Heartbroken Horror

I am appalled by the hypocrisy of the so-called “progressive” political class today.

New York’s state legislature cheered when a bill was passed that would allow for abortions without limit (up to the point of birth), and the order was given to light up the city in pink to celebrate their achievement. Meanwhile, the governor of New York is working to remove the death penalty from the state’s constitution, arguing that it is inhuman to carry out a death sentence for convicted murderers.

So, just to clarify, the life of a convicted murderer in New York is protected,but this is not:baby

Are we clear?

A lawmaker in Virginia presented legislation that would allow an unborn child to be aborted even while the mother was in labor, and the very same day presented legislation that would make it illegal to spray pesticide to kill the fall cankerworm.

So this is protected in Virginia,

worm

but this is not.

baby

Are we clear?

At the 2019 State of the Union address, the entire assembly cheered (rightfully so) and sang “Happy Birthday” in honor of Judah Samet, a holocaust survivor who also escaped the mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in October 2018.  Yet those progressives were suddenly quiet when the President spoke about ending the holocaust of our generation, the millions of lives that are taken each year in abortion.

The women in white cheered and danced at the President’s mention of more women than ever before being elected to office, but their dancing sharply contrasted with their stone-cold expression when abortion was discussed.

Simply appalling.

And yet it is not at all surprising.

For years our culture has been pushing the truth of God’s Word to the margins of life. The idea that we were created by a wise, holy, and sovereign God is set aside for the more popular notion of science: big bangs, evolution, and man as the master of his own destiny. Good and evil are no longer defined by an eternal, objective Truth, but are, among everything else, subjective, situational, and shifting with the times and culture, determined by the current milieu.  The value of the person sitting next to me is no longer drawn from the fact that he or she bears the image of God, but only in their positive contribution to society.

Francis A. Schaeffer once wrote in Whatever Happened to the Human Race?,

“If man is not made in the image of God, nothing then stands in the way of inhumanity. There is no good reason why mankind should be perceived as special. Human life is cheapened. We can see this in many of the major issues being debated in our society today: abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, the increase of child abuse and violence of all kinds, pornography … , the routine torture of political prisoners in many parts of the world, the crime explosion, and the random violence which surrounds us.”

As we read in Romans 1:21–25:

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

Every God-fearing, Bible-believing, disciple of Christ should fall on their knees, lamenting the brutality of the world around us.  Our children have been sacrified to the modern-day version of Molech (ie. success, pleasure, prosperity, irresponsibility).

But we also give praise to our Sovereign God, because He has allowed the veil to be pulled back, revealing the hearts and minds of those in power. They are exposed for what they truly are, “slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil… [who] though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them” (Romans 1:30-32).

We need to pray.

Pray that God would raise up men like Gideon, who would have the courage to bring down the idols of the day.

Pray that God would give us wisdom, that we might know how to reach this fallen world with the truth of His Word.

Pray that God would give us compassion, that we might come alongside those who are struggling with an unexpected pregnancy, supporting and encouraging them in their decision to choose life.

Pray that the Gospel of Jesus Christ would be proclaimed boldly, so that all who are lost in sin might hear the call to salvation and peace with God.

And when you rise from prayer, having drawn near to the living God, stand firm and be ready to make Him known!

SDG

Evangelism 101 – Know Your Sins

In our Sunday evening worship services I have been preaching a series on Evangelism. We’ve looked at what it means to share the gospel, the pitfalls many encounter when giving a testimony, and will soon be considering (when the weather allows us to come back together) what is essential in sharing the faith.  Within that greater conversation, I thought I would share this excerpt from the Memoirs of Robert Murray McCheyne.  This is a letter he wrote as a pastor to a young girl who has inquired about whether it is necessary to be convinced of one’s sins before salvation.

I think this worth sharing because it is a completely different approach to how many do evangelism today.  We tend today to focus on the benefits of salvation, without ever really explaining why we need salvation in the first place.  Telling people they are sinners, and sinners to the very core of their being is unpalatable, offensive, and not the preferred method of witnessing today. Yet, as McCheyne points out, almost 180 years ago, “you will never go to Christ, the heavenly Physician, unless you feel that your soul is sick even unto death.”

To a Soul Seeking Jesus—No. I.
Seek to Know Your Corruption
Dundee, 1841.

ACCORDING to promise, I sit down to talk with you a little concerning the great things of an eternal world. How kind it is in God that He has given us such an easy way of  communicating our thoughts, even at a distance! My only reason for writing to you is, that I may direct your soul to Jesus, the sinner’s friend. “This man receiveth sinners.” I would wish much to know that you were truly united to Christ, and then, come life, come death, you will be truly and eternally happy.

Do you think you have been convinced of sin? This is the Holy Spirit’s work, and His first work upon the soul (John 16:8; Acts 2:37). If you did not know your body was dangerously ill, you would never have sent for your physician; and so you will never go to Christ, the heavenly Physician, unless you feel that your soul is sick even unto death. Oh! pray for deep discoveries of your real state by nature and by practice. The world will say you are an innocent and harmless girl; do not believe them. The world is a star. Pray to see yourself exactly as God sees you; pray to know the worth of your soul. Have you seen yourself vile, as Job saw himself (Job 42:5, 6); undone, as Isaiah saw himself (Isa. 6:1, 5)? Have you experienced anything like Psalm 51? I do not wish you to feign humility before God, nor to use expressions of self–abhorrence which you do not feel; but pray that the Holy Spirit may let you see the very reality of your natural condition before God!

I seldom get more than a glance at the true state of my soul in its naked self. But when I do, then I see that I am wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked (Rev. 3:17). I believe every member of our body has been a servant of sin (Rom. 3:13, 18)—throat, tongue, lips, mouth, feet, eyes. Every faculty of our mind is polluted (Gen. 6:5). Besides, you have long neglected the great salvation; you have been gainsaying and disobedient. Oh, that you were brought to pass sentence on yourself, guilty of all! Hear what a dear believer writes of himself: “My wickedness, as I am in myself, has long appeared to me perfectly ineffable, and swallowing up all thought and imagination, like an infinite deluge, or mountains  over my head. I know not how to express better what my sins appear to me to be, than by heaping infinite upon infinite, and multiplying infinite by infinite. When I look into my heart and take a view of my wickedness, it looks like an abyss infinitely deep, and yet it seems to me that my conviction of sin is exceeding small and faint.”

Perhaps you will ask, Why do you wish me to have such a discovery of my lost condition? I answer, that you may be broken off from all schemes of self–righteousness; that you may never look into your poor guilty soul to recommend you to God; and that you may joyfully accept of the Lord Jesus Christ, who obeyed and died for sinners. Oh, that your heart may cleave to Christ! May you forsake all, and follow Jesus Christ. Count everything loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ. You never will stand righteous before God in yourself. You are welcome this day to stand righteous before God in Jesus. Pray over Philippians 3:7, 9. I will try to pray for you. Grace be with you.

Bonar, Andrew A., and R.M. McCheyne. Memoir and Remains of R.M. McCheyne. electronic ed. Chicago: Moody Press, 1996. Print.