One poster wrote:
" My Daddy's aim was that all his children "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine." 2 Timothy 4:2 I am a reprobate from this point of view. I see myself as thoughtful, intelligent human being. Heaven is a bribe, Hell is a threat/extortion."------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I; on the other hand, was introduced to a life changing and mind expanding lecture as a young man. I was attending classes on the PZX triangle used in Astro-Navigation computing at the Washington Planetarium. My eyes were opened to the universe, both what we see and understand - and - that which we cannot yet grasp.
With that stated and if you desire; take this trip with me and learn just how small all of us are.
I double dog dare you. Indeed; A desire to comprehend the Universe may well be humanity's oldest shared intellectual experience. Yet only recently have we truly begun to grasp our place in the vast cosmos. Open your mind and imagine the various worlds in the Solar System and the ferocity of the scorching Sun. From Earth to the Universe then move out to the colorful birthplaces and burial grounds of stars, and still further out, beyond the Milky Way, to the unimaginable immensity of a myriad galaxies.
Now; use your imagination to follow a scene from the movie "Contact" - staring Jody Foster.
The movie script was about making contact with intelligence from another part of the universe, and the opening scene was so fast and deep that it flew over the heads of many viewers who were still squirming in their seats and sticking their hands in the popcorn bag. Here is what it showed, so sit back, open your mind and learn.
It was a clear warm night and a young girl had her bedroom window open and her head was sticking out of the window and dreamily looking up at the night sky... In the background the soundtrack was playing her choice of current rock music....... The camera filming the scene was hovering just above the roof of her house and both she and the house were clearly shown. You could easily see the dreamy look in her eyes, when the camera slowly started to ascend up into the night sky.
Soon the camera was so far away that you could no longer see the house, but you could see the town.
As the camera rapidly increased the distance you could no longer see the town and soon you could see the whole planet as would be viewed from our space station today.. You could still hear her radio station broadcasting her favorite rock music because the radio waves did not have far to travel..
http://www.wwu.edu/planetarium/images/poster_fettu_600.jpgZoom: and the camera moves to the outer reaches of our planets and about the time you approached Mars you could hardly see earth and because of the radio waves she was listening to had been lost in the time delay and you were now listening to those broadcast some time ago and President Kennedy was heard speaking.
Again the camera moved even further into space and our sun became invisible and the radio was playing "Hitlers rants" in the background. At this point the radio was our only contact with our home planet-- we were almost "all alone" in space.
The climax being: Upon drawing near the milky way and in preparation for moving past it into deep space, all that was heard on the radio was static because not enough time had passed for the radio waves to travel this far from earth.
How far can we travel into the universe in the future? Who knows, we cannot even begin to see that far.
Are their other lives similar to our own -- on a host planet similar to ours? Could be.
the odds favor it.Will we be discovered and visited by aliens? -- or will we
as promoted by the movie "Contact" head off into space and find other planets?
Now the question: Who or what created this vast universe we cannot even begin to see or understand? -- Was it God? -- Was there a "big bang" that in a nanosecond God caused the universe to form and expand faster than the speed of light. Is there proof?
Well: Perhaps there is some proof of the big bang after all...
My point: Those among us who cannot imagine the whole picture will deny God's world and keep their focus where they can still see their feet. They will call it "Mother earth" and contend it is themselves "man" who must save us all from something or the other... They will be known as deniers.
You know who they are (as do they). They are among us.