Doesn't make sense to
me but then I look around and what have we become save Christian people
that have very little resemblance of Christ. I am about as politically
conservative as one can get. I am labeled by many as pretty much a
fundamentalist and most also know that for labels sake... I'm about as
Pentecostal as they come.
I see a major problem though, in the church as a whole (discarding denomination labels), and that comes once we get into the area of politics. In most countries politics plays a huge part of our lives. Just to catch up with the news, local and national, you are blanketed in politics of all sorts. Liberal, conservative, and even moderate. Because of this we talk about that sort of thing often in both real time life as well as life on the Internet. Where I see a major disconnect though... we tend to check our Christianity at the door of the polls and for some reason we have this idea that the two cannot mix. Problem is... how can we possibly separate the two and still be in Christ?
Issues such as abortion, immigration, welfare, and whatnot... we go on and on and on. Folks from all sides making their stands and while they may mention something from Scripture.. Scripture is not what guides them. While they may mention God... He doesn't guide them in politics either.
Abortion is a nasty problem and something that I totally despise. I hate it about as much as anything I can possibly think of and I would do most anything to see it stopped. But then.... there is the young lady that had that abortion. She was selfish and did so because she didn't want the hassle. Perhaps she was selfish and didn't want to have to worry about how much it would cost her to raise the baby. Perhaps she was scared because she didn't want momma and daddy to know she was discussing Ugandan affairs with the boy next door.. I mean serious... their little girl? She figures they will flip. Perhaps she was raped or drugged or maybe even just stupid while in a drunken stupor for the first time. The reasons are countless I know.... I have heard many. Are they valid? No. But okay... they weren't valid reasons but the deed was done anyway. What now? Rail on and on about the evils of abortion? What good will that do in regard to that young lady?
Stand outside the clinic and hold up signs showing dead babies sucked out of the womb and all torn apart? This is a tactic that I don't understand really. Most the girls that are on the way into the clinic have already made up their minds. What is this sign going to prove to her, save giving her nightmares for years to come and all that to the credit of the Christian man or woman standing at the sidewalk showing her what... the love of Christ? Yelling Baby Killer to the top of your lungs... showing God's love to her via sound waves... such a brilliant tactic really. Why do we do this and do it in the name of God?
I'm the kind of guy that thinks you know... if that crap worked then abortion would have been stopped years ago and yet it still goes on. Abortion is nothing less a symptom of a society gone awry. It is horrible... but it didn't start at that clinic. It started in the back of a car perhaps... or in the house because mom and dad were so busy doing whatever on their computer that they paid no real attention to their sweet little Becky while she was sneaking her boyfriend into her bedroom. Perhaps they couldn't hear the noise because they had their faces stuck in their television watching something racy enough to be a sin itself... but hey... wouldn't want to go there.
I want there to never be another abortion starting now. Not another one. But then I know that tomorrow morning... 9:00'ish clinics across the nation will open up and start their procedure. Girls and young women will go in by the hundreds tomorrow and have a baby sucked out of their womb. At some of the clinics there will be people out there with their signs and yelling their loving words that truthfully aren't loving at all nor are they said in love. Just more of the symptom coming home to roost.
Then there are the borders. They won't be closed off tomorrow. Who knows how many folks are crossing over as I type and by this time tomorrow... it could be thousands. It is a problem and one that you'd think should be fixed. I wouldn't argue with you that it is a problem that needs to be fixed. But it isn't going to be and that is a reality. We can holler just like those folks at the clinic. Hold up our signs telling them to go back home to Mexico. They aren't going to go though. We can demand they be arrested and put in jail until they are carted back to Mexico and then we can complain because the jails let out criminals in order to hold all the immigrants coming in because of all the arrest... that is certainly our American right to do so. But then where is Christ in any of this? Try as I might... can't picture Jesus doing this sort of thing where He to have been sent to earth, and America, in our day. I am so confident in that fact that I would guarantee you, and dare say that I am speaking with the mind of Christ, that He would have nothing at all to do with this petty stuff. Matter of fact... I strongly suspect we'd here a lot of parables on the matter were He here today and preaching on the side of a hill to a bunch of folks. I figure that all that we would hear from Jesus is compassion because of their plight and not nearly as much concern about how much we, as a nation, might suffer because we have less money now because we're taking care of all them Mexican folk.. Just can't see that being a major concern of His knowing how much we have and would still have even if all of us shared half of what we own. We've allowed nasty attitudes to permeate our thinking and actions to the point that we don't even represent Christ any more. I don't care what your leanings are politically be it left, right, center, above or below. We're really messing this up. The left can't stand the right and the right can't stand the left and let's cut through the chase and call it what it is. You hate the other side. You can go on about you hate the ideology and not the person until your lips fall off your face and most of you are simply lying. If you believe I am wrong then you have simply lied to yourself long enough that you have actually believed your own lie.
Forget that mess. We can't escape politics because it's as much a part of our society as breathing has become. But do we have to act like the world in all of this? The people in the church need to grow up and I mean everyone. We don't have time for the hate or even "extreme dislike" any longer. Those kids that get abortions... it's horrible. Now that they have done it... love them. They need that now more than anything. Put down the signs and shut up hollering at them. Why not instead go sit down as near the door as you can legally sit. When they come out... hand them a card with your phone number on it and tell them that you are there for them if they ever need to talk. Most might in fact toss it away. But some might keep it and call. Most will sneer at you perhaps and even throwing the card away... one day the reality of what they did is going to set in and they will remember. Maybe they take a drive back to the clinic hoping, maybe even praying, that they might see you there sitting at that corner handing out a card to yet another girl.
None of these things are the only things we can do or should do... we can be creative and the Spirit of God will work through us. But come on... what we are doing now is CLEARLY not working so let's get our head out of our proverbial backsides and recognize the rather obvious. Time is short and we've lost so much of it in our loss of identity and who we are and what we are about. My prayer is that God kicks us all into reality of what we've become and then He allows us time to at least redeem some of the time we've wasted acting just like the world we're supposed to be different than.
REPENT! TURN BACK TO GOD! Redeem the time while there is time left to redeem!
I see a major problem though, in the church as a whole (discarding denomination labels), and that comes once we get into the area of politics. In most countries politics plays a huge part of our lives. Just to catch up with the news, local and national, you are blanketed in politics of all sorts. Liberal, conservative, and even moderate. Because of this we talk about that sort of thing often in both real time life as well as life on the Internet. Where I see a major disconnect though... we tend to check our Christianity at the door of the polls and for some reason we have this idea that the two cannot mix. Problem is... how can we possibly separate the two and still be in Christ?
Issues such as abortion, immigration, welfare, and whatnot... we go on and on and on. Folks from all sides making their stands and while they may mention something from Scripture.. Scripture is not what guides them. While they may mention God... He doesn't guide them in politics either.
Abortion is a nasty problem and something that I totally despise. I hate it about as much as anything I can possibly think of and I would do most anything to see it stopped. But then.... there is the young lady that had that abortion. She was selfish and did so because she didn't want the hassle. Perhaps she was selfish and didn't want to have to worry about how much it would cost her to raise the baby. Perhaps she was scared because she didn't want momma and daddy to know she was discussing Ugandan affairs with the boy next door.. I mean serious... their little girl? She figures they will flip. Perhaps she was raped or drugged or maybe even just stupid while in a drunken stupor for the first time. The reasons are countless I know.... I have heard many. Are they valid? No. But okay... they weren't valid reasons but the deed was done anyway. What now? Rail on and on about the evils of abortion? What good will that do in regard to that young lady?
Stand outside the clinic and hold up signs showing dead babies sucked out of the womb and all torn apart? This is a tactic that I don't understand really. Most the girls that are on the way into the clinic have already made up their minds. What is this sign going to prove to her, save giving her nightmares for years to come and all that to the credit of the Christian man or woman standing at the sidewalk showing her what... the love of Christ? Yelling Baby Killer to the top of your lungs... showing God's love to her via sound waves... such a brilliant tactic really. Why do we do this and do it in the name of God?
I'm the kind of guy that thinks you know... if that crap worked then abortion would have been stopped years ago and yet it still goes on. Abortion is nothing less a symptom of a society gone awry. It is horrible... but it didn't start at that clinic. It started in the back of a car perhaps... or in the house because mom and dad were so busy doing whatever on their computer that they paid no real attention to their sweet little Becky while she was sneaking her boyfriend into her bedroom. Perhaps they couldn't hear the noise because they had their faces stuck in their television watching something racy enough to be a sin itself... but hey... wouldn't want to go there.
I want there to never be another abortion starting now. Not another one. But then I know that tomorrow morning... 9:00'ish clinics across the nation will open up and start their procedure. Girls and young women will go in by the hundreds tomorrow and have a baby sucked out of their womb. At some of the clinics there will be people out there with their signs and yelling their loving words that truthfully aren't loving at all nor are they said in love. Just more of the symptom coming home to roost.
Then there are the borders. They won't be closed off tomorrow. Who knows how many folks are crossing over as I type and by this time tomorrow... it could be thousands. It is a problem and one that you'd think should be fixed. I wouldn't argue with you that it is a problem that needs to be fixed. But it isn't going to be and that is a reality. We can holler just like those folks at the clinic. Hold up our signs telling them to go back home to Mexico. They aren't going to go though. We can demand they be arrested and put in jail until they are carted back to Mexico and then we can complain because the jails let out criminals in order to hold all the immigrants coming in because of all the arrest... that is certainly our American right to do so. But then where is Christ in any of this? Try as I might... can't picture Jesus doing this sort of thing where He to have been sent to earth, and America, in our day. I am so confident in that fact that I would guarantee you, and dare say that I am speaking with the mind of Christ, that He would have nothing at all to do with this petty stuff. Matter of fact... I strongly suspect we'd here a lot of parables on the matter were He here today and preaching on the side of a hill to a bunch of folks. I figure that all that we would hear from Jesus is compassion because of their plight and not nearly as much concern about how much we, as a nation, might suffer because we have less money now because we're taking care of all them Mexican folk.. Just can't see that being a major concern of His knowing how much we have and would still have even if all of us shared half of what we own. We've allowed nasty attitudes to permeate our thinking and actions to the point that we don't even represent Christ any more. I don't care what your leanings are politically be it left, right, center, above or below. We're really messing this up. The left can't stand the right and the right can't stand the left and let's cut through the chase and call it what it is. You hate the other side. You can go on about you hate the ideology and not the person until your lips fall off your face and most of you are simply lying. If you believe I am wrong then you have simply lied to yourself long enough that you have actually believed your own lie.
Forget that mess. We can't escape politics because it's as much a part of our society as breathing has become. But do we have to act like the world in all of this? The people in the church need to grow up and I mean everyone. We don't have time for the hate or even "extreme dislike" any longer. Those kids that get abortions... it's horrible. Now that they have done it... love them. They need that now more than anything. Put down the signs and shut up hollering at them. Why not instead go sit down as near the door as you can legally sit. When they come out... hand them a card with your phone number on it and tell them that you are there for them if they ever need to talk. Most might in fact toss it away. But some might keep it and call. Most will sneer at you perhaps and even throwing the card away... one day the reality of what they did is going to set in and they will remember. Maybe they take a drive back to the clinic hoping, maybe even praying, that they might see you there sitting at that corner handing out a card to yet another girl.
None of these things are the only things we can do or should do... we can be creative and the Spirit of God will work through us. But come on... what we are doing now is CLEARLY not working so let's get our head out of our proverbial backsides and recognize the rather obvious. Time is short and we've lost so much of it in our loss of identity and who we are and what we are about. My prayer is that God kicks us all into reality of what we've become and then He allows us time to at least redeem some of the time we've wasted acting just like the world we're supposed to be different than.
REPENT! TURN BACK TO GOD! Redeem the time while there is time left to redeem!
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