Years ago, a team of astronomers at the University of Minnesota announced they found a hole in the universe in the Eridanus constellation. They say it has no galaxies, few stars, not even dark matter. It’s just an empty place they say is a billion light years across. I think it means that IF you could travel at the speed of light, it would take one billion human years to go from one end of this hole to another. Who can comprehend it? Only God, because he created that hole and the entire universe and everything in it. His divine power and wisdom keeps it running.
I’ve reading through the book of Job lately. Job knew something about empty places. As you may recall, Job was a wealthy and well respected man. But then he lost all his possessions, his children, and his health. He was only left with his criticizing ‘friends’ and a nagging wife. Covered in boils, he was in unspeakable pain every day. Yet Job accepted his condition as allowed by his sovereign God. He spoke truth about God to his so-called friends despite their constant battling against him. What a vast empty place that must have been!
After repeated discourses between Job and his accusers, the Lord spoke to Job, reminding him of who was God and who wasn’t. “Where you were when I laid the earth’s foundations? Who marked off its dimensions? Can you bind the chain of the Pleiades? Can you loosen Orion’s Belt?” (Interesting that God points Job, in his place of emptiness, to the Orion constellation which borders the Eridanus constellation where this large empty hole was found.) Essentially, God brought Job to the end of himself. Job turned to God and God restored him. Not only him but twice his wealth and more sons and daughters.
Can you associate with Job in your suffering? And after your endless questions and cries for help, after all your own reasoning and you find yourself in a dark empty place…can you surrender everything to God? I know this is painful because I’ve gone there myself. But when we tell God, “I’m tired of being bitter, angry, lonely, always in pain, full of grief, always anxious and afraid, I desperately need your help,” he is ready to change us. When we stop resisting his leading and going our own way, he will restore us. It’s a matter of telling ourselves every day (and throughout the day), “Yet still I will believe you Lord. Yet still I will trust you. Yet still I will claim your promise of assurance, peace, love and so much more. I will let your goodness replace my harmful thoughts and actions. My beliefs will be made evident through my thoughts, words, and behaviors. I will walk out of my self-imposed prison of rebellion and find freedom in following you.”
The choice is ours. Where are you going to turn in your place of emptiness?