Twenty-four years ago, I was born. This was the first and only time in history that it happened. Twenty-four years later, I reflect on the impossibility of my own existence.
How many people had to live in order for me to have life? The right people first had to exist and then they had to find the right people to have children with. Not only that, they had to time it right. The right egg, the right sperm, the right conditions. And this happened for thousands and thousands of years. If the universe started over, the odds of any of us existing would be so small that we would have to deem it impossible.
How much tragedy and injustice led to my existence? Certainly my ancestors weren't all happily married and in love. Many suffered at the hands of tyrants. Many died prematurely. They would never know that their lives would result in my own.
Was it all chance that led to my birth? Chance that led to a life that believed it had a purpose? Or was it by design? This one will live.
Whatever you believe, you have to celebrate existence. The odds are stacked against us. 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000+ to 1. None of us should be alive. But we are. I am.
It's my birthday.
How can this be?
You could even change those odds and eliminate even the "1" that is up there for chance. There is no way it was by chance you or anyone was/is born. God gives us life. He has plans for us (Jeremiah 29:11)
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