Daily Devotional – November 6

Biology

Humpback whales, the gentle giants of the deep, are warm-blooded animals. These mammals must maintain a certain body temperature to survive, yet they live continuously in water that can often be ice-cold. These warm-blooded whales must also move between warm, shallow waters and cool, deep waters, which cause them to experience huge temperature differences rapidly. To prevent these mammals from experiencing hypothermia in the cool waters, God gave whales a layer of blubber, which acts like the best winter coat ever designed.

This blubber can be 1½ to 2 feet thick, giving the humpback whale a total of nearly 40,000 pounds of insulating blubber. Think about wearing a huge winter coat outside on a 100oF summer day! You would immediately overheat. So why doesn’t a whale overheat when swimming in warm water? God has solved this problem by building the whale’s fins to act like huge air conditioners. Just like the African elephant with its large ears filled with blood vessels, the whale’s fins contain millions of tiny capillaries that can rapidly either warm or cool the blood. Do we say air conditioners happened by accident and chance, or do we say they were designed? God designed the humpback to survive in both cool and warm ocean waters.

O Lord, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all. The earth is full of Your possessions— This great and wide sea, In which are innumerable teeming things, Living things both small and great.

~ Psalm 104:24-25

Source: "Pearls in Paradise" by authors Bruce Malone and Jule Von Vett

References for this devotional.