What? This Evolved? – Essential Doctrines, #48
Second, Third, and Fourth Days of Creation
As I write this, North America is excited about a solar eclipse. Hotels are booked solid all along the viewing band. Schools are cancelled. Blogs and articles are full of advice about how to view the eclipse without harming your eyes. There is never a dull day on planet Earth. Interesting. Exciting. Stimulating to the imagination of poets and pundits—and especially to God’s children.
Please remember that I am not dealing with all the questions skeptics pose about the order of the days. They were dealt with in part one of these chapters on creation. Instead of doubt we embrace the fact that God’s power and wisdom is infinitely beyond our capacity to understand. We embrace the account of creation and celebrate the great works of God.
Let us then consider how this wonderful universe came into being in days two through four. As the days of creation advance, we see God bringing order and beauty out of chaos and forming matter into its myriad forms.
TWO During the second day of creation, (vs. 6-8), “God said, ‘let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water.’ So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse ‘sky.’”
During this second day, we have the creation of atmosphere, sixty to eighty miles thick, forming a canopy sustaining life. The dry air of this delicate security blanket is about 78.08 percent nitrogen, 20.95 percent oxygen, and 0.93 percent argon. A brew of trace gases accounts for the other approximately 0.04 percent, including the greenhouse gases carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and ozone.
If there was too much oxygen, any spark would consume all the combustible substances of the world. Fortunately, like everything else God created, it is in perfect balance. Earth’s atmosphere absorbs heat and cold, insulating us from the frigid cold of space and the burning heat of the sun. It is transparent except where fog, dust, or smog obscures sight. Without it no creature could exist. And without it there would be no sound, music or communication.
Consider for a moment the marvelous element called water. It is tasteless, colorless, transparent, and buoyant. It exists in three forms; liquid, solid, and vapor. Without evaporation into water vapor we could not enjoy watching the myriad clouds that float across our sky; cumulus, cirrus, nimbus, and stratus, nor could we see our plants grow. These clouds are giant floating reservoirs of water, part of the weather cycle that makes life possible. Water evaporates into vapor purifying it of the mineral salts that accumulate in the oceans. Then it falls as rain on our dry planet causing plants to grow and forming lakes and rivers that in turn flow back into the sea to be evaporated again thus continuing the cycle.
One physicist has estimated that a rain of four inches over an area of 10,000 square miles, in for example, Alberta would require the burning of 640,000,000 tons of coal to produce enough water. Then it would require another eight hundred million horsepower of refrigeration working day and night for 100 days to produce such a rainfall. (Ibid, p. 85) It’s so easy to take the rain cycle for granted.
We don’t have space in this article to consider the marvel of trade winds, storms, tornadoes, typhoons, and blizzards producing lightning, hail, snow and rain. But hardly anyone on planet earth doesn’t consider weather before venturing forth. But do we pause and realize that weather is according to God’s design and for his purposes to either punish or bless mankind?
“O LORD God Almighty, who is like you…you rule over the surging sea; when its waves mount up, you still them”(Ps 89:8,9)?
“The breath of God produces ice, and the broad waters become frozen. He loads the clouds with moisture; he scatters his lightning through them. At his direction they swirl around over the face of the whole earth to do whatever he commands them. He brings the clouds to punish men, or to water his earth and show his love” Job. 37:10-13)
“My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD…As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth” (Isaiah 55:8-11).
“I also withhold rain from you when the harvest was still three months away. I sent rain on one town, but withheld it from another. One field had rain; another had none and dried up” (Amos 4:7).
THREE During the third day, (vs.9-13) God gathered the water under the sky to one place, and let dry ground appear. On the ground he caused vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit…according to their various kinds.” Rehwinkel writes, “On the third day God separated the liquids from the solids of the original chaos and then formed them into the first planet, giving it a spherical shape: dividing it into continents, islands, and seas; dotting it with mountains and valleys, lakes and rivers. He hung it in space without beams or cables and set it in a rotating motion (at a thousand miles an hour)” (Ibid, p. 91).
By contrast with spaceship earth, it has taken mankind centuries to engineer a space ship to travel to the moon and yet we exalt this achievement while denying God exists! Let those of us who walk by faith, worship our Creator as we walk around our spinning orb without getting dizzy. What a rich blanket of vegetation wraps our planet; stunning variety, astounding beauty, and delicious foods. Millions of species and forms of life. From plankton in the seas to sequoia on land, from peach trees to pine and oak. Flowers from roses to clematis, from orchids to phlox and daisy. Fruits from blueberries to apples, mango, dates, and melon. Grains from wheat to barley and rice. Vegetables from lentils to potatoes, beans, lettuce, celery and cucumber. Different kinds of vegetation appear in different climate zones protecting soil from erosion, feeding animals, and beautifying the earth.
There are 150,000 species of trees with 300 kinds of oaks and 90 pines. Some tower to 300 feet and can live an estimated 3000 years. Like everything else in creation the variety of forms is astounding. Each species has differing leaves, bark, shape and root networks. God built into each tree an efficient water pumping system through capillary action which can transport nutrients hundreds of feet in the air where leaves absorb carbon dioxide, expel oxygen, and convert gases and sunshine through photosynthesis into nourishment. What a marvel is a tree.
FOUR During the fourth day, (vs. 14-19) God created “lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and year, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth…two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night….the stars”
The sun is a revolving sphere of glowing gases a million times larger than earth with a diameter of 866,000 miles. This atomic furnace is precisely 93,000,000 miles from earth, the exact distance necessary to keep us from being either a perpetually frozen orb or a molten sea. This marvel is the source of all the energy on earth, estimated by astronomers to be equivalent to 230 trillion units of horsepower. During the recent eclipse, when the temperature dropped some ten degrees, I personally experienced how dependent we are to the sun for heat.
Nine planets, including earth, revolve around the sun. Each moves in its own orbit and rotates around its own axis. Earth rotates at a speed of a thousand miles an hour dividing time into day and night.
The moon, our nearest neighbour, orbits the earth at an average distance of 240,000 miles while itself rotating around its own axis thereby keeping the same side facing earth.
Like so much else in Scripture, the simple words, “he made the stars also” (Gen. 1:6) encapsulates an astonishing reality. Stars visible to the naked eye number three to five thousand. Telescopes have increased that number to uncounted billions, a number beyond our ken. They are further divided into galaxies, such as the Milky Way. Some ten thousand galaxies have been discovered and each contains some two hundred billion stars!
Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, is nine light-years away. A light-year is the distance light travels in one year at a speed of 186,000 miles per second! Thus, Sirius is six trillion miles away and yet its light is visible. Imagine the power and heat of that distant burning orb.
No wonder David marveled. “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man that thou are mindful of him? (Psalm 8:1,3). Job probably refers to this vision of creation when he writes, “the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy” (Job 38:7).
Considering the order and beauty of the universe, Cicero wrote that it could not have been the result of chance. There must be a cause, a Mind, behind it all. Philosopher Immanuel Kant wrote, “I know of nothing more awe-inspiring than the starry heaven above and the moral law within us. (Ibid, p.145)
(Let me know your thoughts on this subject. If you appreciate this blog, please pass it on. If I can help you spiritually, let me know. Further articles, books, and stories at: Facebook: Eric E Wright Twitter: @EricEWright1 LinkedIn: Eric Wright ; Eric’s books are available at: https://www.amazon.com/Eric-E.-Wright/e/B00355HPKK%3Fref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share)
