We may speak of it as the firm ground upon which
we stand, and may think of the wonderful time of which we are going to read
in our chapter in Genesis, when God caused it to bring forth and bud, and
clothed all its waste places, so that it has been ever since the green
earth which is so fair to look upon. This is the way in which we generally
speak of the earth, is it not?--but we may also think of it, not as it
appears to us, but as a great globe hung up in the heavens by the mighty
hand of God, who "hangeth the earth upon nothing"; for "the pillars of the
earth are the Lord's, and He hath set the world upon them."
If you could look at a star through a telescope, I think the first thing
that would strike you is that there is nothing by which it is upheld and
kept in its place. You might say, as you saw it, as it were, hanging in the
depths of the sky, "Why, it is hung upon _nothing_!"
It is just so with our earth: there is nothing that we can see by which it
is supported, no "pillars" for it to rest upon--but yet it is kept in its
place. God set it there, and God keeps it there.
The Hindu has tried to account for this in his own way: he says the earth
does rest upon something; it is supported upon the backs of four great
elephants and when he is asked, "Where do they stand?" he replies, "Upon
the back of a huge tortoise." This shows the folly of men who have tried
to explain what filled the patriarch Job with awe and wonder, even before
God had asked him those questions which He alone could answer.
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