Friday 24 July 2015

Loving thy neighbour without condoning their sin

Doug Wilson has a great post about how to love our homosexual family, friends and coworkers without celebrating and condoning their sin.  There is a biblically faithful way to love and accept them as people made in God's image without at the same time accepting their sinful lifestyle.  This is a very important topic.  The church (or at least those most often heard in public discourse) seems to divide on this subject along the lines of either avoiding relationships with homosexual folks altogether or accepting their lifestyle wholeheartedly.  In actual fact, neither of these ways is godly love and neither is biblical. 

Here are a couple of quotes from Doug's post that I hope make you want to read the whole thing:
"...taking Scripture with Scripture, we can plainly see that there is a type of interaction with sinners that is not only permissible, but considered as a general pattern in the church, is actually required. In other words, it ought to be normal. There are other instances when Christians should have nothing to do with it."
"This is why wise Christian bakers will never bake a cake for a homosexual wedding reception, and they should always bake a cake for a homosexual’s birthday party. This is why families must not attend a homosexual wedding reception, and why they certainly should attend a homosexual’s birthday party — the one that the evangelical baker made a cake for."
While it is certainly true that biblical truth is always true at all times and in all circumstances, very often the two sides of a particular debate are taking only certain truths and applying them to a situation and the other side is using a different set of passages to justify exactly the opposite actions.  When forming a position on a particular issue, it is important to consider all of the applicable Scripture and the same is true when determining how to live out that truth.  Check out Doug's very wise biblical exposition and application here. 

Tuesday 21 July 2015

Planned Parenthood baby body part trade Part 2

There has been another video released showing another conversation with a high level official and doctor with Planned Parenthood discussing the market for "tissue" from abortions.  By tissue, they mean intact  organs, legs, arms, heads, and other body parts.  PP maintains that they are doing this not for profit - nominal fees intended to recover costs with maybe a bit extra, you know, for the time and effort, the extra trouble they have to go to to ensure that they not damage the body parts that they buyers are looking for.  And again, PP says they do this strictly for the benefits of scientific and medical advancement and that the way they do it is all legal.  The legality is certainly one of the issues currently up for debate, but the bigger issue is not the legality according to federal and state laws but rather where this stands according to God's law.  Of course the murder of humans is against God's law whether those humans are inside of the womb or outside.  They are made in the image of God with the inherent dignity that entails.

You can find the second video here at Doug Wilson's blog.  Again, it is not for the faint of heart, but if you are a Christian you better be serious about seeing the practice of government-funded abortion end, and therefore you better not be faint of heart.  And if you missed the first such video, you can see it here along with some thoughtful exhortation.

Kevin DeYoung has some further good thoughts about the abortion battle in light of the current controversy here.

Al Mohler adds his voice here and Russell Moore here and here.

BUT, if you only read one opinion piece on this whole issue, whether you are already convinced abortion is evil or you are as yet undecided, you really ought to read Rosaria Butterfield's thoughts in her article I Thought Planned Parenthood Protected Family Values.  

This issue is bigger than the US.  Planned Parenthood operates in Canada as well, and often not under that name.  And this issue is bigger than PP since many abortions happen in other clinics and in government funded hospitals.  Pray that these recent revelations about the baby body part trade cause many in our culture to wake up and see the abortion industry for what it is - mass murder on a colossal scale (even when there is no harvesting of baby body parts).  And pray that all who are not already aroused to this cause in the church would wake up and pray for the end of abortion.  Also, pray for and work toward the care of those who currently don't see any other option and declare the forgiveness and love in Christ available for those who now regret their past choices to have abortions.  And as many are doing in the US, consider telling your elected officials that you are absolutely opposed to this practice and that you are dead set against any of your tax dollars supporting this type of thing in Canada.

Father, forgive us our tresspasses.  Lead us not into temptation.  Deliver us from evil. 

Thursday 16 July 2015

Planned Parenthood and the baby body part trade

This post links to some pretty disturbing material, but if you care about the fight to end abortion this is a pretty significant breaking story. 

Douglas Wilson has posted on a recent video which was released showing a doctor very high up in the Planned Parenthood organization discussing the trade in baby organs and body parts, harvested, stored, sold and shipped from their clinics (at least in the US).  I consider Doug to be a very reliable source, but I know that there are very credible seeming things on the interweb that sometimes turn out to be a hoax.  I looked into this story on Snopes and there is quite extensive discussion of the story including official and direct statements from both PP and the makers of the video.  Snopes currently has this classified as "Undetermined" and the issue that doesn't seem to be clear is if the PP clinics are harvesting and selling baby body parts legally (because the mothers have signed a donation form to allow their baby's body parts to be sold and used for research, etc.) or illegally.

However, whether this is being done legally or illegally (contrary to US gov't laws that allow only certain practices regarding the retention and use of the body parts of aborted babies), we need to stop and ask our selves what kind of a society do we live in where the mass murder of babies has become an industry and where a private, for profit, organization like Planned Parenthood can mislead women, kill children, and further profit by selling the body parts of the dead babies.  And we also need to not be hoodwinked by the debate over whether this body part trade is operating fully legally or if it is in contravention of law.  The fact is it is pretty disgusting that it is happening at all.  No matter what the laws of the land are, according to God's law taking human life is wicked and trading in persons as though they were commodities is an abomination.

I encourage you to read Wilson's post here.  Be warned, the conversation in the embedded video link is not for the faint of heart, made all the worse by the casual manner of the doctor.  Part of the power of the pro-abortion/pro-choice lobby is their success in hiding what actually goes on in abortion procedures and their white-washing of the industry as if it were a highly regulated aspect of routine medical care.  This type of story really puts the lie to that rhetoric.  May God have mercy on our culture.