This is in response to a column in the University of Oklahoma’s student paper on Roe v. Wade. I felt that it was important to respond, and now I feel like it’s important to post it up. It represents a very personal take on the tragedy of abortion in the context of a greater tragedy -- a pandemic of ignorant arrogance masquerading as prevailing wisdom.
It was written with the reader in mind and the assumption that people may not really understand salvation even if they’ve sat in a church all their lives.
The column is here: http://www.oudaily.com/news/2011/jan/26/column-roe-v-wade-still-attacked-38-years-later/
I remember the day well. I was coming up on my 14th birthday and the anniversary of my father's tragic death in an automobile accident. My mother was moving us to the city where she was going back to college to finish her degree. I’d just seen "The Cross and the Switchblade”, and it had made an indelible mark on me: I had interpreted the message to mean that I could do anything, anything AT ALL, and then say sorry and God would just make everything ok. When I heard the Roe v. Wade news a shudder of relief hit me; my plan to beat the system was ON because any female-specific consequences could now be swept away easily, legally.
They say Roe v. Wade was fought for women, for girls just like me. The court tried to forge for me a freedom to make mistakes, as did the message of the movie. They tried to save me, but it was a little, cobbled salvation. It didn't work. Now that I am over 50, I have seen that consequences can't be swept away. I understand that giving me the legal ability to sweep the evidence of my choices away cannot sweep away the consequences of my choices.
The odds on consequences are impossible to calculate. We calculate anyway, the action is taken and its effect on the future unfolds slowly like a retrovirus, obscuring its inception. As life goes on we find ourselves trapped, victims of dice rolled long ago, in ways that are out of our control, no do-overs. I can deny my choices in the inception but I can’t escape their effects.
Consequences are like God’s last ditch effort to stop us, to jar us awake: as they pile up we find we need Saved from our little, cobbled salvations. Age and regret can make a person long for more wisdom than they could ever have, and forgiveness, and to wash the blood off their hands, and help for the ones who are young, who are making their own beds now, sleeping in them always -- and the terrible realization that there is no one on earth who can fill That need.
Among reasons people oppose abortion the most important ones are not as contrived and foolish as the author has been led to believe. Maybe the author hasn't yet watched the effects of her own misguided choices blow up in agonizing HD before her eyes, totally beyond her control. Maybe not yet, and my most sincere desire is that she never make arrogantly foolish choices and suffer the consequences. But she will. We can’t not.
Then maybe the author will feel differently. Or at least understand better.
As we get closer to the end of our little myopic lifetimes and myopic understanding of the past as it relates to the needs of the future we can see more clearly that Little We don't have a lever or a place to stand from which to stem the tide of the disasters the choices of the parents bring on the children.
May the author, and the generations, feel the searing longing for a Truth that is higher than our heads and can Save us, mostly from our arrogant ignorance. That longing produces better plans.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
An Interesting Turn of Events
An excerpt from the book I have been reading, “Walk of the Spirit, Walk of Power” by Dave Roberson. The book is available HERE. I didn’t realize. Did everyone else know this? Am I the only one who had no idea what this gift was about?
The book is about the role of the gift of tongues: when I was reading it, it made me think of the scripture in John 3:6 --That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Think of it, God the Holy Spirit, praying in a language that I don't know, in concepts I can't even begin to understand, and using my own mouth to birth into being His own plan to fulfill His destiny for my life. No wonder he says, "I thank God I pray in tongues more than all of you". This is literally a no-brainer. What a relief. I'm going for it, not going to waste time on skepticism.
___________________________excerpt begins here:
With that prayer language, He gets involved directly with you in a one-on-one relationship that is independent of anyone else, even of your own mind. When the Holy Spirit prays for you, He takes the plan He hears the Father utter and pours it through your spirit. And the language He uses to express that plan as it flows through you is the supernatural language of tongues.
Every time you give the Holy Spirit opportunity, He will use that language to pray for your calling, to pray out the plan of God, to edify you, and to charge you with His Holy power. He will lend Himself to you as your faith allows Him to be activated within your spirit. He will pull you out of everything Jesus set you free from and into everything Jesus says that you are in Him.
If you want to, you can go into your room and pray in that supernatural language for two, four, or even twelve hours, and God the Holy Spirit will create every single word that comes out of your mouth. It is your choice to pray or not to pray. But every time you do choose to pray, you will come out of that time of prayer more edified in His plan and purpose for you than if you hadn’t done it.
God’s plan for you is in the Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is in you. The Holy Spirit is armed with the knowledge of everything He heard about God’s redemption plan for you before the foundations of the earth. And every time He searches your heart, He does it with the intention to pray that plan -- the mind of God concerning you -- into existence in your life.
The more of God’s plan we find, the more the Holy Spirit (who is the Executor of spiritual law) will be able to bring natural law under subjection in our lives.
Natural law governs the circumstances that surround us, causing things to go for or against us -- making us either rich or poor, sick or healthy, happy or sad. But God designed natural law to be made subordinate to spiritual law. And since the divine plan for our lives comes from the very heart of God, it is enforced as spiritual law… The Holy Spirit then employs those laws to see that circumstances -- natural laws -- line up with the purpose and plan of God for our lives.
We cannot pray consistently for very long (in tongues) before the things that don’t belong in God’s plan for us begin to fall away.
The Holy Spirit continually searches your heart with the intention of removing everything that is contrary to the will of God, your Father the Planner. Then the Holy Spirit replaces it with the plan He heard for your personal life before the foundation of time when God formulated His plan for you. He prays the perfect plan of God into your spirit so you not only know what you are called to do but how to fulfill that call in the perfect timing, will, and power of God.
God trades your natural plans and ideas for His through the supernatural medium of exchange, tongues for personal edification. You can know beyond a shadow of doubt that as you yield to that divine exchange, all things will indeed work together for good for you, because you love God and are called according to His purpose.
____________________________
In the book Roberson tells about how he left his job because he knew God had called him to ministry. He didn’t know what to do next, so he decided that he would pray during the hours he would have worked and trust God to pay him, to take care of His family, meet his needs.
Yesterday I found out that I am not going to be able to go to work until I can walk, till I can perform my job normally. Even though I am healing well and quickly, that means at least four or five more weeks. Yesterday I was wondering what to do with my time, and today I found an answer to that question. I am highly motivated to get me some of the above -- so I am going to spend the whole time, more or less, praying in tongues.
I am getting so much from this book. It clears up so many things that I just didn't understand about how God "strengthens us with might through His Spirit in the inner man". I have been praying about this a lot. It is the foundation of my prayer for everyone on my prayer list. Now I have information.
He is faithful, so faithful.
____________________________________________
The book is about the role of the gift of tongues: when I was reading it, it made me think of the scripture in John 3:6 --That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Think of it, God the Holy Spirit, praying in a language that I don't know, in concepts I can't even begin to understand, and using my own mouth to birth into being His own plan to fulfill His destiny for my life. No wonder he says, "I thank God I pray in tongues more than all of you". This is literally a no-brainer. What a relief. I'm going for it, not going to waste time on skepticism.
___________________________excerpt begins here:
With that prayer language, He gets involved directly with you in a one-on-one relationship that is independent of anyone else, even of your own mind. When the Holy Spirit prays for you, He takes the plan He hears the Father utter and pours it through your spirit. And the language He uses to express that plan as it flows through you is the supernatural language of tongues.
Every time you give the Holy Spirit opportunity, He will use that language to pray for your calling, to pray out the plan of God, to edify you, and to charge you with His Holy power. He will lend Himself to you as your faith allows Him to be activated within your spirit. He will pull you out of everything Jesus set you free from and into everything Jesus says that you are in Him.
If you want to, you can go into your room and pray in that supernatural language for two, four, or even twelve hours, and God the Holy Spirit will create every single word that comes out of your mouth. It is your choice to pray or not to pray. But every time you do choose to pray, you will come out of that time of prayer more edified in His plan and purpose for you than if you hadn’t done it.
God’s plan for you is in the Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is in you. The Holy Spirit is armed with the knowledge of everything He heard about God’s redemption plan for you before the foundations of the earth. And every time He searches your heart, He does it with the intention to pray that plan -- the mind of God concerning you -- into existence in your life.
The more of God’s plan we find, the more the Holy Spirit (who is the Executor of spiritual law) will be able to bring natural law under subjection in our lives.
Natural law governs the circumstances that surround us, causing things to go for or against us -- making us either rich or poor, sick or healthy, happy or sad. But God designed natural law to be made subordinate to spiritual law. And since the divine plan for our lives comes from the very heart of God, it is enforced as spiritual law… The Holy Spirit then employs those laws to see that circumstances -- natural laws -- line up with the purpose and plan of God for our lives.
We cannot pray consistently for very long (in tongues) before the things that don’t belong in God’s plan for us begin to fall away.
The Holy Spirit continually searches your heart with the intention of removing everything that is contrary to the will of God, your Father the Planner. Then the Holy Spirit replaces it with the plan He heard for your personal life before the foundation of time when God formulated His plan for you. He prays the perfect plan of God into your spirit so you not only know what you are called to do but how to fulfill that call in the perfect timing, will, and power of God.
God trades your natural plans and ideas for His through the supernatural medium of exchange, tongues for personal edification. You can know beyond a shadow of doubt that as you yield to that divine exchange, all things will indeed work together for good for you, because you love God and are called according to His purpose.
____________________________
In the book Roberson tells about how he left his job because he knew God had called him to ministry. He didn’t know what to do next, so he decided that he would pray during the hours he would have worked and trust God to pay him, to take care of His family, meet his needs.
Yesterday I found out that I am not going to be able to go to work until I can walk, till I can perform my job normally. Even though I am healing well and quickly, that means at least four or five more weeks. Yesterday I was wondering what to do with my time, and today I found an answer to that question. I am highly motivated to get me some of the above -- so I am going to spend the whole time, more or less, praying in tongues.
I am getting so much from this book. It clears up so many things that I just didn't understand about how God "strengthens us with might through His Spirit in the inner man". I have been praying about this a lot. It is the foundation of my prayer for everyone on my prayer list. Now I have information.
He is faithful, so faithful.
____________________________________________
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