Have you ever wondered how you can hear? It begins with something making a sound. When this happens, the sound sets the air near it in motion. This motion passes to the air next to it, and so on, in waves, until it reaches your ears. Your outer ear, the part you can see, catches these sound waves. Without the outer ear we would still hear some sounds, but we would miss many sounds.
The sound next travels down a curving canal to the eardrum. This canal is lined with hairs and wax that trap dust, water and even small bits of dirt or insects that could cause damage to the eardrum.
The eardrum is a membrane about one-half inch across. As sound waves hit this membrane, it vibrates like the skin of a drum, and the vibration travels through it to the middle ear. This has the three tiniest bones in your body. They are connected and are often called the anvil, hammer and stirrup. These catch the vibrations made by the drum and magnify them by about 20 times. This happens because the end of the stirrup that taps on the cochlea in the inner ear is very tiny. Pressure that is concentrated becomes greater, just as when a high heel presses a woman’s weight onto a floor, compared to a whole foot.
The inner ear is protected by the hardest bones in your body, because it is so important. It gives you both balance and hearing. The hearing takes place in the cochlea, a twisted snail-like tube, filled with fluid. This fluid is the reason the sound needs to be amplified, since movement through liquid is harder than movement through air. Much is still not known about the cochlea, but it takes sound and converts it into electrical signals which are then sent to your brain and interpreted correctly. All of these processes are done at the same time by two ears. Your brain can tell where the sound is coming from because of having two ears.
Ears are an amazing example of the wonders of God’s creation. No human could ever invent anything like it nor could such an incredible thing develop by itself.
Our opening verse is about the Lord Jesus. When He came to this earth, He became a real man, with ears to hear and a desire to obey God in everything. He is the only man who always heard and perfectly obeyed God’s voice, but He is the example of how we should live, too. Our ears are amazing instruments, and they have been made so that we can hear and obey. For a child, this begins with obeying your parents. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right” (Ephesians 6:11Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. (Ephesians 6:1)). As you learn to obey your parents, you are learning to obey the Lord later
in life.
Did You Know?
The middle ear has the tiniest bones in your body.
Messages of God’s Love 6/2/2024