Things I Don't Get

A coworker walked into a conversation between another coworker and myself. The topic at hand was the nonsensical tweet from Planned Parenthood about how "every child deserves the opportunity to live up to their God-given potential." Nonsensical given their tendency to kill a large number of children. "Oh," the newcomer said, "abortion has given lots of women better lives."

I didn't know what to do with that. I didn't know how to think through it. Killing babies is good if it makes someone "better off"? I mean, purely in terms of numbers, if murdering a baby in the womb gave ... let's be generous ... 75% of women a "better life" (and we'll be generous with that term, too), it would mean that while 100% of the babies killed had no life at all, only 75% had a "better life". That is, statistically more babies were killed than lives "improved". But the sheer magnitude of the claim boggles my mind. I can only conclude, "It's acceptable, even laudable, to kill babies if it makes people happier." Astoundingly enough, even the religious left will hold to this idea. While bemoaning our "narrow-mindedness" and "hate" for other sins they support, they will doggedly defend killing babies as something as narrow as "a woman's choice" and consider themselves "more loving" for the murder they endorsed. These are things I don't get.

I met a young man the other day. He was planning to go into the ministry. He attended a well-known, conservative church. He was studying to become a pastor. "Not the traditional kind," he told me. He was planning to be "bivocational". You know, like how Peter, James, and John were fishermen and Apostles or Paul was a tentmaker and an Apostle and Evangelist. That's well and good. And then it turns out that he is living with his girlfriend (not wife). Now, this guy wasn't uninformed. His church and His Bible said that sexual immorality was sinful. He knows of the clear statement that those who are sexually immoral will not inherit the kingdom (1 Cor 6:9-10). His Bible, just like mine, says, "Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body." (1 Cor 6:18) But he's pretty sure it's okay now to be sexually immoral and a pastor because, after all, times have changed.

I cannot imagine how this works. "Here's the deal, God. I'll tell You which of your commands I'll accept and You can evaluate me on those, but the ones I reject are off limits. I will be glad to be pleasing to you in the commands from you that I allow. You're just going to have to get up to speed -- to come into the 21st century. Look, get a copy of Microsoft Word and revise Your Bible because clearly it's outdated. I can do that for You if You like. In fact, for my own purposes, I already have." Now, I don't expect people who reject God to follow God's commands. That wouldn't be reasonable. It's more difficult for me to think that way about people who claim to want to follow Jesus. But to see this kind of "thinking" from someone who wants to be a pastor is just something I don't get.

There are lots of ideas out there about lots of things. Some I agree with. Some I agree with after changing my own ideas. "Well, now, that makes sense. I guess I was wrong." Some I disagree with, but still understand. "I see where you get the idea that baptizing infants is biblical; I just don't agree." But there is an entire other set in which I scratch my head and say, "Sorry ... I'm not following that at all." Mind you, I'm not here to question these people. I'm talking about the ideas. I'm just wondering how much "reasoning" goes into these positions and how much is more "feeling", "intuition", or something else.