Venom is produced by the Snake

Even if you are hard-hearted enough to think partial-birth abortion is not a crime against humanity, you still should have been appalled at the editorial cartoon produced by Tony Auth of the Philadelphia Inquirer to criticize the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision upholding the federal law that bans the procedure. Coming from an artist who would consider himself open-minded, tolerant, and enlightened, it was a grotesque example of bigotry against people of faith.

In fact, "grotesque anti-Catholic bigotry" is precisely what Chuck Colson and a raft of other prominent Christian leaders called Mr. Auth's work when they released a statement condemning the cartoon this past week.

In addition to Mr. Colson, the list of leaders signing the statement included prominent conservatives whose doctrine is beyond reproach: Gary Bauer of American Values, Frank Page of the Southern Baptist Convention, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, Louis Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition, Don Wildmon of the American Family Association, and Wendy Wright of Concerned Women for America.

But if you think Mr. Auth's doodle represented bigotry, you should consider the venom spewing from Ken Silva at apprising.org. Legalists never miss an opportunity to miss the point, and Mr. Silva is the master. Rather than raise his voice in support of the ban on partial-birth abortion, instead of taking a stand against gross prejudice on the basis of religion, Mr. Silva chose to rant about how the statement supposedly endorsed "apostate Roman Catholicism." Somehow Mr. Silva thinks these leaders (including Mr. Silva's favorite whipping boy, Rick Warren) are endorsing the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church when they protest the prejudice of Mr. Auth's cartoon.

The "Not Grace" Party can always be counted on to change the subject and distort the truth if it serves to draw attention to their "look at me! look at me!" blog sites.

Nothing in the statement remotely endorses Roman Catholic doctrine. There are many points at which people like Mr. Colson and Mr. Warren would seriously disagree with RC teaching. But if you have to agree with everything one group believes and does before you defend them, Mr. Silva better hope a lynch mob doesn't show up on his doorstep. His neighbors will pull their blinds. One wonders what injustices he would allow, what courageous stands he would criticize, simply because it suits the self-serving agenda of his messiah complex.

It took me half a lifetime to realize this basic fact of nature: Venom is produced by the Snake, not the Lamb.

Free at last!

I grew up in an independent, separatist fundamentalist environment. I didn't know that was what it was until Joseph Zichterman gave me those words. We just called ourselves "the true church."

As far as we were concerned, every other church had fallen into one grievous doctrinal error or another. The only people we were sure about going to heaven were those in our own church -- and some of them were doubtful. The other independent church across town? Not sure about them. Denominations? We wanted nothing to do with hell-bound compromisers.

We were always fighting. If we were not fighting the doctrinal error at other churches, we were fighting among ourselves. We saw it as a badge of honor, as proof of our holiness before God and our zeal for pure doctrine. When "error" crept into our congregation, we drove it out. If we could have forced the other churches to shut down, we would have been proud to do that. Since we had no power over them, we condemned them as evidence of the End Times Apostasy.

Then an e-mail shows up in my inbox. All it contains is a quote and a link to a blog. The words cut like a knife:

"There are two sides to religious self conceit; one is where the soul mostly contemplates its own superiority; ... and the other side is where the soul mostly contemplates the defects of others .... The censorious man belongs to the latter class, for while spiritual vanity is a part of his make-up, yet spiritual inquisition and severity with others constitutes the major part of his life. There are many who think that mere power to detect evil is a proof of holiness, and that growth in grace itself shows itself by an increasing aptness to ferret out the weaknesses and shortcoming of others." (George Watson)

Light pierced my darkness. Jesus died for me because I cannot, but he could -- and did! His perfect life and saving death purchased for me what I could never earn on my own! God's amazing grace! I am free at last -- libérez enfin!

I am still struggling to understand whether I was a Christian all those years or have just been born again. I feel like a new person. When I look back at my old life (and my old church), I do not see much evidence of Galatians 5:22-23: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control." I do, however, see lots of Galatians 5:19-21: "immorality , impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing." Maybe not all of those, but most of them.

In retrospect, I see the irony of it all. Have you ever noticed that sometimes a church's name gives you a clue to what is really lacking in the church? One of our fights forced out some members, which organized a new church that called itself "Unity Baptist Church." Another fight created "Fellowship Baptist Church." And our name? "Grace Baptist Church." Grace is what we proclaimed most loudly, but it was what we were missing most.

God has done a new work of grace in my heart. It is like a heavy load has been taken off my shoulders. I feel so light, I think I could fly! I have been overwhelmed by God's grace ... the real thing, not the empty word used so often from our pulpit. All my life, church leaders loaded two heavy burdens on the people -- living perfectly moral lives and believing perfectly correct doctrine. All we ever really learned was that we could not behave and believe perfectly -- no more than the "apostates" and "heretics" we constantly condemned. The list of what you could not do and could not believe just kept getting longer and longer.

In any case, I want to share the joy that comes from realizing I am accepted and loved in Christ and I do not have to put others down to justify myself. I have been made righteous before God, not by my own perfect belief and behavior, but by the blood of Jesus!

I hope this blog helps other modern-day pharisees escape their "yoke of slavery." I hope it helps others not fall into that slavery. But most of all, I hope it helps all God's children -- inside church and out -- find the freedom Jesus paid for with his life.