Making spaces, 1

Space, the final frontier. Space, the first three dimensions. Space, elbow room for America's school house rockers. Space is something to fill up. It's empty, but it needs something in it. The idea of an empty space makes us feel lonely. It's sort of frightening. Even thinking about the vast "emptiness" of outer space gives me the willies. We can hardly imagine there being nothing but planetary rocks and gigantic fireballs with vast amounts of nothing in between - especially when we look up at the stars and see a great conglomeration of lights. It's even harder to imagine that all those giant candles exist with earth as their focal point - for light, seasons and signs to the inhabitants of earth. And when you think that they're out there to, perhaps, lead the way in the Creator's musical praise (Cf., Kepler), suddenly all that emptiness doesn't seem so empty any more. Now you realize that it's filled with the "music of the spheres."

Music fills the air. The hills are alive with it. It fills what would otherwise be the vast emptiness of outer space. It may not be music we have ears for yet, but it's there nonetheless. The shouts of God's praise are from one end to the earth to the other. Of course, just because the stars "praise" their Maker (Psa. 148:3) doesn't necessarily mean they're singing. It could be that they are praising Him by doing what they are made to do - blazing forth amazing heat and light with power no human can comprehend. Either way, God gets praised. Either way, the vast emptiness of space is being filled up - perhaps with light, perhaps with song, perhaps with both, either way, with praise.

We know that at first, there wasn't anything up there in all that emptiness. There was darkness and there was light. On the second day, there was firmament above and firmament below. Then, sea and land, with all its vegetation, waiting to house and nourish wildlife. Three days, three sets of spaces to be filled - six rooms in His house in which He would place the "furniture" of creation. Then, on the fourth, fifth, and sixth days, God went about filling up these rooms of His house (Isa. 66:1) with living things. I'm not sure we'd consider the sun, moon, and stars "living" really. But maybe our definition needs to be stretched a bit. Still, those are the created things of the fourth day that fill the vastness of that which was made on the first day. Then, He filled the two firmaments with beings that fly and swim. Finally, He filled the land with things that crawl and walk, including man. All of His "fillings" added to His praise so that His house was full of His praise and glory. He made a space, and then He filled it.

We make spaces, too. We "cultivate" spaces so that things which glorify God will have a place to grow. Adam cultivated the garden, ordering it so that it could bear fruit to God's glory. This is what it meant for him to be God's image-bearer. He created alongside God, or pro(with)-created. In essence, that continues to be what it means to be human. We make spaces to cultivate and fill.