LIFE

What do you think about God? Do you think that he has absolutes? Things that are right or wrong whether or not anyone else believes it? Are there things that are true no matter the repercussions or inconvenience?

One of my earliest memories, I think from age 3, involves a little bouncy ball—probably the kind you get from a toy machine for a quarter. I was in a friend’s back yard one day when I discovered one of these balls, half covered with dirt and abandoned long ago by my playmate. For some reason I wanted that ball, and more than that, I wanted it secretly. So I took it without ever saying a word. Hardly any time had passed before that little ball began to eat me up. I couldn’t think about anything else but the stolen ball. I knew it was worth very little, I knew it would never be missed, and I knew my friend would have given it to me if I had asked, but despite all the justifications, taking it had been wrong, and I knew it.

The sad thing is, I think that often our moral compass is more on target when we’re toddlers than any other time in our lives. For a little kid, the fact that some things are right and some things are wrong isn’t a concept that all that hard to swallow. It’s only after we get a little wiser and grow a little older that the murky shades of gray begin to set in.

No issue personifies this better than that of abortion. It’s something a lot of people feel uncomfortable talking about directly, resulting in the many euphemisms thrown around that make talking about it less abrasive—and consequently much easier to gloss over. Like a frog sitting in the proverbial pot, many years ago our country was boiled slowly with nonsense about tissue and the lifelessness of a fetus until Roe vs. Wade was able to come in and swallow us whole. Suddenly the smallest and most vulnerable lives in our country became defenseless against legislation that left the balance of a life in the hands of its mother.

Justification was cut thick and doled out freely until the nation’s conscience was dulled and many had swallowed the lie. Even after science has proved that life, not tissue, exists from conception, the ruling stands because the desensitizing is already complete. Not even a beating heart, a developing bran, the presence of organs, or anything else can get in the way of a culture set against the right of the unborn baby to life. The inconvenience to our culture cannot be sacrificed to a reawakened conscience.

Now it is all about choice. If you choose life, that's your choice. If another chooses abortion that's her choice. But what ever made us think that the choice of life was for anyone but God to decide?

Recently I was participating in a Walk for Life with the organization we adopted Adrienne through. We were in a local park, so other walkers were out , and one of these made a point of telling us that she believed in a woman's right to choose. It broke my heart, and filled me with a desire to show her Adrienne. I wanted her to look at this perfect, beautiful baby and think of what would have happened if her mom had decided to choose something other than life.

I hate what legalized abortion has done to this country. Who can measure the toll it has taken, not just on the lives aborted, but on those who have been left to deal with the consequences of a conscience that wasn’t completely seared? How has it undermined our families and the moral framework of our country? How many women are left broken instead of empowered because of the “freedom” given to them by our laws?

I am broken for the women facing that choice. I am broken for the lives lost. I am broken for those suffering the aftermath.

This brings me back to where I started. What do you think about God? Do you think that he has absolutes? Things that are right or wrong whether or not anyone else believes it? Are there things that are true no matter the repercussions or inconvenience?

Psalm 139 says
“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know them full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be."

I want to put aside the cultural pressures, the deceptive arguments, and everything else that numbs what I know is right. I want to remember Poppy Joy, a life that not many would have deemed valuable, yet who changed my life and so many others. I want to remember Adrienne, a life who would not be here if her mother had not made the courageous decision to give her life. I want to remember that anyone who God creates is innately valuable, and no amount of legislation, logic, or social convenience can change that.

It’s election time, and I’m not a single issue voter, but I do prioritize the issues, and I don’t have any hesitation telling you that the issue of life is at the top of that list. The next president of our country might have an impact on abortion and the future of our country, and I certainly don’t want to miss out in voting, and then praying for the man who step into office come this January. I received a call from a pollster one night last week, and I was happy to be able to express that this was the biggest deal breaker for me in the election. It's something worth fighting for.

Just a little food for thought.