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Article Archive |
2008
Born Again!
by Jim Morris
The biology professor dimmed the classroom's lights as he started the projector. The film showed a special container made up of two sheets of glass with rich, black soil filled in between them. A man went to the container and made a finger deep hole that could be seen through the glass side facing the camera. He dropped in a pale seed, covered the hole with soil and watered it. We could still see the light colored seed through the glass as the dark soil received it.
The rest of the film was shown in “time-lapsed photography.” That is, a stationary camera took pictures of the seed in the glass container at certain time intervals each day over a period of weeks. Evidently, when the photos were pieced together in sequence they made an incredible film showing the growth of the seed into a full-grown, living plant.
We watched in amazement as the seed transformed before our eyes. A taproot shot out from the kernel and went deep down into the soil as a folded leaf and stem pushed upward toward the surface of the soil. The photography showed the seed reaching deeper and higher at the same time. I wondered how such a fragile thing could ever have the power to break through the surface of the soil to be “born.” However, the leaf shot through the surface and reached toward the light.
The plant continued to grow and develop through the artificial days and nights of the lab. The roots developed and reached deeper in the nutrient laden soil. The stem thickened and sprouted more leaves as it reached for the moving light source. LIFE! It was a beautiful sight to behold.
Here are some questions that perplex scientists, philosophers and theologians alike: “When does life begin?” Is a seed alive? Is a transforming seed alive before it breaks through the surface of the soil? Does life begin only when it is born from the soil to be seen?
We might ask the same kinds of questions about human life. Does human life begin at conception or birth? If we say “birth only” then why are the abortionists wrong to kill “unborn babies”? Or, we might ask the same of spiritual life. Does eternal life begin when the word of the Lord is conceived in our hearts by faith or when we are “born of the water and the Spirit” (John 3:5) by obedience to that faith?
Life is in the seed. Life is in the conception. However, for continued life we must be “born again.” Jesus' seed conceived within our hearts demands birth!
“Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been BORN AGAIN, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God” (1 Peter 1:22-23).
12-10-08
# 50
