When the New Horizons spacecraft safely beamed back photos of Pluto this week, it was an exciting milestone in the scientific discovery of the universe. After almost a century of appearing as a fuzzy dot, images of the former-ninth planet of our Solar System were shown in glorious detail.
Yet compared to the rest of the universe, this celestial body is only in the same street as our planet, and the same suburb as our galaxy, the Milky Way.
The further we pierce the great depths of space, the more we see the glory of God.
Well before telescopes and satellites, The Psalmist would lead us in praising God, saying “LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory in the heavens.” (Psalm 8:1).
Yet, even more extraordinary is that God would make humans to be the centre of the universe.
He exclaimed that “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 honour.” (Psalm 8:3-5).
Yet it was a thousand years later that the greatest human of all walked on our planet, who though his death, would bring the greatest glory of all to God.
As we read in Hebrews chapter 2 verse 9, “we do see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honour because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.”
Jesus is far more glorious than Pluto, and through his glory, we too share in his glory.