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Astronomers are convinced that the universe is of inconceivably immense size and that the heavenly bodies are not spread out uniformly in space but are in a series of groups. The basic unit in each group is a star, of which our Sun is an average specimen. The Sun has the Earth and other planets in orbit around it. The stars we can see on a clear night are only the Sun's immediate neighbours in space. The nearest star is 25 trillion miles away and light from it, travelling at 186,000 miles per second takes about 4.3 years to reach us – i.e. at a distance of 4.3 light-years. To help you better envisage this distance, if the distance from the Earth to the Sun (93 million miles) were represented by one inch, then the nearest star would be four miles away.

Beyond the stars of the Milky Way, our own galaxy can be seen, plus another similar galaxy, and beyond this are more galaxies that appear smaller because they are further away.

This distance is small in astronomical terms. On a clear night the Milky Way can be seen as a bright hazy band across the sky. With a telescope the Milky Way is seen as millions upon millions of stars, each like our Sun. This cluster of stars is called a galaxy and is a mass of stars formed into a flat disc about 100,000 light-years in diameter. Our Sun, together with its solar system of a few stars, is situated towards the edge of this galactic disc.

At one time our galaxy was thought to be the entire Universe but it is now known to be but an infinitely small part of it. There are millions of other galaxies organised in groups. In what is prosaically styled our ‘local group’ are about 20 galaxies but this is a comparatively small group. About 50 million light-years away is a group that contains thousands of individual galaxies.

Your mind may be reeling at the magnitude of all this – but we have not yet described the Universe. These groups of galaxies are themselves aggregated into superclusters of about 150 million light-years across. A large number of these superclusters, separated from each other by immense distances, form the observable Universe.

This then is the modern concept of the Universe. We could summarise our relationship to it as follows:

The origin of the Universe
One of the discoveries about the Universe is that all the clusters of galaxies appear to be moving away from some central point like the debris from an explosion. This has given rise to the ‘big bang’ theory of the origin of the Universe, which is accepted by many, although not all scientists. Physicists have been speculating on a sequence of events that might have led to the formation of the universe. They suggest that originally matter did not exist; there was only an atom-sized nucleus of pure energy. For some unknown reason, this pent-up energy nucleus rapidly began to expand.

The result of this expansion was to convert energy into matter. First came very small subatomic particles, then simple atoms such as hydrogen and helium. With further expansion more and more complex atoms were formed, gradually producing the array of chemical elements present today. These newly formed substances condensed into galaxies and into individual stars but their momentum was maintained and they are still all racing away from that original point of expansion.

Not completely random
This much-abbreviated account of the theory of the origin of the Universe (and it is still only a theory) may give the impression that its creation was the inevitable consequence of a purely random chain of events. However this is not so. If the Universe did develop in this way, then there had to be very fine control of the original ‘explosion.’ If the newly created Universe had been too dense, gravitational forces would have made it collapse back into itself. If the matter had been too diffuse it would not have condensed into galaxies and stars. The rate of expansion had to be just right. As one physicist put it: ‘To get a Universe that has expanded as long as ours has without either collapsing or having its matter coast away would have required extraordinary fine-tuning.’ (National Geographic Magazine, Volume 163 number 6, page 741.) This same scientist calculated that the odds of achieving that kind of precise expansion would be the same as throwing a microscopic dart across the Universe and hitting a bull’s-eye one millimetre in diameter.

So the first thing that astronomy tells us is that although all the components and mechanisms for the formation of the Universe can possibly be explained by science, if this was its origin, then it was not just an accident. First an original ‘big bang’ had to be triggered. In any fantastically violent creation event that followed, there had to be precise control if the Universe was to survive.

How was it controlled? Who threw that metaphorical dart and hit the bull’s eye against all the odds? Is the Divine claim through the prophet Isaiah that outdated after all? The prophet wrote:

‘I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded’ [Isaiah 45.12].

The purpose of the Universe
With a Universe so vast, it seems almost presumptuous that puny man should enquire about its purpose. Yet on a purely scientific level – and there are obviously other possible levels of understanding – it is thought that the original expansion and the immensities of space were necessary requirements for the production of the elements needed for life. ‘Some scientists are arguing seriously that this forbiddingly large and existential Universe was absolutely necessary for life to evolve. The elements of life had to be cooked up in stars... The Universe had to be rapidly expanding all that time. The Universe has to be large for life to have evolved.’ ( National Geographic Magazine, Volume 163 number 6, page 745.)

Scientific discoveries not only indicate some control in the formation of the Universe, but also the end product of this process produced the raw materials which we now know are the components of living things. Nearly three thousand years ago the Bible expressed the same idea that the earth was created as a receptacle for life:

‘For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited…’ [Isaiah 45.18].

As we end this brief review of the current scientific thinking on the Universe we can confidently say that these discussions do not rule out the existence of an all-wise and powerful Creator. Indeed, they almost demand His existence.

More information about Creation
Life on earth
Life is the exception
Man in the image of God
Does chance produce design?
Design demands a designer