“He knows the number of the stars; He calls them all by their names. Great is our Lord, and of great power” (Psalm 147:4–5).

The darker the night, the better we can see the stars, all of them vast distances away. Some of them are hundreds of trillions of miles away. King David enjoyed gazing at them and wrote: “The Heavens declare the glory of God” (Psalm 19:1). Do you enjoy them too? How strange that some people try to figure out how the starry skies came into being when the answer is found in many places in the Bible. Here is one: “The worlds (stars) were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear” (Hebrews 11:3). The stars came into being at God’s command!

Astronomers admit they have not been able to find an end to the stars and are increasingly amazed at what they discover with electron telescopes. They report that the galaxy called the Milky Way, of which our world is a very tiny part, has an estimated 200 billion stars in it, and that there are at least 175 billion galaxies with a total number of stars so large that it is impossible for our minds to grasp the number. Yet, as our opening Bible verse tells us, God knows the exact number of stars, and even more amazing, He has a name for each one of them! Actually, there is no point in trying to count them, for God himself declared, “The host of heaven cannot be numbered [by man]” (Jeremiah 33:22). We are also told, “one star differeth from another star in glory [beauty]” (1 Corinthians 15:41). No two are alike. What pleasure our blessed God must have had when He stretched “out the heavens like a curtain” (Psalm 104:2).

Here is an example of how the Creator made each star different from all others. Earth’s diameter is 7,926 miles, compared with the star Betelgeuse’s diameter of 540,000,000 miles and the star Aurigae’s diameter of 750,000,000 miles. Our sun is 865,000 miles in diameter, or more than 100 times Earth’s size. If we were to compare others within reach of telescopes, we would be astounded to discover what great differences the Creator has made in all of them.

It has been calculated that our fastest spaceship traveling from Earth would take 40,000 years to reach the star known as Alpha Centauri, which is 26,000,000,000,000 (26 trillion) miles away from us. (Even at that distance, it is the third brightest star in the night sky.) Yet, for all these great distances, which boggle the minds of astronomers, the Creator has each heavenly body under His constant gaze and keeps each one in its proper orbit. Only He could make them, place them in their orbits in space, and keep them in order.

We sing a hymn that states it so well, “Isn’t He wonderful!”

In about 1830, a man named George Wilson killed a government employee when he was caught robbing the mail. Wilson was tried and sentenced to be hanged. However, the President of the United States, Andrew Jackson, sent Wilson a pardon. Then George Wilson did a strange thing: he refused to accept the pardon. No one seemed to know what to do, so Wilson's case was sent to the U. S. Supreme Court. Chief Justice Marshall wrote his opinion: “A pardon is a slip of paper, the value of which is determined by the acceptance of the person to be pardoned. If it is refused, it is no pardon. George Wilson must be hanged.” And he was.

The cross of Christ is a revelation of God’s love for all people. We may do cowardly and disappointing things and bring deep pain to God’s heart, but in the cross we see that He never gives up on us. Something happened that day on Calvary that forever makes a difference in the relationship between people and God. Even when the love of Jesus was thrown in His face with spitting, mocking, and cursing, it remained unbroken.

The death of Christ on the cross is the pardon God has sent. There on the Cross He, because of His great love and grace, paid for the penalty of our sin. But before it becomes a pardon, we must accept it in faith and obedience. It is through the cross, and only through the cross that we can be saved from sin and its consequence of eternal separation from God in hell.

Here is what God, who cannot lie, says:

1. Every human is a sinner (Romans 3:23)
2. God's penalty for sin is death (Romans 6:23)
3. In His great love, God has made provision for the salvation of sinners (Romans 5:8)
4. Each person must put his trust in the Lord Jesus Christ who offers free salvation for those who accept His gift of love (Romans 10:9–10, 13)

When the director walks onto the stage, the play is over. When the Lord returns in judgment, what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something new coming in? This time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature. It will be too late then to choose your side. Instead, it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realized it before or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side.

“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son SHALL NOT see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him” (John 3:36). Have you accepted God’s pardon in Christ Jesus the Lord? If not, will you?