FCP-06-FLOWERS.

FLOWERS.

Consider the flowers!

Thousands of varieties of flowers are divided into their respective genus by some characteristic which they maintain as a definite law. The Callistemon and the Melaleuca are both bottle-brush plants but the stamens in the Callistemon are always individual whilst the stamens in the Melaleuca are always in bundles. Millions of flowers could be examined but the law is unfailing. Have you ever, as you breathed in the exquisite perfume of some of the flowers, been mystified by the fact that every flower perfume, regardless of time, place, soil, or any other condition, always produces its very own particular perfume? And one could write volumes showing how the Hand of God is revealed in flowers alone but no description could do justice to the beauty and workmanship revealed in the leaves and flowers under the microscope and so permanent is this beauty that, even when pressed and dried, many flowers, especially the wild-flowers, retain all this exquisite beauty. In some cases one could almost imagine they were gazing into a crystal palace or a cave set with jewels, yet when anything, even the most delicate and beautiful work done by human hands is put under the lens, it appears so clumsy in comparison as to be almost unbelievable. Are you going to say then that, these millions of exquisite designs, far exceeding in beauty and workmanship anything produced by man, are the result of mere chance?

Marvelous beyond description are the means provided in the various flowers for the reproduction of their kind and, just to touch the fringe of this, it must be remembered that the pollen grains must be placed on the stigma in order to fertilize the ovary.

How is this to be achieved?

There are of course three main agents. The wind. The birds. The insects, and the ingenious designs and methods whereby these three agents can do this work can only be described as incredible! Pages could not do it justice!

Nectar is provided to attract the insects and the birds and color to guile them and, where color is lacking, strong perfume is provided while in the case of wind pollinated plants, such as wheat and pine trees which have no need of color or perfume another ingenious way is provided to effect pollination. The pollen is powdery and is carried by the wind to the sticky stigma and, in some cases, even has wings. In the insect pollinated flowers, it is sticky as well as having other means of adherence such as, tiny hooks which cling to the insect or bird until it comes in contact with the sticky stigma which, in turn, is especially designed and placed for the reception of the pollen. Many flowers have special devices for shooting the pollen onto the insect by releasing a trigger. Some flowers fertilize themselves having a trigger arrangement which is released by an insect or bird, causing the pollen to be shot onto the stigma.

Among the Australian terrestrial orchids are many with the most ingenious and intriguing mechanisms. Many have movable or extremely sensitive parts which combine with other parts of the plant to hold, or temporarily trap an insect until pollination is achieved. Some release a platform or tongue, which springs upward and traps the insect in a compartment where it is held prisoner until the process of pollination is accomplished after which it releases its prisoner and resets itself for the next visitor.

Often flowers only permit flying insects to visit them, means being provided to prevent crawling insects approach the flower while others, such as the Epacris, (a heath flower), cater especially for long tongued birds such as the Honeyeaters who, by the way, are provided with an actual brush at the end of their tongue, exactly like a tiny paint brush. Here again, is clearly revealed, foresight in design, because many flowers are thus reserved for the nectar birds, and are inaccessible to bees. These birds, of course, are a vital factor in the balance of nature, their diet being approximately half nectar and half insects.

Now what is the purpose of all these devices?

It is for the formation of seed for the propagation of the species, the miracle of life which man has not been able to fathom because even though he has been able to discover the ’elements of life’, the DNA structure, he has not been able to discover the secret of life itself. He knows the process. But he also knows, even though he is reluctant to admit it, that the prospect of bringing life from these inert elements, from the so-called ’building blocks of life,’ is remote because, not only is it beyond his understanding but he simply does not know how or why, the action of the genes and chromosomes is able to establish each species with, their forms and life-long characteristics when the microscopic world inside the ovary is fertilized.

Scripture states it positively. God set in motion these laws which have continued unfailingly. Genesis 1:11. After his kind. For any person to suggest all this, (supernatural design which at every point reveals wisdom and purpose), is mere chance is, to put it mildly, childish and amounts to deliberately shutting one’s eyes to the visible things of Creation which, in turn reveal the invisible Creator, and bring upon themselves the condemnation we read earlier in Romans 1:19-22 and, ’they are without excuse.’ A point of particular interest, to those who want to see the Hand of God in Creation, is the fact that there is a numeric order running through all creation which, we shall see later, definitely, and beyond all dispute, proves that Creation and the Bible, (in its original form), is the Work of one and the same Author. In flowers, particularly the wildflowers untouched by man, we find on examination they have a definite numeric order. The basic number of the Daffodil is 3. The Boronia 4. The Buttercup and Eriostemon 5. This means if there are 4 sepals there will be 4 Petals and either 4 ... 8 ... 12 or 16 Stamens and the stigma will be divided according to the basic number for each plant. In other words, this means that if a flower has a basic number all its parts will correspond to that number or a multiple of the same.

Boronia is a particular favorite of mine and, again and again, when out among the wildflowers and stop to examine and admire the flower of this genus I marvel afresh at the wonder of Creation for as sure as a child is born with ten fingers so also will this little flower in the bush comply with the numeric formula of its kind and it is the same in a field of wheat. There may be millions of grains of wheat but every head has an even number of grain and many other similar examples could be given, each faithful to its formula.

Surely no one thinks this is mere co-incidence? In examining the leafy stem of a plant we find the leaves are arranged in uniform order also and if we draw a line around the stem from one leaf stalk to the next, this line will wind around the stem as it rises and, on any particular plant, there will be the same number of leaves for each turn around the stem.

There are different ranks.

Grasses are two ranked. That is, the second leaf starts exactly opposite the first, and above them the next two leaves do the same so that the leaves are in two vertical rows, one row on one side of the stem and one row on the other.

Most water plants are three ranked. The second leaf being one third around the stem, the third leaf another two thirds away and the fourth leaf level with the first.

Apple trees are five ranked. The spiral winds twice around the stem before it reaches a leaf directly over the first and this continues in various other species. The law is fixed and can be expressed numerically. The two ranked as 1/2 and the next as 1/3. The next order is found by adding the two top numbers of these fractions and placing them over the sum of the two bottom numbers, that is:-- 1+1 = 2, and 2+3 = 5 from which we get 2/5 and of course, using the same method with 1/3 and 2/5 we have 3/8, and so on.