Blood
"The life is in the blood": Lev 3:17; 7:26,27; 17:11,14; Deu
12:23.
- Blood is the source of life -- its red blood cells supply oxygen and
nutrients to every cell in the human body. [Christ's blood is a "transfusion" of
life to us: "Drink my blood" (Joh 6:53-57; 1Co 11:25-27; Mat 26:27,28). What was
forbidden -- ie the partaking of the natural blood of other animals -- is
commanded of us, on a spiritual level. It is only through Christ and his shed
blood that we may have life.]
- Blood is the agent of cleansing -- it removes
carbon dioxide and toxins and waste products from every body cell, and
transports them to the lungs and kidneys, where they are excreted or expelled.
[Likewise, believers are "washed in the blood of the Lamb": Rev 7:14; 1Jo 1:7;
Heb 9:11-14.]
- Blood is the agent of overcoming disease -- its white cells
attack and neutralize and consume invading bacteria and viruses and "alien"
bodies. All immunizations and vaccinations make use of this amazing capacity of
the human body to heal itself. [By Christ's blood we can overcome all
difficulties and trials: Rev 12:11; Joh 16:33. He is the one who has overcome
all things, and when we are inoculated with his "blood" we are provided with the
necessary "antibodies" to fight off the "disease" of sin: Heb 2:14-18;
4:15.]
"Imagine an enormous tube snaking southward from Canada
through the Amazon delta, plunging into oceans only to surface at every
inhabited island, shooting out eastward through every jungle, plain, and desert
in Africa, forking near Egypt to join all of Europe and Russia as well as the
entire Middle East and Asia -- a pipeline so global and pervasive that it links
every person worldwide. Inside that tube an endless plenitude of treasures
floats along on rafts: mangoes, coconuts, asparagus, and produce from every
continent; watches, calculators, and cameras; gems and minerals; forty-nine
brands of cereals; all styles and sizes of clothing; the contents of entire
shopping centers. Five billion people have access: at a moment of need or want,
they simply reach into the tube and seize whatever product suits them. Somewhere
far down the pipeline a replacement is manufactured and inserted.
"Such a pipeline exists inside each one of us, servicing not
five billion but one hundred trillion cells in the human body. An endless supply
of oxygen, amino acids, nitrogen, sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, sugars,
lipids, cholesterols, and hormones surges past our cells, carried on blood cell
rafts or suspended in fluid. Each cell has special withdrawal privileges to
gather the resources needed to fuel a tiny engine for its complex chemical
reactions.
"In addition, that same pipeline ferries away refuse, exhaust
gases, and worn-out chemicals. In the interest of economical transport, the body
dissolves its vital substances into a liquid (much as coal is shipped more
efficiently through a slurry pipeline than by truck and train). Five or six
quarts of this all-purpose fluid suffice for the body's hundred trillion cells"
(Dr. Paul Brand and Philip Yancey, "In His Image", p 55).
