Wednesday 24 March 2010

Gen 4:1-2 The miracle of new life

Gen 4:1-2   Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, "I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD." And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground. (ESV)

Thousands of generations later each birth is no less miraculous. Imagine how Adam and Eve felt at the birth of the very first baby. They hadn't even been to anti-natal classes to prepare them! There were two and then there were three. Wow.


Two people joining together becoming one flesh, and producing another person. If you think the miracle is explained with DNA then think again. A baby is not simply a machine. I remember well, long seminars at university discussing the enigma of intelligence. When does a machine become intelligent? Self aware? Conscious? As a child I built machines out of Lego and powered them with a jet of water from a tap, wondering if as the cogs and gears moved round if they possessed some kind of rudimentary intelligence. Since then I have written computer programs with thousands of lines of code, millions of instructions, simulating intelligence, but can a simulation become the real thing? Where does the soul come from? What is its relationship to the body? What is the difference between mind and matter? Reducing the miracle of each birth to the chemical recombination of DNA misses more than it measures.

I remember looking at an empty cot and thinking, in a few days time there will be a person there. And a few days later there was!  And as I watch my children grow the mystery deepens. Life where there was not life. A person where there was no person. Now notice how insightful this verse is. "with the help of the lord". Without Him no amount of water will bring Lego bricks to life. He has to do it. God gives life. It comes from him. And around 25 years after the miracle of my birth I was "born again", not by flesh and blood but by the Spirit. Jesus who is life, who has life in himself (John 5:26) gave me everlasting life.

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