The Ears of the Universe

“Listen, O heavens, and hear, O earth; for the LORD speaks” Isaiah 1:2

The Ears of the Universe

Listen – English fails us.  We need to read more than just “listen”.  We are to hear the sound of the voice of God echoing through the ages, right back to the beginning of creation.  “Hear, O Israel” is now paralleled with “Hear, O heavens”.  Shimehu shamayim.  The sound is poetic.  The effect is electric.  Even the heavens hear and obey!

Have you ever listened to the sound of the heavens?  Scientists discovered years ago that there is a deep, residual sound carried in the fabric of the universe.  They call it the left over noise of the Big Bang.  But maybe, just maybe, there is another source of that sound.  What if it is the answer of the universe to the call of its Creator?  Shama is not a word for simply listening.  It is a word for hearing and responding.  It is the call of the Creator into every part of His creation.  Go out on a starry night, away from the sound of Man, away from the flickering lights of men trying to make there own suns, away from the noises that fill our ears with reminders of considerably lesser gods.  And hear what God is saying in the breathing of the universe.

Years ago I spent some time on a small island in the South Pacific.  It was hundreds of miles from any industrialized civilization.  There were no electric lights, no cars, no airplanes.  Night was night, filled only with the lights God provided.  I remember lying on the beach, seeing the southern sky so clearly.  Billions upon billions of suns, God’s display of optical dust spread out on a canvas of black.  And I listened.  I heard the universe breathing the rhythm of God’s breath, alive, stable, confident.  So deep was the sound that it moved my soul.  “My God, You are too wonderful for me.”

We have been cheated by “progress”.  Even in the midst of the night, it is nearly impossible to escape the cacophony of human interference with the melodic harmony of God’s symphony in the heavens.  But if you ever hear it, just once, you will know that this sound does not belong to us.  God calls the heavens – and they answer.