It sounds like you concisely made the point that murder is wrong because man is made in God’s image, and the law of God is in men’s hearts – and that God has made this so plainly evident that one doesn’t even need to be a Christian to acknowledge it.
Seems like you found yourself in a perfectly useful venue to appeal to natural law. “God’s truth is so evident that even non-Christians understand it.” I’m hopeful that such a point struck the kind of people who have always seen the Christian position begin with a soft, syncretistic premise. “I’m a Christian, and Christians believe abortion is wrong.”
No. It has nothing to do with what we believe. It has to do what is simply true in the world God made.
Thankful for what you’ve written and spoke. May God use it.
Perhaps I’m being careless with my words and reading too much of recent “Defy Tyrants” history into my analysis. The abolitionists have been shouting that rallying cry at the top of their lungs. When disobedience is required because they have deemed current rulers tyrants (and for actions far less oppressive than abortion), it is difficult to hear their words as anything other than threats or ultimatums.
It is easy for me to pump my fists when brothers denounce the unbelieving senators who actively pursue wicked legislation. It grieves me that there are senators who want the bloodshed to continue and even increase. I am disgusted by the conservatives who lack faith and conviction to do anything that comes close to supporting their own party’s platform. I want to call fire down from heaven when professing Christian senators speak about the horror of a woman having to give birth to her rapists child when there are women in the room who have done just that or who were conceived in rape.
I do appreciate my brothers’ zeal. There is a time for prophetic witness, speaking truth to power, and actively opposing the wicked decrees of our rulers. But zeal can often be misguided, particularly when your fundamental rallying cry is tainted. More than one drum needs pounding. The Christian’s witness ought to be more than Psalm 2. Taking into consideration our context and nuancing our words is not necessarily a lack of faithfulness. It may be wisdom. A less combative stance or a more deferential tone may prove to be helpful to the man on the inside who has to have daily conversations with his colleagues about the ins and outs of a bill. And I’m certain it would be better for our own souls.
Could you expand on what you mean by training men to work in the legislative branches of our governments? Do you mean men who work as aides to legislators or who get elected as legislators themselves? Or were you thinking of men going to testify before the legislators, in more of a lobbying or activist sort of role? Or do you mean both?
We need men to take on certain works according to their gifts and character. Accountability to their spiritual authority is necessary for any men desiring to engage in various kinds of activism.
The man who preaches in the streets may not be the man who should testify before a senate hearing. And the man who testifies before a senate hearing may not be the man who should intercede outside of an abortion clinic. And the man who intercedes outside the abortion clinic may not be the man who should run for elected office.
I think we would be wise not to take a one-size-fits-all approach to these works. The ordained men of the church should exercise their authority by identifying men with gifts corresponding to the different works and training them appropriately. Street preaching should be for men who have gifts of compassion. Legislative work as an elected representative requires wisdom, patience, and collegiality. Activism in the statehouse requires men who are thoughtful and know something about strategery. Ministering outside of the abortion clinic (with its increasingly hostile environment) requires men with self-control and faith.
We seem to be so desperate for numbers in these various areas that we don’t dare vet any man according to his strengths and weaknesses. The church needs to do more than call men to the fight; they need to work on the character of the men and be wise about what battle corresponds with their training and natural gifts…or hold them back entirely in some cases.
Rom. 12:3 For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. 4 For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, 5 so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. 6 Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; 7 if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; 8 or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.
There are many who want to minister in the jail I serve as chaplain that I don’t encourage/actively disallow. In the Wild West of jail ministry, often those most desirous are the ones least qualified. At least a partial defense against this is church membership and church recommendation for various roles in our parachurch ministry.
Thank you for your answer. Very helpful. I don’t want to drag out the thread any more than necessary, so I will add a brief comment.
We’re in agreement on the need to properly train and vet men for this work, work that caught us by surprise. We weren’t expecting to be in a position to do this, and we are not prepared. Certainly that was how I felt when I traveled up to the Indiana statehouse a month ago as the special session began.
The thing that I would caution against is any sort of Reformed triumphalism we have on these matters of civil activism. Sometimes, in the background, there’s this assumption that the previous generation, the Jim Dobsons and Jerry Falwells, were a bunch of screw-ups, and that if we do it our Reformed way, we’ll do it better. I don’t believe you have said this, but I wanted to put it on the record. We are not the first to attempt to do this work. I know I myself have often been dismissive of others who have attempted the work, but the fruit in Dobbs is clear: our fathers failed in many ways, but their work helped get us this far.
If we’re serious in our work, we will run into the same constraints, disappointments and temptations. Can we improve the work? I believe we can, and I believe we should aim for that. But we shouldn’t assume from the outset, that because our theology is better, we’ll do better than Jim Dobson and Jerry Falwell.