Yesterday Cas spoke at WBS about the second half of Philippians 3 and knocked it out of the park! (I’m still working on posting the audio but we’re having technical difficulties. I’m probably the difficulty, but I’m working on it.) Since I can’t post the audio, I wanted to highlight something she said that has not only captivated my imagination but given me new direction in my prayer life.

As Cas recounted the conversion of Paul, she pointed out something rather remarkable. In chapter 3 of Philippians we get to witness firsthand the dramatic change between Paul “pre-Christ” and Paul “post-Christ.” In verses 4-6 he describes his previous status as the ultimate Jew and persecutor of the church, but in the rest of the chapter we encounter evidence of a dramatic transformation. Rather than persecute the church, he now builds it up.

What Cas pointed out that I had never heard before is that the Greek word for “persecute” (v. 6) is the same word used in verses 12 and 14 to mean “press on:”

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

The Greek word there is dioko, and like many Greek words its meaning changes somewhat depending on the context. Clearly, there are two different contexts between verse 6 and verses 12-14, given that they are translated so differently. The irony is that both uses occur within the context of Paul’s life. Paul’s life changed so dramatically that dioko took on a completely different meaning when applied to his converted life.

In practical terms, this means that the same zeal with which Paul persecuted the church was now redirected toward growing the church. And when I think about it, that makes sense. God had created Paul with that passionate drive, but because of his fallen nature he was using it for evil. The zeal was good and God-given, but the aim was wrong. So God changed Paul’s life, and changed Paul’s aim. He saw the potential in Paul to use his gifts for the good of the Kingdom, and He used them.

This story should challenge us in the way we see non-Christians in our lives. It’s so easy to take an adversarial stance, getting defensive or pointing out the things about them that are wrong. But what a terribly hopeless perspective!

Instead, the story of Paul should spark our imaginations. Rather than condemn people or judge them, dream on their behalf! Look for their strengths, the things about them that were clearly given to them by God but have simply been misdirected, and then pray for their Christ-like potential.

Maybe you have a friend who excels in the business world but is consumed by the drive for success. What would their life look like, how could they use their gifts, if God got a hold of them? Maybe you know someone who, like Paul, is extremely critical of the Christian faith and enjoys debating all the reasons that God can’t exist. Just imagine if that same passion to engage issues of truth with fervor and zeal were harnessed on behalf of the Gospel?

God has the ability to redeem ANYONE, so it’s important that we pray with that perspective in mind. Rather than simply dislike unbelievers or see them as lost causes, dream God-sized dreams on their behalf! Imagine what God could do with their gifts, and then pray for those things to happen! Such a perspective will help to stave off the us versus them mentality that we so easily sink to, but it is also far more faithful to the redemptive character of God, with whom we ALWAYS have a reason to hope.

About a year ago I wrote a post about a prophetic warning written by the Pope 40 years ago about the cultural consequences of using contraception. Since that time, my then-fiancé and I decided to begin the journey of Natural Family Planning, which I’ve written about it some here.

Ike and I have been married now for about 2 and a half months, and so far NFP has already been quite a blessing. It’s compelled us to talk about a lot of things that we might not have otherwise done, and has been an important part of our growing intimacy with one another, as well as building an important theological foundation for our future family.

So today I want to repost a blog that was written around the time that we embarked on this journey. What I didn’t write when I first posted it is that this information was given to us by a priest that Ike and I happened to sit next to on a plane. We were not yet engaged but we were planning on marriage and in the midst of wrestling through this big issue. As God would have it, we crossed paths with this godly man who happened to be involved in a tremendous amount of pro-life work such as teaching, and fundraising for young mothers. He was very wise and offered us a lot of insight we hadn’t before considered. We both felt that God spoke through him to confirm a lot of what we’d been considering. We are very grateful to him.

_________________

Forty years ago Pope Paul VI released a statement on contraception that, looking back, was stunningly prophetic.

The essay, entitled Humanae Vitae (”Of Human Life”), was written at a time in American history when contraceptive pills were becoming very popular. Women across the country were celebrating their newfound freedom as the history of American sexuality turned a new page.

The Catholic Church, however, was singing a different tune. Unlike the many women who rejoiced over the changing cultural tides, the Pope raised a voice of concern, a concern that we can now see was completely warranted.

Although the Catholic Church’s position on contraception has been debated among Christians (Catholics put a heavy priority on the procreative purpose of sex, whereas many other Christians do not), there is one point on which the Pope was completely right.

If only we’d listened.

What follows is an excerpt from Humanae Vitae in which Pope Paul VI projects the cultural implications of contraception. His predictions could not have been more accurate, and I have posted this today because of the profound impact it has had for women since:

Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection.

Did you get that?

FORTY YEARS AGO, Pope Paul VI predicted the exact situation that we find ourselves in today. He warned that the practice of hormonal contraception would divorce the responsibility of sex from the act of sex. He also feared that, as a result of this divorce, men would no longer need to guard the sanctity of sex, thereby leading them to treat women and sex in a recklessly casual way.

And his fears came true.

Sex without consequences. That is what the contraceptive revolution bought our country. And what do you think happens when we cheapen the price of a costly good? We no longer value it quite so highly.

Pope Paul VI was exactly right.

So while the contraceptive pill seemed like a gateway to women’s freedom and a means for valuing the female life even more, it instead devalued women, giving men the freedom to use them for sexual gratification without weighing the implications of their actions.

Now I write all of this not as a diatribe against the practice of contraception, but to caution us about considering the ideological impacts of the decisions we make. Just because science develops a solution to making our lives easier or providing us with a convenient short-cut does not mean we should embrace it.

Whenever we seek to relieve ourselves of divinely placed forms of accountability and responsibility, we forget that God created those measures for our own protection. Sex is about more than just procreation, but the fact that sexual intercourse leads to the birth of a new human life should cause us to approach the act of sex soberly and reverently.

While the contraceptive pill can’t take all the blame for the objectification of women and the number of absent fathers in our nation, it certainly played its own part. In a consumer-driven culture that wants what it wants right now, we have taken a thousand tiny steps in the wrong direction, and those tiny steps add up to a society that has wandered horribly off the path of truth.

No, the contraceptive pill is not, in itself, an evil, but blank-check contraceptive practices do not coincide well with a Scriptural view on marriage, family and sex. It is time we start examining why. I hope you will ask yourself that question.

The next time you hear someone say, “I don’t believe in having regrets,” pay attention. You’ll most likely hear it from a celebrity on t.v., but it’s a mantra that has come to define our culture. We are a culture that doesn’t believe in having regrets.

What this really means is that no one ever wants to admit they made major mistakes in their life, or that they wish things were different for them. That’s why the idea of a life without regrets is so appealing. It encourages us to surrender ourselves to the tide of the universe, embracing a vague theology about how everything happens for a reason. And there is something to be said for focusing on the future instead of beating yourself up about a past you cannot change. Even from a Christian perspective, God sets us free from guilt. While we should feel convicted about our sin and strive to do better, the punishment for our past mistakes has already been paid. God doesn’t ask us to continue punishing ourselves. From that angle, the mantra of “no regrets” is somewhat compatible with a Christian understanding of God’s sovereignty and His grace.

However, regret and guilt are two very different things. We don’t need to bear the guilt of a sin from which we’ve been forgiven, but we should certainly feel remorseful about it. We should be sorrowful that it happened. But our culture doesn’t make this distinction, which is why the language of sin and guilt is so unintelligible to them. When we try to articulate disobedience to a world that doesn’t believe in having regrets, or when we explain sin to a culture that “did the best they could with what they had” or “made the choice that was right for them,” the concept doesn’t take hold.

This unintelligibility becomes particular obvious in discussing topics of morality, such as divorce or premarital sex. In a world where people don’t have regrets, it doesn’t matter that a person had sex with a ton of different people or that they were married multiple times. These decisions are recounted as valuable experiences that shaped them into who they are. Now they’re stronger for it. No regrets.

Under this light, the ideology’s true colors are revealed. While it portrays itself as the ultimate live-life-to-the-fullest kind of worldview, it’s really just a cover-up for selfishness. Maybe someone has no regrets about their divorce, but what about their spouse, or their children? And while a guy or girl may have no regrets about the people they slept with, what about the partners they may have hurt? While we shouldn’t bemoan the things we had no control over, or be wrought with unending guilt about the past, we should certainly regret the times when we hurt ourselves, or others.
A life defined by regret isn’t healthy, but a life with NO regrets at all is just as unbalanced.

Knowing this about our culture, it does give us some insight on how to articulate our faith. God doesn’t warn us about sin simply because He’s a prude. He’s not a stick-in-the-mud deity in the sky who doesn’t want us to have any fun. He warns us against sin the way a parents warns a child about a hot stove. It will hurt us, and it will hurt others. We live for Christ as a means for being free of those snares, not because we’re better or holier than others.

As Christians we want to be free of regrets, but that doesn’t mean we superficially gloss over the ways in which we’ve messed up. In taking those mistakes seriously, we acknowledge the people we have hurt, including God, while embracing the forgiveness that awaits us in Jesus Christ. A life without regrets does neither.

Every week I get on this blog and write in a way that attempts to sound somewhat authoritative and thoughtful. I like to give the impression that I know what the heck I’m doing, but I really don’t. I’m constantly growing and learning about life and God and myself, and this blog is no exception.

As a writer, I’m always working on two key things, and I still have a loooong way to go on them both:

1) Finding my voice. It’s easy to mimic the countless other Christian voices out there that I think sound really great and I want to be like. Every time I read something thought-provoking or hear a great preacher I think, “Hey I should be more like them.” This is always a disaster. I’m not them and I end up sounding fake. That said, I’m still working on figuring out how Sharon says things best, and to stick with that.

2) Figuring out my target audience.

This second one has been really hard for me. Anyone who’s read my blog knows that it’s targeted towards Christians (in case “She Worships” didn’t give it away) but over the last couple weeks as I’ve written a number of posts, I kept having the thought, “How would this sound to someone who doesn’t believe in this?” Will they be totally turned off by all the Christian jargon and insider language I’m using? While I may be encouraging Christians, am I simultaneously turning off many who aren’t? And not because I’m being judgmental, but simply because of the basic assumptions I’m making? This is the internet, after all–it’s not like I’m holding a secret meeting of Christians that’s safe from the prying ears of those who disagree with me.

Yet sometimes I write like I am.

This is something that a lot of Christians struggle with. Some of us have so immersed ourselves in the Christian world that we don’t know to relate, or even talk to people outside of it. We know how we’re supposed to talk to non-believers, ie. be kind and loving, ask them questions about what they believe, listen to them, and then gently direct the conversation towards Jesus. That’s like every Christian’s covert op for being friends with non-Christians. And while that’s not necessarily a bad thing (it definitely beats standing on a sidewalk screaming at people through a bullhorn) it’s generally not very convincing to people, and it overlooks our greatest evangelistic bridge–our humanity.

As humans, we share a lot of things with each other. We face the same fears, struggle with the same temptations, and we want happiness, health and security. God deals with all of these issues through his Son, and that’s one of the reasons why we follow Him. We don’t have to be afraid anymore. We don’t have to be bound by our anxieties and mistakes. Our humanity finds refuge and wholeness in Christ.

But for some reason, a lot of us act like we left our humanity behind when we became Christians. Because we feel so much pressure to make the Christian life appear totally awesome, we don’t talk about our doubts, our struggles, our regrets, or our fears with much openness. Even when we do talk about those things, it’s with a Christian spin or the tag line, “But God is faithful!” Yes, He is, but sometimes things are scary and awful. Period.

Many of us hide the things that make us human. We turn into Christian robots that smile all the time, always have the right answer, and are thoroughly unable to sustain real relationships with people who think God isn’t real.

This is why the Incarnation is such an important part of the story of Christ. God didn’t become man simply so that he could die in our place. He became man so that he could relate to us. He spoke to the world in a way it could hear and understand. He spoke into our humanity, and continues to do so.

That should be our model for ministry: Be human. Don’t act scandalized when a non-Christian (or a Christian) doubts Scripture–that’s human. Don’t judge when a non-Christian sins–that’s human. And don’t be condescending when a non-Christian struggles to have faith–that’s human.

Conversely, don’t act like holiness and purity come easy to you–that’s not human. And don’t act like you figured out God because you’re so smart or good–that’s not human either.

When I write in a way that only speaks to Christians and excludes the average human being, I have failed. Not only as a writer, but as a called disciple of Christ. Given that Christians are humans too, we need to hear the exact same truths as our non-believing counterparts. The language we use should essentially be the same. That said, if I’m no longer writing for the human heart, then I’m not really ministering well to Christians or non-Christians.

With all of that in mind, I’ve decided that that my target audience is human women. Regardless of what topic I’m discussing, I’m going to try harder to frame my language in a way that any person could understand. Obviously that’s a somewhat impossible goal given that the wisdom of God will many times be foolishness to humanity, but that’s no excuse for me to get lazy either.

The Christian in-crowd language is one of Satan’s greatest tools for short-circuiting our accessibility and authenticity. And he is so adept at it that most of us think it’s not a problem for us. I have non-Christians friends, and I know a lot of Christians who are a TON more socially awkward than I am, so until recently I always talked about Christian-ese in the context of “them.” “That’s something that cheesy Christians do. Not me.” But honestly, I think that’s what the majority of Christians do. Christians who act like broken humans are the exception.

Ultimately, our in-crowd language not only shapes our speech, but our minds and hearts as well. In-crowd language is merely a reflection of an in-crowd community. And as Christians, that’s something we’ve got to avoid. It’s hard to break out of the rut that our language falls into, but it’s something I want to work on in my writing, as well as myself.

This month Forbes published its list of the 100 Most Influential Women in the World.  The top of the list is most composed of CEO’s and successful businesswomen, so in one interesting feature of the list, Forbes asked a number of women for their personal reflections on power. What follows is some of their responses:

• “Confidence is Power” – Lauie Ann Goldman, CEO, Spanx
• “Power is the ability to create change in the world” – Tensie Whelan, Executive Director, Rainforest Alliance
• Power is not being tied to any person or any thing. “If a deal or a relationship does not make sense, I can walk.” – Lynn Tilton, CEO, Patriarch Partners
• “Power is one’s ability to inspire positive change…to impact the global village.” – Tina Sharkey, Chariman and Global President, BabyCenter
• Power is confronting “the demons that prevent us as human beings from living up to our full potential.” – Cheryl Dorsey, MD, President, Echoing Green
• Power is about having choices. – Karen Wickre, Senior Manager of Global Communications & Public Affairs, Google.
• “I feel powerful by being able to influence others in a positive way.” – Missy Robbins, Executive Chef, A Voce Madison and A Voce Columbus
• “I do consider myself to be a powerful woman…having [a] person believe in you is very empowering.” – Deanna Kangas, CEO of Stila Cosmetics
• Power is having “the ability to change the world in powerful ways through collaborative and collective efforts.” – Linda Avey, Co[Founder and Co-President, 23and ME

In response to these reflections, I couldn’t offer a better response than that of author Mary Kassian. On her blog she wrote the following challenging words:

Reading through the Forbes list, and the reflections of these nine “powerful” women made me think how very differently things work in the economy of God. For the Christian woman, “power” has an entirely different meaning. “Power” is not about chipping our way to the top of Forbes list. It’s all about the gospel. The gospel of Jesus Christ is “the power of God.” Paul proclaimed that he would never shrink away from proclaiming that fact. (Romans 1:16)

So what does power look like in a Christian woman’s life? It looks very, very different than the world’s idea of power. For the Christian woman, power is knowing Christ and the power of his resurrection and sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. (Philippians 3:10) Power is not about attaining confidence, prominence, influence, having choices, being the head of a government or having a CEO position in a company. Power is living a cross-centered life. Power is dying to sin and living to righteousness. Power is laying down our lives for the sake of the gospel. Power is humility, and service, and self-sacrifice, and often involves suffering and shame. It’s “sharing in Christ’s sufferings, becoming like him in his death.” That’s a radical thought.

Power in the cross? That truly is a radical thought.

Welcome back to She Worships.  Sharon is still living it up on her honeymoon, but you are sitting by your computer (or snazzy iPhone) reading a blog post from some nerdy medical student.  Sounds like a fair trade huh?  Hey!,  you didn’t have to be so frank.  You could’ve just chuckled.

Like Sharon said on Tuesday’s post, my name is David and I have been friends with Sharon for the last 3 years since I came to town for medical school.  She asked me to write some posts for her while she was away on how we as Christians ought to approach and live in light of the often confrontational opinions of the scientific community.  I hope you had the chance to read Tuesday’s post, but today I want to get down to business with a specific topic today.

Just this week I was reading a textbook on the biological basis of AIDS and was amazed by the first sentence in one of the chapters.  It states “Every science has its borderland where the known and visible merge with the unknown and invisible.” The author, rather than opening with some cold hard fact, opened his chapter with an invitation away from the realm of the known virology of HIV and invited the readers to consider the mystery of its complexity.  As believers this is where we often have to live, balancing the tension of understanding the known and longing for the invisible.

It is in that tension that life exists most of the time.  One area where I still don’t have an answer is the question of the ethics of birth control.  I was talking about this issue with my family the other night, and my mom and my sister-in-law where shocked when I told them that there is a possibility that oral contraceptive pills (OCPs) may cause a chemical abortion after fertilization occurs.  This is a topic that is hotly debated and little consensus has been reached within the Christian community.  I care greatly about seeing healthy marriages raise healthy children and doing so to the glory of God.  It is essential that all of us considering parenthood be educated about this topic. Once again I want to arrange the topic in a series of points.  (Spoiler alert: Parents if you don’t want your kids to know that babies don’t come from storks please screen accordingly.)

1. Sin begins in the heart-The way I see it, the driving factor for the overwhelming majority of abortions is idolatry.  “On average, women give at least 3 reasons for choosing abortion: 3/4 say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities; about 3/4 say they cannot afford a child; and 1/2 say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner.” (1)  For many in our generation children are seen as an inconvenience, yet free and uninhibited sex is an assumed right.  I believe that there is an inherent difference in the willful cessation of a life and the failure of birth control to prevent ovulation for two parents who are trying to do the best that they know how to prevent pregnancy out of very good intentions.  (I know I am just throwing up comment fodder, but it will be fun.)

2. The Bible does not say that life specifically begins at conception- Like I said in point number 3 in my last post; the Bible is not a scientific textbook.  Before you go getting mad about the statement I just made, I think that this issue is painted with a much more significant brushstroke.  You see, I think it is most clear in the Scriptures that in God’s eyes my life began before the foundation of the world.  (Eph 1:4) Paul goes on to say in Ephesians that we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (2:10) I believe that those good works are carried out through supernatural acts of the Spirit AND by the very natural arrangement of my DNA which God ordained to make me the precise version of a human that he desired.  This arrangement of DNA happens at fertilization.  Most of the time.

3. Becoming pregnant is actually incredible complicated-Why this issue is tough for me is the fact that 70% of fertilizations do not result in a viable pregnancy. (2) Fifteen percent fertilizations are not viable due to a failure to implant into the endometrium which is an issue we will talk about later.  For me as a believer, I have to make a faith statement about what I believe happens to those arrangements of DNA that fail to ever develop into ex utero human beings.  The case for fertilized eggs that fail to appropriately undergo integration of the two parent genomes or fail to survive the treacherous week traveling down the fallopian tubes is that they either are simply conglomerations of DNA that never obtain an existence in the mind of God or they are eternally known and loved souls who are free from the curse of sin (supported in Romans 1) and they dwell eternally with God.  I don’t know what to make of that startling 70%.  God does.

4. The oral contraceptive pill has three mechanisms of action by which it prevents pregnancy- The primary effect is that the progesterone and estrogen derivatives contained in OCPs block the surge in a hormone that tells the body to ovulate and block the development of a dominant egg that is ready to ovulate, respectively.  If this fails due to any one of a number of reasons, the progesterone in the OCP should have also acted to thicken the cervical mucus that theoretically acts as a barrier method to fertilization.  I have read some studies done in rabbits that questioned the effectiveness of this phenomenon, but it is generally accepted that it occurs.  Finally, if steps one and two fail, the third mechanism by which pregnancy is prevented is that the progesterone in the OCP has blocked the proliferation of the endometrium.

5. The endometrium is more important than you think-Many Christian authors (Randy Alcorn et al) use the term “hostile endometrium” when they describe the condition of the endometrial lining for women on OCPs.  My first reaction was “That is a little harsh.  But is it true?” I was very surprised to read in a highly respected Endocrinology textbook (3) that the author actually used the same term.  He goes on to say that “The progestin in the combination pill produces an endometrium that is … exhausted and atrophied…and is therefore not receptive to ovum implantation.”

Other studies  ”suggest that an endometrial thickness of 8 mm or more is necessary for successful implantation, although not all studies have found such an association. (4) Other researchers have shown that normal OCP use reduced thickness to ~3-4 mm. However the mean value of 3.9 mm had and SD of 3 mm meaning that for some women (top 15%) would retain a possibly thick enough endometrium after a year of OCP use.  This study was conducted using a lower dose progestin OCPs which are most common nowadays.  (5)

Even with all this information I just read this morning in a paper that “exogenous (coming from the outside) progesterone…prevents abortion (spontaneous ones) , further supporting the hypothesis that ovarian progesterone production is essential for the maintenance of early pregnancy” (6)

6. So what does all this mean?-Putting everything together I think the bottom line is that the decision to use OCPs is one that ought to be entered into with sober awareness that there is a risk one may accidentally cause an abortion that they would otherwise be appalled by.  The odds for this occurring are where the tension of science and theology is seen.  From the best I can deduce without finding hard and fast numbers I would say the odds of having a fertilized embryo that would meet a hostile uterus and that be the reason that it fails to survive would be between 1/100 to 1/1000. More clearly, if 1000 women in our church were having sex with their husbands every month and all of them were on the pill, 1 of them would have an abortion that their choice of medical therapy was responsible for.   I know that is a wide window, but there are several factors and conflicting data to consider in that calculation.  I don’t know if those numbers are true or not, no one does.  Keep in mind that 15/100 fertilized eggs fail to do this naturally.  Women get pregnant on the pill all the time, so we know it is not guaranteed to happen just because of the pill.

I believe Sharon has a lot of wisdom and has demonstrated in previous posts that your choice of contraception is tremendously more complicated than simply physiology.  Sharon’s question for me was “Do the numbers matter, or do you just know something is wrong regardless?”  I will ask you the same question.

References

(1)    www.Abort73.com-http://www.abort73.com/index.php?/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics accessed on 08/12/09

(2)    Blueprints of Obstetrics and Gynecology

(3)    Kronenberg: Williams Textbook of Endocrinology, 11th ed. 2008.  Accessed online through MD Consult. July 2009.

(4)    Gabbe: Obstetrics: Normal and Problem Pregnancies, 5th ed. 2007. Accessed online through MD Consult. July 2009.

(5)    Lüdicke F et al. Effect of a combined oral contraceptive containing 3 mg of drospirenone and 30 microg of ethinyl estradiol on the  human endometrium. Fertil Steril. 2002 Jun;77(6):1308-9

(6)   Norwitz E. UpToDate article: Physiology of Parturition. Updated Nov 19 2008.

While I’m on my honeymoon, my friend David Goodman will be posting his thoughts about the relationship between science and theology. Now before you tune out because this sounds nerdy/boring, you should know that my conversations with him have surrounded the issue of birth control, and that’s why I’ve asked him to post. He is going into his 4th year of medical school at UNC-Chapel Hill and has wrestled with this topic a lot as he considers the ethics of prescribing birth control, and how it coincides with his pro-life beliefs. He is a godly man, as well as being super sharp, so I thought you all would benefit from his insights!

 Hello blog world.  She Worships has been invaded by a dude, most notably illustrated in the picture from Rocky IV situated to the left.  No, this is not a shameless plug to get Sly Stallone on Sharon‘s blog.  This was the image that came to my mind when Sharon asked me to write about the relationship between science and theology.  You see in the film Rocky is a fiery, passionate boxer with a mission to prove going up against the formidable Russian Ivan Drago, the machine-man that represents the overwhelming strength of the Cold War USSR who crushes opponents with almost superhuman force.  At one point in the fight Rocky is dancing around the ring, taking punches from the Russian and taunting him saying “You ain’t so bad!” in an effort to tire him out.

Ever since I was a small child I can remember watching valiant attempts at effective, anti-drug campaigns on t.v. Who can forget the famous father and son drug confrontation??–”I learned it from watching you!” (In case you aren’t familiar with this 80′s classic, you can check it out here)

Twenty years later those commercials still pepper the television. And while some of them remain unconvincing, some of them are also pretty creative. In particular, the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign  launched an ad this past May that I really liked:

This commercial is noteworthy due to its insight about motivations. Many of the “voices” that the young man hears are actually quite good ones. He would be foolish not to listen to them. They are providing healthy, compelling reasons to stay off drugs.

Yet this ad recognizes the pitfalls of listening to those “good voices.” Were he to follow their advice, even when it’s good, the teen would still be engaging in the same faulty decision-making that led him astray in the first places: It’s all a form of peer pressure. Whether it’s a pot-head friend at school or his concerned parents, these voices are all exerting a kind of pressure that sways his conscience in their direction, rather than helping him to form opinions of his own.

So instead of being tossed around by the various voices of others, this ad encourages teens to make their own decisions. In doing so, teens will have an immovable North Star amidst the storm of competing voices.

On one level, I think this perspective is brilliant. It exposes the human tendency to people-please, the vanity of it, and the ways in which this desire can pervert even the best of intentions. But what’s even more significant to me is that this type of well-intentioned people-pleasing is very present in the Church. Frequently Christians are motivated not by God’s opinion, but the opinions of other Christians. This kind of people-pleasing is sometimes hard to identify because it often results in a seemingly healthy Christian life. The opinions that are most revered are frequently very sound and good. Yet we go astray whenever our primary spiritual compass is determined by them. Rather than weigh our lives against the teachings of Christ and God’s Word, we listen more intently to those Christians whom we most respect.

And that leads us to the ultimate flaw with the anti-drug ad. It fails to actually identify the only voice that matters–God’s. Contrary to what the commercial implies, the teenager’s own voice is really no different from the other voices he hears. As fallible humans, our emotions and circumstances cloud our judgment and give us conflicting messages all the time. Discerning the difference between your voice and others can often be a nearly impossible task. At times, the two are indistinguishable.

And the same is true for Christians. When we are driven by the opinions of others, even if their advice is godly, we are doing little more than the insecure teenager who is enslaved to the opinion of her peers. While the outcome may look different on the outside–one lifestyle appears to be healthy while the other does not–the underlying motives are the same. Both the Christian and the teenager are building upon a foundation that will ultimately falter.

That is why our only true North Star is the voice of the Father. Only the perfect words of Scripture can anchor us amidst the voices of others and ourselves. That is why a better, more holistic closing to the ad would therefore read, “The only voice that matters is Yours.” In our culture, that is a message that every teenager, every woman, and every Christian needs to hear.

Last month the New York Times ran an op-ed column that responded to some surprising findings about the happiness of the modern woman. In “Liberated and Unhappy,”Susan Etheridge reflected on the paper “The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness,” written by economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers. In the course of their research, the authors found that in spite of all the advancements women have enjoyed over the years, male happiness has “inched up and female happiness has dropped.”

What is even more surprising about these findings is that they indicate the exact opposite of what feminists predicted. Writer and seminary professor Mary Kassian described this very discrepancy on her blog, explaining that feminist Betty Friedan “pointed her finger at the male-female relationship and theorized that it was to blame. If only woman could leave the traditional role of homemaker behind, be educated and participate in the workplace on the same basis as man, be free to express herself sexually without any restraints, and have society free her from the burden of bearing and caring for children, THEN she would be happy.”

It would seem that Friedan’s goals have now been realized. Women are reportedly “wealthier, healthier and better educated than they were 30 years ago.” But the results she anticipated are nowhere to be found. Why is this?

Etheridge weighs the various possibilities, but she comes to an interesting conclusion:

“All this ambiguity lends itself to broad-brush readings. A strict feminist and a stringent gender-role traditionalist alike will probably find vindication of their premises between the lines of Wolfers and Stevenson’s careful prose. The feminist will see evidence of a revolution interrupted, in which rising expectations are bumping against glass ceilings, breeding entirely justified resentments. The traditionalist will see evidence of a revolution gone awry, in which women have been pressured into lifestyles that run counter to their biological imperatives, and men have been liberated to embrace a piggish irresponsibility.

They should also be able to agree that the steady advance of single motherhood threatens the interests and happiness of women. Here the public-policy options are limited; some kind of social stigma is a necessity. But a new-model stigma shouldn’t (and couldn’t) look like the old sexism. There’s no necessary reason why feminists and cultural conservatives can’t join forces — in the same way that they made common cause during the pornography wars of the 1980s — behind a social revolution that ostracizes serial baby-daddies and trophy-wife collectors as thoroughly as the “fallen women” of a more patriarchal age.”

* To read the whole op-ed piece, click here.

On some level, Etheridge’s conclusions are not off-base. We do need to decrease the number of single mothers in our country, and we should be aware of the ways that a career can negatively affect one’s family–for both men and women.

But I fear that Etheridge is also guilty of making the same mistake as Friedan–addressing the symptoms instead of the cause. This cultural phenomenon of “If we fix this, then we’ll be happy” reminds me of a woman who is never quite satisfied with her body. She diets and loses weight, but she’s still not happy so she gets breast implants. Then she’s still not happy so she gets a nose. But still, she is not happy so she gets a facelift. And the cycle goes on. As she nips and tucks and nips and tucks, she fails to address the true reason for her unhappiness.

Feminism is guilty of doing the same. It has made promises that it cannot deliver. As Proverbs 13:12 tells us, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick,” and that is exactly what we have witnessed here. It is one thing to be slightly unhappy with your circumstances, but it is quite another to have your expectations elevated, only to be let down. That is when despair sets in.

We see this dynamic all the time in marriages–a wife marries a man thinking he’ll be her knight in shining armor. When she discovers he is just a human who cannot complete her, in steps bitterness and resentment. Feminism is like that slightly chubby husband who smells kind of funny and leaves the toilet seat up. He may not be a bad husband at all, but he’s not what you were dreaming of either.

All of that to say, the problem here is not what feminism has achieved–the problem is the motivation behind it. In many ways feminism has been a good thing for women–women are now educating themselves and doing things for the world that they were never able to do before. That is a good thing.

But the movement went awry when it became woman-centered. Like any other false idol, it promised a salvation that lies in Christ alone. And as all idols do, it guaranteed that women would be happy if we just served ourselves a bit more. Etheridge demonstrated this very point with her own recipe for on-going improvements to the feminist movement. It is an idol that will never be satisfied. It will always want more and more and more.

So while we shouldn’t ignore the legitimate needs of women, and we should seek to build a society based upon an equality of gender, race and class, we should do it for the glory of God, not our own happiness. As Kassian concluded,

“The real paradox about female happiness is that though she might try, woman will never be able to make herself happy. Nor will men make woman happy. Nor will children, career, prominence, possessions, lifestyle…nor anything else that woman might strive after. Apart from a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ as the rock-solid foundation of joy, woman will never find what she is looking for. Without a vibrant personal relationship with Christ, she will forever ask herself Friedan’s painful silent question – “Is this all?””

Yesterday a doctor who practiced late-term abortions was shot and killed by a fanatical pro-life proponent.

His name was Dr. George Tiller.

He was shot in his church.

While he was serving as an usher.

These last two details of the story really threw me off. Without calling into question the salvation of either man involved, to the world it would appear that Christians are now killing other Christians over the issue of abortion…a movement that is supposedly “for life.”

Not only were both men Christian, but they were both Lutheran as well. And both men were acting out of their spiritual convictions. The shooter likely thought he was saving thousands of lives through the taking of one. Dr. Tiller, on the other hand, engaged in his work for the protection of female lives. In a public statement, Tiller’s wife explained that her loss “is also a loss for the city of Wichita and women across America.”

One faith, two totally different convictions. What is going on here?

The problem is that both men had strong convictions about the value of life, but they applied their ideology in very selective ways. They both supported various aspects of life, but not ALL life. One failed to value life whenever it comes, the other failed to value life no matter what it does. And in so doing, they departed from the example set for them by Christ.

This is what happens when Christians get tunnel vision on one particular issue–it eclipses EVERYTHING else, including God Himself.

I think that’s why the world is so often confused by the pro-life movement. While the events of yesterday are by no means the norm (that man was probably just insane), there are other ways that we engage in a kind of philosophical schizophrenia.

We say we support life whenever it comes, but we don’t follow this statement to its logical conclusion. We’re as vocal as can be about the evils of abortion, but we don’t actively support unwed mothers (and I mean actually support them in tangible ways–not just talking about supporting them in some vague, hypothetical way). Nor do most churches actively invest themselves in the school systems and under-privileged families that raise those children.

What’s more, the people who fight so long and hard for abortion seem almost oblivious to the injustices that occur in our system of capital punishment. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, numerous individuals have been falsely convicted and sentenced to the death penalty due to eye witness error, government misconduct, and false confessions, just to name a few. (Source) Why isn’t the pro-life movement fighting for these lives, many of which were only exonerated AFTER their executions?

Our culture is also baffled when staunch pro-lifers are liberal on the issue of war. Now I am not going to dive into the topic of whether or not our present war is just, but how you discuss this war, regardless of your position on it, betrays your stance on life. Do you grieve for the loss of life, both American and Iraqi? Are you committed to ending the bloodshed in as peaceful a manner as possible?

When the pro-life movement focuses almost exclusively on one type of life, we reveal ourselves to be no different than Dr. Tiller. He ranked the value of adult women over unborn women. Oftentimes we rank the value of innocent unborn babies over criminals and strangers in other lands. But we part ways with God’s character when we do this.

To fight only against abortion is not a holistic approach to pro-life. We must therefore embrace a worldview that not only values life whenever it comes, but also values the redemptive possibilities of all lives, no matter who it is or what they have done. It may sound radical, but this is the appropriate response to a God that has shown impartial grace to a world that does not deserve it. God sent his son to die for criminals and strangers, so I wonder what that might look like were we to live it out today.