Go, Stand, Speak

We know more than we let on. So Paul tells us in Romans 1. Still our conclusions are not the fruit of careful, dispassionate reasoning. Motives mix up our minds, and too often we end up believing not what we know but what we want to believe. Which is one reason I am so grateful for those who faithfully go, stand and speak outside the baby killing centers in our neighborhoods. The “clients” came to the Orlando Women’s Center in various groupings: boyfriends with their girlfriends; girls with their girl friends; even one grandmother with her pregnant granddaughter. They came knowing that they were not there to have cells removed. They came to murder their unborn babies. The tool they used to suppress that truth, however, was its very banality. They tell themselves that it’s no big deal, precisely because the world doesn’t make a big deal out of it. They thought they would walk in, hand over their cash, and walk out just a little more hollow.

Ordinary Christians, lining the sidewalk, speak a very simple truth- You are going in there to murder babies. Some hold up signs of aborted babies. Some stand and silently pray. Some gently plead. Some boldly preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. All tell the truth- You are about to murder your baby. All tell the truth- the culture is lying; you are about to murder your baby. All tell the truth- you know the truth. If you will embrace Him, you will find life abundant.

Some of the couples walk past sharing the nervous laughter of those walking through a graveyard. Some angrily denounced us. Many drew their hoods over their faces, blocked their ears with their ipods, and hurried past. All heard the truth- I’m here to murder my baby- and all felt its weight. They didn’t believe the lie. They did, however, act on it. They murdered their babies. They went home, and like those on the sidewalk, they mourned the death of their babies. They suppressed the truth, and the result was something even more perverse, more unnatural, than the burning lusts of those Paul addresses in Romans 1-­- mommies murdering their own babies. As perverse as it is, we ought not find this shocking, to be surprised that the unregenerate side with the lies. All of us, in our natural state are of our father, the father of lies.

The second lie is worse. Inside the church, inside the vibrant, orthodox, passionate, politically active, evangelical church we believe this lie- Abortion is a political issue. We should vote for that electable candidate that is more “pro-life” than the other electable candidate. We believe this lie- that abortion is a bad social problem. We should write a check to the Crisis Pregnancy Center. I saw the truth when I went there. Twenty yards away there was no political issue. Twenty yards away there was no bad social problem. I learned the same truth as those who went inside- those who went inside were murdering their babies.

Political issues are solved politically. Social problems are solved socially. But when babies are being murdered, we are called to go there, to stand, and to speak. We are called to bring the potent and powerful Word of God to bear at the very gates of hell. We are called to bear witness to Him, who bore our shame. We, each of us, carry within us the Spirit of Truth. He indwells us. When we suppress the truth, however, we quench Him. Praise God by His omnipotent grace, we are then convicted. We then go, kneel and weep. Our hands are bloody. But they are washed in His blood.