Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 71

How Can I Work Toward Reconciliation with a Friend When We’ve Offended One Another?

We are in a season where it seems there have never been more strong opinions about a variety of topics, and more opportunities to offend others. To some degree, disagreement and conflict with those we care about is inevitable in a fallen world. And certainly, disagreement isn’t inherently sinful. But sin can easily be involved in our communication and responses. So how do we navigate that with grace, and work towards reconciliation when we do offend one another? Here are some thoughts I shared with a reader who asked for advice:

It is not your job to focus on your friend’s sins, even as it is not their job to focus on your sins. The fact that they may do so does not mean you should do the same. They are accountable for their choices; you are accountable for yours. Your leading the way in confession and admission and apology for whatever you could have done better may or may not prompt them to do so themselves. But whether or not it does, it is still right and Christ-honoring.

It may well be true that they have heart issues that need to be addressed. But the way to do this most effectively is to address your own issues first. Your primary job is to deal with your own issues, only secondarily theirs.

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye” (Matthew 7:3-4).

I think the plank and speck analogy offers helpful insights. Was Jesus really saying that every time we see something in our brother’s eye there is always something worse in ours? Sometimes, yes, but surely not always. I think the point is that our first duty is always to see our own faults, not the faults of others. And in the case of a relational conflict, if we are acutely aware of our sinfulness, we will see the bigness of our faults outweighing those of our brother. When Paul calls himself the chief of sinners, was he really saying no one on the planet had sinned more? I think, rather, he was saying, “I am the worst sinner I know.” Why? Because he knows his own sins far better than anyone else’s, even those who might in fact be worse sinners. But his focus is on his own sin, and by putting the focus there he humbly calls on God for His grace and sets the example of coming to terms with his faults.

So Jesus didn’t say, “Forget about the speck in your brother’s eye,” but rather take care of the problems closest to you, the big ones in your own life, so then and ONLY then can you really help your brother address his issues.

Romans 14:19 says, “Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.” Making every effort means going out of our way to pursue peace with others in God’s family, even when doing so is inconvenient or sacrificial. Love never says, “Grow up, believe and act how I do, since as usual, I’m right again.” There is a road to peace and building others up. It doesn’t come naturally or happen on its own—it takes focused effort and leaning into the Spirit’s help.

“All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.” (1 Peter 5:5-6)

“Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ‘In your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry,  and do not give the devil a foothold.” (Ephesians 4:25-27)

“Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” (Colossians 3:12-14)

I also encourage you to watch my message, “When Christians Disagree about Beliefs and Actions.” See too my book The Grace and Truth Paradox.

Photo by Sam Manns on Unsplash

We Must Learn the Skills to Resist Sexual Temptation

Scripture says, “Resist the devil and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). Only by exercising self-control and being on alert can we expect to resist the enemy’s plan to lead us into sin. Satan “scouts us out” and knows only too well the chinks in the armor of every Christian. His aim is deadly, he excels at tailor-made temptations, and it is at our points of greatest vulnerability that he will attack.

But we shouldn’t forget that “the one [Christ] who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). As powerful as the evil one is to tempt us, God is infinitely more powerful to deliver us and has given us in Christ all the resources we need to live godly lives (2 Peter 1:3-4).

So how do we resist the devil, particularly in the area of sexual temptation? We all have to learn the skills of resisting temptation, because we’re not naturally good at it. I’ve seen a lot of Christians, younger and middle aged and older, end up in sexual immorality. I’ve seen marriages and lives destroyed.

What strikes me most in what I’ve seen over the years is not just how wrong sin is, but how stupid it is: “Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned? Can a man walk on hot coals without his feet being scorched? So is he who sleeps with another man’s wife; no one who touches her will go unpunished” (Proverbs 6:27-29).

I vividly remember a particular counseling appointment as a young pastor. Eric stormed into my office and flopped into a chair. “I’m really mad at God.”

I was startled because Eric was one of the happiest young men I knew. He grew up in a strong churchgoing family, married a Christian woman, and seemed to have a sincere love for Christ.

I asked him why he was mad at God. He explained that for months he’d felt a strong attraction to a woman at his office. She felt the same. He’d prayed earnestly that God would keep him from immorality.

“Did you ask your wife to pray for you?” I said. “Did you stay away from the woman?”

“Well . . . no. We went out for lunch almost every day. And . . . we committed adultery.”

I looked at Eric and slowly pushed a big book across my desk. As it inched closer to the edge, I prayed aloud, “Lord, please keep this book from falling!”

I kept pushing and praying. Sure enough, God didn’t suspend the law of gravity, and the book fell.

“I’m mad at God,” I said to Eric. “I asked him to keep my book from falling . . . but he didn’t answer my prayer!”

I can still hear the sound of that book hitting the floor. It was a symbol of Eric’s life. Instead of calling on God to empower him as he took decisive steps to resist temptation, he kept making unwise choices while asking to be delivered from their natural consequences. Eric went from genuine happiness to misery in a period of just a few years, and eventually he went to jail for sexual crimes. His immorality and sexual abuse didn’t come out of the blue. They were the cumulative product of minuscule daily compromises and choices that sabotaged his righteousness and happiness.

Contrast Eric with his friend Rocky. Raised in an unbelieving home, he’d had sex with many women and later came to faith in Christ. Rocky made new choices in keeping with his new nature: immersing himself in the daily meditation of God’s Word, joining Bible studies, learning to pray, sharing his faith, and reading great Christian books. He fled from sexual temptations that came his way and guarded his heart and mind. In the process of knowing Christ and following him, he became one of the happiest and most Christ-honoring people I’ve ever known. His marriage, family, church involvement, and service to others display the fruit of his wise choices.

Both Eric and Rocky showed a sincere love for Jesus. Both asked God to help them live righteously. But Eric expected God to save him from the consequences of his wrong choices, while Rocky called on God for strength as he did all he could to make right choices.

Both men were defined by their daily choices and by how they chose to respond to temptation, which cumulatively produced sin and misery for one, and righteousness and happiness for the other.

In this video clip, I share some thoughts about preemptively avoiding temptation:

Here are some more ideas about this, and about how to resist sexual temptation:

Chapters 5 and 6 from my book The Purity Principle are available on our site.
Years ago I wrote about carefully counting the cost of sexual immorality as a motivation to avoid it.
This is the first of three short articles focused on overcoming addition to pornography, and here’s one about Overcoming Temptation by Looking Past It—and Looking Up.
Here’s an article from Jon Bloom on How to Resist Temptation’s Mirage Moment.
Finally, my booklet Sexual Temptation: Establishing Guardrails and Winning the Battle contains clear, preventive guidelines we can follow to avoid immorality.

Photo by Nadine Shaabana on Unsplash

Is Jesus Displeased with Outgoing and Humor-Loving Personalities?

Note from Randy: One of the things I love about working with the team at Eternal Perspective Ministries is how wise and biblically-based their answers are to the many questions people ask.

In the early days of the ministry I answered nearly all the questions myself, but as time went on I called on our staff members to do more and more of it. I am always struck by the balance of grace and truth in their responses. They genuinely care about people, and they know that God’s Word is the key to really answering their questions. Since people are usually asking their questions of me, our staff tries to quote things I’ve said in books or articles. They do such a great job in their answers, including many things that are directly from them and not me, that I have no doubt people are getting better answers than they would have if the responses were just from me.

We often post those questions and answers on our website, not using people’s names so as to not violate confidentiality. Occasionally we use them in a blog. Someone asked a great question and Stephanie Anderson’s answer was right on target. Hope you enjoy this.

Hello! I really enjoy the articles you write! I'm a college freshman and find them very relevant and encouraging in my walk with Jesus.  I had a question and was curious as to your opinion on it (I did read an article you had regarding this topic!) I have a pretty outgoing personality and sense of humor, and have kind of subconsciously felt for awhile that Jesus is displeased with me and my/in general humor, laughter, being goofy etc. I think I have this image of Him as being very serious and strict, even though He must have had a pretty magnetic personality to draw so many people to Him, the little children, etc. I was just wondering what your thoughts on it are?

This is Stephanie with Eternal Perspective Ministries, and I help Randy with his messages. I love that you are thinking about this! It also makes me smile because if you were to hang out with Randy in person, you would find out that while he is very serious about his relationship with Jesus, he is also quick to smile and laugh and joke. It sounds like a sense of humor is also a God-given part of your personality—and that is great! It is a gift from Jesus, the source of all laughter and joy.

I love what you shared about Jesus having a magnetic personality that drew children. Randy would absolutely agree with you on that. He says in Happiness,

When I wrote my first graphic novel, Eternity, I had to decide how I wanted the artist to portray Jesus’ face in a typical scene. Having read the Gospels many times and known Jesus for forty years, I knew his default look should be one of happiness. Yes, I asked the artist to portray him as angry when facing off with the Pharisees and sad when heading to the cross. But the man who held children in his arms, healed people, fed the multitudes, and made wine at a wedding was, more often than not, happy! If we picture Jesus walking around in perpetual sadness or anger, grumbling and looking to condemn rather than to extend grace, we’re not seeing the Jesus revealed in the Bible.

Randy has a chapter in Happiness about the humor of Jesus, and it’s one of my favorite chapters in the book. It has given me a fuller picture of Jesus and His personality, and helped me gain a deeper appreciation for Christ’s teachings in the Gospels. You can read an abridged version of that chapter here. If we understand that Jesus Himself has a wonderful sense of humor (and the best laugh in the universe), it frees us up to enjoy God-honoring laughter and joking and fun without feeling guilty or like we’re not being “pious.”

Of course, there is sinful and crude humor that is dishonoring to the Lord, but humor can also be honoring to Him. We can test whether it glorifies Him by measuring it against Scripture:

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Ephesians 4:29).

“Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving” (Ephesians 5:4).

“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things” (Philippians 4:8).

You mentioned being goofy—there is a time to be serious, and a time when laughing and even being goofy are appropriate (Ecclesiastes 3:4). Both are part of the human experience and reflect that we are made in God’s image since He has emotions. I think that as you are walking with Jesus, and growing in your knowledge of Him as you study His Word, He'll make you sensitive to when each is appropriate and how you can honor Him in every time of life.

And being outgoing certainly can be a wonderful strength, and it sounds like it’s the way Jesus made you. I’m not as outgoing myself, but my husband and youngest daughter are, and I love seeing that aspect of their personalities! He is the God of variety and has given us all different strengths and personalities that can glorify Him.

Remember that if you’ve accepted Jesus as your Savior, God is well pleased with you, as He is well pleased with His Son. He made and formed you and designed you to glorify Himself. God “takes pleasure” in those who fear Him and hope in His mercy (Psalm 147:11, NKJV). Zephaniah 3:17 is another beautiful passage, talking about God's delight in His children: “The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.”

Randy writes, “This is profound on every level. God is with us and is mighty to save—great words, but words often expressed in Scripture, more familiar to us. What is remarkable here is that this great God who created the universe ‘will take great delight in you.’ GOD take delight in ME? God take GREAT delight in me? You must be kidding. No. This is God’s Word. No kidding.”

Here are some more related articles from Randy you might like to check out:

Exploring the Happiness of Jesus

Heaven: Home of Laughter

Laughter in Heaven

Hope this helps. God bless you as you follow Him!

Oh my goodness, thank you SO much!!! I needed to hear this more than you know.  Thank you thank you thank you! Made me tear up.  I truly appreciate your encouraging words, this has been SO helpful for me. Thank you!

Photo by Leighann Blackwood on Unsplash

Christopher Yuan on “Is Being Gay Genetic?”

A few years ago when we were both speaking at an apologetics conference, I had the privilege of meeting Christopher Yuan, who is an author, speaker, and instructor at Moody Bible Institute. I read a lot of books, and Christopher Yuan’s Holy Sexuality and the Gospel: Sex, Desire, and Relationships Shaped by God’s Grand Story is on the shortlist of most important books I’ve read in the last decade.

Christopher is that rare individual who has personally grappled with issues related to homosexuality in the crucible of life. Instead of reinventing theology or engaging in creative interpretation, he lives consistently with biblical beliefs even when it’s personally difficult or unpopular. In that respect, he is God’s gift to us, and I for one am profoundly grateful. 

The Colson Center produced a video with Christopher answering the question, “Is Being Gay Genetic?” for their What Would You Say? series. This is a terrific answer.

Photo: Pixabay

Martyn Lloyd Jones on Sin

“What is the matter with the world?” Martyn Lloyd-Jones asked. “Why . . . war and all this unhappiness and turmoil and discord amongst men? . . . There is only one answer to these questions—sin. Nothing else; it is just sin.”

Addiction provides a picture of all sin patterns. At first, the happiness it causes seems to outweigh the misery. But eventually the periods of misery increase while the periods of happiness fade. This is called the law of diminishing returns. Life is promised; death is delivered. Every drug, alcohol, and pornography addict is living proof that the next high is less satisfying than the last.

If insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results, sin not only leads to insanity—it is insanity. Regardless of your drug of choice—materialism, cocaine, pornography, power, anger, slander—the nature of any sin is saying, “This time will be different.” Yet it just keeps killing us—in the name of happiness.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones shares these helpful definitions of sin, and why we must avoid it, in his book Life in Christ in 1 John:

What is sin?

When we disobey God’s holy Law, his revealed will.
Sin is whatever is condemned in Scripture—‘Thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not commit adultery…’ We have sins of ‘commission’ and sins of ‘omission’—in other words, it’s just as bad to do what you shouldn’t do as to not do what you ought to do.
Sin is violating your conscience—going against your conscience (Romans 14). If we are doubtful about a thing, we ought not do it (1 Thessalonians 5:22).
Sin is being governed by our desires and not by truth.

Why must we not sin?

Sin is condemned and hated by God. It goes contrary to the very nature of God.
Sin is ugly and destructive by its very nature. It’s wrong in and of itself. Just look at what sin produces.
Sin is the terrible and foul thing that caused our Savior to die. The problem of sin is what brought the Son of God to earth to die. Why would we desire that which cause the Savior so much pain and grief???
Sin is dishonorable to the gospel and its claims. We claim to believe the gospel and have victory over sin but then don’t walk in patterns of victory. There’s no point in saying you want to walk with God and deliberately sin. In other words, we say we want to fellowship with God and then break that fellowship with deliberate sin. Sin is inconsistent with our profession to hate sin.
Sin leads to an evil conscience. We suffer guilt and condemnation for sin.
Sin robs you of joy. You should avoid sin at all costs because you know what it does to you.
Sin leads to doubts about your salvation.
Sin hinders prayer. It’s impossible to pray as we ought to when we are holding onto sin.
Sin leads to a sense of utter hopelessness.  

First John 3:21 says, “If our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God.” Without the convicting work of the Holy Spirit (see John 16:8), there’s no hope for any of us to turn to God—and without repentance and forgiveness, there’s no restoration to relationship with our joyful God.

Though those of us who have accepted Christ are forgiven of our past sins, including some we don’t remember, we are called upon to confess our sins as we become aware of them: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

It may seem confusing that we must continue to confess recent sins in order to experience new and fresh forgiveness. But while we have a settled once-and-for-all forgiveness in Christ, we also have a current ongoing relationship with Him that is hampered by unconfessed sin.

Scripture says, “He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy” (Proverbs 28:13). Confession means agreeing with God that we have sinned against him.

Charles Spurgeon said, “It does not spoil your happiness . . . to confess your sin. The unhappiness is in not making the confession.”

While true conversion begins with admitting we’re wrong, it doesn’t end there. It involves repentance. Repentance is more than reciting well-calculated words with a view toward minimizing our losses. Repentance, when it is genuine, is in fact not accompanied by calculation at all. It is utterly vulnerable, and demonstrates this by a radical change in behavior, a new humility, and a willingness to accept God’s discipline. 

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick” (Jeremiah 17:9). Sin requires a radical solution—salvation in Christ, which transforms our nature and dramatically affects our capacity to embrace greater happiness in God. Our justification by faith in Christ satisfies the demands of God’s holiness by exchanging our sins for Christ’s righteousness (see Romans 3:21-26).

God grants believers new natures that free us from sin’s bondage. Now we can draw upon God’s power to overcome evil. Because our hearts are changed when we become new people in Christ, we want a better way. “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you” (Romans 8:9).

Once believers are born again, we cannot continue to sin as a lifestyle because of our new natures (see 1 John 3:9). Sin is still present in our lives (see Romans 6:11-14; 1 John 1:8–2:2), but we have supernatural power to overcome it since we’ve died to sin (see Romans 6:6-9). God’s Holy Spirit indwells us and helps us obey Him (see 2 Timothy 1:14).

The result? With the Holy Spirit’s help, we’re free to reject sin and its misery, and embrace righteousness, with its true and lasting happiness.

Browse more resources on the topic of happiness, and see Randy’s related books, including Happiness and Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

Photo by Nathan McBride on Unsplash

Do the Old Testament Promises of Prosperity Apply to God’s People Today?

In some circles, the abundant life Jesus promised His followers has been confused with material wealth. Prosperity theology says that God’s plan is always for us to be wealthy—and to spend our money primarily on ourselves. Jesus, who didn’t even have a place to lay His head and who owned nothing but a robe and sandals (Matthew 8:20), clearly didn’t live a money- and possessions-centered life. Surely that’s not what He wants for us either.

So how can we explain the apparent contradiction between the words and lifestyle of Jesus and the apostles, and the Old Testament prosperity passages? Can God’s people today lay claim to those Old Testament promises of prosperity? The answers to these questions lie in the fundamental differences between the Old and New Covenants. Suffice it to say that the New Testament reflects a fuller picture of the true, eternal wealth that is ours in Christ.

Material Wealth = God’s Blessing?

The portion of truth that makes prosperity theology credible is that some Old Testament passages link material prosperity with God’s blessing. For instance, God gave material wealth to Abraham (Genesis 13:1-7), Isaac (Genesis 26:12-14), Jacob (Genesis 30:43), Joseph (Genesis 39:2-6), Solomon (1 Kings 3:13), and Job (Job 42:10-17) because He approved of them. He promised the Israelites He would reward them materially for faithful financial giving (Deuteronomy 15:10; Proverbs 3:9-10; 11:25; Malachi 3:8-12).

In Deuteronomy 28:1-13, God tells the Israelites that He would reward their obedience by giving them children, crops, livestock, and victory over their enemies, but He also tacks on fifty-four more verses describing the curses that would come upon the nation if they didn’t obey Him—including diseases, heat and drought, military defeat, boils, tumors, madness, and blindness. The teaching is double-edged: prosperity for obedience, adversity for disobedience (Deuteronomy 28:14-68).

The Old Testament also warns against the dangers of wealth—especially the possibility that in our prosperity we may forget the Lord (Deuteronomy 8:7-18). Furthermore, the Bible recognizes frequent exceptions to the prosperity/adversity doctrine, noting that the wicked often prosper more than the righteous. The psalmist said, “I have seen a wicked and ruthless man flourishing like a green tree in its native soil” (Psalm 37:35), and “I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. . . . This is what the wicked are like—always carefree, they increase in wealth” (Psalm 73:3, 12). Solomon saw “a righteous man perishing in his righteousness, and a wicked man living long in his wickedness” (Ecclesiastes 7:15). Jeremiah, a righteous man who lived in constant adversity, framed the question this way: “You are always righteous, O Lord, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?” (Jeremiah 12:1).

Are material wealth, achievement, fame, victory, or success reliable indicators of God’s reward or approval? If so, then He is an evil God, for history is full of successful madmen and prosperous despots. Was God on the side of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and other prosperous butchers of history during their rise to power and at the apex of their regimes when they were surrounded by material wealth? Is God also on the side of wealthy cultists, dishonest business executives, and immoral entertainers? If wealth is a dependable sign of God’s approval and lack of wealth shows His disapproval, then Jesus and Paul were on God’s blacklist, and drug dealers and embezzlers are the apple of His eye.

An Eternal Inheritance, Not a Temporal One

In the Old Testament, material blessing was given for obedience (Deuteronomy 28:2), yet in the New Testament many of the saints were poor (Matthew 8:20; 2 Corinthians 11:27; James 2:5). (The same is still true today for the majority of believers not living in the Western world.) Enjoying worldly wealth is emphasized in the Old Testament (Deuteronomy 28:11; Joshua 1:15; Proverbs 15:6), yet the New Testament talks of giving away possessions (Mark 10:17-21; 1 Timothy 6:17-18). By their obedience, the Israelites avoided persecution (Deuteronomy 28:7), but by their obedience Christians incur persecution (Matthew 5:11-12; 2 Timothy 3:12; 1 Peter 1:6).

Why this disparity? Because God was determined that New Testament saints would understand that their home is in another world. No book better demonstrates the relationship of Old and New Testaments, and the two worlds on which they center, than the book of Hebrews. The new covenant is said to be “founded on better promises” than the Old (Hebrews 8:6). The Old Testament is copy and type and shadow. Accordingly, the material blessings promised to Old Testament saints are to remind us of our future heavenly blessings—but never are they to replace them. The new covenant brings not the temporal inheritance promised Israel, but an eternal inheritance (Hebrews 9:15).

We no longer sacrifice animals, because the Lamb of God has come. We no longer worship in a temple, because we ourselves are temples of God’s Holy Spirit. We no longer go to a priest, because Christ is our high priest, and we ourselves are a believing priesthood. We no longer look to material riches, because of the spiritual riches that are ours in Christ.

God demonstrated to the nations surrounding Israel His superiority to their gods by prospering the people of Israel when they obeyed Him. Now He wishes to display Christ’s lordship and presence to the world around us through a better faith and morality, not a higher standard of living.

The Israelites were citizens of the Promised Land (Deuteronomy 8:7-9; 11:8-12). Their destination was on this earth. But New Testament saints haven’t yet arrived at their destination and won’t until our lives here are done. We’re told our citizenship is in Heaven (Philippians 3:20; 1 Peter 2:11). The Promised Land was a foretaste of the glory that awaits us. We are to stake our claim in the ultimate Promised Land: “You have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God” (Hebrews 12:22). The earthly Jerusalem isn’t our destination. It’s only a signpost pointing the way, just as earthly blessings aren’t our ultimate rewards, just foretastes of what’s coming.

Hebrews speaks of promised blessings, a great inheritance of lasting possessions (Hebrews 6:12; 10:34; 11:13-16). These promises must be patiently awaited, because they come not in this world but the next (Hebrews 10:35-39; 11:13, 16). Our destination is as much superior to the Promised Land of Palestine as Christ’s blood was superior to the blood of bulls and goats. The effect of prosperity theology is to promote “Heaven on earth.” But prior to Christ’s return there can be no Heaven on earth. When earth becomes our Heaven—when we see God’s blessings as being primarily immediate and temporal—we lose sight of who we are, why we are here, and what awaits us beyond the horizons of this world.

Our Far Greater Spiritual Riches

Our greatest resources are spiritual, not material. They come from another world, not this one. Even in the worst of circumstances, it’s possible to experience a full, deep life in this world that’s under the Curse, and that’s what sets the Christian life apart. This soul-level abundance means that poor believers who are living in oppressive circumstances can be far more joyful and satisfied than unbelievers who are living in luxury and popularity.

In the New Testament, the Greek word ploutos is used six times for material riches put to evil purposes (Matthew 13:22; Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14; 1 Timothy 6:17; James 5:2; Revelation 18:17). Yet the same word is used eleven times in the positive sense, each time referring to spiritual, not material, riches (Romans 11:33; Ephesians 1:18; Philippians 4:19; Colossians 1:27). Once we experience those riches in Christ, we find them so profoundly satisfying that we can never again elevate earthly and material riches to the place of importance they once held.

We’ll also use the resources that God does entrust to us as means of investing in eternity, and preparing for the life to come. “Your plenty will supply what they need. . . . You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion” (2 Corinthians 8:14; 9:11). Don’t assume that God prospers you beyond what you need just to raise your standard of living. It’s more likely, according to these verses, that He prospers you to raise your standard of giving. He provides in excess not for us to live excessively, but so we can become rich in good works.

As thoughtful Christ-followers, we should never assume that financial abundance is God’s provision for us to live in luxury. We should assume that God entrusts us with His money not to build our kingdom on Earth, but to build His Kingdom in Heaven. A good question to ask God is, “Lord, whose kingdom am I focused on building: yours or mine?”

See more resources on money and giving, as well as Randy's related books, including Giving Is the Good Life, Money, Possessions, and Eternity, and The Treasure Principle.

Photo by Paul Rysz on Unsplash

Moral Standards and Goodness Can’t Exist Without God

Atheists’ argument that goodness and moral standards can exist without God does not hold up. If there’s no God, people don’t live after death and aren’t held accountable for their actions, good or evil. That’s why Dostoevsky said, “Destroy a man’s belief in immortality and... everything would be permitted, even cannibalism” (The Brothers Karamazov).

To say that an atheistic worldview provides no basis for the existence of good and evil does not mean that atheists have no sense of right and wrong. They do. They live in a culture influenced by a historic belief in God and the morality revealed in Scripture. This provides them a residual basis for believing that moral categories are important, while their own worldview doesn’t.

How does an atheistic worldview explain an atheist’s morals? Suppose time, chance, and natural forces accounted for us. If we could move from nonlife to life and from irrational to rational—quantum leaps, to say the least—then what more could we do than invent pragmatic social rules to govern group behavior? Since the powerful make the rules and they would survive longer by making the weak serve them, then why would anyone but the weak want life to change?

If the natural world is all there is, would mankind get its morals from animal instincts? A gazelle runs from the cheetah, but gazelles don’t sit around the campfire and discuss how unfair it is for cheetahs to kill gazelles. Neither do cheetahs wrestle with the morality of whether they should kill gazelles. Do fish have rights that sharks should recognize and respect? Are sharks evil for eating fish? Would a good shark refrain from taking advantage of vulnerable fish? If so, how long would it survive?

In an evolutionary worldview, why object to stronger human beings stealing from or killing weaker ones? Wouldn’t this simply be natural selection and survival of the fittest, not a question of right or wrong?

It doesn’t help to define happiness as pleasure, as opposed to pain. Being eaten by cheetahs doesn’t make gazelles happy, but eating gazelles makes cheetahs happy. Animals can experience “happiness” or lack of it, but that doesn’t provide a moral code. Animal ruthlessness and lack of compassion for the weak is simply how the system works. How could anyone view it as evil?

The naturalist may claim that the survival of the fittest is descriptive, not prescriptive; that it describes the world as it is, not as it should be. But on what does he base any sense of should? Why “should” he operate differently than the way the natural order operates, since he’s part of that natural order himself? Any appeal to natural law seems baseless, unless there is a Creator, a Lawgiver, who has built into us a sense of that natural law.

Atheists who have thought through the implications of their worldview occasionally admit its utter moral emptiness. Unbeliever William Provine put it this way in a debate: “Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear.... There are no gods, no purposes.... There is no life after death.... There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning in life, and no free will for humans.”

Notice his admission that there is no ultimate foundation for ethics. The naturalistic worldview has no basis for declaring some things good and others evil.

But surely something within Dr. Provine can look at good and rejoice, then look at evil and cry out, “This is wrong!” What is it that cries out? The Bible calls it the conscience, God’s law written on our hearts (see Romans 2:15). We have a moral code, a natural law built into us. That’s what allows us to step outside of what we see around us and call it good or evil.

Excerpted from  If God Is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil.

Photo by Lachlan Gowen on Unsplash

Setting God-Honoring Boundaries for Purity: Advice for Women from Wise Christ Followers

A reader commented on one of my blogs about sexual purity and Christian leaders:

I have appreciated your thoughtful response. I do wish you could do an article on how to protect yourself from ungodly leaders claiming to be spiritual... I am dumbfounded when I read about a wife texting a “godly” leader and she hasn’t shared her texts with her husband from the beginning. …she should be communicating with a husband-wife team and possibly have another woman she trusts reading the responses as well. Being asked to send photos of yourself, not to mention nude photos should be a definite alert. How did it even get to that point? Being asked to keep things secret is always an alarm point for me, and I let people know I keep myself free to always share things with my parents since I don’t have a husband. It saves me a lot of trouble if I let people know that upfront.

Let me be absolutely clear upfront. This blog is not about blaming victims of sexual abuse or about excusing the abuses of leaders. (Nor is it about women being the problem.) As I’ve written before:

Sexual involvement with one who has come to seek emotional help or spiritual guidance should not only be considered fornication or adultery—it should be considered sexual abuse. Sexual activity that comes out of a ministry context is comparable to child sexual abuse, where the supposedly mature and stable adult figure takes advantage of his or her authority and credibility to initiate or allow a sexual encounter with the immature and vulnerable. In such cases, the person in ministry is not a victim but a predator. And it is all the worse because we are trusted representatives of Christ.

[When some have] said, “These were adult women who were consenting adults,” they failed to recognize the imbalance of power between an established Christian leader with great verbal skills who is in the obvious power position and who exerts influence on someone. While it isn’t a righteous response, it’s understandable that someone could not only be flattered by the man’s interest but also reason, “I thought doing this was wrong, but he knows the Bible far better than I do, maybe it’s really okay.” Is that rationalizing? Of course. But when Jesus talked about abusive leaders being wolves among the sheep, surely he wasn’t putting equal blame on the sheep as on the wolves.

This is why we need to create a culture in our churches and ministries where when people bring up concerns about a leader’s actions, they are taken seriously and the claims are thoroughly investigated, not automatically dismissed based on the leader’s word alone.

Still, I believe it is wise for Christian women, just like men, to have clear boundaries when it comes to purity and relationships, and to teach boundaries to their children and teens. This isn’t about legalism or about earning our salvation, or about following a list of rules just to appear more godly. It’s simply about being wise, and honoring God in our choices by guarding our hearts (Proverbs 4:23). (And as I’ve written before, because boundaries protect us, they actually bring freedom and joy, not misery and confinement.)

The following advice comes from a Revive Our Hearts conversation between Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Mary Kassian, two sisters I greatly appreciate. Though this is geared towards women, the principles are applicable to both men and women:

Nancy: I know when I’ve talked in the past about hedges and boundaries on this program, invariably we’ll get emails from listeners saying, be more specific. “What are some of your hedges? What are some of your boundaries?” I’ve always been hesitant to do that because I don’t want to say that the hedges that I’ve put in place in my life are exactly in every detail what someone else should put into their life. But I have found that women have been helped as I’ve been willing to share some of the practical hedges that I’ve put into my life.

I’m a single woman. Mary, you’re a married woman. [Note: Nancy married Robert Wolgemuth in 2015.] Let’s just for the sake of mentoring and encouraging women who are listening and may not have been mothered, may not have been counseled in some of these practical areas, let’s start with you as a married woman. You love Brent. You’ve been married thirty years now. You want to protect your marriage. You want to guard your own heart. So what are some of the practical ways that you've set out to establish hedges and boundaries to protect that relationship?

Mary: One of the practical ways is what I call a seclusion hedge. And that is to ensure that I interact with men that I am not married to, men who are other than Brent, in a public venue and not in a private venue. I avoid places that are secluded. So if I’m meeting with someone, a colleague, it will be in a room where others can watch or that has glass doors, or glass windows, or we leave the door open. I avoid being in secluded, private, isolated places with men that I’m not married to.

Nancy: I know we practice that within our ministry. I don’t meet in a room alone with a man without the door being ajar or windows in the room. Some people see that kind of thing and think that seems so extreme. That seems obsessive. Yet I’m thinking, if you don’t violate that seclusion principle, you’re unlikely to be in an emotionally or physically adulterous relationship. People probably never have an affair with someone that they've never been alone with in a private setting.

You can call it obsessive. But I so value the marriages of my colleagues and the men that serve in our ministry, the men that I work with. I’m thinking it’s worth it for them and for me, for their marriages, for my life, to put some of those boundaries up. Is this a biblical mandate to keep the doors open? I’m not going to call it that, but I think there’s a lot of wisdom in it.

Mary: I think there is a lot of wisdom in it. Proverbs tells us that the wise person foresees danger and takes precautions.

Nancy: Prudent.

Mary: Is very, very prudent. It’s just a smart thing to do. When Brent does that for me, I appreciate that I know that he’s not going to be having meetings off somewhere with a woman alone. And he knows that I will honor him in the same way. It's just a way of respecting my marriage, and it's a way of respecting the marriages of other people as well.

Nancy: I think another way of putting up appropriate hedges and boundaries is in the whole area of communication. This is something that I’ve watched just take down a lot of women and a lot of marriages. The whole email/Facebook communication; how can we think about that in a wise way rather than a wild way.

Mary: Well, I think that we need to be careful with where we go in our communication. If I communicate with someone other than Brent, another man, I try to avoid really personal topics. I can confide in girlfriends, but I can’t confide in other men. If I’m having a heartache, or if I’m having something very personal going on in my life, or if I’m having a struggle in my marriage, it’s just inappropriate for me to be sharing personal information.

If I do share personal information, I need to be very cautious to share that information in a way that my husband is aware that I’m sharing it or that he is included in it. So if I’m saying something personal, how I really enjoyed church this weekend, I might type something like, “My husband and I really enjoyed being at church this weekend.” Or I would use “we” phrases and always make sure to make it very clear that I am married and I’m committed to my marriage. I am not just an “I;” I am a “we” in terms of being a couple. That just draws that boundary very, very clearly right up front that this is place, this is a line that is not getting crossed.

Nancy: I know some couples who have practically handled that in relation to their Facebook account. They don’t have their own individual Facebook accounts; they have a Facebook account. If they're going to do it all, together. It has both of their names on it. So when you're communicating with the one, you realize the other partner has access to that, is seeing that material. I think that helps keep away from private or secret communication that could become a time bomb waiting to go off.

Mary: It really could become one. I appreciate Brent often will CC me on an email if he’s communicating with a woman and needs to set something up or tell her something. If it’s just purely business, he doesn’t always do that. But if there's anything of a private or personal nature, he'll CC me on it, or he will tell me about it. I will do the same for him. That just really honors, it nails down those hedges and boundaries. It honors our marriage. It keeps us safe.

Nancy: I don’t want to belabor the point too much, but I think as much as we have seen of emotional adultery, sometimes leading to physical adultery, but illicit relationships being fueled through email, through Facebook, through instant messaging, through various social media, these things can be great blessings if they are used in a wise way. But we're seeing just monumental collapse of trust and covenant and breaches of fidelity and faithfulness through these means.

I talked recently with a couple, a man who is in full-time Christian ministry. His wife has become addicted to Facebook, and through means of Facebook she has reconnected with an old sweetheart who she is now carrying on an emotional affair with, and it is devastating her marriage. I assume it’s devastating his as well in his situation.

But this is something that is rampant even among believers. Nobody wakes up in the morning and says, "I think I’m going to have an affair." They first breach smaller, individual, single hedges or boundaries and then find that leading to another, leading to another, leading to another larger compromise. And it's like Proverbs says, “The end leads to death” (see verse 27). 

Mary: It does lead to death. You and I have both seen it numerous times where just a little compromise, because it's not sin just to send an email, and it's not sin to share a little bit, and it's not sin to share a little bit more. But there's an erosion that takes place, and a chipping away at those boundaries. Those boundaries get pushed to different levels and different places. And you cross more and more boundaries until every boundary is crossed, emotionally, if not physically. 

So to protect ourselves, to keep ourselves safe, to keep ourselves pure, to honor our marriages and the marriages of those around us, we do need to establish those types of boundaries.

Listen to the full podcast.

Also see Mary’s Personal Hedges Worksheet. She writes, “A hedge is a personal rule that minimizes a woman’s exposure to an unwanted sexual risk. It’s a boundary that helps her protect her own sexual purity as well as the sexual purity of the men around her. It’s a strategy whereby she seeks to honor God and lessen the opportunity for sin. This worksheet is to help you establish what your personal hedges are.” You might also like to check out Mary’s book Girls Gone Wise in a World Gone Wild.

See also my blog Pursuing Sexual Purity in Your Marriage and my book The Purity Principle.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

How to Know You’ve Become a Pharisee

Note from Randy: I love this analogy Eugene Peterson shared in his book The Jesus Way.

Imagine yourself moving into a house with a huge picture window overlooking a grand view across a wide expanse of water enclosed by a range of snow-capped mountains. You have a ringside seat before wild storms and cloud formations, the entire spectrum of sun-illuminated colors in the rocks and trees and wildflowers and water. You are captivated by the view. Several times a day you interrupt your work and stand before this window to take in the majesty and the beauty, thrilled with the botanical and meteorological fireworks.

One afternoon you notice some bird droppings on the window glass, get a bucket of water and a towel, and clean it. A couple of days later a rain storm leaves the window streaked, and the bucket comes out again. Another day visitors come with a tribe of small dirty-fingered children. The moment they leave you see all the smudge marks on the glass. They are hardly out the door before you have the bucket out. You are so proud of that window, and it’s such a large window. But it’s incredible how many different ways foreign objects can attach themselves to that window, obscuring the vision, distracting from the contemplative beauty.

Keeping that window clean develops into an obsessive-compulsive neurosis. You accumulate ladders and buckets and squeegees. You construct a scaffolding inside and out to make it possible to get to the all the difficult corners and heights. You have the cleanest window in North America — but it’s now been years since you looked through it.

You’ve become a Pharisee.

Eugene Peterson, The Jesus Way, p. 211.

Photo by Jean van der Meulen from Pexels

God Answers Decades of Prayer: The Closure of Portland’s Lovejoy Abortion Clinic

Interview by Stephanie Anderson, EPM staff
(with special thanks to Ron Norquist for contributing the introduction)

It’s just a small, unassuming medical building nestled in an older residential part of Portland, Oregon. Commuters who stopped for seconds at the blinking light on the corner of NE 25th and Lovejoy Street barely noticed the sparsely landscaped Lovejoy SurgiCenter. But over the years, tens of thousands of women approached the front steps to the clinic, where a pregnant woman could become “un-pregnant.”

In the past, this sleepy corner has been alive with action: people holding signs, little pockets of prayer, sidewalk counselors asking the women to consider other options, often directing them to local pregnancy care centers. One man, Doc Hite, would show up almost daily for many hours even into his late 90s, holding a sign and offering help. When asked why he would do so at his age he simply said, “These are babies.”

In the late 1980s and early 90s a small ministry called Advocates for Life brought groups of volunteers to peacefully block access to the clinic by sitting in front of the doors. Two of those volunteers were Randy Alcorn and myself, Ron Norquist. On those days, the corner of 25th and Lovejoy was a busy one: there were police cars, handcuffed prolifers being dragged into waiting police vans, frustrated clinic workers who wanted to get on with their business, and women waiting for the doors to clear so they could get their abortion procedure. The invisible ones were the pre-born children carried by their mothers into that place of death.

For years prolife advocates prayed that God would do what they couldn’t: close it down. They waited and trusted and advocated for those who had no voice.

Then came word in January 2021 that after fifty years, Lovejoy was shutting its doors, ending its business as the largest abortion clinic in the State of Oregon. Local prolifers rejoiced, but their feelings remain mixed. Demand still exists, and in March, an abortion facility under the name The Lilith Clinic opened in downtown Portland and advertises abortions up to 22 weeks. Still, prolifers thank and praise the Author of Life, Jesus Christ, for hearing His people’s prayers that the building at 25th and Lovejoy would no longer house such evil.

In this interview, Randy Alcorn and Kathy Norquist, Ron’s wife, respond to the closure:

Tell us about your personal history with Lovejoy SurgiCenter.

Randy: In 1988 I visited Lovejoy, perhaps the world’s most ironically named abortion clinic, for the first time. I had never been to an abortion clinic, and I didn’t even know where any were located. In December of that year, I attended an Advocates for Life meeting where I was exposed to the idea of civil disobedience to rescue the unborn. They had a rescue scheduled at Lovejoy in January 1989. With some reluctance, I went to my fellow church elders and explained why I believed God was leading me to do this. I asked their permission, and to their credit, while some of them didn’t really know whether it was the right decision, they all said that since I believed this action was biblically right and both my conscience and the Holy Spirit were leading me to do it, they could only support me. I also told Ron Norquist about it and to my surprise and great encouragement, he wanted to join me in participating. Since I didn’t know any other volunteers well, to have a longtime friend come was a huge help. I no longer felt as profoundly alone.

I rescued nine times in 1989 and was arrested seven times, each time taken to jail and placed in a holding tank, a large room on lockdown also occupied by others arrested for nonviolent crimes. I had many interesting conversations and opportunities to share the gospel. Nanci did sidewalk counseling at Lovejoy for several years, approaching women who came to the clinic for abortions, and giving them one last opportunity to see the truth and rescue their unborn children. That was a much tougher job. It was hard for her, but I admired her for doing what we both believed was right. (See Why We Rescued.)

In early 1990 another abortion clinic, called the Downtown Women’s Clinic, won a court judgment against me and several other rescuers. The court demanded we pay the full amount for their loss of income from the dozen or so abortions we had prevented one day. This amount was less than $3,000, but we were also held liable for their attorney expenses which were nearly $20,000. Later I was summoned to court for refusing to pay this. I told the judge that as a matter of conscience I would pay anybody anything I owed them, but one thing I would never do was hand over money to people who would use it to kill babies.

The judged sentenced me to two days (one night) in jail for refusing to pay the fine. I was handcuffed with what is called a belly chain that went around my waist, to which my hands and ankles were also cuffed, and then led out of the courtroom by two armed police officers who escorted me to the county jail. That’s when photojournalists still used flash photography, so my eyes were blinded. Local television news was lined up to cover this spectacle of a pastor chained to the teeth.

Since I still refused to pay the fines, on the first Saturday of May 1990, I was served papers informing me that the church I pastored was receiving a writ of garnishment demanding they send a fourth of my wages each month to the Downtown Clinic. In God’s providence, Saturday was the only day of the week where no one was present on the church grounds to receive that writ. Since they didn’t serve writs on Sunday, that meant I knew two days before the church did that the writ of garnishment would be delivered to them on Monday. This was a great blessing because it allowed me to call a special meeting of the elders on Sunday, where I resigned as pastor to keep my church from having to either pay an abortion clinic or defy a court order. The church was able to disburse my last paycheck, so they could honestly say the next day I wasn’t their employee, and they owed me no wages that could be garnished.

Later in 1990, shortly after we started EPM, Frank Peretti and his wife Barb spent a weekend at our house when he was researching his next novel after This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness. He wanted the story to center around abortion. After a meeting in our living room with women who had experienced abortions and were now regularly involved in ministry at Lovejoy, I took Frank to see it. I told him stories as we stood across the street from the building. There was a New-Agey “altar” in front of one of the homes nearby, and the owners had placed on it an offering, some kind of fresh meat that we couldn’t identify. The spirit of darkness surrounding this place that was so familiar to me by then was immediately evident to Frank.

As we stood there, the clinic owner, who I had come to know well, drove up in her luxury car and entered the building. I won’t describe what she looked like, but let’s just say it was evil. In his novel Prophet, Frank used Lovejoy as the basis for the abortion clinic that is a significant part of his story. He portrays the web of deception and complicity surrounding legal abortion and its exploitation of both women and the church.

In real life and in Frank’s book, family members, doctors, the media, and political figures all have vested interests in covering up the dangers of abortion. In fact, six weeks after finishing the first edition of my book ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments, I attended the funeral of a woman who died at a nearby hospital after “treatment” at Lovejoy. There was no media coverage indicating the place of her surgery or her cause of death.

In February 1991, nine months after I had to resign from the church, we were set for a major courtroom trial that had been looming over us for a year, Lovejoy SurgiCenter v. Portland, Oregon ProLifers. The time came for the judge, who had been overtly hostile toward us during the trial, to give his last instructions to the jury before sending them away for deliberations. His final words were, “You must find these people guilty and you must punish them sufficiently to insure they’ll never do this again.” For our totally peaceful nonviolent actions, the jury awarded the abortion clinic $8.2 million dollars. (At the time it was the largest court judgment in history against a group of peaceful protestors.)

While we were in this thirty-day trial, several amazing things happened. Three Lovejoy employees quit. One explained to a prolife protester outside, “I don’t know what happened. It’s like I suddenly woke up and realized we’re killing babies here. That’s not what I want to do with my life.”

What others intended for evil, God intended for good (Genesis 50:20). Much of what I wrote about the beginnings of EPM involves Lovejoy.

(Our attorney in the month-long Lovejoy lawsuit asked me to prepare closing arguments. It might speak to your heart as a resource to reflect on as our culture leaves less and less room for the exercise of Christian convictions.)

Kathy: Ron was arrested multiple times for rescuing, mostly at Lovejoy clinic, and spent seven months over a one-year period in jail and lost his job as a result. He then had a jail ministry and to this day is still good friends with one of the guys he met in jail.

Ron was not always prolife and can remember debating with his brother Rick about abortion when he was in high school. But when our firstborn son was stillborn in 1976, that solidified in his heart the humanity of the preborn child. So years later when Ron heard about rescuing through Randy, he immediately wanted to join him. That decision changed our family’s life, but God was faithful beyond what we could have ever asked for.

I (Kathy) spent many times over the years down at Lovejoy alongside other dear friends praying, holding signs, and reaching out to the women and men going into the clinic. There were numerous opportunities to share the love of Christ and His message of salvation. My experience at the clinic forced me out of my comfort zone. I often didn’t look forward to going but always left there strengthened with a sense of privilege to stand for Christ and be a light in the darkness. The heaviest drive I made was to Lovejoy and the lightest drive was away from Lovejoy. The relief in leaving was sometimes accompanied by sadness as there was often no one to take our place.

During the year that Ron was in and out of jail and our family was in the news, I felt like we were living in a fishbowl. It was difficult to have people see your husband as “the abortion guy,” as though that was our whole life. But throughout that stressful and trying time, God was at work. I wouldn’t trade those years for anything because God was with us, and He used it all for His good purposes.

What has changed in the prolife movement in the 30+ years since you were first involved with rescuing and sidewalk counseling? What is the same?

Kathy: Rescuing has become a thing of the past for several reasons, but sidewalk counseling has remained. I think God used rescuing and the publicity that resulted to awaken hearts to stand more boldly for life. There are thousands of pregnancy resource centers as well as many other dynamic prolife ministries so the work is still going strong. But there is an ongoing need to have a presence at the clinics, quietly praying and/or holding a sign or reaching out to those going in.

Randy: Now there are many more prolife clinics and prolife volunteers than in those early days. There are many more churches that support those clinics. The political prolife arms, such as Oregon Right to Life, continue their faithful efforts.

However, precious innocent children are still being killed daily, men are still failing to defend and care for the children they’ve fathered, and women are still being deceived into believing that abortion can solve their problems. The truth is, it is never—absolutely never—in a mom or dad’s best interest to kill their child.

What is missing is the regular presence at abortion clinics in large numbers, which drew attention to the fact that children are being killed every day at every abortion clinic. Sidewalk counseling done by some faithful people continues. That’s wonderful. We rescued until the cost of rescuing became so high that it prevented us from doing much else. Ron Norquist paid that high price more than anyone, and I will always respect Ron and Kathy deeply for that.

In my case, I could both live with my wife and young daughters and do a lot for unborn children by speaking out on their behalf and writing books to equip people to defend them. (My 1992 book ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments was a surprise best-seller, and has been used, now in an updated form, to train prolifers for nearly thirty years. Our ministry also gives substantial funds from my book royalties to support the prolife cause.)

What role do you think prolife advocacy and prayer played in the clinic’s closure?

Kathy: God truly answered the prayers of His people! Some dear people spent several days a week advocating at the clinic. Year after year many of us prayed for something that seemed impossible—the closing of Lovejoy clinic—but “with God all things are possible.” When you are standing right next to it, watching women go in and then come out in wheelchairs, it is heart wrenching. I know He used all of the advocates in ways we will never know this side of eternity.

Randy: Lovejoy, where such darkness prevailed, was like the temples where children were sacrificed to Molech in ancient times. I absolutely believe the prayers and actions of faithful people, many people far more faithful than I, were used of God to pull down a heathen child-killing idol.

Certainly there is great spiritual warfare associated with the issue of abortion. It has now been years since Nanci or I have been to that dark and demonic place. I remember a peaceful prolife gathering there when we and our daughters stood across the street from Lovejoy holding up three large beautiful photographs of live unborn children—not aborted babies—one in each trimester of pregnancy. A limo slowly drove around the corner, and the man in the passenger seat looked at us with obvious scorn and made an obscene gesture. 

That man, believe it or not, was immediately recognizable as the mayor of Portland. As a dad, part of me wanted to go after him for having done that to my wife and little girls. Trying to explain who he was to our daughters put a heaviness on our hearts. How could the most powerful and influential person in the city of Portland be so dedicated to the killing of unborn children and make a vile gesture to born children? Only under the influence of Satan. Jesus said, “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44).

What were your emotions and thoughts when you heard about the closure?

Randy: I cried for joy. I thought, “On this wicked corner where tens of thousands of babies have died, Satan will no longer be murdering children.” The single largest abortion clinic in the state of Oregon, responsible for killing more children than anywhere else in our state’s history, no longer existed. If ever setting off fireworks was warranted, that was the occasion!

Kathy: I felt like crying my eyes out. I was overjoyed and could hardly believe it! Just the building itself represents so much evil. To think that it will no longer be the place where babies are being sucked out of their mother’s wombs, and women are being deceived into thinking they are no longer mothers, makes me so happy. My heart has always been with the many women I know and love who have had abortions and the pain they have lived with. I didn’t want other women to have to go through what they did, so I’m overjoyed that Lovejoy will no longer be an option! I still can’t believe it.

What is your prayer for the city of Portland and for the local prolife movement moving forward?

Randy: My prayer is that prolifers will be patient, realizing that despite laws and the policies of a given administration, no one can prevent us from sharing our prolife values and helping women in need. You can talk to the sixteen-year-old girl next door, and you can give a book like ProChoice or ProLife? to kids in the church youth group. You can offer childcare and financial aid to help moms choose life and raise their children or place them for adoption.

Kathy: I would love to see the Lovejoy building destroyed and a life-giving ministry take its place. That would be incredible!

The news about the new Lilith Clinic is certainly discouraging. Portland Monthly reports, “Its location in a multi-use downtown office building could also help deter protesters; the Lovejoy SurgiCenter was located on a highly visible corner in Northwest Portland.”

My prayer has been that God would raise up younger women to advocate outside of abortion clinics. It is a last-ditch effort to save a baby’s life and help the mom. What kept me going back to the clinic was hearing the story of a pastor counseling a young woman who had previously had an abortion. He asked her what she would have done if someone was outside the clinic standing for life when she drove up. She said, “I told myself on the way to the clinic that if anyone was outside, I’d keep driving and not go through with the abortion.” Sadly, no one was there.

40 Days for Life is a wonderful prolife ministry that organizes a peaceful prayer presence at the clinics. There is a great need for more people, and it makes a huge difference.

What is your advice to prolife advocates today?

Randy: Find your place and learn what your gifting is and where you can best serve Jesus and the cause of women in need and unborn children. Love your fellow prolifers and respect their different callings. Resist the turf-consciousness that inhibits cooperative action and therefore contributes to the very killing we are trying to stop. We must end needless duplication of efforts in the same communities and learn from the experience and expertise of others. We must hold loosely our volunteers and donors and not fear losing them to other groups working for the same cause. We must set aside some of our personal agendas and realize that we can accomplish a great deal more if it doesn’t matter who gets the credit as long as God gets the glory.

There are a variety of legitimate prolife activities. The Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and their special forces all have their role in winning a war, but without strategy and cooperation, they would end up wasting resources. Likewise, there’s an important place for abortion alternative centers, prolife education, literature distribution, sidewalk counseling, picketing, boycotts, political action, Life Chain, and many other activities. But each of these is to serve the whole, not as “the” prolife effort but one working in concert with the others. If one of us wins, we all win; if one loses, we all lose. Without mutual respect and cooperation, prolife organizations will get caught in each other’s crossfire, and we’ll end up fighting the wrong side.

We must work harder and smarter, ever broadening the base of prolife activists, not just burning out a few. All our efforts need to be harnessed as part of a strategic long-term plan to save the most children and women from abortion. At the heart of this must be the mobilization of whole churches, not just individual Christians. Only churches can provide the numbers and resources needed to win the battle for children’s lives. Churches must be helped to form prolife task forces to educate and mobilize their people and make community impact. There are many excellent groups and resources, including books and videos.

Kathy: Never give up! Galatians 6:9 says, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” God is doing so many things behind the scenes that we won’t know about until we get to Heaven. James 1:27 says, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress…” The unborn are true orphans when their mothers and fathers want to abandon them.

I have great respect for those in prolife work, and we should do all we can to encourage them with our prayers and financial support. There is such a darkness and deception surrounding abortion, and it isn’t an easy ministry. Satan is a “liar and a murderer” and doesn’t like people standing up for life and truth. Yet the darker it gets, the brighter the light of Jesus can shine, and what joy that light brings!

Browse more prolife articles and resources, as well as see Randy's books Pro-Choice or Pro-Life: Examining 15 Pro-Choice Claims, Why ProLife? and ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments.