Amazing, too, is the way that regions far from rivers, lakes and seas get the vital life-sustaining water. The sun’s heat is constantly changing thousands of millions of gallons of water into vapor. This vapor, lighter than air, floats upward and forms clouds in the sky. Wind and air currents, created by the sun’s energy, move these clouds. As the air in the clouds cools, the vapor condenses into tiny water droplets that attach themselves to dust particles. This atmospheric dust has come from various sources, including disintegrated meteors. The droplets next join together, forming larger drops, rain.

Raindrops grow only to a certain size and then begin falling. What if this were not so and raindrops became colossal in size? This would be disastrous. Observes Arthur L. Brown, in his book Footprints of God: “Without the provision for gentle showers, vegetation would be destroyed, crops beaten into the ground, trees stripped of leaves and fruits, fields ploughed into deep trenches, and soil washed away. Every passing cloud would be an object of terror. But how beneficent is the existing arrangement! Instead of ruinous cascades of water, it trickles down in gentle and fertilizing drops, as if the cloud were perforated like a sieve with tiny openings. The drops fall and seldom is a blade of grass hurt, or the most delicate flower bruised.”​—Pp. 110, 111.

[Diagram on page 6]

(For fully formatted text, see publication)

Vapor Cools, Forming Clouds

Clouds Cool, Causing Precipitation

Invisible Water Vapor

Rain

Evaporation from Precipitation

Evaporation from Rivers and Lakes

Evaporation from Land and Transpiration from Plants

Precipitation Seeping into Ground

Evaporation from Oceans

Groundwater Flows into Lakes, Rivers, and Oceans

Water, vital for all earthly life, is transferred by solar energy from rivers and lakes and falls on the land in gentle drops