The Vastness of Space

It was a cloudy yet warm afternoon as we sat along the shore of Lake Erie, and gazing toward the clouds drifting along my thoughts took me beyond and above the vast array of the unseen space of God’s Universe, immense and growing without human understanding. Knowledge of time and space are human recollections, yet with God these do not exist. For God created all there is and as Augustine wrestled with this very essence of beginning, I too think often about what the Creator has already given to us; our space and our time-yet in God’s wonderment there is no past or future; it is already present. (Confessions of St. Augustine - “Inquiry into Creation and Time” Book XI).

But my thoughts go beyond the vision of these wonderful, gray, and ever-flowing clouds and what lies beyond the comprehension of our own discretionary thoughts of creation. Who is this eternal entity that is called God? A supreme existence that is not just Omnipotnet and forever, but loving and endearing, creating all this for us.

Beyond what cannot be seen or in fact even imagined is nothing, and yet everything that does exist. As Augustine reflected intensely about creation, time and space, so I also reflect upon the unseen, the unknown, and the forever here for us, and there for a future that is not yet; beyond and about the realm of God’s presence.

We search with questions of what or how yet no answer is found or even heard within our persona, and still we seek an answer to assure our investigative minds. What if or why was all this made if but for a fallen world that is not worthy, yet You O’ Lord did this to make us worthy because of Jesus Christ’s redemptive and passionate trek to Calvary. Herein the Paschal Mystery comes alive with virtue, love, and the Grace of Almighty God.

Ever growing and always existing our universe looms beyond the understanding of man’s finite existence and the limited essence of life’s purpose for humanity. Created we were, and for God’s own reason of life giving breath to a world yet to be fulfilled in time; but only time as we know it. For God there is no past or future for the infinite is always in the presence of God’s Kingdom.

Here we can view an unseen miracle of the very essence of a God that loves humanity so much that He created from nothing something that goes beyond any thinking of tomorrow’s past and places all in the presence of His eminent persona. God is our hope of all the wonderment we are capable of sharing even when we do not understand the scope of it or the comprehension of its meaning. Search as we might to unravel the mysteries of the Universe as well as God Himself, we are left in a type of limbo only to ask how and receive an empty vessel of satisfaction. It is not ours to know the why and how but to learn obedience to the Lord’s presence and gift of life.

In the realm of space and time, as we have no other measurement to assess the existence of our presence in this element of matter, there exists beyond what can be seen or felt an openness to somewhere even beyond what the senses can comprehend. Ancient minds have searched for answers and as with understanding God, the more we search the less we know. Is there a height to which we can climb, or a weight we can lift, or an obstacle we can overcome that will give our inquisitiveness a reason to shout eureka we finally have discovered the hidden quest of life? No! Will anyone ever accomplish this inquiry of the mysteries of our world? I hardly doubt it.

How then do we surmount what the human mind wants or the soul of man thinks he needs to become one with God? We can never be equal to our Creator nor will we ever learn the mysteries of our Lord by constantly seeking to understand what He has already given to us; life, and life to the fullest with Him, but not here and now. Think back to Genesis and the garden wherein Adam and Eve dwelt; secure and with all they needed. Then came the Fall. The searching for knowledge that was not theirs to have. Reflect upon the lives of mystics and many of the saints that searched in wonderment and found a Presence that did not reveal these answers, but found answers instead in the solace of a peace that brought them closer to the Lord in a way only known to so few. It is there for each of us, but must be sought by the way of the Cross, suffering, and adherence to Grace from a loving God.

My thoughts turn to that mighty song of “How Great Thou Art”. To even dream of what or how, and why what lies beyond the mysteries of life, this mysterious God to whom all is pure, all is real, and all is His Creation in which we exist for now and into the unknown future that is created for a life with the Omnipotent God. Dream as we may, seek this quest of what was hidden for centuries revealed in Christ, and realized in man has now become but a speck in God’s Kingdom of the vast world expanding in our hearts and opening to a something beyond the comprehension of man’s finite mind and intelligence. Never will we understand here and now what is prepared from the beginning of time, time as only we can understand since our past and future exist eternally in the presence of Almighty God, while He awaits our souls to be united to a beatific vision than is so complex yet so majestic that one cannot even dream what is before us with an Eternal Trinity of Love and Peace.