Planet Home

READ: ISAIAH 45:18; REVELATION 21:1-5

The spacecraft settled one last time. It was only when all was quiet that I realized I was back. I started to take my helmet off, then paused.

Could I really do it? Walk outside without a helmet? Were the computers lying to me in their atmosphere reading of 21% Oxygen, 1% argon, and 78% nitrogen?

The rest of the crew didn’t seem to think so, and they all lumbered off the ship through the airlock, struggling against 9.807 meters per second of acceleration.

I had expected blinding sunlight and sky, but the sun was veiled by clouds, and raindrops patted against my helmet as I emerged. Instead, my first impression was of green everywhere. Trees, grass, even the uniforms of the attendants who greeted us.

My suit sensor buzzed, warning me of microbial life. I silenced it with a verbal command. I hadn’t heard it during the trip, so I had forgotten it was still on.

The rest of the crew had removed their helmets, so I reached up to do the same. My fingers felt weak, but I finally managed to undo the constraints and twist the thing off.

Water sprayed me. Oxygen and argon-flavored nitrogen washed through me, filling my lungs and my blood. Invisible microbes landed on my skin and hair, like an organic blanket welcoming me back home.

For the first time in months, life surrounded me. The trees, the people, the animals, the insects, and the smallest creatures high in the atmosphere and deep in the mantle.

I was on Earth, the best place in the universe. • Kevin Zeller

• Why is Earth special in the universe that God created? How is it different from other planets and moons in the solar system? What kinds of details did God include in making it a habitable place for humans?

• Jesus lived, died, and rose again on the earth and will return to reign on the made-new earth forever. How does this knowledge affect the way we look at our planet now?

For this is what the LORD says—the Creator of the heavens, the God who formed the earth and made it, the one who established it (he did not create it to be a wasteland, but formed it to be inhabited)—he says, “I am the LORD, and there is no other.” Isaiah 45:18 (CSB)