Divine Design

Amazing Transitions at Birth

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: Patti Barnes

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Series Code: DIV

Program Code: DIV000004A


00:01 The contents of the following program
00:03 are not intended to substitute
00:05 for the advice of your healthcare provider,
00:07 and the producers of this series
00:09 assume no liability for the use
00:11 or misuse of the material presented.
00:20 Creation or evolution,
00:23 design or random chance,
00:27 they say it all began with a big bang,
00:31 but when we look at the amazing human body,
00:34 the answer is obvious.
00:36 The complexity of the design
00:37 exceeds anything man has ever made.
00:41 The body, it only have been designed
00:43 by the master designer we read about in the Bible.
00:49 Divine Design.
01:04 Hello, I'm Patti Barnes,
01:06 Director of the Midwifery program at Hartland College.
01:10 There are several amazing transitions
01:12 that take place at birth in both the mother's body
01:16 and the baby's.
01:17 We'll discuss the mother's changes later,
01:19 but for now,
01:21 let's look at some of the transitions
01:22 that have to take place in the baby in order for him
01:25 or her to survive.
01:27 After all, the baby is going to undergo a drastic change
01:31 from the mother's womb,
01:33 which he has been comfortably living
01:35 in for the past nine months in a world of water.
01:39 An environment that none of us could survive in.
01:43 To an outside world, the world of air
01:46 and the baby is also going to transition
01:49 from a constant climate to an ever-changing one.
01:53 This is something that man with all his intelligence
01:56 and brilliance could never develop.
01:58 And it certainly could not happen by chance.
02:02 First, there is a divine hand that is guiding in this.
02:06 In Psalm 71:6, we read,
02:10 "By thee have I been holden up from the womb:
02:13 thou art he that took me out of my mother's bowels:
02:17 my praise shall be continually of thee."
02:20 Is this just nice poetic language here
02:23 or is this telling us that God does something special
02:27 as the baby is coming out of the womb.
02:31 Right at birth, a miraculous change must take place
02:34 in the baby's circulatory system.
02:37 Remember all along,
02:38 the placenta has been supplying the functions of the liver,
02:42 the lungs, the kidneys,
02:44 and carrying away waste and carbon dioxide,
02:47 while supplying the oxygen and necessary nutrition.
02:52 In other words,
02:53 the placenta has been the life support system
02:55 for the baby.
02:57 Now that is about to come to an end,
02:59 because it will end, there must be
03:02 a rearranging of the baby's circulatory system.
03:06 Up until now,
03:07 the blood has been bypassing the liver and the lungs.
03:11 You might roughly compare this to driving down the highway
03:14 and seeing a sign that says road closed ahead.
03:20 You were forced to take a detour for a while,
03:23 until you emerge back into the highway.
03:26 This is what the blood has done,
03:29 detouring around this major organs,
03:31 while the placenta
03:33 was temporarily performing their functions.
03:36 These detours are called shunts.
03:39 Another way of looking at this
03:41 is to sync up the path of least resistance.
03:45 The resistance into the liver and lungs has been high,
03:48 therefore restricting the flow through them.
03:52 The blood was flowing freely through the shunts
03:55 and to and from the placenta,
03:57 because the resistance was quite low.
04:00 At birth, the road closed signed is removed
04:03 and the traffic is able to continue
04:05 straight through the liver and the lungs
04:07 where the resistance has now fallen
04:10 due to the amniotic fluid being displaced
04:13 and the blood vessels expanding.
04:16 Another miracle of creation
04:17 is a restriction of blood flow in umbilical cord.
04:22 A strong muscle like tissue that surrounds the cord
04:25 begins contracting, clamping down on it.
04:28 There is an amazing substance called Wharton's Jelly
04:32 that has been serving a very important role
04:35 while the baby was in the womb.
04:37 This jelly like material has help prevent the cord
04:40 from kinking and pinching off the blood flow,
04:44 so necessary for the baby's survival.
04:48 Now this jelly serves a different
04:50 and opposite purpose.
04:51 After being exposed to the cold air,
04:54 it begins to condense and harden.
04:56 The result is a restriction of the blood flow
04:59 to and from the baby.
05:01 This prevents excessive blood loss
05:03 for both the baby and the mother.
05:06 By the way, did you know
05:08 that the baby's cord blood contains iron,
05:12 immune building red and white blood cells
05:15 and stem cells that can fed the baby.
05:18 That is why more and more studies
05:20 suggest not clamping the cord immediately after delivery,
05:24 but waiting for a minute or two
05:26 or until the cord stops cross-fading
05:28 This helps brain development, increases immune function
05:32 and may prevent anemia in a first year of life.
05:36 When the cord gets clamped and severed,
05:38 the blood flow is completely channeled back
05:40 into the arteries.
05:42 Gradually, the shunts or bypasses begin to shrink
05:46 and disappear.
05:47 Now, all the plumping is reorganized,
05:50 so that the baby's organs can do
05:52 all that the placenta was doing.
05:54 All this takes place in a matter of minutes.
05:58 As you can see this is just not possible with evolution.
06:02 Charles Darwin admitted in his book
06:04 on the Origin of Species.
06:07 "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed,
06:11 which could not possibly have been formed by numerous,
06:14 successive, slight modifications,
06:17 my theory would absolutely break down.
06:21 But I can find out no such case."
06:24 Darwin living in the mid 1800s
06:27 obviously knew nothing of the miracle of childbirth.
06:30 Here his theory does indeed absolutely break down,
06:36 not just once or twice but countless times,
06:40 one little glitch in this process
06:42 and there is no baby
06:44 and no second chance to get it right.
06:46 But hold on, just getting the plumping right
06:50 doesn't answer the question
06:51 of why the baby begins breathing.
06:54 Science still has not determined exactly
06:56 why the baby takes its first breath.
06:59 What triggers the baby to begin breathing?
07:03 If he doesn't breathe,
07:05 the rerouted blood flow through the lungs
07:08 won't solve the oxygen issue.
07:11 There are several theories about how this happens
07:14 and here are just a few.
07:17 The sudden exposure to cold air causes a gasping reflex.
07:21 Hormonal influences may play a part.
07:24 The respiratory nerve center is triggered by stimulation.
07:29 The change in pressure on the chest
07:31 from the womb to the air.
07:34 An increased level of carbon dioxide.
07:37 Perhaps all these are contributing factors
07:40 and we will probably learn more as research continues.
07:45 Friends, this is evident of an incredible design,
07:49 not mindless chance.
07:51 In Colossians 1:16, it says of Jesus,
07:55 "For by him were all things created,
07:58 that are in heaven, and that are in earth,
08:00 visible and invisible, whether they be thrones,
08:03 or dominions, or principalities, or powers:
08:07 all things were created by him, and for him:"
08:11 Only our own wise creator
08:13 could have engineered all these things.
08:17 But wait, we're not finished yet.
08:20 There is another major obstacle that the baby has to overcome
08:24 or all this nine months of incredible growth
08:27 and development is for nothing.
08:30 We've got to get the seven or eight pound baby
08:33 to fit through a tiny hole.
08:36 But don't worry,
08:37 God didn't bring us this far to leave us,
08:40 He anticipated and planned for this ahead of time.
08:44 In His infinite wisdom, He made the baby skull
08:48 in such a way to help fitted through this tight squeeze.
08:52 Let's take a brief look at this wonder of creation.
08:57 The baby skull has five main bones or plates
09:01 that have a special feature to aid in delivery.
09:05 They are the occipital bone at the back of the head,
09:09 two parietal bones on either side
09:13 and two frontal bones they make up the forehead.
09:17 All these bones are connected together by sutures.
09:20 These sutures are joints which in a baby are flexible
09:24 even allowing the overlapping of one bone over the other.
09:29 Where two or more of these sutures come together,
09:32 it is called a Fontanelle or soft spot,
09:36 allowing for even more flexibility.
09:39 This flexing process is called molding.
09:43 Not only does it allow flexibility,
09:46 but even a slight reduction in size making it easier
09:49 for the head to pass through the birth canal.
09:52 This is the reason why babies are born
09:55 with slightly cone shaped heads.
09:57 They eventually will reshape
10:00 and the Fontanelle's will close as a child grows older.
10:04 Well, this helps but it still appears
10:07 that there is an impossible task ahead.
10:10 The birth canal is simply too tight
10:13 to squeeze the baby's head through.
10:15 This is where God made a wonderful provision
10:19 with the mother's pelvis.
10:21 First something must be done about the pelvic floor though.
10:24 Muscles from all different directions
10:27 are anchored to the coccyx, which by the way proves
10:31 that it's not just a useless organ.
10:35 This pelvic floor supplies a base like a sling
10:40 that keeps our organs from dropping down.
10:44 So this mass of muscles
10:46 and tissues stand in a way of the baby's passage.
10:49 How in the world is he going to get pass all that.
10:53 The problem is solved.
10:56 At this point, the mother is producing more hormones
11:01 that will soften the muscle tissue.
11:04 When the baby's head descends,
11:06 a combination of contractions and pressure from the head
11:10 will cause this cervix to dilate.
11:13 Then further contractions help push the baby's head
11:17 through the softened pelvic floor.
11:20 We'll talk more about dilation
11:21 and effacement in a later segment.
11:24 But here the baby runs into yet another obstacle.
11:28 He gets passed all the muscle structure
11:30 only to run into the bones of the pelvis.
11:33 Now what?
11:34 The female pelvis is formed differently than the males.
11:38 Where the males is more narrow and funnel shaped,
11:41 the women's is like a bowl.
11:44 In fact, the Latin word for pelvis is basin.
11:48 It is made up of three major bones,
11:51 two illium bones and a sacrum.
11:54 A fourth smaller bone
11:56 is located at the base of the sacrum
11:58 which we all know is a coccyx.
12:02 Notice the three joints are ligaments
12:04 that connect the major bones,
12:06 two where the illiums and sacrum meet
12:10 and one at the bottom where the ischiums
12:14 which are the lower parts of the illiums come together.
12:19 We can all be glad for these joints
12:21 to say allow a degree of flexibility
12:23 and shock absorbents when we run, jump, or fall.
12:28 But this flexibility is pretty limited.
12:31 At birth however,
12:32 another miracle of design is set in motion.
12:35 The mother secretes a hormone called relaxin
12:39 that actually softens these joints,
12:42 making them much more pliable and elastic.
12:46 The pelvis can then stretch open for the baby
12:50 to pass through.
12:52 There is also a fourth joint at the coccyx
12:56 that will allow that little bone
12:58 to flex back in a way for the baby's passage.
13:03 Surely we can all say with the Psalmist.
13:06 "Marvelous are thy works;
13:08 and that my soul knoweth right well."
13:11 As we consider how the Lord has provided for every step
13:15 and stage of development
13:17 all the way through the delivery,
13:19 we can take a spiritual lesson.
13:21 The Apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 1:6,
13:25 "Being confident of this very thing,
13:27 that he which hath begun a good work in you
13:29 will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ."
13:33 In another words,
13:35 Jesus is not going to leave you with an unfinished work,
13:39 so long as you cooperate with Him,
13:42 He will bring you to completion.
13:45 Join me next time for more on the Divine Design.


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Revised 2016-09-19