On: ABORTION - and - DISAGREEING WELL.

As a human and a Christian, I have general thoughts on dialoguing with people I disagree with, because living in 2022 means you can’t and won’t agree with everyone: 

• I think Jesus was willing to listen, learn, and ask questions - and we should be too. (See Luke 2:46).

• I think Jesus picked his battles wisely. He often backed down from fights (see Matthew 17:24-27, 26:52-56; Mark 8:11-13; John 10:39); but, sometimes, He fought fights worth fighting (John 2:13-17). We should pick our battles wisely too.

• I think Jesus was very careful with the emotion of anger - and we should be very careful too (see Matthew 5:22).

• I think Jesus was kind, but also vocal about His sense of truth - and we should be too (see Matthew 23; John 5:14-15, 8:11).

• I think Jesus shared meals with people He disagreed with on all sorts of topics - religion, sexuality, and morality (to name a few) - because all humans are worthy of dignity - and we should too (see Luke 7:36; John 4:1-45; Luke 19:1-10).

• I think Jesus loved and healed disabled and ‘dirty’ humans, because all humans are worthy of dignity - and we should too (see Matthew 8:1-4, 15:29-31).

• I think Jesus could disagree with people, friends, and family yet still love them - and we can too (see Mark 10:21–22; and juxtapose Mark 3:21/ John 19:26-27).

• I think Jesus didn’t label people based simply on their bad ideas or failures - and neither should we (juxtapose Matthew 16:23/ John 21:15-19; juxtapose Acts 15:36-41/ 2 Timothy 4:11).

• I think life can be really complicated and painful and nightmarish sometimes (see Mark 5:2-5; 7:25-26; Luke 8:43-48, 9:38-40) - and sometimes abortion can look like the only option.

• I think Jesus requires that His followers show each other the dignity rebuking one another privately before making it public (see Matthew 18:15-17).

• I think Jesus knew the difference between genuinely curious dialoguers (see John 3:1-14, 4:9-10; Mark 10:17-22, 12:28-34; Acts 16:30), and agenda-driven dialoguers (see Matthew 22:15-17, 23-28; Luke 11:53-54).

• I think Jesus accepted that sometimes He’d be unfollowed (see John 6:54-71), misunderstood (see Matthew 11:25-27; Luke 2:49-51, 9:43b-45; John 12:16), rejected, hated, mocked, and worse (see Luke 4:16-30; John 15:18-25; Matthew 27:24-44) for His ideas.

• I think people rarely change their opinion on an issue after being yelled at, mocked, or belittled (see Proverbs 15:1).

• I think kindness can be transformative, healing, and rare (see Romans 2:4).

• I think we should be slow to anger, slow to speak, and quick to listen (see James 1:19).

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As a Christian, who believes the Bible is true (and presents sexual and moral ethics that are radically rigorous and difficult to live by), I have thoughts on unborn humans:

• I think God made all humans with inestimable value (see Genesis 1:27).

• I think sex is designed by God to be both a good gift and a serious responsibility - not just one or the other (see Genesis 1:28).

• I think God loves all humans (see John 3:16).

• I think growing humans are living humans (see Luke 1:41-42; Exodus 21:22-25).

• I think God loves unborn humans and is meticulously invested their growth and development (see Psalm 139:13-16; Job 31:5; Jeremiah 1:5).

• I think humans killing humans is wrong (see Exodus 20:13).

• I think humans killing unborn humans is wrong (see Exodus 21:22-25).

• I think humans killing unborn humans on a national level is twisted (see 2 Kings 8:12).

• I think children are a blessing (see Psalm 127:3-5).

• I think killing a child in order to avoid discomfort or inconvenience (or in attempt to secure comfort or convenience) or because of pressure (from a god, another human, or cultural system) is wrong (see Ezekiel 16:20-23, 36).

• I think there are different “kinds of homicide” (see Deuteronomy 17:8).

• I think Jesus doesn’t always label people based on their worst decision or mistake (see Matthew 16:23/ John 21:15-19; Acts 15:36-41/ 2 Timothy 4:11).

• I think God doesn’t treat humans the way their sins deserve (see Psalm 103:10).

• I think Jesus’ teachings rearranges how we’re expected us to punish people and treat enemies (juxtapose Exodus 21:22-25/ Matthew 5:38-48).

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As the father of 2 deceased unborn babies (miscarriages) and one newborn baby (5-weeks-old, who carries half my DNA, whose movements I felt while he was in the womb, and whose birth I watched every moment of), I have thoughts on unborn humans:

• I think a growing human being is a living human being.

• I think human life is very valuable.

• I think unborn girls and boys shouldn’t be treated like their bodies don’t matter - by their mom, their dad, or their parents’ doctor.

• I think unborn humans have the right to live.

• I think unborn humans shouldn’t be terminated against their will.

• I think terminating unborn humans is wrong.

• I think the medical community should do everything within their power to save mothers and unborn babies when pregnancy is complicated.

• I think society should provide all the resources and support it can for mothers (and fathers) who desire to keep their unborn baby, but who find themselves in difficult life circumstances.

• I think society should provide all the resources and support it can for mothers (and fathers) who do NOT desire to keep their unborn baby, but also don’t want to kill their unborn baby.

• I think pregnancy and birth are indescribably beautiful and incomprehensibly complex - providing some of the best proof for the divine.

• I think abortion-survivors (whose parents attempted to abort them, but failed) deserve a bigger voice in this conversation.

• I think those who aborted children, but come later to regret the decision, deserve a bigger voice in this conversation.

• I think killing unborn humans should be as illegal as killing full-grown humans, because both are human - valuable and worthy of dignity and life.

• I think it's possible to advocate for both women's rights over their own bodies AND to advocate for unborn babies' rights to life. But this requires taking a stand against abortion.

• I think the only qualification you need to advocate for any other human being's dignity, respect, and right to life is that you must also be a human being (you can be a man, woman, child, eunuch, asexual, whatever).

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I grieve with those who have lost unborn babies for whatever reason, and understand that pregnancy's circumstances can be indescribably painful, complicated, and nightmarish. I’ll listen to you and I’ll love you, even if we disagree. You are human too. You deserve dignity. We are more than our worst moments. We are all made by and loved by God.

It Gets The Job Done.

There was a man who faithfully ate at the same diner day after day. The food was not terribly healthy, but he remarked each day with a satisfied pat on his full belly, “It gets the job done!” The waiting staff would always laugh along with him.

One day, he found a small pebble in his food. He was shocked since he had nearly eaten it! He carefully avoided the small stone, pushing it off his plate with his fork, and called attention to the waitress. He quickly forgave the offense, then patted his full belly and remarked with a forgiving chuckle, “It gets the job done!” 

Days later, however, the same offense occurred, this time with three pebbles! He had only realized it after swallowing one of the small stones lodged in an unsuspecting bite towards the end of his meal. Fearful, he sharply pushed the plate away, gravely concerned for his health, and began to interrogate the waitress. But a self-proclaimed nutritionist also frequented the diner and interrupted the conflict confidently saying, “My dear fellow, a small pebble can hardly do you much harm! Relax! Drink! You will not surely die!” 

The man relaxed. Took a long deep gulp from his water glass, and marveled at how the nutritionist had calmed him with such a confident and favorable diagnosis. He leaned back and grinned, surprised at how good he felt, after having swallowed a rock no less! Perhaps his nutritional assumptions were really just unfounded overreactions to societal expectations. As he left he patted his satisfied belly and said with a slightly more triumphant chuckle “Yes! It still does get the job done!” 

The occurrence became ordinary at the diner, but the man was no longer bound to his dreadful and outdated assumptions. It was just easier to let the professional nutritionist do his thinking for him. 

By now the pebbles grew in size and in number while the portion of real food grew smaller and scarcer. But he paid the rocks no mind - always sure to boldly swallow at least one or two if only to prove to himself that he could! And he declared to every patron in the restaurant that same emboldening phrase which had become almost a mantra, “I will not surely die!” And then, with all the vigor and vim he’d had before, he would give his bulging belly a hearty and familiar slap with both hands, grinning and hollering, “It gets the job done!” 

The days turned to weeks and the man faithfully ate his daily portion of stones. By now the helpings of real food that were put in front of him were scarcely more than a mouthful, with gravel taking up most of his plate. But he had become accustomed to his new diet and devoured the stones so quickly and so unflinchingly that other stone-eaters in the diner marveled. 

Given more time, the man became a proud stone-eater. Pounding no less than a dozen rocks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He became the talk of the diner, and his pride soared. The staff even had a shirt made for him that said, “Chief of Rock-Eaters!” 

Over time he became an encyclopedia of culinary-geodes, able to describe the taste and texture of various stones with such detail that it would cause the mouths of others to salivate. He also started an interest club for rock-eaters of all levels. 

The club grew into a roaring new line of videos, diet guides, and life coaching resources. Before long he was posing for magazines and publishing articles - critics beware! He was living proof of the wonderful benefits of the new StoneDiet™! All of his well-branded merchandise bore one of two slogans, either: “It gets the job done!” or “You will not surely die!

The benefits of the diet included (among many other things): Affordability (rocks are cheaper than food!), Satisfaction (rocks fill up your stomach far quicker than food!), Weight-Loss (rocks cut calories and carbs like you wouldn’t believe!), and Popularity (being a rock-eater is edgy!). And thats not even to make mention of what a great conversation starter it is! 

His commercials almost always featured perfectly-modeled women who were unable to contain their sensual desires for an edgy-looking rock-eating dude.

As you can imagine, his teeth did suffer terribly, ground down nearly to his gum line. But the popularity afforded him the finances to mask the ugliness with dentures, and the man continued his rock eating with no real concern.

When an old family-friend (a Doctor) suggested that rock-eating was detrimental to one’s health and had a mortality rate of 100%, the man threw up his hands and raved. He could hardly bear the sound of the Doctor’s voice. To the popular, published, and seemingly-healthy rock-eater the Doctor’s words were like nails on a chalk-board. He spit back vitriolically at the Doctor, “I will NOT surely die!” and “It gets the job done!”

About this time, at the height of his achievements, he began to notice a subtle growl begin to develop from deep within his gut. Quiet at first. The kind of growl you only feel. But then with time the rumbling grew both loud and violent, with sharp pains piercing him intermittently. 

The man could not seem to put his finger on the source of his agonizing pain. He told a friend about it and the friend suggested, “Perhaps it’s something you ate?” He quickly thanked the friend for their concern with a mild condescension and then dismissed the theory saying, “I’m eating what I’ve always eaten. It gets the job done.”

Day after day the man ate stones for breakfast, and for lunch, and for dinner. Stones of all shapes, sizes, colors, textures, and densities now comprised most of his diet except for rare meetings with family or old friends. He had become a proud aficionado, and shared his passion with almost any passerby. 

Yet his undiagnosed pain grew each day. He developed a tremor and his movements became slow and painful. He also developed a terrible slur, and no matter how hard he tried to be heard most people could not bear to listen very long to his incoherent ramblings about rocks, which now made them feel uncomfortable. Soon he could hardly hold a conversation without vomiting. Sometimes his episodes of acid-reflux were painful, other times embarrassing, and other times they were downright violent.  

His countenance fell, his eyes lost their shine, and he no longer chuckled with his waitress as he sat in the diner booth day after day. He still ate his portion of stones, but was no longer much good in conversations since his friends all feared his violent fits of puking, and could hardly stand to listen to him for more than a couple minutes. With great effort and terrible pain he would pull himself up to his feet after each meal, trying to hold it in. And with a strange detachment and distant stare would tenderly hold his fragile belly, staring at the floor, and with a small unconvincing smile mouth the words “It gets the job done.”

His pain was excruciating, loathsome, and unbearable. And though it were only a few years since the nutritionist had said, “you will not surely die,” he now felt like dying. So he lay in bed, unable to get up and go to the Diner that had become more or less a second home. 

One day, as he slipped in and out of consciousness, alone and afraid, he felt death begin to creep up on him, and he realized that he was without hope of recovering. Then, all at once, he felt the stones bulging in his stomach cavity turning and grinding against each other. And suddenly he knew - firmly and without any measure of doubt, the destruction the stones had wreaked in his body. He wept bitterly - an ugly and gargling cry. And with one great heave and with all the strength left in his pitiful body he slurred the words of defeat: “It never got the job done!” And he wept through vomit and pain crying, “Help! Help! Help!”

And as day turned to night he thought in his mind, “How stupid I have been! Surely, I am about to die!” And “Look at me now on my deathbed made of stones.” 

That very hour, covered in the shame of vomit and misery from the grinding rocks, and grey with death, and in utter exhaustion, just then The Doctor knocked on the man’s Door. And though he had been a dead man, he somehow received the strength to stagger to the door and fall upon the handle. There, in great pain and agony he, opened it and collapsed to the floor. 

The Doctor carefully picked up the good-as-dead man from off the floor. He laid him down on a green couch while he restored the bedsheets and stripped him of his vomit-covered clothes. He took his own jacket from off himself and covered the man in it. The same man who once had been so violently angry with him. The same man who built a self-destructive empire of cheap-satisfaction and had covered his shame with false teeth. And the Doctor - once a stone rejected - became the cornerstone of the dying man’s life.

When the man awoke the Doctor was in his home, at his bedside, feeding him Bread and giving him Water. Patiently, gently, slowly.

Within hours the light began to comeback to the man’s eyes. Within days the vomitous fits became less frequent and the acute and piercing pain began to wane. And though his Doctor was clear that the recovery would be long and that time and pain would be a part of soothing the trauma, He also promised he would never leave.

The man and the Doctor became fast friends and over the years they would chuckle as they’d eat together in the man’s home. And from time to time the man would stop... and with humbled tears in his eyes, and as deep gratitude welled up in his soul, he would say “You really got the job done.”

And they would take long walks to the diner, where the doctor would say sweetly to it’s patrons: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” - Revelation 3:20

A THEORY :: Spiritual Predisposition

Most Christians seek God the same way they “found” God. There’s nothing particularly wrong with it, nothing unnatural about it, in fact it makes a good deal of sense. But if we want more of God, to know the dimensions of Him that we didn’t encounter at first, we’ve got to start being kind to each other.

Here’s a Story:

Two brothers “find” God… or really, God finds two brothers. One’s name is Thinker, and God captivates him with a conversation of reason, or something like that. The other’s name is Feeler, and God captivates him with a supernatural encounter, or something like that.

Pause here: This is fantastic news, right?! God is saving all kinds of different people! Okay, resume.

Naturally the two brothers begin to pursue God through the same means God used to illuminate their hard hearts in the first place. Thinker keeps thinking about God, and Feeler keeps feeling for God. And both of them are growing.

The two start surrounding themselves with like-believers. Thinker seeks God at a thinking-church and by going to thinking-meetings. Feeler seeks God at a feeling-church and by going to feeling-meetings. Both are becoming “strong” Christian men. One is a strong thinking believer, and the other is a strong feeling believer. Thinker is a ravenous book-reader and Feeler is a ravenous prayer-warrior. Thinker thinks Feeler should read with more veracity and exercise his mind, and Feeler feels Thinker should pray with more authority more and exercise his heart.

Over time the chasm grows between the two brothers and now they look so different that they assume the other is doing something wrong. Bitterness stirs. Each becomes so offended that he starts questioning his brother’s salvation. "Perhaps," they say, "we're not even brothers at all." Thinker thinks Feeler is an irreverent gift-worshiper and Feeler feels Thinker is a sad book-worshipper.

It’s lame. It’s stupid. But it’s common.

For Thinker it was Gospel-wine in a Rational-wineskin. For Feeler it was Gospel-wine in an Experiential-wineskin. But instead of continuing to drink good Gospel-wine, they gnaw on their Gospel-flavored wineskin until all that’s left is a lot of opinions and a mess of emotion.

One's got a shriveled heart like the Grinch. One's got a shriveled head like the blonde in Clueless. And this is a problem because the GREATEST COMMAND (according to Jesus) is the veracious engagement of our WHOLE being: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your Heart, Soul, Mind, and Strength.”

They have no idea how badly they actually need each other.

How does the Thinker begin to cultivate a heart saturated with the emotions that his knowledge of the Gospel should be compelling? And how does the Feeler begin to cultivate a mind saturated with the knowledge of the Gospel that so stirs his emotions? The answer, of course, is “Together."

How did YOU “find” Jesus? Has your walk with God maintained that flavor? Do you try to help others find Jesus the same way you did? I hope so! But perhaps it’s time to walk toward the parts of God you know exist but have been uncomfortable approaching. You’ll need some brothers and sisters who are a little different than you. Maybe even a little weird.

Divisions in the Church happen when you only love and listen to part of your spiritual family.

Not only do I need brothers and sisters to point me to deeper unplumbed caverns of God’s nature, but I need brothers and sisters to give me what I really need… not another book, not another encounter, but the Gospel. To pour out Gospel from their varied wineskins into my soul. To show me the Jesus of the Bible through many lenses, cultures, and testimonies until I'm completely captivated with the splendor of it all.

It's the atoning death of one Son and the call of One Spirit in the face of many circumstances that wakes the dead to One Lord.

For Paul, a blinding light and a vision that rattled his soul. For the Eunuch, a Bible study on the long road back to Ethiopia. For some, Paul’s rational arguments in the synagogue. And still for others, the inebriation of their senses and a distinct outpouring of gifts and wonders at Pentecost.

In each of these. One Gospel. One Spirit. One Call.

So rather than demonize each other, perhaps we can marvel together at the kindness of a God that meets us where we’re at. And from time to time maybe we can take off our Spiritual Predispositions, our crusty wineskins, and hear the Gospel afresh from one another.