Did God Say?
“The decisive point,” notes Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “is that this question suggests to man that he should go behind the Word of God and establish what it is by himself, out of his understanding of the being of God.… Beyond this given Word of God the serpent pretends somehow to know something about the profundity of the true God who is so badly misrepresented in this human word.” The serpent claims a path to the knowledge of the real God behind the Word. It is not atheism that is introduced by the serpent but idolatrous religion, says Bonhoeffer. “The wolf in sheep’s clothing, Satan in an angel’s form of light: this is the shape appropriate to evil.” This will be the doubt that Satan will introduce through false religion through the ages:
“Did God say?” That plainly is the godless question. “Did God say,” that he is love, that he wishes to forgive our sins, that we need only believe him, that we need no works, that Christ has died and has been raised for us, that we shall have eternal life in his kingdom, that we are no longer alone but upheld by God’s grace, that one day all sorrow and wailing shall have an end? “Did God say,” thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not bear false witness … did he really say it to me? Perhaps it does not apply in my particular case? “Did God say,” that he is a God who is wrathful towards those who do not keep his commandments? Did he demand the sacrifice of Christ? I know better that he is the infinitely good, the all-loving father. This is the question that appears innocuous but through it evil wins power in us, through it we become disobedient to God.… Man is expected to be judge of God’s word instead of simply hearing and doing it.
Michael Horton, Pilgrim Theology: Core Doctrines for Christian Disciples (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012), 143.
No, Gun Control is not a pro-life issue!
Well, maybe gun control is a pro-life matter if it is admitted that guns are effective tools to protect the weak and vulnerable from criminals. It is a pro-life action to save a life from harm. But this blog post is about something else.
Christians are often scolded for failing to include better gun control (or banning) in their arguments against abortion and euthanasia. As defined, abortion is the taking of a human life which is yet unborn. Euthanasia is the taking of a human life who is deemed too disabled, ill, or old to be allowed to survive. Abortion is always involuntary for the baby; euthanasia may be voluntary but is increasingly being made involuntary by families and authorities. To be pro-life, the Christian argues, is to be against these acts of murder.
As the gun control argument is presented, Christians are inconsistent if they do not likewise seek to limit access to firearms so that mass shooting tragedies could be reduced or avoided completely.
But if the argument is made this way, it ignores the fact that the most vocal opponents of firearm access are also the most likely to be proponents of abortion and euthanasia. The irony is that those who would control firearms through state regulations are the same people who invoke the powers of the same state regulators to pay for abortions and euthanasia, to train doctors to perform them and limits protestors’ freedom of expression to protest against it.
The government that enforces laws against murder does not at the same time train killers and provide their weapons. It does not protect them from the consequences of their acts and rightly condemns them.
Comparing abortion, euthanasia to mass shootings and murder doesn’t acknowledge this significant difference, while at the same time refusing to see the one similarity: all kill the innocent all are murder.
No one should listen to anyone who calls for a surrender of firearms but pushes for the government-sanctioned murder of the most helpless people in society. Such a mindset is so skewed, so schizophrenic, so depraved as to be disqualified from the discussion. It matters little if the pro-choice crowd has the peoples’ support, state authority and finance, church support, popular media praise, or the approval of educational institutions. The fact is if they will kill the helpless they will eventually get around to you.
Mass shootings are rare. Abortion and euthanasia are not. Jesus warned against swallowing a camel but chocking on a gnat. Failure to know the difference is what damned the Pharisees of His day and it can do the same today.