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Life from Blood

Genesis 9:4
“But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.”

The Bible teaches us that our physical life is in our blood. It also teaches us that our spiritual and eternal life is dependent upon the blood of Jesus Christ.

The bright red drop of blood on the left is oxygenated while the drop on the right is deoxygenatedYour heart pumps blood at a speed of more than three feet per second. This means that any given red blood cell will make a full circulatory trip from your lungs and back in only about a minute. But your heart is not the only hard-working part of your circulatory system. Your red blood cells live only about 4 months. In that time, a red blood cell has made over 170,000 trips from your lungs to bring oxygen to every part of your body. That means your body must constantly replace red blood cells. So your body produces about 2 million new red blood cells every second. Your body does this most efficiently by recycling the iron from dead red blood cells into the new red blood cells. Iron, of course, gives the hemoglobin in red blood cells the ability to carry oxygen.

As we learn more about our circulatory systems, we see that physical life is a daily gift from God. Yet, it was the life-blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ, shed on the cross for us in His holy, innocent suffering and death that makes eternal life possible for us.

Prayer:
Lord Jesus Christ, thank You for shedding Your life-blood on the cross so that I am forgiven and accepted by God. Amen.

Notes:
Science News, 6/3/06, pp. 346-348, Ben Harder, “Blood, Iron, and Gray Hair.” Photo: The bright red drop of blood on the left is oxygenated while the drop on the right is deoxygenated. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.