September 4, 2024

Coming to a state near you.

MAID (Medical Assistance In Dying) is the Canadian system that was designed to assist terminally ill people to commit suicide. Then someone challenged that law in the Canadian Supreme Court, but not to stop it. They wanted to expand it. "It’s not fair," the argument went, that the terminally ill get to benefit from this while others do not. The safeguards put into place to limit this have gradually fallen to the point where physician-assisted suicide is now the 5th leading cause of death in Canada. In 2016, there were 1,018 physician assisted suicides. In 2022, there were 13,241. It is bizarre that doctors who are supposedly committed to helping their patients live are increasingly involved in helping people die.

Several states in our country have adopted similar laws and many more are considering them. It is the logical extension of an abortion-minded culture that can brazenly kill a young life in the name of reproductive freedom. “We trust the women of America to make decisions about their own bodies,” Kamala Harris says. In other words, if you want to kill the life of the child living in you, go ahead. Wait a minute. My freedom of speech does not mean that I get to yell “FIRE!” in a crowded theater. My freedom to exercise does not mean that I get to swing my arms in a crowded elevator. “My body, my choice.” Does my freedom to know what to do with my body mean that I get to execute other people? Pro-abortionists demand abortion that is safe and legal. Safe? How is abortion safe for the unborn child? Abortion is dark. It is death and desensitizes people to the value of life.

Permission to die with assistance (when you are terminal) will become the expectation to die with assistance (when you are terminal). The slogans are not difficult to imagine. “Do your part to help your family.” “Ease your suffering and theirs.” The new “noble and brave” choice will be to die because life is hard instead of facing the challenges of life with true nobility and bravery. People will accept that logic just as abortion is touted as health-care that is safe.

Our response to this goes deeper than being discerning with our votes. As a church family, we should continue to cultivate a culture of life, marriage, family, celebrating births, encouraging parents, investing in moms, dads, helping parents raise children, and being a sweet aroma of life in the midst of the nauseous stench of death that we otherwise inhale around us. There is an intentionality to our discipleship of children, to our men’s and women’s ministries, and to our church as a whole. We embrace from our hearts that life is from God and for God. That is rejected by our world at a great cost. But the church is not of this world even as we seek to rescue people from it.

Grace, peace and life,

Bob

Sunday’s Text: Luke 8:26-39