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Creation Day 3: God creates the "chemical" breath of life
God's step-by-step 'timed process' in creating plants on Earth. As we near the close of Creation Day 3 , one blessing still remains unfulfilled . God ha s already supplied the Earth 's surface with dry land masse s surrounded on all sides by deep water y oceans . He has also filled Earth's gaseous atmosphere above with all of the necessary chemical ingredients for sustaining life, except for one- the breath of life - free oxygen molecules released only by plants .
How free oxygen first appeared in the atmosphere remains one of the biggest scientific mysteries of all time. For one reason, i t's hard to keep free oxygen molecules around despite the fact that oxygen is the third-most abundant element in the universe.
1. Hydrogen - 73.9% 2. Helium - 24.0% 3. Oxygen - 1.1%
, That's because free oxygen molecules want to combine and form compounds with nearly every other element on the periodic table. So how did Earth end up with its present atmosphere made up of roughly 21 percent oxygen ? T o help us answer this scientific dilemma , let's return to Genesis 1:11 and closely examine the exact Hebrew meaning of the word s " vegetation " and " plant ". Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation: plants yielding seed . The English word translated "vegetation" in the above passage comes from the Hebrew word deshe' דֶּ֔שֶ ׁא , which refers to small plants, such as grasses and herbs. The other word, ‛eśeb ֚ עֵשֶ ׂב translated "plants" is even more generic, referring to any kind of green plant. Keeping in mind that our God is a God of order, let's see what science has revealed about the first plants on earth.
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