Plants

After assembling the dry land and the water together, God now begins to fill this land. He does this first with plants. There are three types or categories of plants that God creates: grass, herbs and fruit bearing trees. With the spoken Word of God, we find coming into existence one of the truly marvelous creations that are necessary for the survival of our planet. Let’s look at some of the truly unique features of plants and be awed by the power and the wisdom of God.

The first and most obvious thing that we notice about plants is their greenness. This is a characteristic that all plants have in common. It is caused by the pigment chlorophyll. This molecule in itself is truly unique, for it is one of a small number of chemicals that can trap the energy from light and make it available to the plant. There are five types of chlorophyll, named chlorophyll a, b, c, d & e. Each one of them has a slightly different absorption spectrum. The unique arrangement of the molecule allows it to be excited and capture an electron of energy that will be stored for other uses. There are now known to be two different energy-capturing systems in plants. They are called Photosystem 1 and Photosystem 2. Each are slightly different built to work together to accomplish what God gave it to do, which is to get radiant energy and hold it so it can be available for making chemical energy.

Plants carry on the process that is called photosynthesis, that is “to make use of light.” This process occurs in two parts and is called the “light reactions” and the “dark reactions.” It uses the energy captured by the chlorophyll and stores it in a very important substance called glucose. The plants need the raw materials water and carbon dioxide to make the sugar. This sugar is used by the plant as energy to make its own body, and also as the source of energy by all animals for cellular respiration. Here is one of the truly unique designs in all of nature.

The equation for photosynthesis is CO₂ + H₂O——-C₆H₁₂O₆ + O₂

The equation for cellular respiration is  C₆H₁₂O₆ + O₂——-CO₂ + H₂O

As you can easily see, they are exactly opposite of each other. Plants supply the materials that animals need for existence and animals supply the materials that plants need to survive. A student in one of my classes some years ago remarked about this as we discussed it “you would almost think that someone planned it that way!” Out of the mouth of babes! Certainly as God created the plants, he knew exactly what would be necessary for the existence of animals also and made them to fulfill that need.

How do scientists who do not believe in God account for this? They don’t! They cannot find an answer they can prove for where plants came from, or how plants and animals came to depend so much on one another. Yet, they believe that somehow it had to happen.

This is but just one of the truly magnificent abilities of plants; there are many others. Like how a seed knows up from down. How the plant itself can tell where up is or where the sunlight is. This list could go on and on. Or how certain plants developed the ability they have, like to capture and digest animals as the Venus Fly Trap does. We could go on and on, but let us return to listen to what God had to say about why he put plants here.

“And God said, Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of the earth and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life. I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so” (Genesis 1:29-30).