Thou Shall Not Murder

I've been asked to pray for someone very special to me. She shared recently in a public forum that a long time ago, in younger years, she had an abortion. The news that I heard from her that day did somewhat shock me. I know that before God gets a hold of us, we are very carnal. In fact, carnality is a constant fight in a Christian's life always. She didn't share in great detail about the circumstances, but she did say she often feels very ashamed and that God has recently started to move in her life to the point where she is being freed of the bondage of her past. It was an awesome time of confession, repentance and forgiveness.



She went on to explain how it was very difficult for her to be in Dave Gushee's ethics class and couldn't always bring herself to be there. The subjects explored sometimes hit a little to "close to home for her".



While I was reading in my latest issue of CCM magazine, I saw a picture of a fan at one of this past summer's Christian music festivals. I noticed that a T-shirt worn by the individual was solid black and in white letters it said "Abortion is homicide".



What the t-shirt says is correct. How it says it? I'm not sure. It definitely isn't sugar coating anything and that is good. I don't think sin should be sugar coated. But, then I thought about my friend and how seeing something like that would be a reminder, a trigger. I wonder how those who have gone through something as devastating as abortion react when they see a shirt like that? I wonder if some would even wear that shirt because they know how horrible abortion is, and would work to try to keep another from making a terrible mistake.



Hearing some of my friend's story made me realize even more that only Jesus redeems us. We can't change our past, but He is there, willing to wipe off the dry erase board of our life. Some colors are more difficult than others to completely remove from that board. Ever notice that? Black comes off pretty quickly, like the move from a sinner's life in the darkness to life in the Light. Then there is red...red...that doesn't like to come off at all, but it will with some washing. I find that blue is the toughest to remove. The bruised and battered history of our past sins. Jesus erases them, yet we keep writing on that board. He erases them again, and we still see the residue. We can still make out the words. We can see the outline of the words that condemn...we know that these words are not from our Lord, but they are straight from hell.