Insight on the News
The Zebra’s Stripes
“Millions of years of evolution” gave the zebra its stripes, claims the British magazine World of Wildlife. The reason? Some scientists say that the stripes evolved as a camouflage to protect the animal from predators. Seemingly adding credibility to this view is the fact that stripes do tend to produce a blurring effect when seen from a distance. However, not all men of science agree. Dr. Gerrie de Graaff, scientific adviser for the South African wildlife magazine Custos, notes: “We cannot assume that animals see things in the same way as we do.” By way of explanation, de Graaff points out that the behavior of zebras does not harmonize with the camouflage theory of stripe development. Why? Because zebras do not try to conceal themselves as do animals who depend on color camouflage. They are noisy and active and make themselves conspicuous by grazing on open plains.
Other evolutionists theorize that the zebra’s distinct black and white stripes create an optical illusion. According to de Graaff, one contention is that “charging lions are unable to single out an individual because it merges with others in the herd,” whereas “another suggests that the lion is dazzled or miscalculates its imaginary last leap.” But as he observes, “these theories founder on the observable confidence with which lions kill zebras.”
In conclusion, de Graaff concedes that, “as yet, we really do not know why a zebra has stripes.” The reason, however, is clear to students of the Bible. At Genesis 1:20-25 we are told that all the earth’s creatures were created by God “according to their kinds.” As a result, a natural biological process is responsible for the zebra’s stripes. Such stripes are part of the marvelous variety of design in God’s creation.
Working Ministers?
Some clergymen expect to see drastic changes in their profession in the near future. This was the concern expressed by one Lutheran pastor, Jean-Pierre Jornod, in Reformiertes Forum, a Lutheran journal published in Switzerland. He stated: “I would go so far as to predict that the pastor of the year 2000 will in most cases have a part-time job in addition to his parish.” Why? He added: “Not solely for financial reasons, but first and foremost because society has an increasing need for pastors who are in touch with everyday life.”
Elaborating on this need, Jornod said: “The pastor of the year 2000 will be a man or woman well versed in the art of communication. I do not claim that churches will be empty then, but the people a pastor wants to reach will keep away from church, just as is partly the case today. His message, therefore, will have to be clearer, more understandable, and more to the point.”
It is noteworthy that paid shepherds were unknown in first-century Christianity. The apostle Paul, for example, provided for his own physical needs by means of a secular job—tentmaking. What is more, he reached the people in a very effective way, by teaching them “publicly and from house to house.” (Acts 18:3; 20:20, 21, 33, 34) In contrast with today’s paid ministers, the elders, or shepherds, among Jehovah’s Witnesses still follow this Scriptural pattern of the first-century Christians.