There’s nothing more innocuous than children’s toys. These emblems of childhood joy and innocence are prevalent in stores like Dollar Tree and Dollar General.
Sadly, these toys may not be so innocent after all.
Recent testing indicated that among items sold at discount stores “researchers tested 226 products purchased at five popular retailers for chemicals, including phthalates and lead, and found that 120, or more than half, had at least one chemical of concern. Among the products that tested positive were colorful baby toys and Disney-themed headphones.” [1]
As sickening as this story is, it is hardly the first time something like this has been discovered. In another announcement, a March news story declared that, for the first time, microplastics had been detected in human blood. [2] Previously, such microplastics had also been detected in the placenta of unborn babies, sparking similar outcry. [3]
Our world is cursed, which means all of us are negatively affected by the consequences of original sin. As Genesis 3:17 records, “To Adam [God] said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life.”
Concerning though this is, it is surprisingly less dire than the maladies faced by our great grandparents, who were often poisoned by the concoctions that treated such every day items as dresses and hats. [4]
Interestingly, in a culture obsessed with health and fitness, we seem to struggle to keep things in perspective. As Shelly McKenzie’s book Getting Physical: The Rise of Fitness Culture in America documents, our contemporary fixation on health and purity is a relatively new phenomenon.
In spite of all the carcinogens to which they were exposed, our forefathers still managed to live long and fruitful lives which led to the founding of our great nation and the advancement of scientific knowledge.
Though it is certainly not a good thing to find plastics in the human body, we should also keep this in perspective by recognizing it as part of the nature of our fallen world. While the consequences of that fallen world must be grappled with in this life, we must also remember that it is given that all of humanity must die an earthly death.
As Christians, we can live in the hope of our glorified bodies. As it says in 1 Corinthians 15:50-53:
“I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”
This is not telling us to completely disregard our physical health in this life but, instead, it tells us to remember that it is the hope of our glorified bodies that ought to drive us forward.
Tainted toys cannot touch the immortal soul nor the salvation freely offered by our God in Heaven.
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