Continuing my sidebar of the New Covenant world and the topic of abortion, yes, God gave us life.  And yes, God-given freedom is meant to be used to do good.

Sexual freedom may feel like liberation to women who have bought the “have-it-all” assertions of feminism, but in reality, it’s destructive to culture…to the family…and to women. 

Contrary to popular belief, abortion does not empower women. It empowers men. 

It’s a lie of the highest order and assumes all women are stupid enough to believe Roe v Wade has a woman’s true best interests at heart.  I hear young women protesting, decrying the patriarchy and how men in robes will be telling them to give birth.  Do they not hear themselves? 

Abortion doesn’t liberate anyone but men.  It’s a wolf of chauvinism in the fleece of rights that women think they can feel good about.  But abortion does not elevate women to the status of men, it brings women down below a man’s status and denies women their higher role as the primary builders and stabilizers of culture. 

Women, primarily by virtue of marriage and family, have a unique and powerful contribution to an enduring population and enhancement of culture. 

“One flesh” (that’s marriage). “Be fruitful and multiply” that’s reproduction and family.  That was God’s best for men and women.

I am particularly grieved by men who support Roe v Wade.  Why do they?  I’d argue that at its core, you’ll find chauvinism disguised.  Dig to the root and maybe it’s: (1) So they can sow wild oats as often as they please and there’s no shotgun marriage to force them to live with the consequences of their actions. (2) They profit from abortion in some way, maybe through research grants on fetal tissue or at big pharma or through having a workforce of women who don’t take time off for family.  (3) They think it will score them political points with women when otherwise these men have little in their favor. 

I don’t know.  Boil it all down and the answers are probably what they always are:
Money, Sex, and Politics.

Sexual freedom only exists in the male form because only men can walk away post-pregnancy. Birth control prevents motherhood, but abortion is used only when motherhood was not prevented.  For the woman who chose abortion, make no mistake, there is no true freedom.  Deep down, her mind, perhaps even her body, will always know that she was once—however briefly—a mother. 

Since 1973, men can ignore their role, get out of marriage, have all the sex they want, and go on living, financially free, out of sight, out of mind, moving on to the next woman. 

That is not feminism.  That is not empowering women.  
Women need to be done with that deception and playing the fool. 
Women deserve love and commitment that represents God’s best.

Peter reminds us to “Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil;” (1 Peter 2:16).

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The Series on Roe v. Wade includes:
Http://seminarygal.com/ruminations-on-roe-v-wade
Http://seminarygal.com/life-and-freedom-as-old-as-eden
Http://seminarygal.com/freedom-at-the-expense-of-life
Http://seminarygal.com/no-doomsday-future
Http://seminarygal.com/no-consequence-chauvinism-of-abortion

The pro-Roe movement wants a choice and if Roe is headed back to the purview of the States, there will be more than one State to let women freely choose.  There’s no need for doomsday scenarios, terrible logic, or waving coat hangers wildly at the Supreme Court by young women who are as uninformed as they are afraid because they feel like it’s their right.  That freedom isn’t going away anytime soon. 

This chart illustrates why.  https://www.axios.com/2022/05/14/abortion-state-laws-bans-roe-supreme-court

According to the Guttmacher Institute (which is a friend to abortion, btw), “23 states have laws that could be used to restrict the legal status of abortion” (not eliminate, restrict) and “16 states and the District of Columbia have laws that protect the right to abortion” with four states and DC having no restrictions whatsoever.  I’m not sure what they did with other 11 states (including Indiana, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania among others), but we’ll ignore that for the moment and just say you’ve got plenty of choices.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has declared Chicago will be an “oasis” for abortion…an odd term for sure. Oh ye, young women with coat hangers!  Have no fear!  Come to Chicago or DC or NY or California and you might even get your employer to pay for the travel.  Cue “Midnight at the Oasis” so you can get back to work in the morning. 

Now, for those in the pro-life movement, it’s not a doomsday scenario if some states still allow abortions.  A fifty percent restriction, for example, still saves lives of children whose vulnerability and innocence make them the first victim of abortion. 
Every life saved is worth celebrating. 
With every life saved and cared for, it destroys the false argument
that pro-life people don’t care about babies after they’re born.  
Take care of the first ones and maybe the world will trust you with more.

There have been countless “first victims”—a far cry from the “safe, legal, and rare” mantra that made access easy.  But there are other victims too.  The ones the pro-Roe advocates can no longer silence in a world of social media.

Stories like this one from Luana tell of the secondary victims and the lives impacted forever by freedom at the expense of life.  This photo series appeared on Telegram and yeah, she’s white as are most of the women protesting. 

“I had to tell my husband because of bad choices I made
he would never have his own biological children.”

Infertility is real.  Now think back to the racially skewed abortion services in our last segment.  Pro-Roe architects condition minority women to get rid of their fetuses of color through a procedure that renders many moms infertile. 

Take a moment to ponder the ethical problems of racially skewed infertility. Contrast with sterilization, genocide, depopulation. Now look at all those young white women protesting to keep abortion on demand, as easy as Netflix.
Ethnically skewed infertility for another race doesn’t seem so noble, does it?

Luana’s story continues, “Every day I live with the reality that the only children I will ever bear I killed.”  She experienced both the painful reality of infertility but also the redemption that is available to every woman who has had an abortion.

If there is one take-home message I want through this study of the New Covenant world and how it speaks to the abortion debate, it’s this: History cannot be undone, but you’re not a slave to your history. There is a freedom that doesn’t also come at the expense of life. And it’s the freedom of finding life in Christ that will result in life elsewhere in a far more effective way than legislation.

“If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.   32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.. if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. (John 8:31-36)

Today’s principle: The truth will set you free
and Jesus stands ready
to give you the freedom that is not at the expense of life.

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The Series on Roe v. Wade includes:
Http://seminarygal.com/ruminations-on-roe-v-wade
Http://seminarygal.com/life-and-freedom-as-old-as-eden
Http://seminarygal.com/freedom-at-the-expense-of-life
Http://seminarygal.com/no-doomsday-future

To those in the pro-Roe movement, Roe v Wade represents freedom (specifically reproductive freedom and sexual “liberation” for women), but to those in the pro-life movement that freedom is at the expense of life for the baby who can’t be seen except with a pregnancy test and a high-powered microscope.

But God sees. 

Someday we will see as He does, and every day, science—in honest assessment—
gets a little closer to this biblical reality. 

“I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.  My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.  Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. (Psalm 139:14-16)

To the pro-Roe movement, it’s just a choice, freedom.  But any honest discussion must recognize the way language has been used to create and control public opinion. How often do you see abortion presented as the race issue it is or ascribe hate crimes to the white collars promoting, or the white coats performing, abortions?

The National Library of Medicine has an article, “Perceiving and Addressing the Pervasive Racial Disparity in Abortion.“  In it, the authors write,

“Abortion has been euphemistically described as a “choice” or a human “right.” The undeniable objective reality, whatever one’s political persuasion or ideological posture, is that each abortion is a death. Death by abortion, however, has proven to be an inconvenient reality for many of our politicians and scientists alike. Mortality and fertility are 2 of the 3 principal determinants, along with migration, of the size and demographic composition of the U.S. population.  Given its high incidence and racially skewed distribution, abortion is unquestionably the most demographically consequential occurrence for the minority community.” 

“The most demographically consequential occurrence for the minority community.”  That statement should echo uncomfortably on the heart of anyone who loves a diverse America.  That’s not politics or mere stats.  It’s not inflammatory or anything other than honesty to point out that a third of African Americans are aborted every year at all stages of development, and to what degree is uncertain, the fetus’ parts are sold to research, according to The New York Times. The current administration lifted the ban on fetal tissue research last year and scientists formerly upset with the Trump-era policy are applauding.

I’m guessing the scientific community has been ethically compromised for quite a while,
well before NIH-funded biolabs, Wuhan research facilities, mandatory vaccinations, and promoting COVID mandates even for children like I saw on a TV ad last night.

How much does a doctor’s or scientist’s soul go for these days,
to sell out the lives of children for no imperative medical necessity?
Never forget, Josef Mengele was a doctor/scientist too.

Imagine if pro-Roe architects, politicians, scientific researchers, and yes, Hippocratic Oath doctors, etc. were to lift the veil and honestly describe early term abortion as dismembering a genetic human being (not a tomato or an earthworm, a trout or a puppy).  Predominantly minority human beings with wholly unique, fully human DNA.

It’d be like seeing the African American community, for example,
and erasing 1 of every 3 of them. That’s the population loss.

Self-destruction of their demographic future is the result of such freedom.  Women have been sold a bill of goods called “choice” but call it racially skewed depopulation and suddenly “safe, legal, and rare” doesn’t make it right.  Safe depopulation?  Legal depopulation?  Rare depopulation?  Does it make it “not depopulation” because minority women have been conditioned to do it to their own offspring? 

(Yes, this discussion should make all of us uncomfortable but it’s important for the soul of our nation and the value of black and brown lives who matter enough that Christ died for all of them. We will focus soon on how we can turn discussion to the beautiful redemption available to all in the New Covenant world. First, we must see things for what they are.)

Back to the National Library of Medicine article,
“Black women have been experiencing induced abortions at a rate nearly 4 times that of White women for at least 3 decades, and likely much longer. The impact in years of potential life lost, given abortion’s high incidence and racially skewed distribution, indicates that it is the most demographically consequential occurrence for the minority population. The science community has refused to engage on the subject and the popular media has essentially ignored it. In the current unfolding environment, there may be no better metric for the value of Black lives.” 

Today’s Principle: Each person by virtue of uniquely human DNA
is of value to God.    

Thank you for reading these thoughts as my attempt toward being a peacemaker in a New Covenant world. Any discussion must begin by acknowledging the truth on all sides and seeing neither side of this debate is without sin. All sides can experience redemption.

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The Series on Roe v. Wade includes:
Http://seminarygal.com/ruminations-on-roe-v-wade
Http://seminarygal.com/life-and-freedom-as-old-as-eden
Http://seminarygal.com/freedom-at-the-expense-of-life

Christians, such as I, see that we’re living in a New Covenant world.  One of grace, freedom, love, obedience to Christ, and proclamation of the Gospel.  They are all facets of the New Covenant world.

This New Covenant world has deep roots before the Old Covenant
and even back to Eden
when God gave Adam and Eve both life…and choice.

“And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.” (Genesis 2:16-17)

Do you see?  It’s right there.  Life and freedom.  They are both God-given and held in near equal regard by Him.  God surely knew that with Freedom, some would not choose what brings Life. Adam and Eve did not. Importantly, God resolved the challenge of Life and Freedom–not by stripping Freedom to promote Life–but by sending Christ to die for our sins and give us Life eternal. That’s the New Covenant world in which we live.

Today’s principle is that God honors both Life and Freedom. He gave both in the beginning. Because He honors both, these are the ground rules from which we derive informed, biblical understanding of events and issues the Bible does not specifically address.

There is no simplistic world in which Roe is overturned and everyone moves on, but we can start with an informed baseline. Thank you for continuing to bear with me as God has laid this divisive topic on my heart and I am called to speak peace.

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The Series on Roe v. Wade includes:
Http://seminarygal.com/ruminations-on-roe-v-wade
Http://seminarygal.com/life-and-freedom-as-old-as-eden

I beg your indulgence as I branch the New Covenant idea to venture into political territory today and for the next few installments.  It’s important or I wouldn’t do it.

The decision on Roe v Wade was issued on January 22, 1973.  For any woman born in 1960 or after, it’s been part—even though controversial—of the very fabric of our reproductive lives. 

I am as pro-life as a woman comes and that’s why I’d like to speak to my friends in the pro-life movement and to those in the pro-Roe movement.

If the landmark decision gets overturned as the leaked draft indicates is a possibility, it’s going to change the entire landscape overnight.  I suspect it’s going to be political pandemonium for a while, and I’d like to urge patience and caution upon all who have strong feelings about this.

For those who have never known life before Roe, there will be feelings of deprivation and betrayal of what had been their lifelong ground rules.  Suddenly, there is renewed scary talk of back alleys and coat hangers, things of abortion folklore that will never happen again in a global world, if it ever did on any significant scale.  But protestors and pundits inflaming matters—through social media and a few minutes of going viral—will not help anyone.  May cooler heads prevail.

Constitutionalists, like myself, see turning the decisions local, back to the States, as being more in line with what the Founders designed.  The Tenth Amendment states that “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”  States Rights – US Constitution – LAWS.com .”

But any decision to return power to the States
is not the same as turning back the clock
and pretending this Roe thing was just an unimportant parenthesis,
kind of like how some people view blipping over genealogies in Scripture. 
It changed our world, and we can acknowledge that.

A New Covenant World speaks grace and truth. It offers the Gospel as healing. It speaks peace into chaos. Please bear with me as I explore why we cannot simply turn back time. In the coming installments, I will point to some of the complex issues forthcoming in the “abortion wars” as legal scholars call our future.

What do you think of when you hear the word “covenant”?  In my biblical worldview, it is a core rock-solid promise with a gentle wrapping of love and boundaries for safety, and security.  It has positive vibes all around it.  It’s unconditional love and always a good thing.

God’s covenants were special because God establishes covenants and God keeps them—both those He promised to the world in general and unconditional to Israel, in specific. 

There is one that came with strings regarding our behavior for a period of time.  The Law of Moses (Mosaic covenant) came with the fact that if you obey, blessings follow.  If you don’t, expect trouble.  God’s boundaries are for safety and security and if you cross that boundary, don’t expect God’s safety and security to follow you when you’ve abandoned Him at the border.  He is faithful to the conditions He set forth.

Exodus 24:1 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Come up to the LORD, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance, 2 but Moses alone is to approach the LORD; the others must not come near. And the people may not come up with him.”

 3 When Moses went and told the people all the LORD’s words and laws, they responded with one voice, “Everything the LORD has said we will do.”

Not depending on them to remember, it was put in writing
and sealed in blood. 
They would be without excuse, having promised to obey…twice.

Exodus 24: 4 Moses then wrote down everything the LORD had said. He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and set up twelve stone pillars representing the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 Then he sent young Israelite men, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as fellowship offerings to the LORD. 6 Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and the other half he splashed against the altar.

 7 Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the LORD has said; we will obey.”

 8 Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

People are always less likely to keep their end
even though they twice-promised they would be faithful.  
They abandoned God over and over again.
So God, in His grace, adapted the covenant after Jesus purchased our forgiveness.

Hebrews 8:8 God found fault with the people and said: “The days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah…10 This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord.  I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

Old Covenant, New Covenant. 
Both ratified in blood.
Now Jesus paid it all…
and opened for us that new and living way. 

The old way had been in effect since Genesis.  It was a dead way.  Animal sacrifices over and over and over because sin flowed non-stop from a sin nature we inherited from Adam (and Eve), the first sinner(s).

The old way was designed to remind us that the “wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).  Bloody death.  Ritual sacrifice and a high priest to do it…imperfectly.

Until there was a new and living way opened by Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 10:14 For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy. 15 The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says: 16 “This is the covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.” 17 Then he adds: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.” 18 And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary.

Dispensing with the old way of sacrifice, Jesus was crucified for us. 
And now there is a new and living way.

Hebrews 10:19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body,

This new and living way comes with a new to-do list.  Not the old way of trying to remember and keep the whole law perfectly and a myriad of sacrifices to make up for failures.  Away with that impossibility!  Now there’s a new way.  A new priest.  And new things to do in response to the new way:

• Have confidence:  22 “let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.”
• Be steadfast in faith:  23 “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.”
• Be multipliers: 24 “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds,”
• Be a community of worshipers: 25 “not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing,”
• And be encouragers to finish well:  “but encouraging one another– and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”

The old dead way did not do any of that.  It was individual and it was dead.  It was riddled with doubt since it was all dependent upon man’s imperfect effort.  The new and living way inspires so much more because it is perfect. 

A tell-tale sign of someone who has not put their trust in the new and living way
is how much energy is devoted to earning something that cannot be earned. 

Do you know the freedom of trusting in this new and living way?
If so, what will you do on this new to-do list … today?

Until Resurrection Day, death had the final say. 

I wonder if Satan chortled an evil chortle in Eden as he thought he’d outsmarted God.  Maybe thinking God had made a pivotal error of promising, even threatening mortality if Adam (and Eve) ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, though it was forbidden.  Death, ha, ha!  I imagine our adversary thinking.  There’s no coming back from that!  Image scrimmage. Ha, ha, ha! 

Whatever laughter there may have been came to an abrupt end at Jesus’ Resurrection.

God’s work through Jesus Christ made all things new. 
He is Risen. 
A New Day.  A New Say.

1 Corinthians 15:55 “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” 56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.  57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

A New Day.  A New Say.  Jesus did it all.

Colossians 2:9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority …13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Do you realize how powerful this is?  For thousands of years, mankind had mortality hanging over our heads like an executioner’s hood reminding us that death is imminent. It could happen at any second. All of mankind lived with a constant threat that something could come along–at any moment–and kill us and then, just like that, it’s over.  Forever.

A new day with Resurrection
means that death no longer has the final say in your life and mine! 
We don’t need to fear death at all!  It no longer has a hold on us! 

Jesus has the final say over your life–a glorious game changer with eternal results!
Have you received this free gift of eternal life in Him?
He graciously gives it to all who trust in Him. Just ask Him.

On Easter Sunday, I went to a local beach with my parents for a sunrise service to celebrate God’s making all things new in the resurrection of Christ.  A highlight for me was watching the sun rise in the east as the full moon set over the Gulf of Mexico.  It made me wish I had a better camera than my old phone because God put on a lovely display of celestial glory for all to see in a cloudless sky.  The sermon, however, was less than stellar.

I know I’m pickier than most about the content and delivery of sermons, but more than just the missed opportunity, there was enough doctrinally wrong to confuse people and keep them walking the wrong path. That is what made it a travesty.  It made me think about the essential elements that must be present in a good Easter message.

It’s not just reading the Easter story for the bazillionth time (although frankly, one can’t go wrong with God’s own narrative of the event).  It’s easy to see how pastors can feel like it’s hard to make such a familiar passage fresh and interesting, especially on a high-expectation day for “Christmas and Easter Christians”.  That is perhaps the reason the pastor at my son’s church didn’t read it at all.  He focused on other Scriptures…which ironically made for a better Easter message than the one I heard.

It’s not enough to mention Jesus’ name. 
Or saying He is Risen indeed!
Or that the tomb was empty.

There are probably lots of people whose name is/was Jesus, even in that day as Colossians 4:11 and “Jesus, called Justus” would suggest.  Someday, all of us in Christ will rise and our tombs will be empty. 

He wasn’t just the first to figure it out
like the first figure skater to successfully perform a quadruple or quint axel. 
Without Him, we would never be resurrected to eternal life.

Therefore, here is my list of Essential Elements of an Easter message and you can see how yours stacked up:

Mankind must be presented as both the pinnacle of God’s creation and as sinners.  We are:

• God’s Image bearers. 
• But we have a sin nature due to Adam and Eve’s sin in Eden. 
• God’s Image is present but broken, and we are unable to earn our way or to help ourselves out of this situation. 
• The curse of sin is death. Mortality means all people die until Jesus returns.
• Any hope rests in God defeating death.

Jesus must be presented as the unique Son of God. 

• Fully God, able to change our predicament. 
• Fully man, able to represent us. 
• He must be completely sinless, crucified, fully dead, and buried in a tomb. 
• He must fulfill all Scripture about the Messiah as well as what He predicted 
• He must be in the tomb for 3 days and then rise from the dead. 
• His resurrection must be of His body.
• He must appear to witnesses to prove to man what God later affirms as acceptable sacrifice in the ascension and giving of the Holy Spirit.

Without the essential elements regarding mankind, there is no need for a Messiah.  No need for payment for sin.  No reason it couldn’t be a do-it-yourself project of earning your way to be with God like every other world religion.  We are not rather good people who just need a little Jesus and to show kindness by seeing Jesus in everyone.  We’re (even the best of us) sinners and mortality is our outcome. 

Instead of perfect endless living (eternal life),
pure endless dying is what we’ve earned. 
That’s called “Hell” and Jesus came to save us from that.

I don’t know how your Easter message stacked up this year.  But next year, listen beyond the surface, the jokes, and the attempts to make Easter fresh and interesting.  Listen for what is essential and how God made all things new in Christ.

Revelation 21:1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”5 He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

He is making all things new. Do you believe it?