Summer’s dog days have descended.
The U. S. Supreme Court blocked a Texas law that would have provided minimal commonsense protections for women’s health and safety during abortion procedures. The federal government threatened to rescind public funding unless schools enact practices denying biology, invading privacy, and exposing students to sexual predators. Presidential administration officials refused to perform their constitutional duty of defending churches from state-mandated violation of religious expression and exercise of freedoms. A nonstop succession of legislatures continues to entertain endangering vulnerable lives by sanctioning assisted suicide.
Denmark promised to eliminate Down syndrome within five years through prenatal genetic testing and increased abortions. The United Kingdom proposed expanding experimentation on and destruction of embryos. “Humanitarian” organizations such as Amnesty International and the United Nations exploited widespread violence against women and Zika-virus anxiety to bully independent countries toward policies undermining life’s sanctity. Popular culture, mass media, and social networks have intensified their ridicule and harassment of confessing Christians.
It feels a little similar to a magnifying glass incinerating us like ants. These events only underline the bigger problem—the complete fallenness of the whole world. They only highlight the greater burden—the congenital sinfulness of all humankind. Even if we could extricate ourselves from the ways of death, we wouldn’t want to, because we naturally love its temporary power and moments of pleasure. Fear not just that which destroys some bodies but more so that which has already succeeded at decimating every soul. And fear further yet him who can devastate both body and soul in hell (Matthew 10:28).
After all, has the Supreme Court knit you together? Would any president create and call you into being with mild but mighty words or preserve and sustain you with his own hands? Did congressional representatives ever spin the stars and spread the earth, raise the sun and sprinkle rain for you? Have prenatal tests incarnated themselves in the form of a servant for your survival? Have federal departments substituted in your place and suffered your punishment to spare your life? Did international associations ever give blood and sacrifice body or take blame and adopt responsibility for your salvation? Did public funds ever offer shoulders and feet or open hands and side for your forgiveness? Jesus, your Lord, has. Jesus, your Savior, does.
What legislators came back from the grave for our redemption and justification? What popular culture overcame sin and hell, Satan and self for our everlasting life? What prevailing opinion prepares a heavenly place for you? What mass media unites us to him through sacramental water and unites himself to us in holy food, his own flesh? What social network surrounds us—and every human being no matter what he can do or what she has done—with patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, saints, and legions of angels to assist and encourage? Jesus, the Lord, has. Jesus, the Savior, does.
What they do not own, they cannot take. What they have not given, they cannot ruin. We still have the Source of wholeness and joy, the Giver of relief and healing, the Alpha of peace and the Omega of rest. “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:31-32). The kingdom ours remaineth. This we have in abundance, and we have it to share, especially with those otherwise disqualified or altogether forgotten. This summer, and all of them—like spring, fall, and winter, history and eternity—belongs to our loving God.
Summer’s God days have commenced.