by Pastor Michael Salemink
“My body, my choice” isn’t a creed of freedom. “My body, my choice” is a cry for help.
This supposed motto for autonomy instead smuggles in a satanic deception. The devil intends to divide and isolate people. He misleads us into believing we’re all on our own. “Your body, your choice” means the terminal diagnosis is your problem. No one can save you. You must control this. “Your body, your choice” means the surprise pregnancy is your fault. Nobody loves you. You must correct this. “My body, my choice” doesn’t liberate anyone. It really aims to lay blame. Its façade of power paves the way forward for panic.
The beautiful truth is you are not alone.
Even in our mistakes and moments of crisis, we still belong to something better. Even in our difficulties and afflictions, we still belong to someone else. Even in our shortcomings and shadowed valleys of death, we still belong to somebody greater.
We belong to Father, Son, and Spirit who creates, redeems, and calls us body and life to be precious treasures from fertilization to forever in His heavenly household. We belong—each of us—to the same one human race made in His image inheriting the earth as gifts and privileges for one another. We belong—all of us—to a family woven of a man and a woman come together as father and mother from and for a fabric of loved ones, relatives, flesh, and genetics. We belong—everyone—to the body of Christ, a brotherhood baptized together by a water thicker yet than blood, a mighty communion of saints pushing us ahead and a great cloud of witnesses pulling us on across distance, throughout history, and even beyond death. We belong to a country in this world but not of it and a kingdom of forgiveness, faith, and fellowship, of joy and hope and resurrection everlasting. And we belong to our neighbor, whatever his need, no matter her age, appearance, or ability, by a holy vocation to receive them and serve both their survival and salvation, until we realize the worth and achieve the purpose God Himself has willed into each and works in us all.
Who needs private choices and personal matters? We can do this together, for we have the Lord, and this Savior has us.