"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork" (Psalm 19:1).

Christ is the heir of all things, and to the praise of his glory, he uses all he possesses, including the heavens, to do good to us. He uses the glories of the skies to reveal his majesty for our astonishment and enjoyment.

My son Jonathan has a pretty decent telescope. One night not long ago he called me over to look at a tiny twinkling light in the sky he'd focused on. When I looked into the telescope, to my astonishment there was Saturn. A perfectly clear white ball with white rings encircling it. I was stunned. I wasn't looking at a picture of Saturn - I was looking at Saturn itself hanging there in firmament.

Being a full-service blog, we provide the following facts about Saturn for your amazement:

--Saturn's equatorial diameter is 74,130 miles. Earth's is 7,926 miles.

--It takes 29.5 Earth years for Saturn to revolve around the Sun. This means in my entire lifetime Saturn has only been around the Sun once (well, it's getting close to twice).

--Saturn's mass is 95.2 times that of Earth, yet it rotates on it's axis approximately every 10 hours and 15 minutes - it's spinning more than twice as fast as we are.

--Saturn's minimum distance from Earth is 746 million miles - that means Saturn is more than 7 times further away from us than the sun (the Sun is a mere 91 million miles from the earth).

--The average surface temperature is -300F. Think about this next time you have to start the car on a frigid morning - you could be on Saturn.

--750 Earths could fit inside a hollowed-out Saturn - that's right - 750, and 1600 Saturns could fit into the Sun.

--The rings of Saturn are composed of particles of ice but may include ice-covered rock particles. The size of the particles ranges from the width of a paper clip to a yard to some possibly 6 city blocks long.

I was gazing across 750 million miles of space at a ball that would hold 750 earths, surrounded by perfect rings composed of ice chunks. Saturn was singing to me of the glory of God. Saturn was singing "How majestic is my Creator! How glorious and astounding and marvelous are all his works." Saturn was singing, "Look at me! God created me and my rings and hung us in the sky. All he had to do was speak and I stood forth. And Christ is still upholding me and Jupiter and The Andromeda Galaxy, the Milky Way and the earth by his powerful Word. How awesome is God!"

When I gazed at Saturn, I caught a tiny glimpse of the glory of God. And all I could do was praise him. The heavens declare his glory. Next time you're out on a clear star-studded night, look up. And worship God for his glory.

photo: NASA