Our Amazing DNA: We Are Indeed Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

"The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge."
--Psalm 19:1-2

This past Sunday our church had a guest speaker who gave message on the above passage from Psalm 19. It began with an imaginative "what if" story about the moon landing of 1969. What if as Neil Armstrong stepped down from the Eagle landing craft he noticed a Swingline stapler by his foot there on the surface of the moon. What would people think? 

Obviously, it didn't appear out of thin air. The stapler, as simple as it is, demonstrates features of an intelligent design behind its creation.

This tale became a stepping off point for his sermon, which highlight four points. This blog post is based on his third, our amazing and mind-blowingly complex DNA.

Some of the details he shared were so over-the-top incredible that I didn't even want to share them until I'd confirmed them from multiple sources. Here are a few details about our DNA to wrap your head around. Sources include Britannica Kids (courtesy our speaker Dan Vander-Ark), Nature.com and ScienceFocus.com. 

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DNA is the material that carries all the information about how a living thing will look and function. For instance, DNA in humans determines such things as what color the eyes will be or what color your hair will be. Each piece of information is carried on a different section of the DNA. These sections are called genes.

DNA is in every cell of every living thing. It is found in structures of the cell called chromosomes.

When DNA works correctly, it helps keep the body functioning properly. DNA helps cells to make the proteins which cells need to live. DNA also allows living things to reproduce. The genes in DNA pass along physical traits from parents to children.

Those are the basics about DNA that most of us have been familiar with. We see physical traits in our kids that were in our parents, passed down over generations. But here's the part where it becomes remarkable.

DNA has an extremely complex structure. It's made of chemical substances that are linked together like a chain. Each piece of DNA has two long strands, or chains. The two strands are joined together. They form a shape like a ladder that has been

twisted into a spiral. We've come to know this as the double helix. This ladder has 3 BILLION RUNGS!

Nature.com puts it this way: "The double helix describes the appearance of double-stranded DNA, which is composed of two linear strands that run opposite to each other, or anti-parallel, and twist together. Each DNA strand within the double helix is a long, linear molecule made of smaller units called nucleotides that form a chain."

Every cell in our body has a strand of DNA in the nucleus – and that strand is 6 ft long! But it would be only 50 trillionths of an inch wide. And if you put all the DNA in all of our cells together it would stretch twice the diameter of the solar system. 

This seemed so unbelievable to me that I had to check it out, lest I be guilty of passing along "fake news." That led me to the Science Focus article, How Long Is Your DNA?

"Your DNA is arranged as a coil of coils of coils of coils of coils! This allows the 3 billion base pairs in each cell to fit into a space just 6 microns across. If you stretched the DNA of one cell all the way out, it would be about 2m long and all the DNA in all your cells put together would be about twice the diameter of the Solar System."

In other words, the DNA in your cells is packaged into 46 chromosomes in the nucleus and supercoiled using enzymes so that it takes up less space. 

Vander-Ark went on to say, "Human DNA contains more organized information than the Encyclopedia Britannica, which contains approximately 44 million words." 

In a 1999 Wall Street Journal article George Sim Johnson wrote: "If the full text of the encyclopedia were to arrive in computer code from outer space, most people would regard this as proof of the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence. But when seen in nature, it is explained as the workings of random forces."

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A suitable close here comes from Psalm 139, a Psalm of David from 3,000 years ago, and even more astonishing today.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Illustrations courtesy Zephyris, Wikimedia Commons

License details here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:DNA_orbit_animated_small.gif

Flashback Friday: When Amazing Becomes A Yawn

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN NOVEMBER 2009

Is amazement now boring? This was a thought I had the other evening as I was looking at a series of paintings by a Los Angeles artist at a site called Art-Walk. Her work, and the paintings of several others, had a quality that was mind-blowing as we used to say. The pieces revealed talent and that felicitous ethereal quality of “how did she do that.”

As one surf's the web one soon discovers that there is not just one or two amazing things going on, but gazillions. With relatively little effort you can become impaled by so many varieties of astonishing wonder that one's mind is benumbed by it all. What's going on here?

I'm reminded of the special effects in the most recent King Kong film. They were truly spectacular. The brontosaurus run down the path and later the fight between Kong and the tyrannosauruses... they were wow-level sequences, but my emotions became disengaged during these particular scenes. As they went on and on and on they actually became tiresome. "Just get on with the story," I wanted to say.

And maybe that's the issue with all this spectacle which we see in every direction. It makes for fascinating distractions but, sooner or later, to become meaningful it has to intersect with the story of our lives somehow.

Some people who enjoy and collect art do so not simply because they like a piece but because they like the artist whom they have gotten to know a little but through his or her work. The artist is a person and through his or her work connects to persons. The artist has a story, and the pictures have stories behind them as well. The why, the how, and even the when and where are all part of it.

One thing about art, as well as the natural beauty of the galaxies and the creation -- whether Bryce Canyon or a California coastline -- is that it invites engagement. And maybe it is in this engagement, by slowing down and opening up to it, that we appreciate its deeper beauty, and the greater depths of the artist as well.

In short, when amazing becomes a yawn, it may say more about us than about the amazing. Maybe we would enjoy it more if we'd not try to gorge ourselves on it but to slow down and savor it in more bite-sized morsels. 

And maybe, if we weren't always in search of the next "most amazing thing" we just might find ourselves waking up to how amazing the simplest things really are. Life this morning's sunrise. Like the blooming of a flower. Or the fluttering wings of a hummingbird.

Photos by Gary Firstenberg

Throwback Thursday: Has Amazing Finally Become A Yawn?

THIS POST WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN OCTOBER 2009

Is amazement now boring? This was a thought I had the other evening as I was looking at a series of paintings by a Los Angeles artist at  a site called Art-Walk. Her work, and the paintings of several others, had a quality that was mind-blowing as we used to say. The pieces not only revealed talent but also that ethereal “how did she do that” quality.

As one surfs the web one soon discovers that there are not just one or two amazing things going on. Awesomeness is everywhere. With little effort you can become impaled by so many varieties of astonishing wonder that one's mind is benumbed by it all. What's going on here?

I'm reminded of the special effects in the film King Kong which were truly spectacular. The brontosaurus run down the narrows and later the fight between Kong and the tyrannosauruses... they were wow-level sequences, but my emotions became disengaged and these particular scenes as they went on and on and on became tiresome. "Just get on with the story," I wanted to say.

And maybe that's the issue with all this sensational stuff that we see everywhere. Yes, the distractions are fascinating but, sooner or later, to become meaningful they must intersect with the story of our lives somehow.

Some people who enjoy and collect art do so not simply because they like a piece but because they like the artist whom they have gotten to know a little through his or her work. The artist is a person and through his work connects to persons. The artist has a story, and his pictures have stories behind them as well. The why, the how, and even the when and where are all part of it.

One thing about art, as well as the natural beauty of the galaxies and the creation -- whether Bryce Canyon or a California coastline -- is that it invites engagement. In some magical way it is through this engagement, this slowing down and opening up to it, that we appreciate its deeper beauty, and the greater depths of the artist as well.

In short, when amazing becomes a yawn, it may say more about us than about the amazing. The magical may still be magical. We're simply burned out from it all. Ever been there? Slow down, let go, and dare to be amazed again.

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EdNote: The above was written before the word Clickbait became a household term. The reference here is to videos and photos that truly are amazing, not to ads that promise much and do nothing more than waste our time. 

When Amazing Becomes A Yawn

Is amazement now boring? This was a thought I had the other evening as I was looking at a series of paintings by a Los Angeles artist at a site called Art-Walk. Her work, and the paintings of several others, had a quality that was mind-blowing as we used to say. The pieces revealed talent and that felicitous ethereal quality of “how did she do that.”

As one surf's the web one soon discovers that there is not just one or two amazing things going on, but with little effort you can become impaled by so many varieties of astonishing wonder that one's mind is benumbed by it all. What's going on here?

I am reminded of the special effects in the film King Kong which were truly spectacular. When the brontosauruses run down the path and later the fight between Kong and the tyrannosauruses... these were wow-level sequences, but my emotions became disengaged in these particular scenes as they went on and on and on and on. They became tiresome. "Just get on with the story," I wanted to say.

And maybe that's the issue with all this spectacle which we see in every direction. It makes for fascinating distractions but, sooner or later, to become meaningful it has to intersect with the story of our lives somehow.

Some people who enjoy and collect art do so not simply because they like a piece but because they like the artist whom they have gotten to know a little bit through his or her work. The artist is a person and through his work connects to persons. The artist has a story, and his pictures have stories behind them as well. The why, the how, and even the when and where are all part of it.

One thing about art, as well as the natural beauty of the galaxies and the creation -- whether Bryce Canyon or a California coastline -- is that it invites engagement. And maybe it is in this engagement, of slowing down and opening up to it, that we appreciate its deeper beauty, and the greater depths of the artist as well.

In short, when amazing becomes a yawn, it may say more about us than about the amazing. Slow down, let go, and dare to be amazed.