Thinking about threats on a Thursday, (Real or Imagined)!

With all the flu and virus scare going on I wanted to share some insight into how God created the human body to function in this fallen and polluted world. This is what I have for you on this Thursday, October 15, 2009. Excerpt: How many species live on or in the human body? The short answer is about 200, including 80 in the mouth alone. But that is to belie the sheer industry of the microbial entrepreneurs that inhabit our beings. The total number of bacteria excreted by the body every day ranges from 100 billion to 100 trillion. Every square centimeter of human bowel is home to around 10 billion microbes. Some 10 million organisms occupy every square centimeter of flesh. The most densely populated areas of the human body are the teeth, throat and alimentary tract, where the concentrations are increased by a thousand compared to bare skin. But while such figures seem huge, it has been calculated that the amount of bacteria on the skin of the average human would be the same size as a pea. That is to say nothing of the common parasites found on the human body. The follicle mite, found on every individual, spends its days harmlessly munching dead skin cells. Which is less than can be said for Naegleria fowleri, an amoeba that invades the brain and multiplies until the host drops dead. (Question and answer copied from a November 5, 2005 article in the UK newspaper: The Independent.)

So much for running and hiding from creepy crawly things that are a part of our existence on a 24x7 basis. The good news is that the Naegleria fowleri mentioned above very rarely attacks a human being but when it does it is almost always fatal. This amoeba lives in warm fresh water and gets into the human brain through the nose. Less than 2 people per year die in the United States from confirmed cases of this deadly invasion. This would be considered to be a very insignificant statistic, unless, of course, you or someone you loved was the victim. UPS moves somewhere around 13 million packages per day with a lost ratio of only .0001 but that’s still 1300 lost packages per day and it would become much more statistically significant if it was our package. Death odds are based on actual statistics. There’s a website published by the National Safety Council (NSC) that provides the annual odds and the lifetime odds of dying from some 200 different events.

These cover an unbelievable range of events from the odds of dying from a dog bite to be 1 in 9 million for a year and a lifetime odds of 1 in 115 thousand. Contrast that to the odds of dying from a fireworks discharge at 1 in 75 million for a year and a lifetime odds of 1 in 952 thousand. I know some of you can hardly wait to check out these stats. They can be found at: http://www.nsc.org/research/odds.aspx. We live in a world filled with myths, false assumptions, rumors, and some very ingrained fears that really have little to no basis when it comes to their actual threat. It always helps to be armed with the facts and the greatest source for truth about life can be found in the Creator’s Book, The Holy Bible. The fact that I have a very slim chance of dying from a venomous snakebite will likely not make me any less wary of these slimy creatures. However, the Bible truths that tell me I need to recognize myself as a helpless and hell bound sinner deserving the wrath of a holy God, and further informs me that to avoid this just penalty I must turn to and call upon the only remedy provided by God, that being my trusting in His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, who came and died for my sins, is something that carries a 100% outcome certainty as to where I will spend eternity, regardless of what event takes me out of this world. When it is all said and done this is the one statistic that matters most for us all, not only in this life but in the one that is to come. Amen. …..More later.