"Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds." John 12:14
When the Romans raided and destroyed the Zealot fort, Masada, near the Dead Sea in the first century, they discovered full cisterns and storage rooms full of food (read the story here).
When those remains were discovered in the 20th century, archeologists recovered fossilized remains of wheat, as well as some dried date pits.
Someone decided to test these 2000-year-old date pit and in 2005, planted one... and in today, it is still growing!
Methusaelah is now 12-years-old and researchers pollenated him with a female plant—and made dates.
Gives new meaning to Jesus' words in John 12, huh? We can hold on to our pain and our rights and our dreams and desires, gritting our teeth and standing our ground. And we can hold out for a while. Maybe even a long time. But the power of life—the power of resurrection—comes from being willing to trust God, accept His gift, and die.
It’s good to see this practical example or visual of what Christ taught years ago to many who just did not quite understand. Today, things have not changed too much...many still do not understand and many still do not want to understand. We are a society of ‘me’ far too much. If we would simply die to ourselves, how beautiful the new growth would be.
ReplyDeleteYes! and it's just crazy to me that a 2000-year-old seed still had the power to give life. That means no one is too far gone, no pain too great, no life so destroyed that God can't make it new!
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