FIRMAMENT

The expanse of sky and space in which the stars and planets are set. God made the firmament on the second day of creation to divide the waters that covered the earth from those which surrounded it <Gen. 1:16>. But the firmament includes more than the atmospheric region between the seas of earth and the rain clouds of the sky; it is far more vast. In fact, on the fourth day of creation God placed the stars, the sun, and the moon in the “firmament of the heavens” <Gen. 1:15-18>.

It is this vastness which the Hebrew writers tend to emphasize about the firmament. The writer of <Psalm 150> pointed out that the firmament is “mighty” <v. 1>. The prophet Ezekiel envisioned the firmament “like the color of an awesome crystal, stretched out over… [men’s] heads” <Ezek. 1:22>. What the firmament reflects, then, is the greatness of the God who created it. We are urged to praise God because “the firmament shows His handiwork” <Ps. 19:1>. God’s people can look forward to a day when they will “shine like the brightness of the firmament” <Dan. 12:3>.

The Parable of the Hidden Treasure is a well known parable of Jesus, which appears in only one of the canonical gospels of the New Testament. According to Matthew 13:44, the parable illustrates the great value of the Kingdom of Heaven. It immediately precedes the parable of the Pearl, which has a similar theme. The parable has been depicted by artists such as Rembrandt.

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