God Is the Light of the World—And So Is Everything Else

Some Learnings Inspired by the Recent Artemis II Mission

While catching up on the recent Artemis moon mission, I found myself drawn to a series of questions about Earth and space. Before long, I had descended into a fascinating exploration of this mysterious and extraordinary construct we call the "Universe." The central insight I arrived at was remarkably simple: everything is, ultimately, just light. (A conclusion that resonates profoundly when one recalls the words, "I am the light of the world.")

It all began with a question that the Artemis photographs of the Moon brought back to mind—a question I have always carried but never paused to investigate: If the Earth's surface is truly spherical, why do people on the underside not fall off?

What follows is the journey from that elementary question to what may well be the very blueprint of reality.

1. The Spherical Reality: Why We Do Not Fall Off

When we examine a flat map, our intuition is deceived into equating "up" with the top of the page and "down" with the bottom. Were that model accurate, inhabitants of the Southern Hemisphere would quite literally tumble into the void.

In truth, there is no universal "down" in space. Gravity does not pull us southward; it draws us toward the centre of the planet. If one were to excavate a tunnel straight through the Earth from any given point, one would emerge at the exact antipodal location on the opposite side of the globe. A person standing at each end would be oriented in diametrically opposite directions, yet both would feel perfectly upright—because both are being pulled inward by the mass between them. "Up" simply means "away from the centre."

2. A Tale of Two Worlds: Earth and the Moon

Grasping the significance of that sphere brings into sharp relief how exceptional our planet truly is, particularly when one views the Artemis photographs of the Moon with the Earth suspended in the background. One is looking at two fundamentally different realities situated in close proximity.

The Exposed Moon: The Moon is, in essence, a lifeless rock. It possesses no atmosphere, which means its sky remains pitch black even when the Sun is shining directly upon it. There is no wind, no weather, and no protective envelope of any kind. A crater formed by a meteorite impact three billion years ago appears as pristine as the day it was created, because there is nothing—no erosion, no rainfall—to diminish it. It is a world entirely without a filter.

The Layered Earth: The Earth, by contrast, is a complex engine of nested spheres. At its core lies a molten interior generating a magnetic field; above that, the solid crust upon which we walk; surrounding that, oceans of water that regulate thermal energy; and enveloping everything, an atmosphere—a blanket of gas that scatters sunlight into a blue sky and incinerates incoming space debris. Most importantly, however, that atmosphere provides something else entirely: sound.

3. The Great Muffler of the Universe

Consider the following: the Sun is, in physical terms, a continuous series of thermonuclear explosions. Scientists have calculated that if the vacuum of space were replaced by air, the sound of the Sun reaching Earth would exceed 100 decibels—comparable to standing beside a running chainsaw, without respite, every hour of every day.

We inhabit a world of relative silence only because the cosmos is partitioned by vacuum. Sound is a mechanical wave; it requires a physical medium—molecules of air, water, or solid matter—through which to propagate. Remove the medium, and the wave has nowhere to travel.

By interposing a 150-million-kilometre vacuum between us and the Sun, the universe functions as a vast soundproof barrier. We receive the electromagnetic energy and warmth necessary for life—conveyed through light, which requires no medium—while being entirely spared the catastrophic noise.

4. Miniature Suns in Our Machines

What I find remarkable is that human engineering has, over time, arrived at precisely this same blueprint. Every machine we construct is, at its core, a modest attempt to replicate the principles of the universe.

Consider an internal combustion engine or a thermal power station. We ignite a fuel to produce a violent explosion—not unlike the processes occurring within the Sun. That explosion generates a high-pressure wave—a mechanical impulse—which we harness to drive a piston or rotate a turbine in order to perform useful work. Yet we must then construct heavy metal housings, cooling systems, and exhaust assemblies to contain and attenuate the destructive heat and sound we have just produced, lest they destroy the very machine that generated them.

In effect, we are building miniature suns and engineering buffers around them—precisely as the solar system does on a cosmic scale.

5. The Final Form: Why Everything Is Light

But what becomes of all the energy we generate? The sound of an engine, the physical vibration of tyres against a road surface, the electrical current coursing through the wiring of a building—what is their ultimate fate?

In physics, the law of conservation of energy dictates that energy can be neither created nor destroyed, only transformed. When a sound wave propagates, it progressively causes molecules to collide and vibrate against one another. That friction generates heat. And in the vacuum of space, the sole mechanism by which an object can shed thermal energy is through radiation—specifically, as infrared light.

This means that every "noise" generated today—the rumble of an engine, the timbre of a human voice, the warmth of an electronic device—is gradually dissipating into heat and radiating outward into the infinite vacuum of space as a silent beam of light. Light is the ultimate vehicle of energy. It is, in a thermodynamic sense, the alpha and the omega.

The Ultimate Connection

It is therefore no coincidence that ancient scripture refers to God as light: "God is light; in him there is no darkness at all" (1 John 1:5). Science is, in many respects, only now elucidating the physics underlying that profound metaphor.

Everything in our world originates as light from the Sun, performs a brief interval of loud, turbulent work here on Earth, and ultimately returns to being light. We are not merely living within the universe; we are biological circuits operating in accordance with its established principles. That realisation is humbling—it reminds us how small we are—yet it is equally awe-inspiring, for it reveals how perfectly interconnected everything truly is.

How does it feel to see it all stitched together like that?