Look to the Heavens

“Then God said, ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.’ Thus God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day.” (Genesis 1:6–8)

In most of our minds there are “the heavens,” and then there is Heaven. One is the sky, and the other is the “place” where God “lives.” The birds and the stars and the moon fly in the one, and angels fly in the other. God’s throne is in heaven, the earth is His footstool, and the sky fills up the space in between.

The Bible doesn’t always make this sort of distinction (although at one point it does mention different levels of heaven). At any rate, the Bible here says God created Heaven on the second day—Light on the first, Heaven on the second—and, as with all of His creation, it was a glorious masterpiece, a canvas upon which He continued splashing creation-color for several days after.

Not only birds but bats and bees and pterodactyls made heaven their home when they were created on the fifth day. The fourth day of creation saw the sun launch his first footrace across the heavens—over two million such races later he is still going strong (although he has never improved his time). “Waters below” replace “waters above” through the ongoing miracle of evaporation; thunderstorms and blizzards enthusiastically return the favor, flooding the earth again and again and again and again, ad infinitum, keeping the earth’s tank topped off and her occupants happy (for the most part).

Among other things, God created the heavens (along with the rest of creation) to be our teachers, and mostly our teachers about the Creator Himself:

The heavens declared the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.
Their line has gone out through all the earth,
And their words to the end of the world.
(Psalm 19:1–4)

God the Son Himself came from heaven, and when He left, He ascended back into the heavens, accompanied by clouds and angels, after He rose from the dead. When He comes back at the Last Day, He will come from heaven. Jesus is in heaven right now, praying to God the Father in heaven for us; and our own prayers ascend to heaven where they are heard by God and from which the answers drop like rain upon our thirsty ground.

Hope and salvation, in other words, come from heaven. Morning sunshine, ministering angels, life-saving rains, even stars that announce Messiahs are all so many heavenly teachers proclaiming that our best and only hope comes from Heaven to Earth, and we are fools to look elsewhere.

“God, we give thanks for the heavens You have so masterfully created and given to us as a glorious gift: for sun, moon, and stars; for birds and rainbows; for thunderclouds and lightning; for sunsets and faraway galaxies. We give You thanks, and we pray You would give us eyes to see Your glory written in the skies, that we would be faithful to give You that glory and continual thanks and praise. We pray You would cause the sun to shine on us and the rain to fall on us as Your gifts of life to us, and we give You thanks above all for sending Jesus from heaven and for pouring out Your Holy Spirit from above that we might have eternal life. Through Jesus Christ our Lord we pray. Amen.”