Seeing Stars in Daylight
Abram was squinting into the sun. We don’t talk about that enough.
Imagine slipping on your sandals and walking outside. Imagine the wind is whipping and the horizon stretches far. Imagine it is God who leads (or nudges, or pushes, or drags) you there, beyond the familiar flaps of your tent into a wide expanse of wilderness. Imagine your exhaustion, grown bitter from decades of unanswered prayers. Imagine God’s voice rising from the silence: Look up. Count the stars if you can. Imagine trying, for a foolish instant, to tally them.
Now imagine it is the blinding light of midday, not the thick blanket of darkest night. Imagine numbering the stars when you cannot see a single one, save the sun.
Imagine trying to believe then.
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I had never noticed the sunlight. Only when I read the rest, when I read the whole story in situ, did I realize my mental picture was wrong.
Abram stood outside in plain daylight, staring up into the daytime sky, trying to trust what he could not see. Look at what the Scripture says right after the famous star-counting promise in Genesis 15:5:1
“As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him” (Genesis 15:12).
“When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire-pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram” (Genesis 15:17-18).
Which means, if we flick the reverse button on our hero Abram, walking him back from the nighttime fire, through the evening nap, and back to God’s first call to go star-gazing, he stepped outside in daytime.
It’s easy to believe in stars at midnight. When the sky is blanketed with twinkling lights, when the darkness clarifies the constellations, when their sparkling stories shine to life. There they are, clear as night. Sure and solid as a promise.
It’s much harder to believe a single star exists (beyond the sun) when you’re staring north at noon. Not a single pinprick of starry light to be found. Only an empty dome of blue or white or grey above your head.
Faith asks us to believe impossible things. Reality yanks us down deeper rabbit holes.2 Doubt side-eyes the whole situation and scoffs: sure, whatever. Nice story, never happened.
But God leads us outside and asks us to look up into the unknown.