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Norway will soon begin an ambitious building project on a
remote Arctic island near the North Pole. The Svalbard International
Seed Vault is scheduled to go into operation by 2008. It will provide
storage for as many as 3 million seeds. Norway is funding the initial $3
million construction cost, with the hope other governments, foundations
and seed companies will fund a $260 million endowment to keep the
facility going. The seed vault will be the largest seed bank in the
world, and will be constructed to preserve seeds from around the world
should biological contamination or nuclear war destroy seeds. The
facility will provide blast proof doors, air locks and an occasional
hungry polar bear for security.
Whether this facility will ever actually be needed is
unknown. But, since mankind seems bent on destroying itself, this seed
vault might well be worth the money.
Why expend so much for seeds? Because seeds, one of God’s
greatest inventions, are absolutely necessary for life. One small seed
can reproduce itself 100, or even 1000 times a year. Seeds supply us
with plant food, and the meat we eat comes from animals that eat plants.
“And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing
seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in
the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall
be for meat [food]” (Genesis 1:29).
As precious as seeds are to our physical well-being, even
more precious is the seed of the kingdom, the Word of God. As Jesus
explained the parable of the sower to the disciples, He said, “Now the
parable is this: The seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11).
No seed
equals no harvest. Seed is precious! Ray Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit
451 tells of a future time when no books are allowed. As the novel
ends, books are left only as people have memorized them, to be reprinted
in a later time of freedom. Do we appreciate the precious life-giving
seed that God has preserved for us? What if it were taken away?
Precious Seed
by Bob Prichard
www.oxfordchurchofchrist.com |
