Spiritual Lessons from Biology

“I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting. But the Lord God helps me; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame. He who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me? Let us stand up together. Who is my adversary? Let him come near to me. Behold, the Lord God helps me...Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the LORD and rely on his God.” –Isaiah 50v6-10   I once heard a wild west story about a polka-dotted landscape that stretched far as the eye could see. The prairie had been set ablaze by a flash-fire the day before, and the ground was scorched; brown and mottled like an alien planet. But here and there stood little oval patches of living earth. The lime green dots stood cheerfully in stark contrast against the ravaged fields. And there on the distant horizon, a herd of bison marched on, unscathed, in the rosy morning ...

       I was returning home after a long walk.  The river smelled fresh because of the rain, and a pungent sweet aroma of autumn wafted down from the forest canopy.  As I turned a corner, the path led me back to the roadside.  The gentle sounds of the river fell away, overcome by the swoosh swoosh of traffic.  A chill descended through the ether as the sun sank low upon the horizon.  I crested a hill.  Something colorful on the sidewalk caught my eye.  A beautiful butterfly!  It was a female Red-spotted Purple.  I picked it up.  She fluttered her wings a bit.  She was very weak, barely moving, and one of her wings was torn.  She’d clearly been trampled.  I carried her home, in the palm of my hand.  When I arrived back, I mixed up some sugar water and filled a cotton ball with it.  I set the butterfly’s feet on the ball so she could taste the sugar.  She moved her head a bit, but she was t...

The Alcon Blue butterfly has a fascinating life cycle.   A mother butterfly carefully lays her eggs along the blue petals of the marsh gentian flower, high up where predators cannot eat them.   Down below, all manner of creepy crawly things would just love to gobble up those eggs.   Usually, if a caterpillar hatches and accidentally falls to the ground, it is quickly consumed by a wasp or an ant.   Yet, biologists were surprised to discover that a couple of weeks after the Alcon Blue caterpillars hatched, they deliberately launched themselves off of their protective flowers and into the dangerous world below.   The larvae were quickly overrun with ants and carried away.   How were the butterflies coming back each spring, if in their larval state they seemed self-destructive?   Eventually it was discovered that these butterflies are myrmecophylous, meaning they have a positive association with ants.  When the ants took them back to the nest, it was...

Only the mist is moving over the waters in the early morning hours.  Far away, bugs hum lazily.  The sun is melting away the evening chill.  Shards of silver play along the water surface, the dim sunlight glinting off their scales.  The school of fish moves slowly, deliberately, but twitchingly.  They are a pause-and-play video, ever watching.  Suddenly a flurry of feathers cut through the water.  The fish scatter, all but one, twitching in the beak of the gently bobbing bird. Among all the hunting techniques observed in avians, surely the Green Heron ranks as one of the most fascinating.   These herons are the smallest of their family.  Yet what they lack in size they make up for in intelligence.   The Green Heron is a master fisherman.  He scours the landscape for a delicious morsel, a bit of bread or a seed pod, and carries it to the nearest lake.   There the heron stands upon a rock.  He tip-toes down to t...

" Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting.  He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, Shall indeed come again with a shout of joy, bringing his sheaves with him." -  Psalm 126 v5&6 "You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness." - Psalm 30:11 "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus." - 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 My grandmother came down with a case of pneumonia, and i went to visit her in the hospital.  They kept her in the ICU for days, trying to revive her.  Yet, for all their efforts, she worsened daily.  Eventually they put some kind of helmet over her head to help her breathe.  Trying to speak to her through that contraptio...

"Love one another deeply, from the heart." -  1 Peter 1v22 "Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins." -  1 Peter 4v8 “Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.” - Romans 12v9&10 Traffic in Denver has exploded.  Construction and road maintenance cannot keep up.  Furthermore, many people on the roads have recently moved here from places without snow, making the roads extra dangerous in winter.  Accidents are on the rise, as well as road rage.   Yesterday i was driving somewhere, and i was becoming frustrated.  i kept shaking my head, raising my eyebrows, tsk-ing my tongue, even laughing out loud at the sheer insanity displayed by other cars in front of me.   i was in a hurry, and grumbling to myself wasn't helping.   At one point i found myself in a turn lane at ...

“ Let us lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus.” (Hebrews 12v1-2) Humpback Whales migrate farther than any other mammal on this planet, and they do so with astonishing accuracy.  Their trajectory is reportedly less than 1 degree off at any given time during their 6,000 mile journey.(1) How are these whales capable of such precision?   Sea turtles often follow a particular current.  This is impossible for humpbacks as sea currents are highly variable for the duration of the trip.   Sharks take cues from the earth’s magnetic fields.  Not so for the humpback whales; magnetic north changes as much at 12% along the way.     Migratory birds often follow the sun.  Yet the sun alone cannot explain the whales’ near-perfect navigation.  In a report from “Biology Letters” (2), humpbacks from the same area were found t...

i recently went to Oregon where i spoke at Portland State University on the topic of God and Science.  one morning i woke up early and decided to check out the ocean.  i left the beach-house and followed my nose towards the brine.  When i arrived at the beach, i couldn’t help but gasp.  The entire shore was covered in indigo.  i crept closer and closer, wondering at the strange phenomenon.  After stooping down to inspect the blue colours i came to realize the sand was painted in billions of tiny jellyfish.  i’d never seen anything like it in my life.  It was beautiful, but the weight of death saddened me. Further down the beach i found a twisted piece of driftwood, covered in mussels.  The mussels reached out their feathery hands to taste the morning breeze.  But each time they did, seagulls swooped down and ripped them from their shells.  i wished i could save them, but the thought seemed childish as soon as it passed through m...