suns in our medium size galaxy
Written by Roger Bothwell on February 18, 2011
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574
Rogerbothwell.org