With all the protests vs. Planned Parenthood, I wonder whether the President, Congress, and judges are paying attention. Thanks to Mollie Ziegler Hemingway for keeping us apprised of protests around the country.
Also, how many more babies have been killed since the protests began today? My heart aches for this national tragedy, and even more so for the women who have had abortions. Ministering to them takes love, compassion, patience, and time. Let’s be a part of that movement as well.
Yes, I have been ministering to women for 28 years. The key is not letting themselves or others define who they are by having had an abortion. They are sinners, just like me. They deal with grief, shame, guilt, etc. They are no different than many of us who sit silently and shake our heads about how bad it is, and then we go back to the latest Twitter or FB or Instagram attention-getting topic. Rather, God defines them by sins-forgiven, made-pure-in-Christ. Let that be our foremost message.
Life is under attack at the other end of life, too. Euthanasia (“good death”?) is a convenience for someone else, but does not value the life of the person being put to death. We can cover it with all kinds of sentimental thoughts “She would have wanted this to end”; “Now he is no longer in pain.” Yes, there are times that happens. But realistically, look at what happens in the Netherlands, and it is far past assisted suicide. And notice how this creeps into mainstream US media to justify taking life: Dying Dutch: Euthanasia Spreads Across Europe.
But this isn’t about just pointing fingers at others. We confess our sins because we realize we have failed in so many ways: our thoughts, our words, our deeds, our silence…
Some thoughts from Scripture:
Psalm 139:13-16 (GW)
You alone created my inner being. You knitted me together inside my mother. I will give thanks to you because I have been so amazingly and miraculously made. Your works are miraculous, and my soul is fully aware of this. My bones were not hidden from you when I was being made in secret, when I was being skillfully woven in an underground workshop. Your eyes saw me when I was only a fetus. Every day ˻of my life˼ was recorded in your book before one of them had taken place.
Mark 2:17 (NAS)
And hearing this, Jesus *said to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
1 John 1:8-9 (NAS)
If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Romans 8:1 (NAS)
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2 Corinthians 5:21 (NAS)
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
So, now what?
To those who are struggling with issues of life, death, value of a person’s life, give some time reflecting on something more than media headlines. Maybe even help another family who is living through this. Care for them, and realize that suffering is part of life and cannot be ignored or dispensed with a needle or ended with a putting someone to death.
This has been a heavy post to write about. It reflects some of my concerns expressed among family and friends for 40 years, many years of ministering to suffering people. The thoughts here are a little disjointed from the agony of my heart.
Even as my heart aches with all that is happening, I think God’s heart is breaking, too. He not only desires life for us now, but also life eternal. That is, life here is temporary, and filled with joy, sadness, hope, joy, and suffering and death. But it is not the final answer. We wait for life in its fullness.
Romans 8:23, 26-27 (GW)
However, not only creation groans. We, who have the Spirit as the first of God’s gifts, also groan inwardly. We groan as we eagerly wait for our adoption, the freeing of our bodies ˻from sin˼.
At the same time the Spirit also helps us in our weakness, because we don’t know how to pray for what we need. But the Spirit intercedes along with our groans that cannot be expressed in words. The one who searches our hearts knows what the Spirit has in mind. The Spirit intercedes for God’s people the way God wants him to.
And so we pray
Hope for all who call on the name of Jesus
Our hope is in the God who creates life, who sustains life, and who desires us to have life with him forever.
“believe, teach, and confess” 
Thank God for your ministry over the years. Praying He continues to use you to bring healing.
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The right to die has always been guaranteed…by God, for it is God alone who ends a persons life anyway. Since we are not God it is thererore not within our province to act as though we were Him by trying to kill ourselves. This is the plight of all mankind, thinking that we are God and He s not. I have read much on the subject of pain and suffering in the context of there being an Almighty God and the census is clear; pain and suffering is God’s way of trying to reach the soul of the person so inflicted; it is His final act of love, His final cry to reach, embrace, and save us.
Christ suffered on the cross so that we could be freed from an eternity of pain and suffering. Therefore, since only God has the right to take life, my fear is that the voluntarily taking of our own life is a complete disregard of God’s attempt to save us and it becomes a very short trip from this life to a life of eternal suffering. Suicide is the opitome of what it means to have a complete and total lack of faith in God; the opitome of having only faith in ourselves.
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