Who Wants to Live to Be 150?

Recently I wrote about the future of my six grandchildren, wondering how their lives would be different than mine has been. Well, ABC-TV gave me a glimpse into their future last night as reporter Barbara Walters interviewed a scientist who believes that today's children will live to be 150 or more years old.

He based this claim on current research that suggests that stem cells will someday be used to grow replacement parts for diseased bodies. A patient with a bad heart, for example, could receive a new heart grown in the lab from stem cells. The same could be done for a patient with a bad liver, or kidneys. This scientist was very excited about the prospects of longevity based on growing spare parts from stem cells.

But wait a minute! Have these geniuses really thought this through? Would a lot of 150 year old people around really be a good thing? Even if they were healthy, active and productive?

Many "experts" are already concerned about what they view as limitations on the number of people this planet can actually support. Earth's population is already in the billions; what would it be like to significantly increase population by having people live twice as long as they now do? What strains would this put on food production and health care, not to mention the additional clogging of our highways with more drivers and more vehicles?

The scientist said to Ms. Walters (who herself is 78 years old), "It sounds like science fiction!" He got that right. And probably it really is science fiction.

I must be careful, of course. Somewhere in my personal library I have a statement written by a preacher who claimed that man would never be able to go to the moon. Well, some men did. Unless you believe that fairy tale that says it was all a fake! I do not want to publish on the Internet a statement that someday I might have to take back (if I live to be a 150, that is). Scientists just may be able to grow body parts someday.

But here is what I do know. We already have parts for our automobiles, but, they still wear out eventually. I can pay someone to replace the transmission, or the engine, or to restore the body of the car, but eventually the expense becomes greater than the value. Could this same situation be true of our own bodies? Could replacement parts be "installed" only to find that the results are not worth the time, pain, and expense of the installation?

And how is this going to be paid for? Certainly the medical profession does not plan to grow these parts and install them for free, or even for a reasonable price. The words "reasonable price" do not compute in the medical world. So how are my grandchildren going to come up with the multiples of thousands of dollars, probably millions of dollars, it is going to cost to replace their worn out parts?

This raises another ominous issue. Will these replacement parts be rationed out to those who "deserve" them? Since they will be so expensive, will they only be available to the rich? Will we have only wealthy centenarians while the rest of us die in our 70's or 80's like always? Will those who are deemed to have value be candidates for replacement parts while those who are deemed to have little or no value be denied replacements? Who will decide who has value, and what criteria will be used? Could it be possible that those who have a strong faith in God will be viewed as having little value while those who promote science and reason to the exclusion of God be the ones considered to have value?

My suspicions are, however, it will not come about the way the scientist interviewed last night expects it will. I believe there are limits on what man is able to do. We live in a world and in bodies cursed by God because of sin. Sickness and death are the results of this disobedience to God. The Bible says our lifespans are usually "threescore and ten" or maybe fourscore. In all the world's history, there has only been one time life spans exceeded these limitations. It was before the Genesis flood. The Scriptures indicate people then lived routinely to be 800, 900 even 1000 years of age before they died. Since the flood the life span not generally been higher than it is today, and often was much lower. There have always been and probably always will be individuals who exceed the average span. But the rule of thumb is most people do not make it to their nineties.

I wonder if ABC had its tongue in its cheek when it chose to broadcast this report on April 1. Maybe it was just a big April fool's joke. And besides, who wants to live to be 150, especially when, as a believer in Jesus Christ, Heaven and all its glories wait?