It’s been 20 years since the announcement of the first cloned animal hit the world scene. In 1996, Keith Campbell and Ian Wilmut from the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland took the egg of a Scottish Blackfaced sheep and the (adult) udder cell of a donor white-faced Finn Dorset sheep and fused them together using an electric jolt, forming an embryo. The embryo was placed into a Blackfaced surrogate mother resulting in the birth of Dolly the white faced sheep (an exact clone of the donor). The ethical concerns as well as the use of stem cells (from fetuses or embryos) causes this to be highly controversial.

In 2006, Shinya Yamanaka found a new way to ‘reprogramme’ adult, specialized cells to turn them into stem cells (known as iPS or induced pluripotent stem cells). The hope is that scientists will be able to use iPS cells and not the highly controversial embryonic stem cells. There are still problems in the reprogramming of these cells but the discovery won Shinya Yamanaka and John Gurdon a Nobel Prize in 2012. In the meantime, these cells can be used to test out new drugs, and to study diseases and cloning.

Tests are being conducted using a combination of iPSCs and the CRISPR-Cas 9- gene editing tool (see article on Gene Editing) for comparing edited and unedited cells that have diseases to see what the differences are in hopes of finding a way to cure them. Computers and the internet have greatly advanced the study, communicating and sharing of information for scientists, so much so that none of them can keep up with the speed at which science itself is traveling at. It does help them come together for a common purpose, accomplishing “that which they have imagined” to do. One of those things is cloning.

Cloning Animals
As far a cloning goes for now, there are over 20 species of animals that have been cloned some of which are cats, dogs, cows, sheep, pigs, deer and horses. Though not perfected and very costly, the success rate is anywhere between 3-10%. Much improvement needs to be achieved before it becomes routine. That isn’t stopping companies like Boyalife in China from building a cloning factory capable of producing one million calves a year. Boyalife also plans on cloning dogs and horses.

Cloning polo horses is a gigantic business bringing in hundreds of thousands of dollars for just one cloned horse. Crestview Genetics of Buenos Aires has cloned over 45 polo horses. A copy of a champion polo stallion called Aiken Cura was auctioned off for $800,000, others can go for around $600,000.

Farmers that can afford it are cloning their animals to be more productive milking cows, better meat producing cattle, sheep with the best quality wool, etc. That puts the regular Joe Farmer at a bit of a disadvantage until the cloning process is perfected and affordable for him.

Mens Wicked Imagination
God says over and over in scriptures that man does things according to his own wicked imagination and that “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”Jer. 17:9 Man can’t know the deceitfulness of his own heart, it needs to come by a revelation from Jesus Christ himself. Cloning is another wicked deceitful devise that man has imagined. Aside from wanting to make money and crafting their own creations, man wants the power over life. It’s another way of saying that God doesn’t know what He is doing and that mankind can do it better. They don’t need God.

“And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.” Gen. 11:6 (Read: Whatever They Can Image) When Nimrod built the tower of Babel God put a stop to it by dividing people and confusing their language because it wasn’t the end times. But now we are living in the end days when language no longer divides men. Technology now makes it possible for men to come together and do whatever they can imagine, which is just another proof of what God prophesied would happen in the end times. Men are becoming gods, they have the power to bring forth those things which they have imagined and they have real substance (like cloning) which has an effect on life. Is this not playing god? It’s the question that keeps coming up when scientists learn new things on genes, DNA, cloning, etc. Are we trying to play god? They know it. They do want to be God, to say what is good and evil, create life and mold it after their imagination, achieve eternal life for themselves without God. This is the antichrist spirit that’s at work in the world today. I know the time is fast approaching when God will put an end to this rebellion just like he did with Nimrod and the people living in those days.

Daniel Chapter 12:4 says “..even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.” That is how I know we are in the end times. Knowledge and Technology has increased so much in the past 100 years but especially in the past 20 or so years you can’t even keep up with it. Cloning is just another proof of this being fulfilled. It won’t be long until all that God prophesied about these end days will be fulfilled.

In Spite of all the rebellion against God that goes on, God still calls out to anyone that will turn to Him with their whole heart. He will give them a new heart, one that desires Him and His perfect will for them. He will give them ears to hear Him and eyes to see what is really going on around them. There is a battle royale going on between God and Satan for men’s souls. Deceit is all around us and we need to be saved everyday. Only Jesus can save us. I hope you turn to him. He is the best friend you could ever have. He truly does care for us.

In the meantime, we have two free books that you can read on prophecy and the end times we are living in. They are written to shed light on prophistory in God’s Word. The Redemption Play and Daniel The Book.  They prove God’s prophecies are all true and can be trusted because what He prophesied would happen, has come to pass. Therefore you can rightly conclude that what He says will happen, will come to pass. God is in control and has a plan for mankind and it’s wonderfully explained in “The Redemption Play,” and Daniel “The Book” is God’s secret end times book for us believers, worthy of prayerful study and constant consideration. Spoiler Alert! God wins in the end and so does The Bride of Christ! God Bless.