SIN--THE NEW DIRTY WORD

Sin is one of the easiest things to do.  Most times it can be fun.  Where once, not too long ago, sin was abhorred, it is now adored and encouraged.  Sin has been rebranded.

"Misappropriation of funds" now bears the less shameful tag for "stealing a person's money".  "Partial Birth Abortion"  nicely repackages the new and improved "Infanticide".  Disingenuous is the softer label for lying. You would find it hard to recognize sin by its outer labels.  You have to do some peeling first to see the actual product.

The great lie from the famous garden lives on and thrives even in the "Christian" community today.  "You shall not surely die!"  Just as the devil sneaked into the garden, so has he intruded the Church.  Same old message, same objective--to get the human species to distrust and disbelieve God and to cut mankind from his rightful relationship with his Creator.  It is a strategic war for your soul, for it is a soul tie that binds us to one another and to God.

Now, not everyone who looks the part is a genuine Christian who is truly committed to living by the instructions and Spirit of Jesus. Hey! Not everyone who plays an instrument is a musician.  It takes practice, discipline and commitment, and the results are clearly evident.  Saying that I am a musician does not make me one, and having the endorsement of my friends and family certainly does not make my off-key, rhythm-less noise qualify in front of a panel of discerning judges.

Simply put, God says, "This is the way to go if you want to walk with me.  If you choose a different path I won't go that way with you."  We are of worth to God so even if we go down the wrong path he will help us if we turn around and come back to him.  Our ancestors made choices that affect us down the line.  Some sins are harder to break off because of the spiritual forces behind them.  We normally see sin in the light of the person doing it and the consequences.  But we hardly discern the demonic influences lurking in the background.  Sometimes they team up in order to render the person helpless and enslaved, regardless of how much praying they or others do on their behalf.  So the individual reasons, "Well I must have been born this way, so I will stay this way."

Of course!  We ALL were born this way.  We inherited sin in our spiritual DNA, which went bad after our first parent's choice. The cure for this can only come from the master Physician, Jesus Christ.

Similarly there are some cases in the natural that came about as a result of things going wrong in the womb.  Take the case of hermaphrodites, some of whom undergo sex reassignment surgery in infancy.  It creates a dilemma for persons who would want to judge by external appearances.  There are some things in this life that are too complex for the human mind to fathom.  It is necessary then to have compassion as our Saviour did and not behave as if we have all the answers. Their sin was paid for at the cross.  GOD will determine in his own wisdom who belongs to him and who does not.

If we sin wilfully, consistently, insisting that WE should decide what is good and what is evil, regardless of what God says, then the day will arrive when God makes his final choices known.  If we stubbornly hold on to the devil's lie that we are like gods, knowing good and evil, we shall surely die.  Revelation 21:8.

Need I define the repackaged name for "death"?

IMPLICATIONS OF A PRO-CHOICE GOD

It was the off-season. On a hot, slow Thursday night in September my husband, my post-teenage son and I joined our two friends from New York for dinner at the local pizzeria. 

With a table and entire restaurant (plus staff) to ourselves, we caught up with the happenings in our families, work, community, mutual acquaintances, and, inevitably, politics—local and American. Politics led to religion, which in turn raised the issue of personal conviction, and an examination of their relationship to current social systems and their legal frameworks. Our friend, whose wife in her quest for meaning in spirituality has settled for Buddhism, wanted to politely pin me down with the harder questions about homosexuality, its origins, and the pro-life debate. It was encouraging that we could all participate in the discussion without making each other feel intellectually inferior.

The time just flew. We could have gone on and on but it occurred to me that we might have been delaying the staff so we continued our deliberations in the car as we drove our friends home. The final question posed to me concerned whether God would send people to hell. I could have tried a “Jesus tactic” on him—answering a question with a question. I could have asked him, “What do the scriptures say?” and asked him to read Revelation 20:11-15 and Revelation 21:5-8).

Instead I speculated that under our imperfect human system of laws although a person is guilty there are clauses that provide leniency for the defendant. How much more the Great Judge. The important thing is that a person hearing the gospel and refusing to rightly respond by surrendering one's life to the authority and instructions of Christ should not feel unjustly condemned when he is sent to hell. Let God decide how he will deal with those who never heard.

We parted on good terms and in peace that night. However, lying awake in my bed the following morning I could not help but reflect on the pro-choice argument. 

Liberals and even some conservatives vigorously defend a woman's right to choose whether to terminate a pregnancy or to allow the child to develop. According to their reasoning a parent (in that case, the mother) has every right to decide how many children she will keep, and how many she will discard, as well as make selections based on the sex and health of the unborn baby. Yet more often than not it is a highly offensive offensive notion to pro-choice advocates that God could also be pro-choice.

Why not? If he is the parent, spiritually speaking, why is it not his prerogative to decide how many children he wants and which ones to abort in the trash can of hell?

If there is no hope (cure) for a foetus with a defect (sin) could it be more merciful for him to terminate life in the womb (this transient existence on earth)?  Then why are people finding it unconscionable? In this light, let us evaluate sin and determine whether people born with this birth defect are worth saving or should be expelled...