Phil. 2:15 “Do everything without grumbling or disputing, so that you will be blameless and honest, faultless children of God in the midst of a crooked and perverse age, in which you appear like stars in a dark world, offering men the message of life.” (Goodspeed's New American Translation)
Nothing could be more appropriate for Summer time than a study of the stars. The “stars of the Summer night,” as we gaze upon them, transfix us with their silent beauty. In the cities and suburbs, smoke and fog sometimes hide them, or dim their luster. But at the seashore or upon the mountains the crystal-clear air makes them seem almost near enough to touch. Abraham was once told to count the stars, but it was an impossible task. He couldn't do it. Neither could we, but we have it upon the reliable testimony of astronomers that there are about one billion, eight hundred million stars in the heavens. Naturally, since we can look out from only one side of this planet we dwell upon, we can see less than half of this number at one time. And many are so dim or so far distant that only the most powerful telescopes can bring them within view. Thousands upon thousands of those we do see are included in the myriad known as the Milky Way, which Joyce Kilmer calls “Main Street, Heaventown.” And doubtless millions upon millions more lie outside even the sight of the most powerful telescopes we have yet invented, and thus are outside of our ken.
Stars have always loomed important in the lives of men. In ancient times, before mankind had any scientific knowledge, they were regarded as augurs to tell fortunes or to foretell the future. Men looked into the heavens and saw strange shapes of stars: a lion, a fish, a crab, and others. Thus did the age-old pseudo-science of astrology develop, a superstition that prevails even to this day among ignorant people.
The Magi, or Wise Men, who visited the infant Jesus shortly after his birth, were probably astrologers at the court of some Eastern prince. Their task was to scan the heavens constantly, looking for omens. When a new star of great brightness appeared, they searched all their books and documents until they came upon the Old Testament passage telling of the star which was to herald the birth of the King. So, thinking nothing unusual, for they had long felt the influence of the omens of the stars in their lives, they set out on their long and perilous journey to worship this great new King. How skeptical we'd be today, if a similar event occurred!
But men studied the stars in ancient times for good and useful purposes, too. Calendars were adjusted according to the stars, and the passing of years was recorded by the different positions of the planets. In navigation, it was the stars which first made it possible for men to sail out of the sight of land and still set their course truly. The Phoenicians and Greeks were the first mariners who really set sail upon the sea. The stars guided Odysseus, Columbus, Magellan and every mariner, until about twenty years ago radio beams became accurate enough to tell the position of a ship.
From the stars, men learned great and useful facts about our own world. Copernicus established astronomy as we know it today, by working out a system to indicate the order of the universe. Galileo, the “star-gazer,” incurred the wrath of the Catholic Church by his discovery that the earth, like the other planets, moved, and was not the center of the universe, as Aristotle and the Scholastics had always taught.
Oh, we could speak of the stars for a long time, for astronomy is a great and wonderful science. It tells us of worlds that are thousands of times the size of our limited sphere. There is room for every heaven we have ever imagined across the tremendous distances of limitless space. Think of the stars -- their number, their dignity, their beauty and their magnitude. then consider our text: “You appear like stars in a dark world.” This is our Christian destiny, and what a great and wonderful destiny it is!
We realize this when we remember that Jesus expected great things from a feeble band. As His close followers and disciples He had fishermen, women, winners, non-religious folk, people of slight education and of low social caste. They mostly proved fickle, except for a few who stayed close by Him through struggle and trial. Finally He selected eleven of these feeble and wavering followers, had in a farewell address commanded them to “Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” No wonder they stood open-mouthed and bewildered, gazing up into the sky, as He ascended and disappeared from view. What a task, and what a trust, for eleven poor men! All the riches of God heaped in their laps! But history records the glorious story that ought to be a constant and unending source of inspiration for every Christian. These men, with so little to recommend them for the great task they were given, nevertheless accepted it in its spirit and in its letter, and inaugurated a work that has since grown and spread to the ends of the earth.
When Paul tells the Philippians to be stars, he is imposing a likewise difficult task upon them. There were very few really influential people in Paul's congregations. Christianity, at the start, was an outcast religion, and no one of official position or social standing dared to have anything to do with it. Until the Fourth Century, Christians were persecuted and killed. So it was not the landed gentry or the people of influence who joined those early Christian bands, but rather the folk who had little or nothing to lose. Mostly slaves, women, peasants, servants and other humble folk were the members of the early Christian congregations. Yet, of these humble and comparatively insignificant folk, it was said that they “turned the world upside down.” And in our text, Paul commands these people to shine like stars! Certainly both Jesus and Paul had great expectations of their followers!
What does it mean that the lives of Christians are to be like stars? Let us consider this for a moment in the light of our knowledge and make a few deductions.
Stars, I know, are always serene and calm. The turbulent affairs of the earth do not affect them. Phillips Brooks wrote of the Christmas night, “O little town of Bethlehem, How still we see thee lie. Above thy deep and dreamless sleep, The silent stars go by.” And during the World War, soldiers told me, it always seemed strange for one who was in the midst of the noise and turmoil of the battlefield to look up above the smoke and slaughter and see the stars shining, as calmly and peacefully as they did on the quiet prairie nights back home in the American mid-West.
But stars are like that, and so should Christians be. The follower of Christ can be calm and serene amidst a troubled world because of the spiritual resources he possesses in his faith. Just as still waters run deep, so do the resources of spirit and the depth of understanding of the world and its ills which are the portion of the Christian enable him to maintain an untroubled spirit. This deeper understanding and greater sympathy with the failings of mankind enables the Christian to avoid surface quarrels and disputings and grumblings, as Paul admonishes. Thus is serenity of living achieved.
Stars furthermore give light. It may be faint, but it is light nevertheless. Jesus said that Christians should give light, too. “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Christians are the light of the world, assigned the task of spreading the brightness of the knowledge of God. Bailey asks the stars:
“What are ye orbs? The Words of God? The Scriptures of the skies?”
And Joseph Addison, the essayist, speaks for the stars in supplying the answer:
“In Reason's ear they all rejoice
And utter forth a glorious voice;
Forever singing as they shine
“The hand that made us is divine.”
The Christian lives shine forth the message of the creative power of God and the regenerative power of Christ. And those lives shine, not for a moment or even for a year, but for a long, long time, for their influence lives on beyond them. As Longfellow wrote:
“So when a great man died
For years beyond our ken,
The light he leaves behind him
Lies upon the paths of men.”
A third feature of the stars is their surpassing beauty. Poets and lovers of Nature have long sung their praises and all of us, however prosaic we may be , have occasions when we admire their loveliness. In the Hayden Planetarium ad New York , the most pedestrian souls often gather to see and hear a lecture on the universe. And in the great lecture room the light slowly fades away until the people sit in absolute darkness. then the lecturer dramatically turns on the machine which flashes upon the domed ceiling the panorama of the heavens -- millions of stars. And as the brilliant scene shows overhead, those utterly unpoetical audiences gasp with a sort of unanimous “ ahhhh.”
But similar to the beauty of the stars is the comeliness of a consecrated life. The Bible speaks of the “Beauty of holiness” and we are all able to see the beauty of consecration, in a devoted Mother, a faithful servant of the Lord, or a loyal good neighbor.
And a fourth feature of the stars is their certainty. They never falter, are never off-schedule, never change their courses. The mariners of old, of whom I spoke before, possessed compasses which guided them very well. But they often found in their wider travels that the compasses were not completely accurate. Ore deposits and the now-known fact that the magnetic pole and the North Pole are not identical conspired to produce some confusion. But the mariners knew that they could always correct their bearings by the stars, when they came into view. The stars never faltered.
The Christian life has the same kind of certainty, the kind that enables Paul to say, “We know!” The Christian life has accuracy of direction amidst the crosscurrent and mental turmoil of the world. The Christian has a set goal and a direct path toward it. When it seems that this age of ours will not permit us to be sure of anything, be sure of the love of God as expressed through Jesus Christ!”
This serenity, beauty, light and certainty is needed by the world today. Years ago, Emerson advised, “Hitch your wagon to a star.” Today the world needs at least one star to hitch its wagon to, and perhaps could do with a billion of them. The world is dark with hatred, strife and fear. These are days of uncertainty, when all the rocks of human sureness are crumbling. Social, political, educational and economic systems that we once thought well-grounded are ready to totter and fall. Even the Church sometimes seems to fall prey to discouragement. Is it too late for the world to be reborn and renovated? Shall we give in and say that we tried to hitch our wagon to a star, but it turned out to be a meteor that flashed across the sky and then burned out?
In Colonial days there was a period when the sun hid behind clouds for two weeks. People were terrified and anticipated the worst. “There is no more sun,” they screamed. Let us learn a lesson about foolish fear and not become discouraged by a few clouds. Let us rather accept Christ's estimate or our ability to shed light. “Ye are the light of the world,” He said. If the world seems dark, it is a reflection upon our light-shedding ability. Maybe we need to be more zealous in burning, maybe we need to cleanse and renew the wick that bears the flame of love in our hearts.
“Every life is a profession of faith and exercises and inevitable and silent propaganda,” said Henri Ameil. Then how our lives should shine!
“How far that little candle throws its beam! So shines a good deed in a naughty world,” wrote Shakespeare. We might conclude therefrom that a good deed rates as one candlepower, which is the measurement of the light from one candle at a distance of one meter. A short time ago I climbed to the top of a powerful lighthouse, Highland Light at Truro on Cape Cod. The light thrown from that beacon equals four million candlepower and can be seen at a distance of twenty-one miles on a clear night. But even that pales into utter insignificance when compared with a star! The stars are clearly seen though they are millions and millions of miles away. Their strength cannot be measured in candlepower, but must be recorded in light years. Yet they shine upon our little world, bright and clear, with all the power a loving and creative God could endow them.
You are to be like stars, offering to men the message of life. God help us and bless us in this amazing task!