Caterpillar Processors!

For the past few days my eyeballs have been glued to the TV screen! No, I have not become addicted to one of the TV soaps or been totally gripped by the golf, football or any other sporting programme. Instead I have been watching, close up and personal, a family of blue-tits emerging from their tiny eggs and being diligently looked after by their doting, very affectionate and very hard-working parents.

I was given a special bird-box with a built in camera for my birthday and what a brilliant success it’s been. First Mum and Dad built the nest, then Mum laid seven eggs and then for nearly two weeks she sat tightly on those eggs until suddenly one morning, when we turned the TV on, five of them had hatched and we were watching their first hours of independent life – tiny, squirming pink things which would need to have a lot of growing and changing to do before you would be able to identify them as real birds. As Fi and I sat transfixed by what we were seeing, it was the most natural thing in the world to start worshipping God, the God who had created the world and everything in it and who had gifted this blue-tit Mum and Dad with all they would need to know in order to produce a family. I sat there shaking my head in amazement saying “God, you ARE clever!” God IS the Creator – there is no such thing as an accidental blue-tit family!

Then the next stage of the baby blue-tits’ journey through life was about to begin. Into the box came Dad, with a squiggling caterpillar across its beak. Mum took it from him and carefully placed it in the open beak of one of her chicks – an event that will take place thousands of times during the next few weeks. And at every stage those tiny chicks will swallow the caterpillar and use it as the raw material for their internal processors, which will miraculously convert the caterpillar into flesh, eyeballs, all the bodily organs and feathers.

Now, I was trained as a chemist and I know for a fact that there is absolutely no chemical factory in the world that could do what each one of those tiny chicks is doing, without even having to think about it! Caterpillar processing is an incredibly complicated chemical operation, but each one of those chicks is fully equipped with all the ingredients for the process and before very long each one of those little chicks will leave the nest and fly into the air – caterpillar powered!

Paul made it very clear in our Scripture for today that God’s invisible qualities are clear for all to see in His creation. I one hundred per cent agree with him. Having watched this emergent blue-tit family, I don’t know how anyone can deny the existence of God. But, sadly, those who do so, will be without excuse when they meet their Maker face to face. May I encourage you today to take time out to look carefully and close up at something that God has made – and spend a few minutes worshipping our amazing and wonderful Creator God.

Prayer: Thank You, Lord, for Your amazing creation. You are the most amazing artist and the most fantastic designer. I am so grateful that Your signature is on everything you have made. I ask that You will open the eyes of your children today to see the truth about Yourself, that is so clearly portrayed through the things You have made. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.