And yet, God smiles. He rejoices. He dances. He sings. He is radiant in happiness over the reclamation of any one sinner, and He is overjoyed to see those so recovered live out the simple joy of deriving every ounce of their identity, satisfaction and significance from Him. God smiles.
But how could He?
How dare He?
Does He not know?
Does He not care?
Oh, yes. Far more than either you or I do.
And one of the subsequent pains He experiences at the very real evil of abortion is the compounded evil of allowing our own interest in this issue to interfere with the joy we should have in Him and in Him alone. If we are not extremely careful, we can (almost without noticing the transaction) allow our passion for this very right and noble cause to fuel a bitterness over the death of children which will poison our passion for God … a God who is capable of smiling in the midst of the very thing we both ferociously despise.
If we act as if only the ending of abortion will allow us to be joyful, we are essentially acting as though Christ is inadequate for us—telling God that He is not enough. We must have our way as well.
Thus, we must be diligent daily to not let our pro-lifeism become an idol which we worship by seeking our real delight from what it can never deliver and has never done for us.
God loves abortionists. God loves women who abort. And God loves pro-choice politicians. And God even loves pro-choice Christians … just as He loves you in the midst of whatever known and secret sins He has paid to forgive.
How dare we hate whom God loves? And how dare we put our own judgment above His by allowing this particular issue to acquire more importance than the real Love of your life.
“But I’ve never done anything so awful as those people ...”
Ahhhh. Now we see the real issue. Maybe you think that you are saved in part by Christ and in part by your own righteousness. And so maybe we are humble, grateful, loving and forgiving to the extent that we think we owe Him—but no further. The real problem is not in how much better than them we are. The real problem is not recognizing that, in and of ourselves, we are not better than them.
Until we realize that we are absolutely no better than anyone and that Christ still absolutely loved each of us enough to give up everything and come rescue us by His own sacrifice, we will always treat with contempt those who violate the rules we think are out of reach of our own depravity. And even if we succeed at getting this particular abomination stopped, we will have done two even more awful things in the process.
First, you will have alienated from Christ anyone who encounters your wrath. And second, you will have failed to heal the alienation from Christ in you which is the only malignancy that can produce such wrath.
And lest I be misunderstood, I should re-state something very simple: It would be the worst of all shames if you read this article and somehow sought to simply stifle your anger and behave more decently in your fight to end abortion.
You can’t.
But even if you could, that would be worse because then you would be oh so proud of yourself for fixing this heretofore unexamined sin.
Just as with every other element of your salvation, it is Christ alone and our pondering of just how much He has loved us that will transform us into the kind of people who can safely be entrusted with carrying the pro-life message and honoring God at the same time.
Take this to Him. Ponder His love for you. Allow Him to heal you. And from that, watch as your actions become completely different—finally running the risk of winning souls in addition to merely winning lives.