Brooke Greenberg (born 1993), of Reigerstown, Maryland, is a nine month old toddler and she's been a nine month old toddler for her entire sixteen years of life. She is about 30 inches tall and weighs 16 pounds and, consistent with her body, has the mind of a toddler. She still has some of her baby teeth. Her condition is so rare (she may be the only one) that it has no formal name; physicians refer to it as Syndrome X.
Brooke's condition has never been explained. DNA sequencing shows no abnormalities. It just seems that the various parts of her body function independently and not as unified whole. Only her hair and fingernails, which are embryologically related, grow. Her body does not know how to age.
We've all looked at our beautiful children and wished that they would never grow up. In Brooke's case, she never has and we consider it a tragedy. Her family loves her just as she is and feels that she has outlived physician's predictions (they said five years ... maybe) because God placed her here for a reason. Her father believes she may help medical researchers better understand aging.
We should be like children in our faith and trust in God ...
"Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 19:14.
"Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein." Mark 10:15 (also Luke 18:17).
but, we should not be stunted in our growth, always remaining in a childlike state.
"When I was a child, I spake as a child. I understood as child. I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." 1 Corinthians 13:11.
We are counseled to grow ever more wise in our understanding of spiritual matters, not merely going around in circles repeating the same truisms over and over.
"As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby." 1 Peter 2:2
"I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able." 1 Corinthians 3:2
"For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong milk. For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil." Hebrews 5:12-14.
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