Mrs. Dougherty’s 5th grade class created sunflowers using the Fibonacci pattern for seeds and petals. How they’ve enjoyed their brief detour in Bible to study Fibonacci and “God as mathematician.”

In God’s creation, there exists a divine proportion that is exhibited in a multitude of shapes, numbers, and patterns whose relationship can only be the result of the omnipotent, good, and all-wise God of Scripture. This divine proportion – existing in the smallest to the largest parts, in living and also in non-living things – reveals the awesome handiwork of God and His interest in beauty, function, and order.

These numbers are part of the Fibonacci numbering sequence, a pattern discovered around 1200 A.D. by Leonardo Pisa (historically known as Fibonacci). Each succeeding number is the sum of the two preceding numbers. The sequence of these numbers is 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, ad infinitum. This number pattern reveals itself in various ways throughout all of nature:

• tornadoes and hurricanes
• the cochlea of the human ear
• ram’s horns
• sea-horse tails
• growing fern leaves
• DNA molecules
• waves breaking on the beach
• the spiral of galaxies and the tails of comets as they wind around the sun
• whirlpools
• seed patterns of sunflowers, daisies, and dandelions

What a lovely integration of Bible, art, and science!