Monthly archive: April, 2008

Why I’m Pro-Choice and Liberals aren’t

April 27, 2008, by 2 comments

Liberals proudly wave the “Pro-Choice” banner, mainly to tout their “I’m for the right to choose” rhetoric, which is odd to me because in reality most liberals are anti-choice in many ways.

Let’s examine a few areas that I’m pro-choice, whereas liberals (mostly) are not:

  • The right to own a gun, carry it concealed, and across state borders, to defend my family and those around me
  • The right to decide my own health care provider, not be forced to pay for health care I don’t want, or for my smoking, drinking, obese neighbor’s health care
  • The right to wear a seat belt in the car when I’m driving alone (I think you’re an idiot if you don’t wear a seat belt, but it should be by choice)
  • The right to wear no helmet on a motorcycle
  • The right to eat Trans fats if I really want to
  • The right to pay fewer taxes and give my money to charity instead of being forced to pay for social things in ways I disagree
  • The right to drive a Hummer or Suburban or Escalade if I want to
  • The right to opt-out of Social Security and save my own money for my family; not only will I not have a negative rate of return like SSA will give me, I’ll be relatively wealthy and able to share more blessings with the poor than the SSA would have done
  • The right to choose which school I send my kids, without needing to be wealthy enough to send them to private school

I do not believe, however, that a woman has the right to abort a pregnancy because in doing so she is killing an unborn baby. It is simply wrong. 

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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“Punished with a baby”?

April 25, 2008, by 30 comments

Several weeks ago, Barack Obama gave a speech that contained a controversial phrase:

I’ve been in a discussion over here on my friend’s blog, where a recent post about an anti-Clinton group evolved into a discussion on Barack Obama’s controversial statements. Ignoring that he analogizes a baby with a sexually transmitted disease, when he makes statements like “I don’t want my daughters punished with a baby,” his supporters give him a pass because he simply used the wrong words.

So let’s assume that he should have used better words, replacing “punished with” with “suffer the consequences of.” It would read like this: “If my daughters make the mistake [of having unprotected sex], I don’t want them to suffer the consequences of a baby or an STD.” How is this any better? In reality all he is saying is that we should not be responsible for our mistakes if we don’t like the consequences. One could argue that this makes the statement even worse!

The discussion evolved far enough for somebody to say that pro-lifers would be controlling the fate of a pregnant woman who wishes to have an abortion. This is simply twisted reasoning.

Here’s how I get there:

When I read the apostle Paul, I read illustrations about sowing and reaping (Galatians 6). It is a farming analogy, used to illustrate a pattern of life. When a person chooses to sow a vegetable seed into the ground, he does not expect to reap fruit from that same soil. The same applies to our actions. To state it in contemporary language, “What goes around comes around.” And while it does not always appear that life occurs in cause-effect patterns (because “bad things happen to good people”), things that are within our control (such as what we eat, whether we exercise, whether we smoke, etc.) have clearly defined risks associated with them. Eat too much, you might gain weight. Exercise enough, you’ll be relatively fit. Smoke, and you might get lung cancer.

There are, of course, some things that are out of our control. I can’t control the drunk driver who smashes into my car. I can’t keep an economy from crashing. I can’t keep Al Gore from lying to us in a “movie.” But it is a simple fact of life that I am in control of my actions, and that I am responsible for their consequences. 

Since I am the one who is responsible for my actions, I must be prepared for consequences that I may dislike, or for which I did not plan. It is how we respond to these situations that makes the difference in our hearts. We can choose to allow them to make us better, or we can allow ourselves to become bitter.

Back to controlling fate. The bottom line is that our actions have consequences, whether we like those consequences or not. It is simply illogical to say that somebody else controls my fate when I’ve reaped consequences I don’t like because of actions nobody forced me to commit. At this point, the argument becomes about escaping consequences we don’t like. But how far are we going to push this? If we are allowed to avoid unwanted consequences, what else are we allowed to do in the name of “choice”? 

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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The Voices in my Head

April 15, 2008, by No comments yet

I just spent 30 minutes in the woods, sitting down, walking around a bit, and just pondering. I grew up in the woods. I loved it. I didn’t know that city life existed, and that I would someday long for the trees, the ability to simply walk outside and within minutes be surrounded by forest and see no unnatural objects (such as houses or roads). I really miss it. Perhaps someday I’ll live with a yard that borders along many trees, so my children can play in the woods, and so I can go back there and commune with God some early morning. 

We’re so addicted to busyness. If we’re not busy, we make ourselves busy. When people ask us about our lives, we reply, “Oh, just keeping busy,” as if that’s inherently honorable and desirable. Yet we all somehow know we’re too busy. Rarely do we say, “I’m not busy enough.” 

Yet I wonder how often we actually take inventory of what is inside of us, to see how “busy” it is in there. Searching our hearts. Knowing our thoughts. What would we find inside? For me, it’s many voices. Voices that speak from different places, be it talk radio, music, television, e-mail, the Internet, church, books, friends, to name a few of the sources from which I drink constantly. 

So let’s name a few (in no particular order): Glenn Beck, Keith Olbermann, Bill O’Reilly, John Eldredge, John Piper, N.T. Wright, Jonah Goldberg, Todd Mangum, my father, my mother, Marlin, Shiree, Colby, Marty, Camo, Scott, Dan, Joe, Josh, Pastor Stevens, Pastor Winne, Jon, Meade, Linda, Matt, Dave, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Silva, Amity Shlaes, John Edwards, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush, Sean Hannity. And these are just a few. I’ve heard their voices, digested at least some of it, and opinions have been formed based on my digestion of these thoughts. 

Jesus is not on the list for two reasons. First, I was thinking of people who are not God (though some might believe themselves to be so); second, to make the point that these voices are competing with Jesus every day. In fact, it would be fair to say that Jesus is competing with them every day, because in many ways I have the volume turned up on them, and with Jesus I just assume he’ll speak when he wants to and I’ll hear him.

I think the volume is just too loud right now. So I’m using this 30 hours to get rid of the voices in my head because they are bogging my mind down. And I’m too “busy” with it to notice unless I’m in a position like I am today of spending time alone, apart from everything in life that contributes to this busyness. 

Lord, please take the voices away. They are all good voices to hear, when places appropriately. But right now, it’s about your voice to me. It’s about the way you want to speak to me. The way you want my heart to be formed. Be forming my heart during this time. Let it be conformed to you as I study your word, study your truth, and learn to know you intimately. Amen. 

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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Expecting from God

April 13, 2008, by No comments yet

I couldn’t even begin to explain my fear of the future without a bit of history, and a bit of history that only a few friends know about. It’s not secret knowledge about me, really. In fact, everybody knows the surface story, the main events, and everybody knows that I wasn’t too thrilled with the way the events came off. 

Near the end of my sophomore year of college, and I had been smitten by a young gal who was a freshman. Over the course of the summer we became friends, and while at first she was only interested in this, I (in typical form) wanted more. I prayed for God to change her heart if it was meant to be. Even more, I prayed that it would only happen if it was meant to be for marriage. I didn’t want this relationship to blossom only to die off later on. We became very good friends, fell in love, the whole story. God had answered my prayer. 

Or so I thought. About four months before I was to graduate from college, we had a pretty damaging breakup, at least to me, which pretty much ruined the rest of my college days. I was pretty devastated. Only I wasn’t devastated with the breakup of the relationship. I was devastated with my relationship with God. Hadn’t he answered my prayers? Wasn’t he the God who gave generously to those who asked him? Didn’t I specifically ask God to not answer this prayer the way I had wanted would it not be good for me? What did I pray wrong? Why did God do this to me? 

For a while, I hated how God treated me. My theological beliefs at the time affirmed that God will answer whatever prayers he wants to answer and in whatever way he sees fit, because he has our best interest in mind. Even if we don’t pray, he will do with us what he will do with us. So when it comes down to answering my prayer, it was easy for me to jump to the conclusion that my prayers aren’t really that important to God. He didn’t really need me to pray for something. He was going to do what he was going to do. 

So I stopped praying. I stopped praying because I agreed to a false belief about God that came to me in an experience I had of him. The key word here is “agreed.” I made an agreement to myself that said, “God doesn’t really need you to pray. It’s good for you, but he doesn’t need you to pray. He knows what you want. Knows what’s best for you. Accept it and live your life as he would want you to live it.” 

Amazingly, there’s snippets of truth to that agreement. God does know those things. He does want us to live our lives for him. And even at the moment I’m writing this, I’m finding it very difficult to tell myself, It’s not true! 

As I mentioned earlier, my life is going pretty well right now. Just before we got engaged, Shiree and I took some time apart to make sure our lives were right with God and that our relationship was right with God. It’s the last time I really feel like life wasn’t going the way I had hoped it would. Even when a few weeks earlier I had been fired from my job, I didn’t feel this level of “life isn’t fun.” 

So for three years, life has been good. Great, really. People say the first year of marriage is difficult. I think we went through our struggles during engagement, so when the wedding came, the worst was behind us. I had just been promoted at work, and we were about to become a family together. If the first year is supposed to be the hardest, I hope it is because we had so much fun! Not that it was perfect, but it wasn’t the struggle I’ve heard it could be. 

Three years. I wonder how long it’ll last. I wonder how long until something unexpected comes into our lives and wrecks it. Before God says, Okay, you’ve had enough fun for now, let’s test your faith a bit. Do you see where my mind goes? Do you see what I’m holding on to? While nobody denies this is what walking by faith is like, my heart is telling me, Beware! God will get you soon because life is too sweet! And it’s because I’ve agreed to believe that this is how God operates. 

On the one hand, it isn’t that bad. I’ll be able to take it in stride, chalk it up to another test of faith, a challenge, something to help me grow. It won’t blindside me like other things have. Perhaps that’s the lesson I’ve learned, after being hardened and then wrestling with the falsity of my agreements. 

Lord, I confess my unbelief to you. I believe in your will for me, and I believe that you will hear me when I cry out to you. You have heard me when I have done so in the past. You have listened. You have answered. You have blessed me. Please recapture my imagination and my heart so I may learn to agree with you. So that I may agree with your words to me. So that I may agree with your truth. May I follow you and grow in your truth so that my agreements do not endanger me. Amen. 


Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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Assumptions about God

April 13, 2008, by 1 comment

We live our lives making assumptions. Assumptions about how we approach people, how we will drive, how we will eat, how we will be active. Each day begins with assumptions. I assumed many things about my 30-hour retreat that turned out to be false. The accommodations were fantastic, though simple, and the location was rather peaceful. To some degree, there was no real “silence” with birds chirping, woodpeckers pecking, and animals scurrying around at the edge of the woods. The hermitage was modern and offered an atmosphere designed for reflection, with a flare of utility for good measure. Much nicer than I expected (which was some camp-like room with nary a bed and a dingy bathroom, and the smell of wet concrete that won’t go away). To my delight these assumptions were wrong. 

Unfortunately, we all have (and many of us share) certain assumptions about God that are not quite true, though we somehow believe and feel that they are true. More dangerous are beliefs about God that are true, coupled with ones that feel true but are not. For instance, we all believe God is love, and he wants what is best for us, and he wants us to be holy. And each of these is true. What endangers us is when we turn that into a formula, A + B = C. If God loves me (A), and I am holy (B), then the best will happen to me (C). And this is fine, so long as life goes well, we’re good people, and nothing truly gets in our way and we feel like God is blessing us. But what happens if something goes wrong? What then? Does God not love us? Of course not. Is this not best for me? Of course not. We are then forced to believe that we are not being holy. Which may or may not be true. Maybe we should instead question our assumptions about God, rather than keep assuming. 

Does it make sense that assumptions get us all tied up with God? Is it fair to say that when we make too many assumptions about God, and he doesn’t work the way we expected him to work, we then become disheartened? But who loses out? Is it God? Is it us? 

I believe it is both. While God doesn’t “lose,” he certainly becomes saddened by our distance from him. But our loss is not only because we are distanced him; it runs deeper still. Bad enough as it is, the distance is only a temporary loss. The real loss is a long-term loss, a feeling that creeps inside of us that says that God is simply this far away from us. God is not near. God is out there. Sort of a Deist view, but we still claim God is interested in us. Perhaps it would be like a child truly believing that his father is involved with him, loves him, and wants the best for him while he is playing in the yard, while his father is watching from the porch. The father may be cheering him on, encouraging him to play harder, run faster, jump higher, build that tree house, all the while standing from the porch. He’s interested and fully engaged in what the child is doing. But he’s on the freakin’ porch! It’s bad enough that there is a distance. But if that child resigned himself to believing that this was the way the relationship with his father had to work, we would each declare this a tragedy. 

So let’s start out with a clear statement that we often don’t assume about God: he is near. God is near. Around us. Close by. Beside us. In the yard playing with us. And Jesus tells us that, as any good shepherd does, he goes one step further: ahead of us. Now, I don’t claim to have any intimate experience of this, but I do know it to be true. I do know that at times Shiree and I have had conversations with people, and somehow in my spirit I know that God was working in their hearts as well. Sometimes it is something simple and “non-spiritual,” but important nonetheless. Sometimes it is profound. It is this way with many things in life, but we normally don’t have the eyes to see it, especially in the moment. We probably don’t realize that God is going ahead of us, making a path for us. Perhaps it’s that conversation you’ll need to have later today. Or perhaps it is the couple you’ve never met who live on the other side of the country who can’t make their flight, and somehow you’ve been waiting on standby for eight hours and really need to make it home. You know, that “mysterious ways” cliché that we all know.  When it happens, we thank the Lord. But we simply don’t expect it.

I want to assume proper things about God. And I don’t typically have proper assumptions, or expectations, and so my life goes by, day by day, same old, same old, hoping to be better each day. And in many ways it is. As I ponder the last three years of my life, I’m struck with a tremendous amount of awe in what God has allowed me to accomplish in my life. I’m now married to the woman of my dreams (she’s even better than I dreamed––really!), I have a beautiful baby boy, I’m about to graduate with a Master of Divinity (funny that you’ll never really “master” it), I have a private pilot’s license, and I’ve been promoted twice at work. We’re completely debt-free, and on the horizon appears to be the purchase our first home. So many things. So many dreams fulfilled, hopes fulfilled, and for the most part, our world is pretty darn nice. 

What scares me is my expectations for the future. 

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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Venturing out

April 13, 2008, by No comments yet

It is difficult for me to do something alone. And by alone, I don’t mean that somebody has to be with me all the time. It could be my five-month old, Eliot, who only offers his presence. It could be talk radio, or some worship music, or some snacks. But in general, I don’t like being alone. Come to think of it, even though I consider myself “alone” while I write this, comfort is found in having my trusty MacBook to keep me “company” as I venture out alone for 30 hours, though I’m only using it for reflections and writing my thoughts. 

It’s about seven hours into my 30-hour silent retreat, and I’m beginning to become a bit bothered by the silence. Up until this retreat has happened, I’ve prepared my heart for what might come. Loneliness. Yearning. Fatigue. Boredom. Restlessness. Urges. 

One might say that I’m not cut out for being alone. God probably is saying, You need to be alone with me so you can be with others for me. In other words, being alone with God will make God more present in my relationship with others. 

John Eldredge co-authored a book called The Sacred Romance, which changed the way I look at my relationship with God. And I’ve read a follow-up book, Waking the Dead, which was equally as important at a later point in my spiritual walk with the Lord. And while I’ve heard others talk about Eldredge’s theology not being “up to par” with other writers, I’ve come to trust his way with words and ability to capture the imagination and describe what a relationship with God looks like. What healing feels like. What being loved by God is like. Even when it’s tough or doesn’t seem like it is going the way we expected. 

So Walking with God is a perfect title as my “guide” through this 30-hour journey.

The next few posts will be about this retreat.

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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Uprooting the New Racism

April 1, 2008, by No comments yet

This article by Pat Buchanan was worth reading. Thought I’d link to it.

Doug

Doug Stuart is a committed follower of Jesus and passionate about building for the Kingdom of God through education and mobilization. He is a regular writer at LibertarianChristians.com as well as the founder of Living Loud.

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