Let’s marvel that we are here.
In “A Short History of Nearly Everything,” Bill Bryson wrote: “Every one of your forbearers on both sides was attractive enough to find a mate, healthy enough to reproduce, and sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so. Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stranded, stuck fast, untimely wounded, or otherwise deflected from its life’s quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment in order to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result—eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly—in you.”
Ponder that Bryson can write such words.
Ponder that you can be stunned at who you are.
Reading his words, I found amazement.
But, some words troubled my heart and soul and mind.
Challenging Bill Bryson
First, contemplate: “Every one of your forbearers on both sides has been attractive enough to find a mate.”
Consider a black woman’s disturbing story. Her parents, grandparents and great grandparents were black. Still, her DNA showed that she was more white than black. Her enslaved female ancestors repeatedly had been raped by white men.
God’s law declares that rapists be tried and executed–but these temporarily escaped.
Some take DNA tests to find they have previously unknown Scandinavian ancestry. How many children were forcibly conceived by my ancestors, marauding Vikings?
Today, through abortion some put to death children conceived by rape.
Why? God says: “Protect the innocent.”
Let’s change Bryson’s words to these: “Everyone of your forbearers on both sides – insert – “despite the circumstances of conception – from rape to marital harmony – nurtured their babies.”
Still, we marvel. Children conceived by rape were not held responsible for the crimes of their fathers. They lived, as did others, despite Bryson’s list of vivid depredations.
Revision 2
Now, let’s consider: “Healthy enough to reproduce.”
Reproduction is a miracle. It occurs often – except when it doesn’t.
At the beginning: Genesis 1:27 “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it…”
Early in our history, one result of our parents choosing to believe a lie and rebel against God is that pain, grief, and trouble entered into reproduction.
Woefully, thus our otherwise healthy compatriots may be infertile. “Why, God?!”
Part of God’s answer is: “I open the womb for conception.” God supervises the “tiny charge of genetic material” producing life.
God, are you that intimately involved with us?
Yes, and more.
Revision 3
Bryson continues: “sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so.”
Friend, did the brakes of your mind screech? Impersonal “fate” and “circumstances” have NO power to bless.
Jesus instructed us: Matthew 10:29 “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. 30But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. 31Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.”
Mom once told my older co-worker: “Bob, there is no such thing as luck.” “Luck” and “chance” describe an impersonal world. When our souls hear God’s word, and then they hear someone attribute something in life to “luck,” our souls rise up countering: “Au contraire!”
Fate did not give each of us 37.2 trillion cells. Without piggybacking on God’s work, even exalted scientific expertise cannot manufacture one highly complex DNA-bearing cell. Luck did not make us. God did.
Our forbearers knew. Belgic Confession (1561) Article 13: The Doctrine of God’s Providence: “We believe that this good God, after creating all things, did not abandon them to chance or fortune but leads and governs them according to his holy will, in such a way that nothing happens in this world without God’s orderly arrangement…nothing can happen to us by chance but only by the arrangement of our gracious heavenly Father, who watches over us with fatherly care, sustaining all creatures under his lordship, so that not one of the hairs on our heads (for they are all numbered) nor even a little bird can fall to the ground without the will of our Father…God holds in check the devils and all our enemies, who cannot hurt us without divine permission and will.”
Biblically articulate pastor Charles Spurgeon, (1834-1892) commented: “Every particle of dust dancing in the sunbeam does not move an atom more or less than God wishes – every particle of spray that dashes against the steamboat has its orbit, as well as the sun in the heavens – the chaff from the winnower is steered as the stars in their courses. The creeping of an aphid over the rosebud is as much fixed as the march of the devastating pestilence – the fall of…leaves from a poplar is as fully ordained as the tumbling of an avalanche” (sermon on Ezekiel 1:15-19).
Let’s change Bryson’s words to: “sufficiently blessed -insert – “by the True and Living God” to live long enough to do so.”
Revision 4
Although we could consider other statements Bryson makes, space limitations here propel us to his final thought: “eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly—in you.”
Friend, you are astounding. But, you are not “brief.”
Truly, our earthly days may be limited to three score and ten – more or less (Psalm 90:10). Thank God, January 11, 2021, I turned 70.
But, the Bible also tells us we need to change Bryson’s words to: “eventually, astoundingly, and – insert – “for all eternity” —in you.”
Friend, you are writing an eternal story.
Who’s your co-author?
Beware, one co-biographer deceives you to destruction. Reject him.
The Other can re-write your story disclosing the truth, loving you.
May God energize you as you fulfill life’s ultimate quest: trusting Jesus, the Author and Finisher of Faith. Friend, may his deep forgiveness and enchanting eternal life be your best story.
Note 1: In regard to the above quote: “Fate did not give us 37.2 trillion cells,” consider… Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, led the Human Genome Project in mapping DNA. At 87, Jane Goodall, the primatologist, in receiving the 2021 Templeton Award, commented about his work: “Francis Collins drove home that in every single cell in your body there’s a code of several billion instructions. Could that be chance? No…Chance mutations couldn’t possibly lead to the complexity of life on earth. [S]cience and religion are coming together and more minds are seeing purpose behind the universe and intelligence.”
Note 2: Nevertheless, “Goodall has gone to great lengths to downplay the uniqueness of human beings. Goodall is also a longtime supporter of the Great Apes Personhood project, which seeks to confer human rights on primates. This blurring of the line between humans and animals is far from harmless” (source for both notes: Stonestreet, Breakpoint, 6/3/21, Breakpoint, https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzGkXdCRfVsLPcPLkjLwMMCkkjnG ).
