The Gospel in the Stars

Last Sunday I spoke at the evangelical congregation in Zoetermeer (projector presentation) about the signs of the Zodiac. Not directly a biblical subject, of course, yet Scripture provides enough material to arrive at a fascinating perspective on it. It is well known that the Bible has little regard for astrology. There is a very good reason for this. Events in the world in general and in our personal lives in particular are not directed by stars (or constellations) but by Him who made the stars. But please, do not draw the wrong conclusion from this! Stars do have a great deal to tell us. Psalm 19 says that the heavens are telling of God’s glory, and that night after night they are proclaiming knowledge to mankind. In other words, the starry sky does not speak of our lives (as horoscopes would have us believe) but of God’s glory and of His work! Consider also that God not only knows all the names of the stars (Psalm 147:4), but also that He made the constellations. In Job (9:9) it says: “HE MAKES the Bear and Orion, the Pleiades and the chambers of the south.”

The God who gave us the holy Scriptures is the same God who also made the constellations. It should therefore come as no surprise that the story of the constellations corresponds with the plot of the Bible. The story of the constellations goes back to the (so-called) mother promise (Genesis 3:15), where God promises humanity a Redeemer who, through struggle, will achieve victory. One by one, the constellations are about that. All nations are familiar with these ancient traditions. I referred to the famous Sphinx in Egypt, a monument thousands of years old that, as an emblem, points to the head and tail (beginning and end) of the Zodiac. The Zodiac begins with the Virgin and ends with the Lion… Anyone familiar with biblical symbolism will immediately recognize one of the threads running through the Bible.

Anyway, it is incredibly fascinating to discover how the Gospel is written in the constellations! For those interested: next Sunday I will continue my presentation in Zoetermeer about the Gospel in the constellations.

Delen: