The Tadpole Swims Within His Hands

Photo credit: NASA, ESA, and the ACS Science Team

O what grand celestial might

The Tadpole sweeps across the night!

Yet this cosmic truth still stands:

The Tadpole swims within His hands.

-- K. Hartnett, July, 2002

Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand and marked off the heavens with a span…Behold the nations are like a drop from a bucket. (Isaiah 40:12;15)

The Tadpole Galaxy - One in a Teeming Universe

Otherwise known by the dull name UGC 10214, this spectacular celestial object was one of the first to be imaged by the Advanced Camera for Surveys- a new instrument installed by astronauts into the Hubble Space Telescope in the Spring of 2002.  The “tail” of the tadpole is evidently gas, stars and dust pulled away from the body of the galaxy by the gravitational interaction of another galaxy nearby.  Computer simulations of such encounters have shown that complex arcs and distorted galactic shapes are quite to be expected.  More remarkable than the “tail” however, is the large number of background galaxies that appear in this one relatively-short exposure- more than 6000!  The area of the sky imaged in this photo is no more than the size of Lincoln’s eye on a penny held at arm’s length!

For all the gods of the nations are idols, but the Lord made the heavens. (Psalm 96:5)

Psalm 19 tells us that the heavens declare the glory of God.  This pronouncement directly applies to many qualities of the celestial realm- such as  its beauty, majesty, and power.  One special aspect of this revelation  however, is that the Lord Almighty is infinite. Our brains quickly “blow fuses” as we try to contemplate the vastness of outer space.  Traveling at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to cross our galaxy alone.  There are literally billions of galaxies in the universe, as far in every direction as the most powerful telescopes can see.  If the nations are to the Lord as a drop in a bucket or as dust on the scales, so too are the sum of all the galactic systems in creation- finite as they are- to Him, the infinite One.