The Inventor

To invent is to design and create something that has never existed before. Some say that Necessity is the mother of invention. That being true, we are the beneficiaries of somebody’s necessity and, as a result we have refrigerators, air conditioners, automobiles, cruise control, automatic transmissions, airplanes, microwaves, cell phones and Snickers Bars.

Sometimes, however, inventions come, not from necessity, but from idiocy. They benefit few or none; they meet no real need, and they make the user waste time and money and to look stupid using them.

There are some really dumb, inane, useless and idiotic inventions. For example: a mummy style sleeping bag with pantlegs or a DVD rewinder!

There are, in spite of these, thankfully, life-saving, labor-saving, time-saving, money-saving inventions which we enjoy and some of which were purely accidental.

Many of the most beneficial inventions were the result of a fluke, or unexpected circumstances or were not at first recognized as useful. They might be better called “Misintentions” rather than “Inventions” For example:

• Researcher Spence Sliver was experimenting with various combinations of adhesives and made an adhesive that would "tack" one piece of paper to another without leaving residue on the second piece of paper. The company had no use for the new adhesive until 3M chemist Arthur Fry needed something better than slips of paper to mark pages in his choir book. Then he remembered Silver's adhesive. Fry's better bookmark became Post-its.

• In the 1930's rubber appeared to be a “miracle material.” It was waterproof and easy to stretch. But it melted in the summer and cracked in the winter. Charles Goodyear worked hard to solve the problem. In 1839, he accidentally dropped a gob of rubber mixed with sulfur onto a hot stove which caused the rubber to vulcanize. Hence we have tires and many other useful rubber items.

• Sir Alexander Fleming, a Scottish researcher, is credited with the discovery of penicillin in 1928. Often described as a careless lab technician, Fleming returned from a two-week vacation to find that a mold had developed on an accidentally contaminated culture plate. Upon examination of the mold, he noticed that the culture prevented the growth of staphylococci. Fleming is quoted as saying: “One sometimes finds what one is not looking for. When I woke up just after dawn on Sept. 28, 1928, I certainly didn’t plan to revolutionize all medicine by discovering the world’s first antibiotic, or bacteria killer. But I guess that was exactly what I did.”

The Original Inventor is God and His work is glorious – and as one Tee Shirt had printed on it, “God Don’t Make No Junk.” Consider just a few of truths about His inventions.

I. GOD’S INVENTIONS ARE INTENTIONAL:

A. Unlike Silver, Fleming and Goodyear, God did not have to experiment and none of His works were accidents. He never says, “Wow! How did that happen? I didn’t see that coming.” He is, however, able to take our mistakes and generate something good. Don’t let failure make you fail, let God have it and tanned aide.

B. God never does anything by accident, or unaware of what He is doing. Paul makes it clear that God intentionally planned our salvation even before creation. He wrote, “All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the Heavenly realms because we are united with Christ. Even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be Holy and without fault in His eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. This is what He wanted to do, and it gave Him great pleasure. So we praise God for the glorious grace He has poured out on us who belong to His dear Son. He is so rich in kindness and grace that He purchased our freedom with the blood of His Son and forgave our sins. He has showered His kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding. God has now revealed to us His mysterious plan regarding Christ, a plan to fulfill His own good pleasure. And this is the plan: At the right time He will bring everything together under the authority of Christ—everything in Heaven and on earth. Furthermore, because we are united with Christ, we have received an inheritance from God, for He chose us in advance, and He makes everything work out according to His plan.” Ephesians 1:3-11 (NLT2).

C. Think of it:

1. He invented the entirety of creation and brought it into being by His command; He made everything as He intended.

2. He invented every atom, every part of our bodies. David knew it and praised God saying, “You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank You for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in Your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.” Psalm 139:13-16 (NLT2).