Oregon friends: Vote

Last week in the US:

• 13 mail bombs were sent to political officials.
• While my husband was in Louisville this week, a white supremacist entered a grocery store and killed two African Americans.
• A man opened fire in a synagogue shouting “All Jews must die,” killing 11.
• Approximately 21,000 innocent babies were aborted.

Each of last week’s tragedies have something in common: Someone seeking to do away with what he perceives as a “problem.”

Democrats, blacks, Jews, unborn babies.

Of course, in no way am I implying that an overwhelmed pregnant woman is the same as a hate-crazed racist, certainly not. But in each instance we see the natural outworking of sin—believing others’ lives are worth less than our own.

Thinking that “they” are the problem. We each have our own ideas of who the problematic “they” are.

But the root is the same, and sadly, that same root is found in my own heart too: A refusal to see my own sin. 

Right now I’m being ruined, once again, by looking at the life of Mother Teresa, as displayed on the pages of Finding Calcutta. Mary Poplin writes,

“The [Calcutta] missionaries look deeply inside themselves for the remaining vestiges of jealously, greed, anger and other sings, and then confess them. They do not look outside to see the cause of the world’s problems; they look inside first. Clarifying what is inside helps to understand what is outside. The heart is only a tiny mirror of the world I so often bemoan.”

Yes. Yes, it is. My own heart that wants its own way, that resents inconveniences and demands certain circumstances. My own heart that wants Jesus, but that wrestles with having to give up my own way.

It may manifest itself as premeditated murder or deliberate shoulder-shrugging indifference, but either way, I place my own life above all others. 

I do it. You do it. We’re all caught red-handed, daily. As G.K. Chesterton remarked,

“Sin is the most empirically proven principle in Christianity.”

Every single day we prove it.

And every single day Christ offers a better way.

I cannot solve all the world’s problems, but I can deal honestly with the sin in my own heart. I can repent. I can seek restoration. I can humble myself.

And, if I am an Oregonian, this week I can VOTE. 

If I am an Oregonian, I can “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed.” (Prov.31:8). Right now, Oregon is the only state in the US that has no restrictions on abortion.

“No restrictions” to an unborn child, means “no protection.” 

No protection, whatsoever, to the most vulnerable people group in the world. To the most voiceless.

Those who literally cannot speak for themselves. 

There are extensive (and expensive!) measures taken to protect various plants, bird eggs, and various animal species, while we actually provide funds to end human life. In fact, nearly 2 million dollars from out-of-state political groups is being funneled into our state to make sure these unborn babies don’t get protected. To make sure that anyone can still, for no reason at all and for no cost, kill a child all the way up until the moment it is born.

If ever there was a calculated, deliberate, focused attack on a certain people group, this is it. 

Of course, Measure 106 does not end abortion, but it is a step in the right direction. Of course, legislation won’t change hearts, it isn’t meant to, but legislation can protect the most vulnerable, and we should use the freedom that we have to speak up for them.

Of course, we shouldn’t only vote. Let us also pray, love, give, volunteer, support. But let’s at least vote.

{Thank you for caring, and reading.}