The Atmosphere

There is the wonder of our atmosphere. We live under a great ocean of air – 78 percent nitrogen, 21 percent oxygen, and the other 1 percent is made up of almost a dozen different trace elements. Spectrographic studies of other planets in the stellar universe show that no other atmosphere, no other part of the known universe is made up of these same ingredients or anything like this composition. These elements are not chemically combined but are continually mixed mechanically by the tidal effect of the moon upon the atmosphere. This has the same effect that it has upon the seas and always provides the same amount of oxygen. Though man dumps a tremendous amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, this is absorbed into the ocean and man is able to continue to live on this planet. If the atmosphere were not as thick as it is, we would be crushed by the billion pieces of cosmic debris and meteorites that fall continually upon our planet.

Then there is the amazing nitrogen cycle. Nitrogen is extremely inert – if it were not, we would all be poisoned by different forms of nitrous combinations. However, because of its inertness, it is impossible for us to get it to combine naturally with other things. It is definitely needed for plants in the ground. How does God provide to get the nitrogen out of the air into the soil? He does so by lightning! One hundred thousand lightning bolts strike this planet daily, creating a hundred million tons of usable nitrogen plant food in the soil every year.

Sixty-five kilometres up there is a thin layer of ozone. If compressed it would be only six millimetres thick, and yet without it life would not exist. Eight killer rays fall upon this planet continually from the sun; without ozone we would be burned, blinded and broiled by them in just a day or two. The ultraviolet rays come in two forms; longer rays which are deadly and are screened out, and shorter rays which are necessary for life on earth and are admitted by the ozone layer. Furthermore, the most deadly of these rays are allowed through the ozone layer in just a very thin amount, enough to kill the green algae, which otherwise would grow to fill all the lakes, rivers and oceans of the world.

How little we realise what God is continuously doing to provide for our life. We see that we live with a tiny ozone layer protecting us from an unseen deadly bombardment that constantly comes down upon our heads. Beneath us is a thin rock crust, thinner than the skin of an apple in comparison. Beneath that is the molten lava that forms the core of this earth. So man lives between the burning, blackening rays above and the molten lava below, either of which would burn him to a crisp. Yet man is totally oblivious that God has so arranged things that he can exist in such a world as this.