From the periodic table to the first man in space, Russia has long been a land of great scientific exploits. If President Vladimir Putin gets his way, Russia could make a discovery bigger than any before. His scientists are researching biological immortality.

While visiting Chinese General Secretary Xi Jinping last year, Putin was caught on a hot mic speaking to Xi about how to live forever. “In a few decades, as biotechnology continues to develop, human organs will continue to be transplanted and people will become younger and perhaps even achieve immortality,” he said.

This wasn’t a random comment blown out of proportion. Putin is very serious about discovering a cure for death. A May 28 Wall Street Journal report claims the Russian government is investing heavily in 3-D-printing living tissue and growing human organs inside pigs. Among the scientists Putin has entrusted this work to is his daughter Maria Vorontsova. The Journal estimates Putin’s longevity program has cost $26 billion.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un seemed to smirk as Putin spoke of “achieving immortality.” Putin may be an extreme example of mankind’s struggle to escape death, but he is far from the only example.

The Quest for Life

Discovering immortality has inspired mankind since the start of civilization. In the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, the hero Gilgamesh questions the immortal sage Utnapishtim on how he could join him. Qin Shi Huang, China’s inaugural emperor, believed mercury could give him immortality. Throughout the Greek, Roman and medieval eras, European philosophers and alchemists searched for the “philosopher’s stone” and other mythical substances. Legends surrounding Spanish conquistadors searching for the “fountain of youth” in the Caribbean grew as Europe settled the New World.

Nobody is looking for a literal philosopher’s stone or fountain of youth today. But influential people worldwide are looking to a different kind of “magic”: science.

One of the most famous is British academic Aubrey de Grey, who claimed in a 2005 cbs interview that advancements in health sciences could bring an “indefinite extension of longevity.” He told cbs that, eventually, “average lifespans would be in the region of 1,000 years.” His theory is that the aging process is caused by a buildup of toxic substances in organs, which science may one day be able to clean up, thereby suspending the process of aging. His specific predictions have yet to bear fruit, but some of his ideas of cleaning up age-related damage are being studied, like stem cell harvesting.

Scientist Ray Kurzweil, a pioneer in technologies like machine speech recognition, has been advocating for advancements in longevity based more on machine enhancement. Some ideas he advocates include developing technology to upload human consciousnesses into computers.

Italian surgeon Sergio Canavero claimed in 2017 that he would perform the world’s first attempt at a human head transplant, attaching a healthy head to a body that would reanimate. Valery Spiridonov, a Russian quadriplegic, volunteered for the project but later backed out. Thus far, it appears Canavero has yet to find another volunteer to have his or her head lopped off. (I wonder why people would be so reluctant?). Canavero has suggested his work could lead toward immortality, with people replacing their aging bodies when necessary.

Israeli philosopher Yuval Noah Harari approaches the subject differently. Instead of having specific technologies in mind, he makes predictions based on the current trajectory of human society that death could somehow be technologically conquered. Harari is no fringe scientist; he claims to have sold 50 million copies of his books in 65 languages.

Some of these people are taken more seriously than others, but the point is that scientific investigation of immortality (or at least steps closer to immortality) attracts a lot of attention and money worldwide. Some relevant figures have a track record of major accomplishments.

Is mankind on the cusp of achieving immortality?

Or, to quote Harrison Ford in Raiders of the Lost Ark, is mankind “digging in the wrong place”?

Religion’s Role

In another Indiana Jones movie, Ford’s character searches for the “Holy Grail,” the mythical cup of eternal life. In his search, Ford references John 4:14, quoting Jesus Christ: “But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.”

Jesus wasn’t referring to some mystical artifact. He elaborated in John 7:37-39: “On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified” (New King James Version).

The gift of a joyous afterlife in God’s company may be the central tenet of Christianity. This theme is prominent from the Bible’s beginning, when Adam’s disobedience led God to cut man off from the tree of life (Genesis 3:22-24), to its end when it speaks of the tree of life being made available to all people (Revelation 22:1-2).

Some of the men listed above aren’t outspoken about their beliefs in religion or an afterlife. Some are proud secularists. But all of them are trying to take God’s prerogative in granting eternal life to themselves. The Apostle Peter said that Christ only has the words of eternal life (John 6:68). Trying to invent biological immortality is putting oneself in the place of God.

These men are not trying to grant a life far superior to what we already have. They offer a crude counterfeit based on bizarre surgeries and technologies. They seek immortality apart from God.

Christ came “that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). It’s a life so wonderful that, for those who truly comprehend it, it is inherently hopeful (1 John 3:3). I wouldn’t call having one’s head sawed off and reattached to a cadaver or one’s mind sucked out and uploaded to a computer as hopeful.

Whom Do You Trust?

This brings us back to Vladimir Putin. The Russian president claims to be an Orthodox Christian. He encourages church involvement in state affairs and takes part in the religious rituals. He brands Russia as the Christian antidote to Western godlessness. But Putin started his career in the atheistic Soviet Union’s secret police, the kgb. He almost certainly wouldn’t have been admitted to the service if he had religious convictions. He is almost certainly an atheist who is using religion as a tool to enforce his rule. It doesn’t take much knowledge of God’s law to know that an unrepentant mass murderer and kidnapper like Putin doesn’t qualify for God’s gift.

In any event, he seems to have more faith in pig organs than in God.

The truth is that God never intended for mankind to live forever physically. He intended physical life to have an “expiry date.” Late theologian Herbert W. Armstrong wrote in Mystery of the Ages:

At that very foundation of Satan’s world it was also decreed (Hebrews 9:27) that God had appointed that all humans should die once, and after that, by resurrection from the dead, would come the judgment. Meanwhile mankind as a whole would not as yet be brought to judgment—neither condemned nor saved. It was at that time decided that as in Adam all humans should die, so in Christ the same “all” should be brought back to life by a resurrection to judgment (1 Corinthians 15:22).

As Mystery of the Ages explains, God’s purpose is to bring humanity into His Family. It’s an existence of such joy that the material world could never compare. Trying to create an endless physical life opposes God’s purpose. Christ said, “It is the spirit that quickeneth [gives life]; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).

Mr. Armstrong wrote:

Philosophers think of human worth as of supreme value in itself alone. They speak of “human dignity.” They speak of the innate “god” powers within each human. They advocate self-confidence, self-glorification. They make mortal man to think of himself as immortal God.

Much to the contrary, the sole value of human life lies in the human spirit and the potential of being begotten of God, later to be born very God, a child in the God Family. …

Therefore, man of himself is infinitesimally of less value than the self-professed wise of this world suppose. But, once begotten by the Supreme God through the very life and Spirit of the living God dwelling in him, a human being’s potential is of infinitely greater value than the world has understood.

How much does immortal life cost? Putin has so far spent at least $26 billion and hasn’t achieved it yet. God lays down far simpler conditions for those He calls: “… Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38; nkjv).

To whom do you look for immortal life? Is it a mad scientist who offers surgeries and chips in your brain? Or is it God who created you to have eternal life together with Him? If it’s the latter, are you taking His call seriously?

To learn more, request a free copy of Mystery of the Ages.