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Talking Out Loud - The Creator's Majestic Power
stalk of corn

Due to a very wet spring, many farmers were late getting their crops in this year. I read an article in a farm magazine where it said the seed in the ground has a way of sensing when it’s growing season is short. In discussing a plant’s ability to detect this shorter growing season, the author states: “Scientists have discovered that if the same hybrid is planted 30 days late, it requires about 200 fewer (than normal) GDDs (Growing Degree Days) to reach relative maturity. The reason why isn’t known.”

The author goes on to say that he “believes it may relate to survival of the species in an evolutionary sense.”  He asks: “Can plants detect from day length that they need to speed up? They want to produce seed, even if it’s smaller than normal,” (Wisconsin Agriculturist, Aug 2019, p 32, by Dave Nanda).

I don’t know about you, but the author of that article seems to be giving the plant a little too much credit for its intelligence. Does an inanimate seed, buried in the depths of the earth, have the ability to reason and conclude that it needs to hurry up and grow because it doesn’t have as much time as it would in a “normal” year? 

Would we rather give credit to the seed in the ground for its ability to adjust to the weather and grow or would it be wiser to look to the Creator and give Him the credit? Afterall, God’s promise to Noah after the Great Flood was: “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest will never cease,” (Genesis 8:22). It is God who makes the crops grow. “I will send rain on your land in its season, both autumn and spring rains, so that you may gather in your grain,” (Deuteronomy 11:14). It is not an evolutionary process. It’s a miracle that God performs year after year in keeping with HIs own promises.

My wife plants beautiful flowers all around our farm buildings every year. She also has a vegetable garden. At one end of her garden she plants sunflowers. At the other end she plants moonflowers. The sunflowers turn their heads to face the sun every morning. The moonflowers bloom every evening at about sunset. In the middle of the garden and on one side is a row of marigolds.

There are flowers in hanging baskets on the back porch. Attached to the heifer shed are a couple of planters where she planted viney plants and beautiful blooming flowers. In front of the house is a garden with a variety of colorful flowers adding to the beauty of God’s creation around us.

All that, and on the edge of our driveway, with its roots safely anchored in nothing but gravel, is growing a single, rogue stalk of corn. With all the beauty around, it is often the subject of conversation by those who stop by. It reminds me, not of evolution, but of the miracle of creation and new life, and the unlikely ways in which God will breathe life into barrenness and hopelessness. It seems impossible that a random seed would find its way to the edge of the gravel, bury itself, sprout, grow, and produce. Yet there it is, along with all those flowers, as a constant reminder of our Creator’s majestic power.

“Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these,” (the words of Jesus in Matthew 6).