five minute friday: Pass

I remember the encounter well.

A friend and I were on the verge of missing the opening notes of a concert. As new drivers, we had survived the stress of Portland evening traffic, one-way-roads, and whereintheworldistheparkinggarage moments with surprisingly minimal befrazzlement. Dashing up the streets to the concert hall, however, we were suddenly accosted by a group of girls, nearly the same ages as ourselves, with baskets and signs in support of a cause our minds hardly registered.

"Can we talk to you for a moment?" they asked.

We barely gave a coherent answer; our eyes were shining for an evening of piano music, our feet sped us onward to the tempo of anticipated tunes.

"Well, here, take these - for your protection," they insisted, shoving miscellaneous somethings into our hands as we hurried past.

It wasn't until we were seated in the concert hall - having deposited our "gifts" in a trash bin without so much as a glance - that my friend turned to me and asked, "Were those girls representing Planned Parenthood?"

And I knew they had been. I had felt a flicker of conscience as we'd ignored them, a begging of my spirit to stop and talk with them. And I had hurried past.

There the details of our evening fade. I can't recollect who played, or which pieces we heard. I don't know if my friend and I stopped for coffee on the way back, or drove straight home to meet a curfew.

But I do remember how I felt once I was home, sitting in the quiet dark of my room.

I felt ashamed.

Ashamed to have rushed by, missing the opportunity to speak with those girls on the street corner. To learn why they were representing Planned Parenthood. To hear their stories. To show them love. To tell them of my Savior.

I felt ashamed for treating an evening of personal enjoyment as more important than the spiritual state of girls who actually tried to talk to me. For valuing the sparkle of an "evening out" above the terribly too-real lives of dozens of little ones.

Jesus once told a parable of a poor man, Lazarus, who sat outside a rich man's dwelling, hoping, begging, for food from his table. Daily, the rich man walked past, without so much as an inkling of sympathy for the sore-ridden, needy one at his feet. His life, his priorities, his comforts - these were of far greater concern to a man of the world than the life flickering on his doorstep.

In America today - indeed, throughout the whole world - we too have have lives to save on our doorsteps: the lives of the unborn, the future of women and girls facing unplanned pregnancies. Daily, lives flicker between being taken or saved, crushed or nurtured, thrown away or valued. Do you hurry past? Do you bemoan the deeds in word without a pause to help? Do you have a hurried, hardly-coherent answer for girls on the street corner?

I have written before on why I am pro-life, and others have written far more eloquently than I - but what I want to ask today is, What are you doing about it? There are countless options: volunteer at a pregnancy clinic, support your local CPC, or even simply take the time to reach out and talk to the women "on your doorstep". Don't hurry past the mission field with which God has surrounded you. These lives may not be dying on our front porches, but they are suffering in secret, just down the street.

~~~~~~~

I've recently signed up (rather last-minute) to run in a fundraiser race for a local Crisis Pregnancy Center. I'd love it if you felt led to support me! The link is here.

However, even if you are unable to financially support Pathways, please cover them - and all other centers devoted to showing Christ's love to women and mothers in need - in your prayers. 

Confession: it took me a bit longer than 5 minutes to write this, in between teaching today. Still, it was written, minimally edited, and posted all in the same day - which is an accomplishment for me!

Photo Credit:
szdl. Passing. 10 Oct. 2013. Flickr Creative Commons

Our Only Ground

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About a month ago, I posted the following on facebook:

I'm tired of the word "deserve." "Ever girl deserves..." "...because you deserve..." "Everyone deserves..."
"But God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead...made us alive...that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus."
All we deserve is eternal death in hell, but Christ's incarnation and sacrifice have rendered what anyone "deserves" as irrelevant. Life is to be centered around His love, His grace, and His mercy. Can we stop with our false sense of entitlement? I'm so grateful to not get what I deserve!

Having the Christian friends that I do, many agreed with me, posting their own encounters and understanding of the magnitude of the free-ness of God's gift of eternal life. However, at the time, I couldn't help but wonder how many people would have so heartily concurred if they knew what had sparked the mini-rant. Last week, as we mournfully observed the 42nd anniversary of Roe v Wade, enough one-liners, and comic strips, and blog posts rolled across my screen to assure me that my motive in the post would have been rather - if not extremely - unpopular. Why? Because the catalyst for my anti-entitlement reaction was a pro-life ad.

How could we, as Christians, have strayed so far in defending our beliefs? Even a pro-life ad on a Christian radio station fell short. After briefly running through general information about the pro-life organization, the commercial then moved to how those looking to donate could do so as a tax write-off (in fact, the whole ad felt disproportionately money-oriented, but that is not the point here). After announcing all pertinent details, the gentle lady's voice concluded, "Because every baby deserves a chance to live."

Deserves? Is that what we believe?

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If you are pro-life, why? Because you believe that the child in the womb is an actual human being and abortion is the same as murder? Who says murder is wrong? Couldn't it sometimes be a necessary evil for the greater good?

Are you pro-life because studies show that a baby in the womb can feel pain? Is pain inflicted on another human a legitimate reason for outlawing a practice? Do we outlaw orthodontists? Doctors who set legs? Who's to say that the temporary pain of an abortion isn't, in the long run, the best for the child, if his life would be one of great trial?

Are you pro-life because "innocent" babies deserve the chance to live? Why? Do their mothers "deserve" to go through the nausea, discomfort, job complications, and financial hardship to bring to term children they don't even want - perhaps for whom they cannot even provide?

Why are you pro-life?

If the Christian literature I saw this past week is any indication, we are failing miserably in our attempts to answer this question. We spout our scientific facts: 8 weeks after conception, the baby's heartbeat is discernible via ultrasound; at 16-18 weeks, the baby can feel pain. These are evidences of personhood. After science we appeal to morality: the baby is alive, and it's murder to abort him; abortion is sacrificing one's children on the altar of selfishness and willful ignorance. Goodness and kindness rise up in protest.  But the weapon of choice is pathos. Miraculous survival stories, heart-wrenching testimonials, appeals to mothers who would never want pain for their children- the more tears we see, the more people we feel we've reached.

Why are you pro-life?

Christians, should not our answer be, "I am pro-life because never once in God's word did He show the unborn to be of any less personhood than the born; therefore, I cannot consider them to be anything else, either. I am pro-life because our God is the God of life and murder is against His very nature; therefore, I oppose it too. I am pro-life because God loves children; therefore, I delight in them as well."?

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Are we ashamed of these answers? Afraid of "turning people away" by our radical, life-supporting, Christian response? Have we so thoughtlessly burned our bridges? Our foundation was surely on the rock, but we have taken a sledgehammer to it in the name of not "forcing our views on others." If we blow the pro-life horn in the name of ever-changing science, unreliable pathos, and floating societal morality, how will it sound?

In observing the Christians of his time, William Wilberforce noted this lack of foundation from which we still waver today:

"If we listen to [the Christians'] conversation, virtue is praised, and vice is censured; piety is perhaps applauded, and profaneness condemned. So far all is well. But let any one, who would not be deceived by the "barren generalities" examine a little more closely, and he will find, that not to Christianity in particular, but at best to Religion in general, perhaps to mere Morality their homage is intended to be paid..."
"Does this seem too strong? View their plan of life and their ordinary conduct....Wherein can we discern the points of discrimination between them and professed unbelievers?"

 I am pro-life. Not because science "proves" or "supports" the life of a child in the womb - although it does.

Not because it is "bad" or "evil" to take that life, whether from the preference of the parent or pressure on the parent  - although it is.

Not because I have shed innumerable tears over the lost lives of so many millions - although I have.

And certainly not because every baby deserves to live - frankly, they don't. None of us do.

I am pro-life because my Father in heaven, Who has so perfectly formed each being, loves, bestows, and values life, and I stand with Him. What other choice do we have? "All other ground is sinking sand."

To Forget This Day

I love anniversaries. Dates of special epiphanies, events, or decisions always have - and always will be - worth celebrating. In a way, each day is mini-anniversary, marked by annual spiritual and intellectual growth, memorialized on the journal pages of by-gone years. Revelations gained, friendships forged, and the beauty of triumph through deepest pains - these are events to hold often before us, with teachable and thankful spirits.

But some things are best, forgotten.

At the ripe old age of 7, mom and dad began cautioning me about what I allowed my eyes to see: magazines in the store, movies at friends' houses, and even words in books. "Once an image is in your mind," my dad explained, "you can never completely erase it."  Even so, there are, tucked away in a dusty back corner of my mind, images I wish away. Yet, by the grace of my Savior, these pictures and thoughts are essentially forgotten. I do not see them, think about them, or relive them. My mind has been reborn to think on more excellent things.

However, until beauty and grace have filled the ugly spaces, distasteful memories - anniversaries of sin - cannot be forgotten. Today marks such an anniversary. Forty-one years ago today was made the most devastating, cold-blooded ruling this nation has ever seen. Forty-one years ago today, Roe v Wade reached its verdict.

True it is that the triumph of evil asks only for the passiveness of good. At a rally I attended this past Sunday, I learned that there are more "pro-life young people" in the States today than there were the year before Roe v Wade. While this is progress, I could not help wondering if there were actually more young people, or simply more young people willing to stand. Who among us is passionate and willing to stand up on an unchallenged issue? If there is no debate about the morality of stealing, do we still uncompromisingly teach that it is wrong? Or do we passively neglect the discussion, merely cringing when "exceptions" are made? What issues do we avoid "giving all diligence" in, because the final line hasn't yet been drawn on the wrong side, forcing our hands? Did abortion blind-side the Christians of the '70s?

Fifty-six times the bell rang on Sunday. Fifty-six. Each soul-shattering clang remembered not ten, not a hundred, not a thousand, but one million still, silent hearts. One million faces that will never wrinkle up in tears, smooth out at the sight of mama, or laugh at papa's silly antics. One million pairs of shoes that will never be tied. One million hugs that will never cling to a lonely neck.

Fifty-six times clanged the bell. Fifty-six million dead.

And I wept. Wept for the little ones who will never be, wishing I could hold them close and protect them from such carnage. Wept for the mothers who have thus ended so many lives, longing to hug them, and tell them about the unconditional, overpowering love and forgiveness my Father has for them. Wept for the desolation with which this country has brought upon and so injured itself.

In these brief 41 years, we have multiplied in unborn, innocent blood - by more than 2500% - the first 215
years of American military deaths. In these short 41 years, we, the people of the United States, have ended the lives of more than the combined populations of Canada and Romania. In these mere 41 years, millions have been lied to about the precious infants in their wombs, have been swindled, or allowed to remain willfully ignorant, as they become party to the destruction of lives.


This is a story with no happy ending - yet. But hope abounds. Abortion rates are dropping in the States, slowly and surely. While there are still thousands of abortion victims, there are also thousands who have been rescued: snatched from death by the prayers, sacrifices, and tireless efforts of those who see each life as sacred.

Oh, so sacred.

Increasingly, the personhood of the child in the womb will be a non-issue in a society that has lost its belief in the dignity of man. Stripped of the science and emotionalism in our debates, we will be left with the very heartbeat of our argument for the honoring of human lives: that Christ's blood was shed to remove all memory of our sin from before the Father.

Friends, let us do more than merely hold a conviction - let us act upon it. Let us work diligently and speak bravely for the lives of the unborn. Let us pray earnestly for the softening and salvation of those both administering and receiving abortions. Let us find ways to support those seeking life for their babies - volunteering our time, organizing fundraising. Let us work earnestly for the removal of this anniversary.

Some memories are best, forgotten.