Category Archives: Religion

Five Choice Lies

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When we hurt and the pain is so deep and the memory consistently fresh, we may choose to live in the grey, that space that blurs the definitive. We want to say yes to help, knowing saying no completely shuts us out from the possibility of help and healing. We live in the grey, the place of self-medication by suppression, an alternate reality we hope will protect us from more pain. In the grey we believe we delay the consequences that come from the yes and the no.

Not because of hurt or pain, some of us live in the grey just because it’s easier that way. I’ve seen this with church folk, those who seek to blur the lines of what Scripture says about abortion so they don’t have to toe the line. They are pro-abortion (pro-choice), not because Jesus is but because they say He is based on his compassion. A classic case of this comes from a sermon listed on the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC) website. The sermon used Mark 5:21-43 to justify why Christians should support women who get abortions, both their choice to have one and healing for them after they have had one.

Yes, without a doubt we should help post-abortive women in their healing process but in no way do I believe Christians should encourage women to have abortions, except perhaps in extreme circumstances. Mark 5:21-43, the story about the woman with the issue of blood, show Jesus’ compassion to heal a woman in pain for 12 years but in no way support a woman’s right to kill. Nonetheless, RCRC attempts to create some grey to dwell in.

Following are statements taken from the sermon that help to lay the foundation for what I call five choice lies:

Statement #1—“As Christians who strive to follow Jesus, we can and must be both compassionate and pro-choice.”
Lie #1—“Jesus was pro-choice which means he would support us choosing abortion.” But Jesus said, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second [is] like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-39). To love God is to obey Him (John 14:15) and he says choose life (Deuteronomy 30:19). And to love our neighbor as ourselves is to love the child in the womb as we love ourselves because the child in the womb is the closest neighbor anyone can have.

Statement #2—“In the 60s, horrified by the injuries and death suffered by women around the country due to illegal, unsafe abortions, religious leaders responded as people of faith and conscience must. Reverend Howard Moody and Arlene Carmen organized the first Clergy Consultation Service in New York City, a network of clergy who agreed to help women gain access to safe abortion providers.”
Lie #2—“It’s better to provide safe abortions so women won’t seek back alley ones.” This is the same notion as giving clean needles to drug addicts and condoms to sexually active teenagers. A safe wrong and an unsafe wrong are both wrong. Romans 13:10 tells us not to do wrong to a neighbor and verses 13 and 14 end the chapter by telling us this: “Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires” (emphasis mine). We are never to provide support for people to commit sin.

Statement #3—“[A] fertilized egg is potential life but not actual life. These Christians hold that the life, health, freedom, and moral agency of the pregnant woman are more important than the potential life in her womb.”
Lie #3—“We cannot scientifically tell when life begins.” This may be okay for non-Christians to say and believe, but Christians who believe the God of the Bible shouldn’t even try to use this one to support having an abortion. Most pro-life advocates believe life begins at conception. The makings of a fertilized egg are the beginning of a baby’s life. But I would add that biblically, life begins even before the womb, in the mind of God. In Ephesians 1:4 God says he chose us BEFORE the foundation of the earth. We were alive to God before we manifested in the earth.
Lie #4—“A woman’s freedom supersedes the life of the unborn child.” 1 Corinthians 10:23-24 says, “‘All things are lawful,’” but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful,’ but not all things build up. Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor.”

Statement #4—“Without Roe, life for American women would be thrown more than 30 years in reverse, returning them to the days when women could not fully control the number and spacing of their children. Without Roe, women will be forced to carry fetuses to full term – even when those fetuses have no brain, no limbs, no heart.”
Lie #5—“Abortion is a viable birth control method.” Family planning is something that families should decide together, but death should not be a viable means to help women regulate “the number and spacing of their children.” “Thou shalt not kill” (Exodus 20:13).

The grey might numb the pain or even the guilt but what’s left is a trail of darkness and deception that is hard to flee.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Be a World Changer

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Happy Black History Month, a time of reflecting on the history and happenings in the black world that impacts the whole world. So I ask you today: What are you doing that will change the world? Being a world changer is your Christian heritage. The world referred to Jesus’ disciples as those “that have turned the world upside down.” I want the same to be said of us. Let this talk transcend the days in February and spill into everyday to change the days we see, for Christ and His Kingdom.

I’d love for you to comment on the blog about how you are changing or plan to change the world.

For a little inspiration, check out these sites:

Biography.com
ClassBrain.com

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Deception Demotes

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Did you ever think someone should get kicked out of your church or has someone ever gotten kicked out of your church? I know some people think that everyone who wants to be at church should be allowed to stay there. They have issues, but at least they came to church to try to get rid of them. Well, some people don’t come to church to get help for their issues; they come to church to start some issues. That is their ONLY reason for being there. And because that is their only reason for being there, they are singularly focused and easily cause deception to sweep through swiftly. What should be done with these people? What if you find yourself to be one of these people?

This charge I entrust to you, Timothy, my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you, that by them you may wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith, among whom are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme.—1 Timothy 1:18-20

In this passage we see the Apostle Paul teaching the younger minister, Timothy, how to occupy his position in the church and giving him an example of what he did to people walking in deception. He told Timothy to “wage a good warfare,” meaning fight with all his spiritual might by holding on to his faith and following what he knows to be right. For Hymenaeus and Alexander, those who abandoned their faith and spoke bad things (probably about the Christian faith or its leaders), “Paul handed over to Satan.” We know Paul didn’t literally hand these men to the god of all evil spiritual entities, but his metaphor suggests that Paul no longer served as a spiritual guide, a protector, for these men. He cast them away from his arch of safety, allowing Satan to have free reign in their lives. Parents sometimes do this, throwing up their hands to allow wayward kids to go their way. It’s not that the parents don’t love them, but when the kids have gone too far in their deception the only thing that may bring them back where they need to be is the natural consequences of their sin. Paul realized this and simply helped to facilitate that with Hymenaeus and Alexander and so do churches that kick out troublesome members who “have made shipwreck their faith.”

With strong black women historically allowing our own strength, ethnicity and gender to dictate to us how we handle situations, it’s likely that there have been some Alexander and Hymenaeuses among us. My hope is that we put ourselves in check so we aren’t kicked out of a church, a job, a friendship or a position of confidante in a friendship. Let us leave our place of deception to come back and sin no more.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Don’t Believe the Lies

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Sometimes we, who too often believe we are self-empowered strong black women, lose belief when OUR powers wane. We may begin to think we can’t do anything spectacular, impact a soul with the power of the Holy Ghost or change our mind even though we’ve tried dozens of times. We may not have peace in the midst of a storm. Perhaps we get here because we haven’t understood or really yet believed the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ. We can change that.

    1. Pick preachers who follow this example: 1 Corinthians 2:1-5
    2. Select scriptures that point you toward belief beyond salvation: Psalm 112:6-7, Matthew 5:16, Luke 10:19, Romans 10:17, 2 Corinthians 3:18; Philippians 2:13, 4:13, Hebrews 11:6.
    3. Find friends who will stand with you like Jonathan’s armor bearer: 1 Samuel 14:1-15
    4. Meditate more on these scriptures and other things like them: Philippians 4:4-9

You can do whatever God commands and be whoever He declares you are. Yes. Now please believe that.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Simon the Sorcerer

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Some of us do what we do because we just don’t know anything different. I wondered was this the case with the woman I saw walking in the offering line with more than a little cleavage. I wondered if she purposely pushed her boobs up and out or if she simply came to church in what she had; she believed in Jesus as her Savior and needed to come and praise Him. Maybe she just didn’t know that He was supposed to be Lord, even over her wardrobe. Perhaps she was like Simon the Sorcerer, and seduction was what she knew, even after she got saved.

But there was a certain man, called Simon, which beforetime in the same city used sorcery, and bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was some great one: To whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, This man is the great power of God. And to him they had regard, because that of long time he had bewitched them with sorceries. But when they believed Philip preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God, and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. Then Simon himself believed also: and when he was baptized, he continued with Philip, and wondered, beholding the miracles and signs which were done. Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John: Who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost: (For as yet he was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.) Then laid they [their] hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost. And when Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Ghost was given, he offered them money, Saying, Give me also this power, that on whomsoever I lay hands, he may receive the Holy Ghost. But Peter said unto him, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter: for thy heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee. For I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness, and [in] the bond of iniquity. Then answered Simon, and said, Pray ye to the Lord for me, that none of these things which ye have spoken come upon me.–Acts 8:9-24

We see that Simon deceived using sorcery, but even after He believed in Christ, he himself was deceived; he thought he could buy the power to impart the Holy Ghost, that he could continue to deceive even as part of the family of God. Peter got to the heart of the matter, telling Simon that he was in the “gall of bitterness, and [in] the bond of iniquity.” Though Peter doesn’t say what Simon was bitter about, perhaps he despised that the people of Samaria now followed Philip, Peter and John instead of him. Perhaps his bond of iniquity was that he was still rooted in the allure of deception, not understanding fully that belief in Christ is only the beginning of the transformation. He still needed to hear the truth of the Gospel and let it penetrate and heal his soul so his thoughts would reflect a sincere, not a seducing, heart. He asked Peter to pray for him, but he needed to do this for himself to begin fellowship with God so God could speak directly to him and make a direct impact on his heart.

Some of us have gotten away from, or maybe, like Simon, never had personal fellowship with God. But it’s never too late to repent and walk away from deception, thinking it’s okay just being in God’s family and not having actions that reflect that. Change is possible, even if we are in the bond of iniquity (1 John 1:9).

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith