A Glimpse of Infinity

I held my breath and waited. I wanted to watch, but I was too anxious, so I distracted myself—while keeping my ears fully tuned in.  The broadcaster’s voice was calm as he used terms like peak-heating, true-test of the calculated trajectory, and plasma build-up on the heat-shield.

I paced.  While it was only a short period of communications blackout, it seemed like an eternity.  I held my breath as the narrator counted down the final seconds.

Then Mission Control called out, “Integrity, Houston, post-com check.”

Radio silence.

My heart pounded and I felt like I was eight years old again, sitting in front of the TV watching the snowy coverage of the splashdown of Apollo 11.

As part of a school science project earlier in the year, each student had written to NASA and requested information on the space program.  In the packet was a large, shiny poster with all the different rockets spanning NASA’s missions from Mercury, to Gemini, to Apollo. We learned about command, service and lunar modules, rocket boosters, launch escape systems, and heat shields.  Then, on a small black-and-white TV, the class set spell-bound as we watched the live coverage of Apollo 8’s launch—it was the first time humans would orbit the moon!

Even during the early morning summer launch of Apollo 11, I remember sitting in front of the TV.  Unlike today’s coverage, back in 1969, you didn’t have instant replay of the launch and my mother had lovingly—well, sternly—instructed me to sit still and be quiet.  Apparently, she still hadn’t forgiven me for her missing the live coverage of John Glenn being launched into space back in 1962 when, as a new crawler, I’d pulled myself up on a chair for the first time, and at the countdown of t-minus one minute, toppled both myself and the chair.  So, together, we watched Apollo 11 shoot skyward to its destination.  Four days later, we again sat in silence and watched Neil Armstrong take mankind’s first steps on the moon.  While I was too young to truly comprehend the magnitude of these historic events, I picked up on the excitement—just like I picked up on my mother’s anxiousness as we watched Walter Conkite’s broadcast of the Apollo’s return to earth.  During the minutes of communication blackout, Mr. Cronkite talked about the capsule’s heat shield and what the astronauts were likely experiencing.  At that moment, I realized, for the first time, that something really bad could happen.  So when Mission Control reached out to Apollo and was met with radio silence, my little heart pounded in fear.  What if something really bad had happened?

Now, here I was—57-years later—battling that same horrible question in the wait.  I whispered a prayer.

And then came the much-anticipated static-y response:  “Houston, Integrity, we have you loud and clear.”

Tears pooled in my eyes as I exhaled and whispered a prayer of thanks. The Orion spacecraft, Integrity, had successfully and safely re-entered the earth’s atmosphere and was minutes away from splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.

Over the years, my interest in the space program waned.  While I was vaguely aware that NASA wanted to return to the moon, somehow I’d missed that Artemis II was scheduled to orbit the moon—and I missed the live coverage of the actual launch.  I semi-followed their mission, making it a point to stay up to date on their trek to the back side of the moon.  I watched reels on social media from real-time interviews with the astronauts, thinking how far technology had advanced in 50 years.  But when I saw what they were seeing—the incredible view from their windows—I was totally, and unexpectedly, invested. 

I was captivated by the vast expanse of space shrouded in darkness. The amazing detail of the moon’s surface. The galactic image of the milky-way.  The cosmic perspective of earth.  The intimate glimpses of infinity—God’s creation.

And all I could think about was that one day I, too, would leave earth and transcend space and time—except for me, it will be the moment I draw my last breath and my faith will become sight.  And oh, what a glorious day that will be!

“By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” – Hebrews 11:3