Thursday, December 20, 2012

Abortion - The Massacre That No One Is Talking About

As we continue to watch the events in Newtown, CT, we are saddened for the needless loss of life.  We are saddened that 26 people were killed by a man who was most likely out of touch with reality.  We are saddened that these families have to go through such agony and grief.  Instead of these families sharing the Christmas season opening gifts and spending quality family time together, they will have the unfortunate task of burying a child during a time that is supposed to be filled with joy and happiness.

As Americans, we find the slaughter of 20 innocent young children and 6 adults to be an atrocious act committed by a completely deranged person.  How could anyone do something so horrendous?  To what depths of depravity can someone reach?

As horrendous as the murders of these children are in our eyes, it pales in comparison to the greatest massacre that we face today.  And that massacre is abortion.  We should not have to see even 1 case where a child, or anyone else for that matter, is murdered in cold blood.  Yet, the unborn are aborted every day by the thousands, in cold blood, and no one bats an eye about that number.

In Newtown, there were 26 people murdered in cold blood.  Since the legalization of abortion in 1973 in the United States, there have been more than 50,000,000 innocent, unborn children murdered through the medical procedure we know as abortion.  Yet, no one is on the news today, talking about the number of children that are aborted each and every day.

For some reason, our society today does not seem to have a problem if we kill innocent children, so long as they are still in the womb.  I, for one, would love to know why a child outside of the womb is more valuable than the potential of the child that is still in the womb.  We even have the terrible procedure where a child is allowed to be partially born, then killed before it is completely out of the womb, a 'procedure' we know as partial-birth abortion.  And while there are pro-abortion people who are against this procedure, there is still considerable support from the pro-abortion movement for this kind of child-murder.

Our society has killed off the unborn at an alarming rate.  And while the numbers have slowed down a little bit over the last 10 years, we are still aborting close to 1,000,000 unborn children every year.  While the pro-abortion crowd cheers the fact that there are not as many abortions, the pro-life crowd continues to mourn that there is even 1 abortion every year, much less 1,000,000 abortions.

Abortion is an atrocity committed against the helpless, defenseless, unborn child.  While we are appalled when someone goes into a school and kills children, or someone goes into a movie theater and randomly shoots and kills people, or we hear that a dictator in some third world country kills thousands and thousands of his fellow countrymen, why are we not as equally appalled when we find out that abortion providers have legally taken the life of millions upon millions of unborn children since the legalization of abortion?

While we need to take time to stop and mourn for the loss of life in Newtown, CT, and pray for these families that are directly, and indirectly, affected by this tragedy, we also need to stop and pray that this senseless murder of the unborn comes to an end in this country.  No society should accept the loss of innocent life, even if it is legal.

Abortion stops a beating heart.  It kills a living being inside the womb.  The fact that this kind of act is legal is sad.  The fact that there are people who do everything within their power to keep abortion legal is even sadder.  The fact that we do not seem to care enough to do anything to stop it - well, that is a problem that we need to address.

We need to stop abortion.  Until then, our society, as a whole, will continue to devalue human life.  Because if we do not even protect the most innocent and helpless among us, who will?

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

A Time To Mourn, A Time To Weep, A Time To Pray

On Friday, December 14, an unspeakable act occurred - 20 children and 6 adults were shot to death by a gunman at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT.  We look at this act in utter disbelief, trying to understand why someone would do this.  To take a gun and use it to kill 20 helpless first grade children and 6 teachers who were doing what they could to protect these children.

We cannot help but mourn the tragic loss of life in Newtown.  There was absolutely no need for this.  There are 20 families grieving for the loss of their 6 and 7 year old children.  It is so hard to fathom what it must be like for these parents to have to bury their children, and it is happening only a week before Christmas.  Usually this is a time of joy and happiness.  It's a time to spend time with those closest to you.  These families will now have to lay that aside and mourn over the loss of their children.

There are 6 adults who perished in this massacre.  By all accounts, they died trying to protect the lives of the students.  They died taking heroic actions against a man intent on killing.  These people died heroes.  We read in John 15:13, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."  These teachers and administrators exemplified that Bible verse - they showed love to those children by trying to protect them, even to the point of giving up their own lives.  Yet, just as the children who perished, these teachers are people who have families, who have children, who have parents.  These families also mourn at the loss of their loved ones.

We cannot help but mourn for the families that lost loved ones that fateful Friday.  We cannot help but mourn for other school children, who lost their friends and siblings that day.  We mourn for the teachers who lost their co-workers.  We mourn for a community that lost 26 people to a senseless act of violence that did not have to happen.

And because we mourn for these affected by this tragedy, we should not be ashamed to weep with compassion for them.  Though maybe not considered to be a manly response, it is very understandable to want to cry for these families.  After all, Jesus Christ wept when his friend, Lazarus, died.  He wept, not only for Lazarus, but for His people and Jerusalem.  If it is OK for Jesus to weep, then I have no problem being able to weep in the face of unspeakable tragedy.

The people in Newtown, CT are experiencing unspeakable tragedy.  We weep with them because we see the tragedy that others must now face.  We weep because we see what unbridled evil is able to do in the heart of someone who allows it to be there.  We weep for the senseless loss of life.  We weep because there are those who do not necessarily mourn over the loss of life, but how they might be able to use this event to further their own selfish, political ambitions.

But as we mourn, and as we weep, we must also pray.  We must pray that those who are so closely affected by this tragedy are able to mourn.  We must pray that these people are able to heal.  We must pray for our schools, that they will be able to keep our children safe.  We must pray for our nation, that we do not lose sight of the fact that we need God's guidance and protection, not just in our schools, but in our communities and in our homes.

It's hard to understand why these things happen.  Why did God allow it to happen?  How could He let this happen to children?  How could someone be this evil?  What drove him to do it?  We may never find out the answers to these questions.  We can look up Bible verses all day long.  We can ask the most learned among us.  And we may never know the answers.

But I think we can take solace in the fact, that even though horrendous events like this happen, God still loves us.  He loved us enough to send His Son to die for us.  I think we would be wise to look at the words of a song written by Marsha Stevens, and heed them.
You said you'd come and share all my sorrows
You said you'd be there for all my tomorrows
I came so close to sending you away
And just like you promised, you came there to stay
I just had to pray.

And Jesus said, Come to the water, stand by my side,
I know you are thirsty, you won't be denied.
I felt every teardrop when in darkness you cried,
And I strove to remind you that for those tears I died.
I also think that we should not be afraid to talk to our kids about this kind of tragedy.  While most "experts" believe that you should not do this, it is important for our children to know that evil exists.  It's also important for them to know what it is like to mourn for others, to have compassion for others, to pray for others.

We also need to show love to our children.  We need to love them, hug them, cherish them.  We just don't know how much longer we have with them.