The Four Corners

In June we experienced solstice. Yesterday we passed equinox. We'll have another solstice in December and another equinox in March. Equinox is the point at which day and night are of equal length. From now to solstice, the days continue to shorten in the northern hemisphere and lengthen in the southern.

Our journey around the sun through these four points might be thought of as a run around the bases in a baseball game. Or they might be thought of as the four corners of the universe.

The idea of four corners is as old as astronomy, and it has been visualized in many different ways. To explain all those concepts would take a lot of research. Perhaps most familiar is the Native American respect for the four directions.

The terms "four winds of heaven," "four winds of earth," "four corners of earth," and "four quarters of the earth" appear in various places in the Bible. Considering that the sun, moon and stars appeared on the fourth day of creation, and that this completed the structure of the universe (the fifth and sixth days being given to populating it), the number four symbolizes structure (or organization), stability (or strength), and foundation.

The stable structure of the material universe provides a certain degree of security. People are secure with the idea that the universe has been here for billions of years. Other people upset that security (for reasons known only to them) by suggesting that

• the world will end in 2012
• another ice age is coming
• global warming will destroy earth as we know it
• a nuclear holocaust is imminent

The Bible, of course, outlines what lies ahead for earth, and since it has never failed in all its prophecies up to this time, it seems wise to trust what it says.

"Heaven and earth will pass away, but My word will never pass away," Matthew 24:35.