Bamboozling Bugs

Psalm 111:10
“The fear of the LORD [is] the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do [his commandments]: his praise endureth for ever.”

For centuries, Asian cooks have wrapped meat, sushi and candy in bamboo bark. Though the reason for this practice seems to have been forgotten, humans evidently once knew what modern science is rediscovering about bamboo.

Chemists have succeeded in extracting the natural chemicals in bamboo bark. What they found was not one or two but four natural chemicals in the bark that inhibit bacteria, especially staph germs. These natural antibacterial agents are now under study for possible use as natural food and cosmetic preservatives. If these natural chemicals can be shown to kill bacteria and yet be harmless to people, the door will be open for an entirely new class of natural food preservatives.

The question naturally arises about how Asians originally came to use bamboo in the kitchen. Is it possible that thousands of years ago, when ancestors of today’s Asians headed east from the Tower of Babel, humans knew that bamboo would help keep their food from spoiling?

Much of what we are learning today was already known to a humanity that was only a few generations removed from our first and once-perfect parents. Remember that the perfection with which humanity was created was more than moral perfection. Because Adam and Eve had a perfect knowledge of God, they also had a perfect understanding of all that He had made. While we cannot be perfect except through the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ, it is also true that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom.

Prayer:
Dear Lord, while humans like to pride themselves on their knowledge, compared to You and even compared to our first parents, we know nothing. I ask that You would be the center of all that I know about every subject. Amen.

Notes:
“Keeping food fresh with bamboo.” Science News, v. 139, Mar. 23, 1991. p. 191.