Not the Incredible Shrinking Planet

Hank Hanegraaff, president of the Christian Research Institute and host of the Bible Answer Man broadcast, reflects on an article titled “The Incredible Shrinking Planet.” From this article you get the sense that when we discovered that the Sun does not revolve around Earth, we likewise discovered that we are but an insignificant pale blue dot (as Carl Sagan put it). That we have little significance considering the vastness of the universe—with more than a trillion galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars (and presumably many times more planets). But the reality is that we are a privileged planet. We humans are of an inestimable value, created in the image of God, and we do inhabit an exalted place in this universe. In coming to grips with the size of the universe, neither we nor our planet have shrunk in significance. Indeed, the vastness intensifies our significance. We have been created for eternity—including incomprehensible growth and development.



Philip Yancey, “The Incredible Shrinking Planet,” February 17, 2022, https://philipyancey.com/the-incredible-shrinking-planet.



Hank Hanegraaff, “Is Earth a Privileged Planet?” (from The Creation Answer Book [Thomas Nelson, 2012], February 4, 2014, Christian Research Institute, https://www.equip.org/bible_answers/earth-privileged-planet/.