On Knowledge and Power
By Charmain Teodoro

I wonder when the director conceptualized the movie “Stepford Wives,” first released in 1975, if he knew just how close we were to the possibility of cloning. Now, less than 50 years later, it’s not only a possibility but an actual reality. Even the food we’re eating can be cloned, and we would never know the difference.

Though advances are continually being made in technology and medicine, it seems all this knowledge and power has led man to take multiple steps back as far as integrity and character is concerned. Power is never an easy thing for man to handle, especially if it falls into the wrong hands. Just look at our earliest ancestors (and no, I am not referring to apes) and our modern-day tragedies seem like consequences that have rippled through the centuries from that fateful night in the Garden:

And the Lord God commanded the man, “you are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die…” When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked… Gen. 2:16, 3:6-7, italics mine.
I think it’s interesting that the first sin ever committed led to man becoming knowledgeable, and consequently, more powerful. We are caught in the biggest Catch-22 of all time, because the more intelligent and knowledgeable we become, the more we sin and “fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). Just think about it: cloning or abortion would not be possible if man were not capable of such knowledge. It’s almost as if we are trying to be more and more like…God.

In 1 Cor. 1:19, God says, “‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.’" And herein lies the irony. I don’t think God ever intended man to become as intelligent as we have become. Not because He wants to keep us ignorant, but because He knows that with knowledge comes power, and power can be used for evil and dangerous purposes. All too often, power’s offspring are some of the deadly sins like greed and lust, and the most dangerous of them all—pride.

So where am I going with this? While I completely support the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom et al., in no way should it ever replace, hamper or substitute the pursuit of God. I say this because it seems that in today’s day and age, people manipulate knowledge to purport unbelief in God, the very source of knowledge in the first place. As much as I often muse about what it would be like to know the future and the how’s and why’s of many things, I’m perfectly content with the promise that God has given me, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” In the end, that’s all I really need to know.