Drunken Mystic

Why are you making such a big deal about this? some may ask me.

It is the defining issue of our generation. What that means is that, in our culture and time, this issue will be the benchmark of those who stand for truth and the things of eternity.

At some point in the future, people will look back and wonder how we could ever have allowed such a tragic evil to take place. Just because many are deceived today that it is okay does not make it so. The country was very divided over the institution of slavery, and rightfully so. There were thousands, perhaps millions, who believed that a man was less because the color of his skin and good only for basic servitude. They were treated as animals … perhaps less so. Even the Supreme Court agreed with them. Did that make it right?

This nation was incredibly challenged by the institution of segregation and discrimination. There were many, possibly millions, who believed that it was okay to separate and segregate a whole portion of the population based on the color of their skin. They wanted to uphold racial tion over another group. The Supreme Court agreed with them at one point. Are we to adhere to that precedent and treat it as sacred?

We won’t mention the thousands that felt lynching was perfectly justifiable. It seems crazy, but people did these things less than sixty years ago, within our grandparents’ or parents’ lifetime.

Many people were convinced that the Jews were not really human and were incredibly discriminated against in Germany. won Time’s Man of the Year in the early ’30’s. Eventually, this mentality led to the horror of the Holocaust. Many, like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, died fighting this system or risked their lives hiding families and children from those terrible things. Their names are written in heaven.

These were defining issues for their generations, and many Christians had to make as stand for what was right, regardless of popular opinion or the temptation to treat it as a secondary issue. Martin Luther King, Jr’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” is a great example of the challenge to Christians of his day based on spiritual truth and social and civic responsiblity.

But what are we to do?

First, we must pray. We must pray for the unborn, that their voices would be heard, as silent as they are. We must pray for ourselves, that we may learn to love even those that commit such sin. We must pray for those women who feel so desperate that they would so wound themselves and their own conscience, that God would reveal His love and mercy and holiness and regard for all life. We must pray for the doctors that perform such heinous acts, that their eyes would be opened. We must pray for the people of this country, that we would be forgiven for this sin (include yourself as Nehemiah did). We must pray for ourselves again, that He may forgive us for not taking the stand as we should.

Jesus stands at the right hand of God and intercedes for His Church. Who intercedes for the world? We do. The Church must take her place in Christ as the intercessor for the sinful world for God’s mercy and revelation.

Second, make abortion a topic of conversation. Do not fear the discussion or the derision it might bring. Do not plea for laws but to challenge the conscience of a nation. This is not a plug for a specific political party. Things like should supercede such considerations.

Third, the Church must be willing to adopt the unwanted. Who better? Unfortunately, modern Christians see children much as the world does, as inconveniences to their lives and careers. The Bible says children are a blessing from the Lord. We don’t really act as if that is true.

Christian households are barren. Orphanages around the world are full. You make the connection.

You can do no better thing than raise a child in the Lord. Your personal career and achievements are secondary to this wonderful gift to the world. Marriage is not a place for you to realize the satisfaction of your own pleasures. It is an avenue to give fully of yourself to another in order to produce life and disciple it. If you’re ready to get married, you’re ready for children.

There is a scripture that is repeated in three of the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, almost word for word. The disciples are arguing over who is going to be the greatest in the Kingdom. Jesus picks up a little child and says, “if you receive a child in My name, you’ve received me. If you receive Me, you’ve received My father.” He goes on to say that to enter the Kingdom, you must be like a little one, but this is a separate statement. Did you catch it? I hope you have ears to hear it. If you want to be great in the Kingdom, minister to children. Receive children in His Name.

Do we really think that is just a cool Sunday School program or children’s church or Vacation Bible School? That is receiving in His Name?

Paul calls our salvation “adoption.” Marriage is between Christ and the Church. What better witness to the world than a couple adopting a child and loving it as its own? The Church has done a decent job of saying abortion is wrong. It needs to do a much better job of saying, “We’ll take them. We’ll love the least of these. They are not unwanted. We want them.”

You have to give Catholics some credit. From the Pope on down, they still stand for life. Mother Theresa actually told people to bring her all their unwanted children and she would care for them.

Is the Church ready to say this? More importantly, are they ready to do it? The world will not believe us until we do.

I’m not saying that Christ is only discussing adoption in that passage, only that it is definitely included.

The Church needs the balls (cahones!) to step up and be the example it was meant to be. Real men raise children.

On July 7, there will be a collective day of prayer and fasting for this issue. I encourage you to participate. You don’t have to wait until then, though. Lift up the nation, and yourself, in your prayers.

Peace.

An average of 4,000 babies are killed every day in this country. That’s 120,000 a month. 1,460,000 a year.

You need parental permission to get an aspirin in most public schools. You can’t carry scissors to your middle school. But you can get an abortion at 13 years old without anyone knowing.

What type of signals does this send the last few generations? Combine it with a public education that denies God and you get some scary results.

“You were not created. You are just another animal. Life is not sacred. Life’s worth is dependent upon who wants you and not any intrinsic, inalienable factors as a gift from God.”

Then we see young people plan and carry out mass murder. We shake our heads and wonder how they can have no regard for life.

You mean, we don’t know?

We are told it is a gun control problem. Or perhaps we can blame it on in the media or maybe graphic video games.

Is it any wonder that the message of pleasure without consequence has grown stronger and stronger? We’ve had over thirty years to practice. In the process, women are actually exploited to a greater degree. Just look at popular rap music and s Gone Wild videos. Actually … you probably shouldn’t. Wasn’t this whole movement supposed to liberate women? It has only enslaved them as being further objects of lust.

Women do not support abortion. A very high percentage oppose it. Why? It goes against their conscience and their nature. How many female abortion doctors are there? The number is startlingly low … especially if we are to believe it is a woman’s “reproductive right.”

As a young man, my mother made me watch a film that showed an abortion take place. I’ve seen breast implants and heart surgeries done on cable TV. Why haven’t they ever aired an actual abortion procedure on the television? It would convince 90% of the viewership immediately that it was wrong. Something about little arms and legs sucked out of a womb converts most of us.

It’s not about right and wrong for liberal activists. It is about agenda and policy. The ends justify the means. I’m convinced neither, in the case of abortion, has any merit.

The time has come for this to be the defining issue for Christians in this generation. I believe it has been.

4,000 a day. 120,000 a month. Almost 1.5 million a year.

But what are we to do?

Peace.

Norma McCorvey was pregnant. Her baby was unplanned and unwanted. In the midst of this crisis, two lawyers working for the cause of abortion approached her. The lawyers wanted to bring an suit aginst the state of Texas, hoping to find a case that would find its way to the Supreme Court and overturn any restrictions on abortion.

Because killing babies goes against the conscience of most people, they needed to make her case look as pitiful as possible. Therefore, they convinced Norma to lie and say she was raped.

She signed the affadavit, Jane Roe.

Based on the lie of a desperate young woman, these lawyers took Norma’s case all the way to the Supreme Court, legalizing abortion in this country.

The country was shocked, to put it mildly. Murdering children seemed so far outside the thinking of most people that no one took the case seriously.

Over 30 years later, Norma is a Christian and pro-life. The same lawyers and courts that so vehmenently fought for her “rights” then won’t give her the time of day, now. They were always more interested in their agenda than the truth, anyway.

Now this is the reality our country lives in. Killing babies is seen as a right by most of the country (how could the Supreme Court be wrong?), even though more than half are morally opposed to it and most see it as wrong on some level.

This disregard for life does not occur in a vacuum. It has its own consequences.

Peace.

Just a little research shows the founding principles behind abortion. Wealthy liberals in the early 1900’s were concerned about the rising population of the poor and minorities. The founders of Planned Parenthood saw abortion as necessary population control. They were pretty racially motivated.

With the rise of the free love society in the ’60’s, the goal of abortion changed and found new life. It no longer was meant to cleanse society of those pesky poor people, at least not on the surface. Now abortion was necessary for those who wanted to have sex without being responsible for their actions. Abstinence before marriage was now viewed as arcane and oppressive. Pleasure without consequence was the goal of the whole society while they criticized their own country for waging an unjust war.

In this view, man is only another animal that should not have to control his urges, which made sense to the first generation taught evolution by public schools. God was a myth to them. Your true origin is a monkey.

While these social activists were destroying brain cells and spitting on soldiers, they realized one of the main effects of sex was very inconvenient to them: life. Babies. So the same men and women who screamed “baby killer!” at returning Vietnam vets fought to legalize abortion.

The fact that the majority of the country disagreed with abortion did not matter. They labeled it a right and deceived people into thinking it was in the Constitution. While lawmakers and the president were fairly conservative, almost a decade of Democratic presidents had ensured a liberal, activist Supreme Court.

It had worked with segregation. Why not abortion? All they needed was the right case.

Peace.

We don’t really talk about abortion like we used to anymore. Through the 80’s, I remember abortion being discussed in political and other public arenas. I argued about it with classmates and discussed it with friends. It was a central issue in the hearts and minds of many.

At some point in the 90’s, we were convinced the issue was settled. It will never change. Just accept it. No one would talk about it anymore, especially as the media became even more liberal and America discovered more pride in winning the Cold War. Consequently, pro-abortion advocates have benn able to realize their dream of abortion on demand, anywhere, anytime.

I recently realized that many young s and teenagers haven’t grown up with a true understanding of the issue or given a chance to form their own convictions. Of course I don’t have any fears of any topic, much to the chagrin of some in my wake. But I do feel as if we need to bring it up again, if not for the hope of change then for the principle of standing for what is right and true despite what the world practices. I don’t know of another group of people more and oppressed than the unborn.

Abortion is the issue of our generation. No other issue takes precedence. Heaven will look back and see who stood for what was right in the midst of such confusion, much like slavery in 1850 and segregation and in 1955. Will it take another fifty years to get a clue? I hope not.

In this series I will lay out the founding principles behind abortion, the history of it, the impact on our nation today and how Christians should be involved.

Hope you tune in.

Peace.