Lowry's Book Shop in Three Rivers, MI

Over Christmas my mom, sister and kids took a day outing to a bookshop in Three Rivers, MI. We got stuck. Lowry's rambles on for room after room containing new books, cheap fiction, kids books, history, religion, cook books, and a whole basement of books I've never gotten to after at least 8 visits to this shop. It's big considering the little backwater town sheltering it. 

This is amusing considering most of the people in this photo are talking. That's the Eby's, for ya. 

The kids were riveted in the kid's section and even the littlest one found something to point out. He has no choice but to become a bookworm with a mother and three older siblings who avidly read most of what they can get their hands on. 

One of my resolutions for the year is to read more and watch TV less. Watching TV isn't wrong, but I'm finding my senses and "information receiving department" overloaded these days. I've been struggling to reconcile humanity and truth; it is difficult to sort through massive piles of fact and opinion.

This past year, two months, and last week have been a hard one for many people. No matter whether you find yourself in the stricken "with her" camp or "make America great again" triumph there have been conflicting emotions. Enough has been tweeted and shared on social media platforms to fuel another cold war and the resulting tensions have caused deep rifts. Independence for women has been the cry and it has made its bed along with other rights movements and civil issues in this past election, stoking a fire where it does not belong. The flames are about legitimate issues, but they are destroying what should be protected. 

Justice for the oppressed is a worthy cause, but this past week I have awoken to the fact that the feminist movement has betrayed women. I cannot justly support a cause for women who can justify taking out what has been given specifically to women to safeguard and house; new life. The victim has become the oppressor and we've raised the stakes from indignity, to murder. The issues are multi-faceted as a whole, but we would mostly agree that there's not a woman alive and informed who would applaud a man trash-talking a woman, but apparently, taking an unborn life is ok. Two wrongs do not make a right. 

We've pitted a woman's choice against human life, and yet we strain at a talking gnat of offense taken. It's a petty detail against 58,586,256 abortions; human life aborted. Were each life to be recorded in our books it would be a sad and gruesome tale of women who felt coerced into what they did by life circumstances: ignorance, missing fathers, libertine lifestyles, poverty, secrecy, and sometimes downright selfishness. Mostly, they have been betrayed by the willing deception of a few of the women who have the power to effect change, and by the passivity of we who know better. Apparently we didn't need the serpent this time. 

The tale of man has never been a pretty read, and our current period of history will not reflect well in any future. I perceive that when even the most basic rights of life are ignored the rest of us will go to hell. We cannot expect anything good to happen when we justify taking one set of lives for the bettering of another. Look at Rwanda. Look at Hitler's Aryan utopia. There is little difference between how they thought and the rationale we use, we just have a politically correct way of saying it. 

In the many grey areas that life has abortion is not one of them. It is a simple enough truth if you will stop to look. No matter whether one is a Christian, Catholic, Athiest, Dem or Rep, etc. this is a truth that ought to be recognized: one life cannot substitute another. 

I'm being hard on the women, I know. The men have responsibility, but it is not equal to ours. Ours are the bodies that carry the children and it is from us that we must raise up a new life that will have nothing to do with ending it. It is our fight, and if we will be truly powerful we have to rise up and protect what God has given us, the safe haven for life of the world. 

I'll wager a guess that all of you (or nearly all) agree and support 100% with the fact that all life, born or unborn, is worth a chance to live. But we are not entirely free from blame ourselves while we sit in our comfortable kingdoms of being cherished, valued and loved beyond what most women in the world experience today. Men who are men and women who are women is a hallmark in our smaller, sub-culture of churches and friends; we cannot possibly know what it is like for those who have felt driven to make the choice to take their baby. Judgement against them is not ours, but the necessity to help where we can, is. 

If we truly care about the future of women and unborn children any step, however small or large, is ours to take. 

Tangible ways to help

• Foster care
• Adoption
• Kids Ministries
• Friendships
• Women's crisis centers 
• Education 
• Exercise
• Support people on the front lines

If you can't help directly with a ministry there are ways of supporting people in those causes. I help with a local kids ministry and know from experience creative help is always motivating to us. Sometimes it's as simple as a special evening for the kids with games and food, or a small homemade gift for each kid. We tend to think large scale on issues and while big picture is great, small deeds are even better. It is on a community level that change is most enduring. 

Educate yourself. Read. Books are one of my favorite ways of gaining information because in writing thought is often more rational and well-organized. Most news sources are professional fear-mongerers and while it's unwise to stick our heads in the sand, it is just as unwise to get worked up daily by people who are paid by your emotions. 

Love mercy, do justly; walk humbly with your God.