Do you know your blood type? My oldest daughter surprised me and said that she has O negative, making her a universal donor. When I asked how she knew that she said it is because she donates blood and plasma on a regular basis. I had no idea that she did this or that she was O negative. Then she asked what my blood type was. All I could say was “red.”
After all these years and many blood draws, I’ve never asked nor been told my blood type. I went on MyChart, thinking that it surely would be listed. If it is, I couldn’t find it.
“In 1901, the Austrian immunologist and pathologist Karl Landsteiner made a breakthrough discovery: He found there were four major blood groups, which he classified in his ABO blood type system. Prior to his discovery, blood transfusions were incredibly risky…
“In 1940, Landsteiner and his colleague A.S. Weiner discovered a second significant blood group factor based on the presence or absence of the Rh antigen, often called the Rh factor, on the cell membranes of red blood cells. Your blood type is classified as positive (+) if the Rh factor is present in your blood and negative (-) if it’s absent. Taken together, this creates the eight common blood types: A positive, A negative, B positive, B negative, AB positive, AB negative, O positive, and O negative…
“Everyone inherits their blood type from their parents, just like eye color, height, handedness, and freckles. Blood types follow simple inheritance rules: Each parent gives you one blood type gene, and the combination determines your blood type. The genes for A and B blood types are codominant — in other words, they dominate equally — while the gene for blood type O is recessive. ”1
Several times, the Old Testament reminds us that “… the life of the flesh is in the blood…” (Leviticus 17:11) Our blood carries the oxygen our cells need as well as nutrients to keep the cells healthy. Our blood also removes waste products, taking them to the right “disposal sites” in our body.
If we lose our blood or if that blood becomes corrupted with some infectious disease, the life is going to drain from us very quickly. If you need a blood transfusion, doctors need to know your type; otherwise, the wrong blood will cause coagulation, blocking arteries, and causing strokes, heart attacks, and death.
Let’s consider what the Bible says about the blood of Jesus. John 6:53-54 says, “Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. (54) Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.”
Vance Havner makes an interesting observation on this passage. “The Christian
experience begins with Christ, the slain Passover Lamb and the blood applied by faith. With that truth sound believers are familiar in experience and doctrine. But the Christian experience continues on the strength of Christ, the Passover feast of the Bread of Life, as we feed upon Christ by faith. With that we are not so familiar.
Do not stop at the Passover, go on to the feast of unleavened bread. The blood must be followed by the bread. The lamb was not merely to be looked at and sung about but also to be eaten. Christ is our song but also our sustenance. All the lamb was eaten; Christ is for every need, all of him for all of us. The lamb was eaten with bitter herbs and so must we feed on Christ with broken and contrite hearts. No work was mixed with this feast nor are we to supplement the provision of Christ with works of our own. The bread was unleavened and we must allow no leaven of sin, malice, strife. The Israelites ate the feast girded and ready to travel: so must the believer sit loose to this world, a pilgrim and stranger, seeking here no continuing city.”2
As believers, we give thanks for the life-giving blood of Jesus. Maybe you don’t know your blood type. Just make sure that it’s the blood of Jesus coursing through your spiritual veins and arteries. “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: (25) Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God.” (Romans 3:24-25)
1https://interestingfacts.com/what-do-blood-types-mean/?lctg=e6fd7449-4b4d-4d27-9340-7ad6e03075f2
2https://www.preceptaustin.org/john-6-commentary#6:53
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