The Red Herring of Tragedy

The murder of children and their teachers is horrible.  It is unthinkable.  And we have been rightly led to mourn the loss life in Newtown, CT.

But there is a red herring in the reporting of this story.  It is a touchy subject.  It is "gun control".

This is not an defense of the NRA or a pleading for the government to leave us with unlimited access to firearms.  I believe that gun control needs to be discussed realistically, yet I do not think that it will solve the problem. 

Take all the guns out of the hands of every man and woman in the United States and you are left with the same problem on a smaller scale. (And perhaps a larger scale.  Don't forget that we live in a world where people can manufacture bombs with directions off the internet.)

Almost every media outlet has jumped on the idea that now is the time for congress to debate gun control and so "fix" the problem of large scale violence.  They report that this is what President Obama was driving at during his remarks to the memorial service in Newtown.

(Which, by the way, does not seem to be what he was talking about when he said he would use the power of his office to talk with teachers, medical professionals, and law enforcement officers about solutions to the problem.  What do medical professionals and educators have to do with gun control?)

Take the guns out of the equation and you are still left with a man in China who attacked and injured 22 people with a knife, hijackers who destroyed thousands of lives without a single firearm, and a society that defends the murders millions of innocent babies through abortion.

Here lies the real question and the real issue.  Do we truly value human life?  Harry Reid, Brian Williams, and countless others have lamented the slaughter of these young innocents.  And they should.  But do these same men shed a single tear for the loss of innocent life through abortion clinics?  Does the idea that millions of pre-born babies are being slaughtered make you lose any sleep at night?

We cannot create a society that values life outside the womb until we learn to value it inside the womb. 

We cannot see the value of life until we see it through the eyes of God.  Each life is one that He created.  More than that, each life is one for which He shed the truly innocent blood of His Son.

Alas, we shall never value life as much as we should.  And for this we must all repent.  Repent and trust in the blood bought forgiveness of Jesus Christ.  Repent and fight for the life of EVERY human being, born or unborn, rich or poor, young or old. 

Repent and continue to pray: "Come quickly Lord Jesus!" 






Comments

  1. daveDecember 18, 2012 at 10:29 AM

    here is what i was thinking during the news that day... it is still a rough draft

    As I reflect on what happened today (December 14, 2012) I am thankful that I was able to spend the day with my daughter. I can’t get myself to even try to think what the parents of the 20 children are going through. I become nauseous even starting to think about it.
    While I do think about all the evil in the world, I keep thinking about something that I heard from many people today: in line at the post office, on MSNBC, online blogs, friends, Facebook, etc. they kept mentioning how sad it is, especially because they are so young. It seems as if it is sadder the younger the victims are. I agree I don’t really know why, is it because the victims that are younger are more innocent? They can’t stand up for themselves? Are more defenseless? The Columbine incident was horrible, and so was Connecticut today. But was one worse than another? I don’t know, but I sense this one is harder for people to understand because the victims were younger.
    That brings me to the situation I have been really dwelling on. I want to ask the question what is worse than killing an entire kindergarten class? How about a preschool class? Or even taking it to the youngest extremes a nursery at a hospital? Or a hospital unit full of disabled children and terminally ill kids? How would we react if that were to happen?
    I think we would all feel horrible. We would be asking the same questions we are today: Guns? Mental illness? Where is God? Why, why, why? We probably will keep asking the questions.
    But what if we took those kids, those babies in the hospital and looked at the six months earlier? What if all those had been aborted? No one would say a thing. No news broadcast, no back page story, no mainstream blog would touch it. Some would say that would have been a mercy abortion. However, over a million people are aborted ever year in the United States alone. Innocent babies, ones that could not defend themselves or stand up for themselves, are killed without a single media outlet trying to get new angle on the story.
    We are so passionate about helping, helpless children (which is good!), but as a nation we condone, sometimes support, and we even have stories of people encouraging women to abort those same kids before they are born. What is the difference? WHY?
    I know there are exception for the life of the mother, rape, and incest, I don’t want to bring those into this discussion, but I think almost every pro-life person would concede those to keep all the other babies safe.
    Is there a point where we will stand up for the lives of all those beautiful babies who don’t even get to see one day.

    ReplyDelete
  2. JoshuaDecember 18, 2012 at 2:26 PM

    Thanks for sharing this Dave.

    ReplyDelete

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