SOMETIMES in life there are events that bring the mind into sharp focus. Things that are so personal, so touching, so emotionally stressful, that the world stands still and clarity hits you like a bolt of lightning.
That happened to me these last few days. And my mind wonders just what evil has been allowed to fester and grow and prosper in this country that once was a bastion of Christian clarity? What is now conjuring evil in the minds and actions of so many?
The event was the birth of my tenth grandchild. A traumatic pregnancy and a more traumatic birth meant a huge amount of emotional capital and prayer invested before the eventual safe delivery of the baby.
Alex Story’s excellent article about how abortion is not recognised as a problem, but rather as progress, and how it has caused unseen damage through what it has stolen from us as a society and from the world as a whole, demonstrates the raw numbers of this dreadful epidemic of child sacrifice.
But for me there is something even more fundamentally troubling than the statistics and ethos behind this crime against humanity. It is the spirit that drives the human element, that enables and encourages such base cruelty and destruction, that is so often overlooked or deliberately obscured; something Alex touches on with both the physical description of an abortion, and the lost potential that can never be recovered.
Holding my beautiful newborn granddaughter and looking her in the eye brought my thoughts face to face with the reality of the evil that is so easily committed, that now allows killing a baby up to the point of birth, that makes society so casual about such a callous and brutal action. I personally wonder how anyone can believe that it OK to tear apart this little person and deny them life, and how anyone can in all conscience carry out such an act. Forget the technical terms – zygote, embryo, organo-genesis – they are used to camouflage and deflect from the destruction of a human life.
It is said that before something happens here on physical Earth, its origin occurs in the spiritual realm. And I firmly believe that to be true: ‘For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly place.’ (Ephesians 6 v12) And that is the only place where we can hope to achieve victory against the powers ranged against us and their earthly manifestations. The essence of all this can be seen in my new granddaughter. Her life, and her right to life, are the measure with which we must judge ourselves, our society, and our futures. If we are to regain and restore those things that shaped British society before the work of the progressive left and the Islamists started the great dismantling march through the institutions and cultural Jihad, we must gain the spiritual upper hand, which is the first step on the very difficult path to victory.
Humans carry on doing their thing: working to pay the bills and progress in life, making families, watching the box, following a sport or indulging in hobbies. Society functions regardless of the foundation it ostensibly sits on. But that foundation makes all the difference to our quality of life, wellbeing, feelings of either degrees of freedom or levels of constraint and danger.
If the Spirit of Christ is not the foundation this country sits on, evil will continue to prosper and grow. Freedoms will be lost, and all our grandchildren will be slaves to ideologies that harm them and give them no value.
Only a nationwide return to Christianity can change the course of this country. The works of man, no matter how well meant, how forceful, how honest, cannot battle alone against the spiritual powers of darkness. We must have Christian revival, and call on the power of God to bring downthe rulers of the darkness of this age, and the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. There are seeds of Christian revival being sown. We must water them here, and pray God enables them. We cannot rely alone on political leaders who say the right things; politicians inevitably end up disappointing us. And the religious leaders of the established church have abandoned God.
My granddaughter was born two weeks early. A state-endorsed candidate for abortion. As long as this remains the situation in this country, we have not won. We should aim high, seek the greatest good, and only then can we hope to make progress. If we don’t have the vulnerable at the heart and soul of our fight, what are we fighting for? And if we don’t have Christianity as our rallying call, what real hope do we have?
And for those who have lost children to abortion, remember that God does not abandon the innocent:
If I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
Even there Your hand shall lead me,
And Your right hand shall hold me.
Psalm 139 vv9-10
