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Archive for the ‘commentary’ Category

Repost: A Young Man’s Testimony to Suffering and the Sovereignty of God

Posted in commentary, Scripture on July 18, 2010| 1 Comment »

As I wrote last November, this is one of the finest statements on disability and the sovereignty of God I have read.  It was written by Joe Eaton, who may not have even been twenty years old when he wrote it.  Joe lives with spina bifida.

If you have not read it, enjoy and be encouraged!  If you remember it, read it again.

Please notice and praise God for how much Bible Joe works into his reflection!

A Young Man’s Testimony to Suffering and the Sovereignty of God from November 7, 2009.

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New rule: I’m only going to read theologians who actually quote the Bible

Posted in Book Commentary, commentary on July 14, 2010| 2 Comments »

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16-17

Warning: I realize I am writing this out of frustration, which means I should set it aside for a day or two before posting.  Obviously I neglected to take my own advice.

Right now I am working my way through two different books on genetics, ethics, and faith.  One was commissioned by a mainline Protestant denomination and includes representatives of that denomination who work in a variety of disciplines.  The other includes representatives across denominational lines and disciplines, but generally people who have a Christian faith orientation.

The chapters by the professional theologians (seminary professors, pastors, denominational officers) run the highest risk of being the least interesting, least helpful, and most likely to leave me discouraged.  When I see a seminary designation, I find myself getting ready for – nothing at all.

I hate that.  One of the reasons I read is the anticipation of something happening!

I don’t mean to indict them all.  But for some reason, theologians, particularly from mainline denominations, seem to have the least confidence in quoting their most important books and authors.  The most egregious example thus far was a seminary professor who talked about God, about the Bible, about John Calvin and the Reformers, but never actually quoted any of them or even provided references or footnotes.  And then he made all of them (God included) subordinate in authority to his understanding of evolution.  And his understanding of evolution wasn’t that good, either, or at least not articulated in a way that I found worth entertaining.  It was all very light and fluffy on a massively important subject.

So, I didn’t know how to engage his thinking on either his assertions about God or about evolution.  And he teaches in a seminary (that was the discouraging part).

So far, the scientists in these books don’t seem to have that problem.  For example, a department chair of Biology quoted scripture throughout her chapter, along with references to arguments from the science of genetics that she unpacked in a helpful way.  It was interesting, had a point of view, referenced a variety of other authors, scientists and researchers, and concluded with a call to action.  I didn’t agree with all of it, but it was worth the time to read and I learned something.  She really cared about the subject matter.

Similarly, theologians who reference the Bible and actually quote it, present an argument, invite me to think about that argument, and actually seem to think the Bible is worth engaging are far more likely to hold my interest and receive my respect.  Frequently I don’t agree – I freely and enthusiastically embrace the sovereignty of God, and that is a hard thing for most people.  But if they care about and reference the Bible, even if they disagree with what God says about himself in it, they at least demonstrate that the book is worth engaging.

After all, they’ve spent a good part of their lives earning the credentials to write, speak and teach on matters of faith; shouldn’t there be something in the Bible that interests them enough to reference it specifically?

So, I am tempted to create a new rule for myself (which I will no doubt immediately break upon making it): when a theologian is writing a chapter or article or book that includes a discussion of faith or assertions about the nature and character of God, I am going to skim it to see if there is any direct reference to scripture, any scripture at all.  If not, I’m not going to bother to read it.

God in his word says that “all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching. . .”  That seems like a pretty good reason to reference scripture!

Am I being unfair?  What do you think?

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More benefits of long-term church membership

Posted in commentary, Helpful things on July 11, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I was reminded this week of another reason it is a good for those of us dealing with disability to have a long-term connection to a church:  long-term church friends.

We spent a wonderful Thursday with friends of ours who now serve overseas as translators for a people-group in south-east Asia.  We first met them in a Bethlehem small group years ago.  We had Paul and they did not yet have any children.  Over the next seven years before they went overseas, our other three children and all three of theirs were born, each “pair” within months of each other.  Dianne and I are so grateful for their friendship and support through some very hard things.  The hours we have spent in prayer and bible study together would be difficult to count!

So the rare opportunities to spend time together as families are precious. And in the middle of our Thursday gathering, Paul went into one of his spells.

That could have ruined everything.

But, experienced friends that they are, they trusted that we knew what we were doing for him.  There was no unsolicited advice offered.  And they did not freak out.

They also demonstrated their usual deep compassion, which looks nothing at all like pity.  God has granted them a special kind of wisdom which displays personal care and affection, yet without their being intrusive or uncomfortable with our unusual family situation.

So, we made Paul as comfortable as possible and continued with our day, well into the late evening.  He was as safe and comfortable where we were as he would be anyplace else.

So, God gave us the gift of a good day along with a reminder about how unusual our friendships are going to be because disability is part of who we are as a family.  Thanks be to God for his gift of the church from which this friendship flowed!

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An Intellectual Defender of Human Life

Posted in commentary on July 7, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Titles frequently tip where a writer is heading.  “Common ground” is one of those phrases in a title that frequently signals a writer isn’t ready to make a stand on a principle or value, and that important, even foundational, things are open to negotiation.

But I was delighted to find myself mistaken as I read Dr. Charles Camosy’s article, “Common Ground on Abortion? Engaging Peter Singer on the Moral Status of Potential Persons” in the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy (subscription required to read full article).

Dr. Camosy does what Dr. Manninen refused to do: he defends the proposition that moral status is inherent to a person and NOT dependent on the ability to achieve a certain level of rational thought.

Wow!

Then he goes straight at Peter Singer, one of the leading thinkers on the moral acceptability of killing infants with severe cognitive disabilities AFTER they are born.

Dr. Camosy does so in a generous, open-handed way that leaves me understanding more about Dr. Singer’s argumentation than I have in the past, even after reading Dr. Singer’s own work.  And then Dr. Camosy identifies weaknesses and refutes multiple lines of arguments.  He ends by arguing that using Dr. Singer’s own line of reasoning, Dr. Singer should be against surgical abortion.  Truly, that was unexpected.

In the middle of all that, he dropped a bomb that has left my head spinning for the past five days: the important difference between active and passive potency in the defense of human life.  When I get my own head around it, I will write more.

Though I’m not yet equipped to explain it, I can tell you right now why it is important.

Dr. Camosy uses the argument on active potential to make a case for protecting the lives of those who otherwise cannot achieve personhood under other philosophical definitions:

So, the very reason we extend personhood to the severely mentally disabled is the same reason we should extend it to fetuses and infants: the beings in question all have a natural potential for personhood (emphasis mine). p. 590

That is a massively important argument!  It is a warning shot to all who believe that ‘personhood’ requires the ability to achieve a level of rationality.

Why do I pay so much attention to this?  Isn’t a biblical argument sufficient?

Yes, I believe that God will judge rightly and that he sees all the evil things happening in this present age:  “God is a righteous judge, and a God who feels indignation every day (Psalm 7:11).”  The evil done against our children with disabilities will not stand.

I also believe we need to be ready for the arguments that are building to destroy our disabled children, and our infirm elderly as well.  There are some who argue consistently (and I would add, persuasively) that philosophical arguments on the moral status of those with cognitive disabilities is NOT as settled as some would like to believe.

Yet, the confidence of those who disdain our children with disabilities is growing.  Peter Singer, for example, has achieved a certain media-darling status; there is a reason why this professor of ethics gets to write editorials for the New York Times and the Times of London.  He is influencing culture outside of the academy in ways that would have been unheard of a generation ago.

We need to be ready.

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Evil is coming, and Jesus is coming, too

Posted in commentary, Scripture on July 3, 2010| 1 Comment »

Al Mohler helpfully addressed an incredible editorial by Antonia Senior in The Times of London: Yes, Abortion is Killing. But It’s the Lesser Evil.

Antonia Senior believes the discussion about abortion is nuanced:

As ever, when an issue we thought was black and white becomes more nuanced, the answer lies in choosing the lesser evil.

She argues that killing a baby is the lesser evil.  The greater evil would be limiting “complete control over her own fertility.”

Dr. Mohler framed it well:

Moral earthquakes, like earthquakes of the geophysical variety, most often occur suddenly and without warning. At one moment, the moral argument is framed in conventional and familiar ways. Just an instant later, all is changed. An article that appears in the June 30, 2010 edition of The Times [London] represents a moral earthquake that resets an entire issue — and that issue is abortion. This chilling essay is hard to read, but impossible to ignore. To read it is to feel the moral ground shift under your feet.

I agree we are seeing a rapid shift in the discussion about unborn life.  I am not surprised, though, because the framework for Antonia Senior’s argument has been developing for decades, particularly in academic circles.

But something greater will replace this shift.  I don’t know when, but I know it is more certain than where the argument about abortion is going.

Jesus is coming back.

In my devotions for today from Isaiah 63, it described how he is coming back:

Who is this who comes from Edom,
in crimsoned garments from Bozrah,
he who is splendid in his apparel,
marching in the greatness of his strength?
“It is I, speaking in righteousness,
mighty to save.”

Why is your apparel red,
and your garments like his who treads in the winepress?

“I have trodden the winepress alone,
and from the peoples no one was with me;
I trod them in my anger
and trampled them in my wrath;
their lifeblood spattered on my garments,
and stained all my apparel.
For the day of vengeance was in my heart,
and my year of redemption had come.
I looked, but there was no one to help;
I was appalled, but there was no one to uphold;
so my own arm brought me salvation,
and my wrath upheld me.
I trampled down the peoples in my anger;
I made them drunk in my wrath,
and I poured out their lifeblood on the earth.”

Isaiah 63:1-6

The ESV study bible illuminates these verses with this stunning statement:  “The Messiah comes in final vengeance.”

He will not let this evil of abortion stand.  It will end someday, preferably before he returns.  But if not, certainly when he returns.

Thus, ours is not just a cause to protect our unborn babies with disabilities until that day; we have a call to warn those who would destroy them that Jesus is coming back.  And that he offers a glorious answer!

We need to tell them now.  Because when he returns, all evils – lesser and greater – will be dealt with.

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When our friends help the enemies of our disabled children

Posted in commentary, Scripture on July 1, 2010| 3 Comments »

Related to Tuesday’s post, I found another journal dedicated to philosophy and medicine, appropriately titled Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine.  Kudos to them for making their content freely available online.

And even more happily, I found an article supporting a philosophical defense of the unborn, Revisiting the argument from fetal potential, by Bertha Alvarez Manninen:

One of the most famous, and most derided, arguments against the morality of abortion is the argument from potential, which maintains that the fetus’ potential to become a person and enjoy the valuable life common to persons, entails that its destruction is prima facie morally impermissible.  In this paper, I will revisit and offer a defense of the argument from potential.

A defense of an argument that abortion is morally impermissible – great start!

Unfortunately, all moral high ground is completely ceded when the topic of disability, particularly cognitive disability, enters the discussion.  In fact, the article serves the cause of those who would kill our unborn children with disabilities:

The fact that we usually regard the killing of healthy infants as murder, and the fact that we seem to have no moral qualms or objections against bestowing medical treatment upon infants so that they can continue living their lives and realizing their potential, illustrates that potential does matter. At least when it comes to infants, their potential to become persons certainly influences their current welfare interest in continued existence, which, in turn, grounds an interest in medical care and leads to the moral (and legal) judgment of infanticide as a form of murder.

Notice the qualifier of ‘healthy’ before infants in the first sentence.  Dr. Manninen is arguing that there is a difference between the ‘normally’ developing or healthy child and the one who may have a serious medical issue.

But she clarifies in a horrible way what she means, as a parenthetical statement (emphases in bold are mine):

(There does seem to be a problem with this claim (that infants are potential persons) when we consider whether or not a mentally disabled infant, who will never really grow to have the robust mental capacities of a person, has an interest in continued existence. My claim does seem to, prima facie, entail that they lack such an interest, and this may indeed pose a problem given that mentally disabled individuals who are not persons, nevertheless, may experience a life of subjective, although perhaps rudimentary, pleasures. The best response I have for this problem, at the moment, is the following. It is the case that mental disabilities come in degrees, and some individuals with mental disabilities approximate personhood more than others. The strength of the interest in continued existence that a disabled infant possesses may run parallel to how closely she can approximate personhood in the future. As abovementioned, if she has a disease that rendered her unable to ever surpass the mental age of a few months old, her interest in continued existence would seem to be much weaker than the interest in continued existence that a healthy infant possesses. . . )

Remember, the writer of this article supports a pro-life position.  But not for a baby with a cognitive disability that is one degree short of personhood or the ability to approximate personhood.  Whatever that is, of course.

I saw this coming, though I hoped it would not.  The warning about how she thinks about disability was in the very first paragraph:

It is important to note here that the term “person” is used here in the strict philosophical sense; it is not meant to denote any and all human beings, as it is normatively used, but rather any being, human or nonhuman, that has the mental capacity to be rational, self-conscious, autonomous, and a moral agent.

These qualifiers as to who is and who is not a person mirror the strategy of abortionists who refuse to identify a fetus as a human being.

In the end, her position is barely discernible from those who support abortion.  At least those who argue that a mother has greater rights than her unborn child have the intellectual integrity to acknowledge there are two parties with rights.  Dr. Manninen will not even grant ‘personhood’ on these children with cognitive disabilities.

If you are tempted to believe that the strong and intelligent have the authority and right to destroy the weak – no matter the reason – consider these words from God:

For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.  But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;  God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 1 Corinthians 1:25-29

God not only has special care for the weak and foolish, God chooses them to bring down the strong and wise of this world.

And consider Christ’s example:

For he (Christ) was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God. For we also are weak in him, but in dealing with you we will live with him by the power of God. 2 Corinthians 13:4

And God has power beyond the ability of any person:

And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28

There is no one stronger or wiser than God.  In terms of intelligence and capacity, the smartest person in the world is equal with the most profoundly cognitively-impaired human when compared to the infinite measure of God’s strength and wisdom.

Yet Christ was crucified in weakness – and those ‘strong,’ pride-filled, hard-hearted sinners who have been called from death to life by God into faith in Jesus have been counted as righteous because of Jesus.  Amazing!

And that same God has said,“Who has made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord?” (Exodus 4:11)

This God made those babies with cognitive disabilities for his glory and for our good.  Let them live.

And don’t, under the banner of making an argument against abortion, give the enemies of unborn babies another reason to kill them.  Any of them.

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Cancer is about God

Posted in commentary, News on June 30, 2010| 1 Comment »

Cure Magazine is a free magazine and website for those dealing with cancer.  They describe themselves as “combining science with humanity, CURE makes cancer understandable.”  We’ve received it for nearly five years, and it frequently has articles that are useful and helpful.

Recently, though, they explored the issue of faith and its role in the lives of cancer patients and survivors.

It reflected the culture’s understanding of religion:

  • People with ‘faith’ were treated respectfully, but God was referenced generically or as a higher power.
  • There was not one mention of the conflicting truth-claims of different religions.
  • There was not one mention of Jesus.
  • Religion is just one ‘frame,’ and the frame you choose “matters less than the opportunity to find a safe place to go inward and see what is in your heart – what truly matters to you.”

Contrast that with how Joni Eareckson Tada has been communicating about her new issue with cancer, including this encouraging news from yesterday:

Joni’s surgery was completed successfully yesterday evening, and she is resting comfortably, preparing to begin the rest of her course of treatment in the next few days,” Mazza said. “She is appreciative of all the prayers on her and her husband Ken’s behalf and is grateful to God for His sustaining grace and extra measure of strength during this time.

She has Stage II cancer and will require chemotherapy.  Please continue to pray for her.

Her journey with cancer is new.  But her message about God and his sovereignty remains the same:

Of course, I believe that God can and does heal and I covet your prayers to that end. Most of all, please pray that God will pour out grace-upon-grace on Ken and me. We’ll be posting regular updates on “Joni’s Corner” here on our website – also posted here you will find an article called “Don’t Waste Your Cancer” by John Piper and David Powlison, both of whom are cancer survivors. I can’t begin to describe how encouraged I’ve been just reading their insights – I’m sure you’ll say the same after you read it. We join you in resting in the assurance of Psalm 62:5-6, “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.”

Note the differences between how Cure Magazine deals with faith and Joni’s response to her cancer diagnosis, even in the above paragraph:

  • God is personal and powerful.
  • We look outside ourselves for comfort and meaning – to God and to his word.
  • We can find encouragement from the experiences of others who are anchored in the word.
  • Joni doesn’t mention Jesus here (but often elsewhere!); John Piper and David Powlison certainly do in Don’t Waste Your Cancer.

Faith in Jesus is wonderful.  Faith in faith is less than useless; it will destroy.  Joni knows that, so she helps us by being clear on who God is rather than offering a generic statement about faith.

I’ll let Pastor John and David Powlison have the last word, from Don’t Waste Your Cancer:

6. You will waste your cancer if you spend too much time reading about cancer and not enough time reading about God.

John Piper: It is not wrong to know about cancer. Ignorance is not a virtue. But the lure to know more and more and the lack of zeal to know God more and more is symptomatic of unbelief. Cancer is meant to waken us to the reality of God. It is meant to put feeling and force behind the command, “Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord” (Hosea 6:3). It is meant to waken us to the truth of Daniel 11:32, “The people who know their God shall stand firm and take action.” It is meant to make unshakable, indestructible oak trees out of us: “His delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers” (Psalm 1:2). What a waste of cancer if we read day and night about cancer and not about God.

David Powlison: What is so for your reading is also true for your conversations with others. Other people will often express their care and concern by inquiring about your health. That’s good, but the conversation easily gets stuck there. So tell them openly about your sickness, seeking their prayers and counsel, but then change the direction of the conversation by telling them what your God is doing to faithfully sustain you with 10,000 mercies. Robert Murray McCheyne wisely said, “For every one look at your sins, take ten looks at Christ.” He was countering our tendency to reverse that 10:1 ratio by brooding over our failings and forgetting the Lord of mercy. What McCheyne says about our sins we can also apply to our sufferings. For every one sentence you say to others about your cancer, say ten sentences about your God, and your hope, and what he is teaching you, and the small blessings of each day. For every hour you spend researching or discussing your cancer, spend 10 hours researching and discussing and serving your Lord. Relate all that you are learning about cancer back to him and his purposes, and you won’t become obsessed.

Lord, please, let none of us waste what you have given us, for your glory and for our good!

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Sometimes pro-abortion arguments are just silly, but the impact certainly is not

Posted in commentary on June 29, 2010| 1 Comment »

Abortion and disability just seem to go together.  Too many people assume that when disability is identified in the womb, the answer is abortion.

Disability-rights advocates find that argument abhorrent.  So do I.  But maybe for different reasons.

Disability studies as an academic pursuit is experiencing a huge expansion on colleges and universities across the United States.  Some of that expansion is being fueled by the idea that disability should not be confined within a medical model, but should more accurately be described as socially constructed.

For example, under this social theory, a person who is blind cannot see; the severity of the condition can be described in medical terms.  The problem comes from how other people behave towards that blind person, limiting his or her ability for educational development, employment and the like.  Blindness simply exists; discrimination based on the blindness is socially created.  Thus, the disability is not the blindness, but the response of the community to the person who is blind.

Thus, for disability advocates under this theory, if an unborn baby is discovered to have a disability that would lead to blindness, the automatic response should NOT be to abort.  Killing a child based solely on the physical characteristic of a disabling condition is inherently a sign of discriminatory attitudes against all people with disabilities.

I find that argument interesting and worth considering.

Not so fast, argues Becky Cox-White, Ph.D., RN and Susanna Flavia Boxall, in their peer-reviewed article, Redefining Disability: Maleficent, Unjust and Inconsistent, in the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy (only the abstract is available online).  They argue that it is actually ill-advised to consider disability as a socially-caused phenomena.  And then they construct an argument for easy access to abortion.

It was entirely utilitarian in its approach, which I find troubling because it always ends up allowing the strong to dominate the weak.

But it was well presented.  In fact, for most of their paper, I found myself needing to think carefully.  They were maintaining a level of seriousness and academic integrity that required thoughtfulness if I was to address their central argument directly.

Then they got silly.  Not intentionally so, which made it worse.  But silly nonetheless.

For example:

If any act that devalues impairments must be forbidden, consistency generates implications far beyond the reproductive arena. Good reasons exist for believing that harms would be multiplied rather than diminished, particularly if one considers the implications for preventive care.

And what are these ‘harms would be multiplied’ if one were consistent about not wanting to kill babies with disabilities through abortion?

  • “Insofar as prenatal care is encouraged for the purpose of preventing children being born with impairments, logical consistency requires activists to denounce prenatal care as disabling (under the social construct theory of disability).” (Cox-White, p. 569)
  • “The disability activist’s argument, taken to its logically consistent conclusion, would preclude vaccines. For vaccines, just as surely as pregnancy terminations, prevent impairments.” (Cox-White, p. 570)
  • “Examples could be multiplied: Treat glaucoma to avoid blindness. Treat otitis media to avoid hearing loss. Treat arthritis to avoid immobilization. Treat hypertension to avoid paralyzing strokes. Activists must denounce all these efforts — indeed, much, if not all, preventive health care — as disrespecting persons with impairments and contributing to disability.” (Cox-White, p. 570)

It is really hard not to respond sarcastically here.  Pregnancy terminations have not prevented impairments – they have prevented a living human being from being born.

The disability activists’ argument is about NOT KILLING A PERSON because that person has a disability.  It does NOT logically follow that one would then also argue against vaccinations which prevent disability.  The opposite is true – vaccinations allow more children to live.  The additional benefit of not having to live with a disability, which even Cox-White and Boxall freely allow is difficult in this culture, is only available if one is allowed to live.

At least they didn’t try to sugar-coat it as they concluded:

Society’s causal responsibility can be challenged. But even if this responsibility were granted, continuing disability of persons with impairments seems likely: Ensuring less disabling circumstances for those with impairments is likely to cause harm to many others. Because justice requires — absent compelling arguments to the contrary — society to avoid harming all citizens, a society has no in-principle reason to preferentially avoid harming persons with impairments. (Cox-White, p. 571)

They spent 13 pages in a peer-reviewed journal making the case for destroying unborn children with disabilities from a philosophical and practical viewpoint.  They dismissed the role of God, the experiences of parents of children with disabilities, and the experiences of people with disabilities as having any value toward dissuading others from aborting their children with disabilities.  They placed a high value on people’s ability to predict what kind of life they will have, their children will have, and society will have.  Based on no evidence, of course, because none of us can accurately predict our future.

The result from this type of thought: even more children will be aborted simply because they have a disability.  And that’s more than just discriminatory against people with disabilities.

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Don’t get stuck in your own head!

Posted in commentary, Scripture on June 28, 2010| Leave a Comment »

God sent three brilliant warning flares across my sky the past two days.

The first was reading a stunningly self-centered, self-justifying and self-righteous communication on a long-resolved issue.  Even the language that attempted at god-talk pointed back to the person writing it.  I had not seen anything like that for a long time.

The person writing it had experienced suffering of a kind.  But in letting his own sense of reality govern everything, unanchored to anything except his own, finite understanding of events, almost everything he had experienced was turned into a personal affront, virtually every perceived hurt a rationale for sin.

He is stuck in his own head, and surrounded by people ready to help him stay there rather than fight it.  Our culture celebrates such self-justifying behavior.

Yet, it was not so far from where my heart wants to go.  I understand that desire to be “right.”  I know how ready I am to justify my actions.

I need something – or rather, someone – bigger, stronger, and better than me to keep me from going in that direction.

The second was in watching the young couple I mentioned on Friday keep themselves anchored to something much bigger than they are.  Watching their son struggle in his discomfort, knowing he had a major surgery coming in a few hours, I remembered the temptation to despair.  Yet, they did not despair.  The young dad referenced or quoted scripture.  The young mom talked of God and his goodness in making their son just the way he is.  And the tears came.  “Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” is no contradiction.

The third flare came in my one-year Bible reading for Saturday, from Psalm 119:97-104.  See how many times the writer of this section references something other than himself:

Oh how I love your law!
It is my meditation all the day.
Your commandment makes me wiser than my enemies,
for it is ever with me.
I have more understanding than all my teachers,
for your testimonies are my meditation.
I understand more than the aged,
for I keep your precepts.
I hold back my feet from every evil way,
in order to keep your word.
I do not turn aside from your rules,
for you have taught me.
How sweet are your words to my taste,
sweeter than honey to my mouth!
Through your precepts I get understanding;
therefore I hate every false way.

I know my heart is prone to sin, so I am grateful that God sent these three warnings to help me:

  • I do not want to be governed by my sinful heart; the example I saw was entirely ugly and hopeless.
  • I was encouraged by a younger couple remembering the promises of God.
  • And I was reminded by the Psalmist that it is God who provides, protects, guides and teaches.

All for God’s glory, and for my good.

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God knows more than we do, and I am very glad!

Posted in commentary, Prayer Requests on June 25, 2010| 1 Comment »

I met an extraordinary young man earlier this week.  He came into the world on May 15.

This morning (Friday) he will have surgery on his heart.

His young parents are clinging to Jesus.  They are the very picture of ‘sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.’

I was humbled to be in their presence at the hospital and grateful God gave me the opportunity to pray for and with them.  Would you join me in praying for him today?

And I was amazed at how much God has given to us in the common grace of medicine, medical technology and trained medical personnel.  They know what is wrong with this boy’s heart.  And they know how to address the problem.  And they have done it many, many times.

But they don’t know what God knows.  He knows how and why he made this boy, he knows this boy’s days, and he loves this boy more than anyone.  How sweet it is to cling to hope here, in the one who knows all, commands all, and has given us many gifts, like medical care.

After seeing this young family, I watched this video, thanks to Abraham Piper and his blog, 22 Words.

I was just amazed at this as well.  God has made us far more complicated than I can begin to comprehend!

Thank you, Lord, for letting me see and feel a bit of your extraordinary abilities today!  Truly, we can rest in you and all the promises you have given us because you are able to do everything you have said you will do.

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