Daily Devotional – February 29

Anatomy

Incredible complexity shows up in every area of the human body. The study of any one of our organs (our heart, liver, stomach, lungs, eyes, ears, and dozens of others) is enough to totally discredit the belief in slow evolutionary development. Doctors spend a lifetime specializing in understanding the operation of just one specific human organ and understand that even tiny variations in one of a thousand different specifically designed parts of the organ wreaks havoc with the human body. To believe that even one of the complex systems listed below developed itself is to believe in pure fantasy.1

In his chapter “Purposeful Design,” Geoffrey Simmons, M.D. lists 81 facts that he believes point to design rather than chance as postulated in Darwin’s theory of evolution.2 Simmons points out that Darwin had little knowledge of genetics, physiology, and conception. So how could his theory still be accepted as valid?

• Every significant change in a human male reproductive system as he evolved from a less-than-human ancestor had to have been matched at exactly the same time with a reciprocal change in the female reproductive system (or vice versa).
• The egg has to know when it’s time to ovulate, how to pop out of the ovary, how to travel through the fallopian tube, how to receive a single sperm and immediately shut out other sperm, and how to eventually implant itself into the uterus.
• A cell resembles a miniature industrial complex more complicated than a General Motors or Boeing manufacturing plant.
• The brain can store between 100 trillion and 280 quintillion bits (1 followed by 20 zeros) of information in a mere three pounds of matter. By comparison, the largest computer array designed to date by IBM3 can store 120 million gigabytes of information (1 followed by 15 zeros) in a building the size of a large house. Thus, the human brain is capable of storing 100,000 times more bits of information than mankind’s largest computer in a much smaller space.
• Eyes are to the brain like an antenna is to a television. Millions of cells lining the interior of each eye function as photochemical receivers, converting light waves into a myriad of electrical impulses that are forwarded at 200 miles per hour to the brain. There the impulses are sorted, organized, and analyzed in a process more complex than the creation and viewing of a three dimensional holograph image. All of this is accomplished in milliseconds.
• Our hormones work in both parallel and tandem. Some require multiple hormones to perform their function and others only work in sequential order within a cell. Many have double and triple functions.
• Every movement of our bodies involves a complex array of interacting nerves, muscles, ligaments, tendons, joints, soft tissues, blood vessels, and bones. Millions to billions of cells work in unison to accomplish this.

Incredible complexity shows up in every part of the body, and then it has to be integrated with the other parts in order to work together. Happen by accident and chance? Hardly! We are fearfully and wonderfully made by God.

For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made:  marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.

~ Psalm 139:13-14

“I have found nature to be a conserver. Nothing is wasted or permanently lost in nature. Things change their form but never cease to exist. After I leave this world I do not believe I am through. God would be a bigger fool than even a man if He did not conserve the most important thing He has yet done in the universe.”

~ George Washington Carver, scientist and inventor

“If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain…Christ [is] risen from the dead…the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he has put all things under his feet.”

~ 1 Corinthians 15:17, 20, 26,27a

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

References for this devotional.

Daily Devotional – February 28

Paleontology

All over the world, we find dinosaur prints captured in mud or shale, which subsequently turned to rock. These footprints are commonly found on top of coal seams, as seen in the College of Eastern Utah’s Prehistoric Museum at Price, Utah. In fact such dinosaur footprint fossils are so common that people in this area use them as door stops! But how did all of these footprints survive the worldwide Flood? Here is one possible scenario.

The worldwide Flood literally pulverized the world that existed before the Flood. The coal seams of the world (which formed during Noah’s Flood) required almost ten times more vegetation on the planet before the Flood than we find alive today. This pre-Flood vegetation must have floated around for months, as wave after wave sorted and dropped sediment in underwater valleys thousands of feet deep below.

During the Flood, many land animals would have sought to survive by clinging onto these huge floating islands of vegetation. Much of this vegetation would have been beached at some point during the yearlong Flood as water levels fluctuated from place to place. Between the beaching of these mats and subsequent covering with more layers of water and sediment, dinosaurs could have made their footprints, followed by a subsequent drowning and burial of their bones. The “age of the dinosaurs” is taught to have extended from 250 million years ago to 65 million years ago, but in reality we are just seeing bones buried at different levels during an extremely complex worldwide Flood about 4400 years ago.

Dinosaurs buried early in the Flood are misinterpreted as having existed over 200 million years ago whereas those destroyed and buried later in the Flood (after leaving their footprints on the newly laid and exposed sediment layers) are misinterpreted as having lived less than 100 million years ago. Because evolutionists leave the world-restructuring Flood out of their thinking, they draw incorrect conclusions about the rocks, fossils, and the age of the dinosaurs. The existence of dinosaur footprints on the top of coal seams points to a catastrophic event such as the Flood.

Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished.

~ 2 Peter 3:6

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

Daily Devotional – February 27

Cosmology

Every time NASA sends a probe to a new location within our solar system, it sends back images that astonish scientists. Why the surprise? Because probe after probe sends back images that would not be expected if our solar system were billions of years old. Evidence for the recent creation of our solar system abounds - from the moon of Jupiter (Io) which is inexplicably volcanically active (it should be a cold moon, if millions of years old) to the raging storms and heat radiating from Neptune (it should be a cold planet if millions of years old); from the magnetic field of Mercury (which should not exist if this solid planet was billions of years old) to stable rings of dust orbiting the sun within the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter (which should have long ago been pulled apart by the gravitational attraction of the sun). The latest discovery supporting the recent creation of our solar system is the smooth surface of Pluto.

In July of 2015, NASA released photographs taken during the New Horizons space probe’s fly-by of Pluto. Again evolutionary scientists were stunned by the evidence. Pluto’s surface showed very few craters. If Pluto had been in existence for billions of years, there should have been millions of craters on the surface from impacts of objects hitting it, and any gas in the atmosphere around the planetoid should be long gone.  Yet, Pluto was inexplicably found to have very few craters and a nitrogen atmosphere. Both are best understood as perfectly logical because our solar system is a recent creation by God only about 6000 years ago – rather than a chance formation billions of years ago. Pluto’s smooth surface, along with the existence of an atmosphere, cries out, “Pluto is young!”

God looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, that did seek God.

~ Psalm 53:2

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

Daily Devotional – February 26

Biblical Accuracy

The Bible is full of prophecy – which simply is advance knowledge of the future. Since time is part of the physical universe, and God is the one who created the universe, God is “outside of time.” The fact that the Bible is filled with specific prophecies, that have come true, is one of the ways we can know the Bible is inspired by the One who is outside of time – God, the Eternal One.

One such prophecy concerns Edom. Edom was an ancient nation located near the Dead Sea. In Ezekiel 35:3-4, 9, God pronounced a curse on Edom, stating that this large nation would become desolate, all its cities would disappear, it would never be inhabited by humans, and it would be overrun by animals and beasts.

Today, we find nothing but traces of uninhabited towns in this area. Even the capital of Edom, Petra, considered one of the wonders of the ancient world with its buildings hewn out of beautiful rose-red solid rock, now stands in ruins. The only inhabitants are birds, reptiles, and assorted other animals. Imagine if a prophet of today came to New Jersey, which is about the size of Edom, and prophesied that New Jersey would become desolate, never to be reinhabited by humans and would be home only to wild animals and beasts. We would say that is ridiculous. Yet that is what has happened to Edom. The Edomites only existed for 1,700 years; their cities and even their language have utterly disappeared. The desolation of this land is a testimony to fulfilled prophecy.

I am against thee, and I will stretch out mine hand against thee, and I will make three most desolate. I will lay thy cities waste, and thou shalt be desolate, and thou shalt know that I am the LORD….I will make thee perpetual desolations, and thy cities shall not return: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.

~ Ezekiel 35:3-4, 9

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

Daily Devotional – February 25

Biology

Wouldn’t it be fun to walk right up the side of a wall or dash across the ceiling without tumbling to the floor? Only in comic books can fantasy heroes accomplish such feats. Inspiring such fiction are spiders, flies, and many other insects that have no trouble scurrying upside down across the ceiling. But no creature defies gravity like the gecko. Scientists have spent decades trying to discover how this heavy lizard, weighing hundreds of times more than an insect, can run upside down across surfaces as smooth as glass.

Originally, it was believed that tiny features on the gecko’s feet functioned like suction cups to suspend the lizard. Later, the real secret was discovered – hundreds of millions of microscopic hair-like filaments on the gecko’s feet exploit weak electrostatic attraction (van der Waal forces) that act as tiny magnets to hold the lizard to the ceiling1. But the mystery of how the gecko could turn these forces on and off to prevent its foot from remaining stuck to the ceiling remained.

More recent work has shown that the gecko hairs are curved like little bent hairs that can be snapped back and forth as the lizard moves across a surface allowing a rapid attachment/detachment mechanism to take place. Even researchers who believe in evolution describe the gecko with words like, “…amazing, finely balanced, and finely tuned this whole system is...” Mankind can invent imaginary wall-clinging heroes like Spiderman, but only God can create real creatures capable of displaying such amazing abilities.

The spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’ palaces.

~ Proverbs 30:28

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

Daily Devotional – February 24

Botany

Michael Faraday (1791-1867) is second only to Isaac Newton as the greatest physicist who ever walked the Earth. Faraday was credited with the invention of electromagnetic induction, the electric motor, the electric transformer, the electric generator and made major contributions to our understanding of magnetism, polarized light, the liquefaction of gases, the development of rubber, optical glass, alloys of steel, electroplating, and artificial rubies. In addition, his greatest contribution to science was the development of field theory in physics. He is ranked by science historians as the greatest of all experimental physicists – adding a whole new vocabulary to modern science – anode, cathode, ion, electricity, electrode, anion, cation, magnetic field, lines of force, and electrolysis.

Faraday’s work so changed modern science that two basic units of physics were named in his honor – the faraday (a unit of electrical quantity) and the farad (a unit of capacitance). Yet, as much as Faraday contributed to scientific advancement – he drew more from his deeply held Christian faith. His actions were strongly guided by Biblical truths, and his Bible contained nearly 3000 meticulously written notations in the margins. His good friend John Tyndall wrote of Faraday, “I think that a good deal of Faraday’s week-long strength and persistency might be due to his Sunday exercises. He drinks from a fount on Sunday that refreshes his soul for the week.”

Just like Newton before him, Faraday drew strength and meaning from the reality that the universe displays order and meaning as a direct result of being created by God. It is not a meaningless assembly of atoms which created itself, but an orderly arrangement – designed by an incredible intelligence outside of the physical universe. This acknowledgement did not hinder the incredible discoveries of these great scientists, but provided the foundation which motivated them.

And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men

~ Colossians 3:23

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

Have you considered how well archaeological evidence provides support for the recent creation of mankind? All anthropologists know that key human technological advancements – agriculture, the wheel, pottery, and horse domestication – were developed less than 10,000 years ago. The oldest plow is about 4,000 years old. It was discovered in Lavagnone, Italy in a peat bog. What about agriculture in general? Archaeological excavations have shown that agriculture has existed less than 10,000 years. What about the wheel? Even secular history books admit the wheel was invented 5,000 - 6,000 years ago and not in just one area but in Germany, Switzerland, Slovenia, and Mesopotamia. What about pottery? The earliest pottery found was in Iran, Japan, and China and has been dated less than 7,000 years old. Some of the pottery was found to be just as sophisticated in design as recent pottery. What about horse domestication? Again, the most ancient date advanced is that horses were domesticated less than 6,000 years ago. Archaeological evidence shows that the three most ancient civilizations, the Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and Indus civilizations, arose 6,000 (or less) years ago.

Even the oldest written languages date back about 5,000 years, and these languages show no evidence of evolving in complexity. In fact, the most ancient languages were just as complex and sophisticated (often more so) than modern languages – having complex grammar and structure. When we examine the evidence of human activity through archaeology, we find overwhelming support for a recent creation of man. If man had been evolving over millions of years, we should find evidence to support this, but we do not. What we find is man leaving his evidence dating back far less than 10,000 years. This is exactly what we would expect by reading the Bible as accurate, literal history.

Please inquire of past generations, And consider the things searched out by their fathers.

~ Job 8:8 (NASV )

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

Most animals flee from forest fires, but not the black fire beetles (Melanophila acuminate). They flock toward the fire! These unique beetles mate, and then the female lays her eggs in the bark of the still smoldering wood. The eggs hatch and burrow into the tree, free to munch away on trees without interference from the tree’s protective defenses.

During its lifetime, any given black fire beetle is statistically unlikely to ever experience a forest fire where it lives, so how does it find a burning forest for reproduction? On the underside of these beetles are tiny pits equipped with infrared radiation detection sensors. This infrared radiation detection system can detect the invisible heat rays given off by a forest fire up to 50 miles away! Do infrared radiation detection systems happen by accident and chance? Hardly! In fact, scientists are trying to copy this system in order to install them around forests to alert foresters when there is a fire. Scientists are only copying a good design. When we see an infrared radiation detection system, we know there must be an infrared radiation detection system Maker! And that Maker is God!

O Lord, there is none like thee, neither is there any God beside thee, according to all that we have heard with our ears.

~ 1 Chronicles 17:20

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

Automakers are busily developing self-driving automobiles which are capable of sensing danger and instantly reacting to it. Imagine that you are in such a car and it senses that a large tree has fallen across the road, blocking your path forward. The response from such a vehicle would be to slam on the brakes and come to an immediate stop.

Now think about that response. Why did the car stop? Did the fallen tree in some way communicate with the car and cause it to stop? Not at all. The car had internal sensors to identify the barrier and internal programming to adapt to the changing circumstances. To believe that the tree caused the car to stop would be both naive and misguided. Yet, this is exactly how biologists are trained to think about life. Their literature is filled with examples that imply that the environment in which an organism lives causes it to adapt and change. The idea that the presence of drugs causes a bacteria to evolve or a sooty environment caused the peppered moths population to shift from light to dark coloration is the common perception among biologists. This is as misguided as believing that the fallen tree caused the car to stop.

Life adapts to changing environments because it has been designed with programming that allows it the flexibility to adapt. It is the organism, guided by prior programming, that adapts to changes, not the environment that causes the changes to happen. The primary reason biologists do not think in this manner is because it implies that a source of this programming is required, and they are trained to believe the environment made the organism. Thus, they miss the One who did the programming. God, the great programmer!

Yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding; If thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures; Then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God.

~ Proverbs 2:3-5

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

Daily Devotional – February 20

Biology

The dragon fish lives 1,500 to 4,500 feet below the surface of the ocean – it is what is known as a “deep-sea” animal. At that depth, light is minimal, and most deep-sea creatures can only see blue light because other wavelengths do not penetrate the ocean to such great depths.

In spite of this, the dragon fish can see red light because he has chlorophyll in his eyes. Yes, that’s right, chlorophyll - stuff that makes plants green. This chlorophyll allows the dragonfish to see in the red spectrum, giving the dragonfish a secret weapon. It pulses far red light which allows it to see its prey without itself being seen. You could say that a dragon fish’s eyes act like a night vision scope on a sniper’s rifle. How can evolution explain a dragon fish evolving chlorophyll, the stuff of green plants, within its eyes? And how did it know that this chlorophyll would help it to see in the red spectrum? And why would it evolve the ability to see in the red part of the light spectrum when it could not have known that red light even existed? Does anyone believe that a night vision sniper scope happened by accident and chance? The dragon fish’s sniper scope eyes bear witness to a powerful and unique designer, God Himself.

And the light shineth in darkness…

~ John 1:5a

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