Daily Devotional – September 2

Biology

A United States entomologist has estimated that one pair of Colorado potato beetles, if allowed to reproduce unchecked, would increase to over 60 million in one season. One female fly, beginning reproduction in May, would produce 143,875 bushels of flies by August. Aphids reproduce quickly, and in one season they can produce over 13 generations. If not held in check, the world’s aphid population would be ten sextillion aphids in one year. Imagine living in a world where insects were not controlled. But what controls insect reproduction rates?

Fortunately, birds have a large appetite for insects. It has been found that a scarlet tanager can eat over 600 gypsy moth caterpillars in 18 minutes. It has been estimated that chickadees alone eat over 8 billion insects per year. Birds keep the insect population in balance. Now consider what evolutionists say about the origin of birds – they did not evolve until many millions of years after insects appeared on our planet!

Without birds, insects would have decimated the world’s vegetation. The world would have been a bleak place with little life. What we see is actually what God has said, that He created both birds and insects during the first week of creation at the very beginning of time.

As soon then as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread.

~ John 21:9

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

References for this devotional.

Daily Devotional – August 29

Biology

The archer fish, named for its expertise in archery, has a distinctive way of getting its supper. This fish shoots its prey with water bullets! The aquatic sharpshooter shoots these “bullets” up to nine feet away with deadly accuracy to knock its prey off overhanging leaves and branches. To accomplish this requires the fish to have a unique design.

This small fish has a mouth that is angled upward with the roof of its mouth having a groove to hold the tongue. When the gills ‘pop’ or slam shut, water is shot through the mouth as the tongue presses into the groove. The tip of the tongue directs the water bullets - adjusting for velocity and volume in order to precisely hit the insect. The cricket, grasshopper, or butterfly falls into the water to be quickly eaten.

But the archer fish’s design is brilliant in many other ways. In order to conceal its position when hunting for insects above the water, its dorsal fins (the fins on its back) are farther back than almost all other fish. In this way, the hunter remains underwater and does not reveal its location. The archer fish’s eyes are also unique. They have a special portion of the retina that swivels into place allowing it to look at the air above the water. Try this when you are swimming, with your mask on underwater, try looking up into the air above the water. It is almost impossible to see anything clearly above the surface of the water in this way - but not for the archer fish!

The archer fish is uniquely made - from its angled mouth to the groove in the roof of its mouth; from the dorsal fin placed farther back to the swiveling retina allowing it to clearly see up out of the water and into the air. How does evolution explain this? Remember that the only option evolution has for explaining life is non-directed, non-purposeful mutations over millions of years. Other fish get their food in the water; no fish ever hunted its food in the air! So where did the archer fish get this idea? He didn’t. The archer fish testifies to the genius of its Maker.

The Lord sitteth upon the flood; yea, the Lord sitteth King forever.

~ Psalm 29:10

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

References for this devotional.

Daily Devotional – August 27

Biology

Does this sound like the plot from a poor horror movie? A parrot attacks and kills a sheep - even burrowing into the sheep’s body to devour its kidneys while the sheep is still alive! That is what was happening in New Zealand’s high country during the late 1800s. Naturalists were stunned as they discovered that local birds (called keas) were killing and eating thousands of sheep. These parrots normally ate seeds and fruit. Why was this taking place? As sheep were introduced into New Zealand’s highland country, the habitat changed drastically, and the parrot’s old food source was greatly diminished. How they learned to eat meat is not known. The New Zealand kea became so hated that in the hundred year period between 1870 -1970, an estimated 150,000 were killed. Today’s keas are not showing this type of behavior.

In 2002, a British researcher reported that he saw a sheep eating a bird; the sheep had snatched and eaten a grouse in the scrublands. This was not normal behavior for a sheep, for they are herbivores, not carnivores. But that was not the only such report, CNN in 1999 reported that Hussein al-Marqouqi’s sheep ate nine chickens. Also, out of China’s Sichuan province comes a report of a panda killing and eating 26 goats. These types of accounts of plant-eating animals devouring meat are not as uncommon as one might think. After the Fall, certain animals started eating meat; prior to the Fall, all were plant eaters. These reports can give us insights into how animals became carnivores.

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

~ Genesis 1:30

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

References for this devotional.