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TheBeautiful Analogy
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Human Reproduction
S
orne ofthe teachings in the Bible are a Little hard
for the average thinking mind to understand.
James tells us to count it all joy when trials,
ordeals, reverses beset us. Troubles a joy? That's
pretty hard to accept, isn'tit? And, for the average
person, a lot harder to put into practice.
Few find any pleasure, Jet alone joy,
in
the obstacles
and troubles they encounter. Yet this biblical teaching
says we ought soto count them. There is a reason,
although few understand it.
In one of the Psalms you'll read that the righteous are
going to have to bear
many
affiictions. But, it promises,
the Eterna! will deliver us out of them all- if we believe
and trust Him!
Again,
it
is through much tribulation that we must
enter the Kingdom ofGod. Why? There's a reason'
Now consider another biblical teaching hard for sorne
to understand.
About ayear ago
1
wrote an article, now available in
booklet form,
What Do You Mean- Born Again?
In the
fifth chapter ofEphesians you find a husband-wife
relationship pictured as corresponding to Christ and the
Church. Scriptural teacbing assures us that, at His
coming, Christ is going to
marry
the Church. Also, the
Scriptures teach that the Church will , at His coming, be
born
of God, by a resurrection of all who have died, and
the instantaneous conversion from mortal to immortal of
those then living (l Cor. 15:50-53).
So one man reasons: Could a full-grown man marry an
infant girl baby, just born? Ifthose in the Church are to
be just then born ofGod, how can they marry Christ
before they grow up?
This, too, seems difficult for sorne to comprehend. Yet
the answer to James' teaching- the understanding of
what James really means- is also the answer to this
seeming inconsistency.
There is a third seeming inconsistency, hard for some
to understand. About ayear anda half ago in tbis
column 1 explained how, contrary to the thinking of
many, a Christian may- and too often does-actually
commit sin
after
he is converted. He
should not,
of course.
The
PLAIN TRUTH January 1978
But too often he does , and yet he still remains a
Christian. The true explanation of James' teaching, first
mentioned above, is also the explanation of this
experience.
So let's understand!
Why were we bom in the first place? What is the real
purpose of human life? God Almighty the Creator is
reproducing Himself! As truly as we mortal humans have
been given power to reproduce ourselves-to bring forth
progeny in our own image, born with our very nature–
even so the Great God is bringing forth sons in His
image, born with His very divine nature!
The very purpose of our existence is that we be
begotten as God's children, and become born of Him.
And human reproduction is the very type of spiritual
reproduction. What God created at the time described in
the first chapter ofGenesis was a physical creation.
You'Il find nothing spiritual there. In physical man.
made ofthe dust ofthe ground, God created the material
with which He may mold, shape, form , and create the
spiritual being. He pictures usas the clay, Himself as the
Potter-forming us into the spiritual image ofHis
designing.
Now human reproduction. I say. pictures spiritual
reproduction. Each human, since Adam and Eve, started
from a tiny egg, called an ovum, the size of a pinpoint. It
was produced in the body of the mother. The egg is
incomplete, of itself.
It
has a life of only about 48 hours,
according to sorne authorities. Unless fertilized by the
life-giving sperm cell from the human father within that
lirnited lifetime, it dies.
Each human, spiritually speaking, is like an egg. The
average human lifetime is said to be 70 years: Adam was
created incomplete, and each of us was born
incomplete-that is, we were made to need the Holy
Spirit of God. And unless, within our limited lifespan of
sorne 70 years, we are begotten ofGod- by His Spirit
which is His
immorta/ divine
LJFE,
entering to impar!
eternallife to us- we shall die- and that shall be the
end-except that God has appointed a resurrection of all
who.have lived, and, for those
(Continued on page 43)