When The Universe Ends, Who Will Have The Last Word?

The answer is easy: The Lord Our God. And in this fact, we should all be glad.

Image by Lumnia Obscura from Pixabay

New York Times reporter Dennis Overbye reported in January 2022 about the “The End of Everything,” which is what scientists describe what will happen as a consequence of the continual expansion of the Universe:

In the last four years astronomers have reported evidence that the expansion of the universe is not just continuing but is speeding up, under the influence of a mysterious ''dark energy,'' an antigravity that seems to be embedded in space itself. If that is true and the universe goes on accelerating, astronomers say, rather than coasting gently into the night, distant galaxies will eventually be moving apart so quickly that they cannot communicate with one another. In effect, it would be like living in the middle of a black hole that kept getting emptier and colder.

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And perhaps most important, starved finally of the energy even to complete a thought or a computation, the domain of life and intelligence would not expand, but constrict and eventually vanish like a dwindling echo into the silence of eternity.

And in a recent column entitled, “Who Will Have the Last Word on the Universe?”, Mr. Overbye reflects over the thought that everything will end:

The End is coming, in maybe 100 billion years. Is it too soon to start freaking out?

“There will be a last sentient being, there will be a last thought,” declared Janna Levin, a cosmologist at Barnard College, near the end of “A Trip to Infinity,” a new Neflix documentary directed by Jonathan Halperin and Drew Takahashi.

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At some point in the future there will be somewhere in the universe where there will be a last sentient being. And a last thought. And that last word, no matter how profound or mundane, will vanish into silence along with the memory of Einstein and Elvis, Jesus, Buddha, Aretha and Eve, while the remaining bits of the physical universe go on sailing apart for billions upon billions upon billions of lonely, silent years.

Overbye wrote, “When I heard that statement during a showing of the film recently, it broke my heart. It was the saddest, loneliest idea I had ever contemplated.”

For me, however, I have known this fact all along, and the thought doesn’t make me sad. It, in fact, makes me incredibly glad.

This is because Scripture told me, over 1500 years ago, that the Lord our God will have the Last Word:

All that is upon it passes away, and there remains the Face of thy Lord, Possessed of Majesty and Bounty (55:26-27).

And in another place in Scripture, God Almighty says:

They did not measure God with His true measure. The whole earth shall be but a handful to Him on the Day of Resurrection, and the heavens will be enfolded in His Right Hand. Glory be to Him, exalted is He above the partners they ascribe (39:67)

And…God even told us in Scripture that the Universe has been expanding all along:

And the sky We built with might, and we are expanding it (51:47)

And so, the “last sentient being,” when all is said and done, will be the Lord our God, Possessed of Majesty and Bounty, with the heavens and the earth in His Right Hand. Dennis Overbye asks, “Will that last thought be a profound pearl of wisdom? An expletive?”

Far from it. It will be words of incredible Majesty, incredible Wisdom, incredible Power, incredible Beauty, and incredible Profundity. When the end comes, it will not be chaos or sadness, for the Lord our God will still be in charge. When the end comes, the Face of thy Lord, possessed of Majesty and Bounty, will be shining as bright as ever.

There is no reason to worry or be sad, for the Lord our God will always be there. And in this fact, we should all be incredibly glad.