Showing posts with label Jeremiah. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jeremiah. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 04, 2015

Furor over Planned Parenthood's "troubling insensitivity"

The furor over uncovered Planned Parenthood secrets in the sale of body parts of unborn male and female babies has shocked nations.

Anyone speaking out against these newly revealed practices must know feelings similar to those of the prophet Jeremiah, as history repeats itself in disastrous and inhumane decisions. He was punished by a king and the king's ministers for prophesying as God had told him to do.  

Jeremiah warned against the pursuit of false gods and self-interest. And God showed mercy in the delay of his wrath, repeatedly. 

As I read Jeremiah, I realize that the same gods of self-interest are followed everywhere. After videos came out showing Planned Parenthood's practices of human body part harvesting, respectable-looking people went before cameras with words selected to gloss over the implications. A bill was introduced in congress, however, and  reached the U.S. senate for a vote "yes," not to refund Planned Parenthood.   

Senator Tim Kaine voted "no," issuing a statement intended, it appeared, to blur the significant illegalities within Planned Parenthood that violate conscience, morality, and ethics:

     "For many women and families across the country, Planned Parenthood health centers are their only source of high quality health care. That’s why I voted against legislation that would deny more than 2.5 million Americans important primary care services. For years, activist groups like the Center for Medical Progress have sought to create controversy around Planned Parenthood as a way to reduce women’s access to health care. While the recent videos released by this group highlight a troubling lack of sensitivity on the part of a few individuals, moving to unilaterally defund Planned Parenthood is not the appropriate reaction'” (Augusta Free Press).

Enough other senators joined Mr. Kaine in voting "no" to the  bill to defund Planned Parenthood, thereby defeating it. They illustrate a fatal weakness of this nation's increasing tolerance for gross crimes against unborn human beings, growing the way every living person continues to develop into physical maturity, starting inside the mother's womb. 

Sen. Kaine's comments reflect the respectability that is on show, like a rose, for an agency that profits billions of dollars from tax revenues and hundreds of millions from abortions, annually.

Other facts cannot be changed. First, the lives of unborn children were violently taken in abortions, due to other violence, rape and incest; then, the lives of unborn lives were aborted "for any reason or for no reason"; now, up for discussion is the careful harvesting of unborn infants' organs for "caring" reasons. 

Their power, however, cannot touch women who receive their health care at places other than Planned Parenthood, by choice. Women who choose not to use Planned Parenthood record a win every time.

In Jeremiah's day, appealing people that acted with guile eventually had to be silent, as God closed off every escape. 

To sow death and deception means, I believe, a terrible reaping ahead,  a whirlwind.  I would not want to experience such a day. 

"...they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind"...(Hosea 8:7).
 

Monday, January 03, 2011

2011 - A Future and a Hope-Jeremiah and the New Year

Jeremiah
"I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, 
thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope
(Jeremiah 29:12-NKJV).

This is assurance for the believer for any time, day, or year. It is one of Jeremiah's prophetic utterances. These are words for every Christian, for we are children of God, whether Gentile or Jew, down through every generation since Christ walked physically among people and an empire's powerful government. In Jeremiah's day, the people of God had gone astray, ignoring God for other gods. Yet, God's promise was that His thoughts toward His people are always for their good, their peace, their future, and their eternal hope. That's why, generations later, a follower of Christ, wrote this to the Christians living in Rome: 

"And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us" 
(Romans 5:5-NIV-italics added).

God knows the future, and in time Christ came and later sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in us, to guide, teach, help, and comfort. In Jeremiah's day, the people were in exile in Babylon. The prophet wrote: The "LORD of hosts, the God of Israel" told "all who were carried away captive...from Jerusalem to Babylon," to settle there, build themselves houses, work their gardens for their food; to marry, have children and grandchildren so "that you may be increased there, and not diminished" (see Jeremiah 29: 12ff).

"...And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the LORD for it; for in its peace you will have peace." All of that was not the hope, but part of its revealing.

And it happens as God says.

During seventy years in exile, the people did "the final editing of the Pentateuch, of the deuteronomistic work of history (the Books of Samuel and Kings), of many of the prophetic books and also in the composition of new literature (such as the Chronistic works of history, i.e., Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles) that reflects the concerns of the returnees from Babylone [sic]...." 

As writers, doesn't this cause us to pause, to reflect? We are pilgrims on the earth. Our Home is in heaven, with God. That plan is our hope, as Christ is the Person of our hope. Yet, wherever we are, He tells us to go into everyday life with hope. We are to settle, arrange our homes, have families. In the midst of the most difficult circumstances, even a form of slavery, the "lowest of the low," God's people accomplish special works if they remain faithful to God and rely upon Him. In every circumstance, we today, as children of God in Christ, have hope in the Lord. 

This reality is for us in this New Year 2011, every day.
Whatever our plans, for example, for writing, editing, or publishing this year (and we do have, make, and put plans into action, surely!), whatever our hopes for the future--spiritually, personally and professionally--, we have an eternal, many-faceted hope. God puts desires and ideas in us and works them out for our enjoyment, joy, and good, for our future alone and in the community of believers in fellowship. 

What a way of faith in which to face this new year in Christ!  


Bible abbreviation notes:
KJV - King James Version of the Bible
NKJV - New King James Version of the Bible
NIV - New International Version of the Bible 

Bible quote source from Jeremiah is the NKJV.
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