March 5, 2026 - Good Morning! It’s Thursday, March 5.
On this date in 1512, Gerardus Mercator was born. Doesn’t ring any bells? Mercator was a Dutch cartographer who made a map that, almost 500 years later, is still the way we “see the world.” It’s called the Mercator Projection. Even though you may not recognize his name, you most certainly would recognize his map. It’s the one that was hanging on the wall in your grade school classroom, the one that is still the primary visual representation of Earth. But, in the last generation, it has become a very controversial map.
Mercator was a devout Christian and so it is appropriate that the first map he drew, in his twenties, was of Palestine. In his thirties he was sent to prison for six months for having Protestant beliefs under an oppressive Catholic culture. His “projection” was completed in 1569, intended to be a navigational tool for mariners. Why is it now controversial? Because it distorts the size of many countries.
Every map is a projection. Every map includes some level of distortion. After all, the map maker is asked to depict a three dimensional round object - the world - using a two dimensional flat sheet of paper. In the Mercator Projection, the farther a land mass is from the Equator, the larger its depiction. So, Greenland, a big island, certainly, and one that has been in the news a lot lately, appears to roughly be the same size as the entire continent of Africa - when Africa is actually 14 times larger than Greenland. Alaska looks about the size of Brazil, but, in fact, Brazil is 5 times bigger. You get the picture. The controversy arises when larger size is perceived to translate to greater importance, greater value. For the most part, in the Mercator Projection, areas like Europe and the United States are inflated, while “third world” countries are reduced.
A wise man once said “perception is reality”. One has only to look at our present American political culture to see the truth of that quote. People observe the exact same event, but perceive it very differently. The Bible tells us that this is true in spiritual matters as well. 1500 years before Gerardus Mercator was born, the Apostle Paul wrote these words to the church at Corinth - “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit, but considers them to be foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are only discerned through the Spirit.”
And so Proverbs 3:5-6 comes to mind this morning. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart; and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path.”
That’s still a pretty good map for the journey of life.
Meet you back here tomorrow,
David
cindertex50@yahoo.com
