THE MARCH FOR LIFE'S CHRISTIAN NAYSAYERS AND A TRUNCATED GOSPEL

I was surprised by many I thought would know better when it comes to the mission of God in the earth when they made statements to the effect that the church has no business marching for the right to life of the unborn and maintaining that marriage should continue be legally defined as heterosexual. Others even asked if Jesus would be part of the march if he were alive today. However, when one considers that God’s mission or purpose in creation was for humanity to lovingly obey God (worship – Genesis 2:16, 17), to love and care for each other (fellowship – Genesis 2:22-25), and to use and replenish the earth’s resources to glorify God (stewardship – Genesis 1:28-30), it becomes rather obvious that God’s mission/purpose is more than worship, least of all a worship that is restricted to “preaching” the Gospel. 

Why do I say that? When humanity disobeyed God and fell (Genesis 3), those three relationships – worship, fellowship, and stewardship – became affected by evil. Instead of worshiping God, humans worshiped the Satan (“prince of the power of the air” – Ephesians 2:1-3); instead of loving and caring for each other, fellowship soon disintegrated into the fratricide of Abel by Cain (Genesis 4); and, instead of replenishing the earth’s resources, humans are making life on earth unsustainable by their over-consumption and ecologically unfriendly ways of living. That’s the bad news. The good news, or the Gospel, is God’s restoration of these things in Christ Jesus who reverses the curse by his death on the cross and so begins to usher in the restoration of God’s reign in the earth which will climax in his second-coming and a new heaven and new earth (Colossians 1:19-23). In other words, the gospel has more than the God-ward call to worship God; rather, it extends to a restoration of fellowship amongst humans which will seek the thriving of all humanity. Of course, this also means that the gospel also extends to issues of the environment and work but that is for another post. 

Now this is where I see a truncated gospel in my brethren: They have limited the Gospel to just preaching the word of God (evangelism) so that the idea of the church seeking restored fellowship amongst humans by protecting the unborn and remaining true to God’s idea of heterosexual marriage is irrelevant or, at worst, heretical. The Gospel encompasses humanity’s social, cultural, and political aspects when seen in terms of restored fellowships. So not to send the message across to our MPs, who sooner or later will be debating such matters that will shape our nation for good or evil, would be to neglect our role as salt and light in the world (Matthew 5:13-15). 

Also to insinuate that Jesus or Paul would not have joined the March for Life is to misunderstand the subtle ways that they confronted the systems of oppression of their day. The fact that both of them did not directly confront oppression does not mean that they did not work within their systems to bring about change. Jesus, in a very male-dominated society that did not consider women as being worth much to the point of refusing legal tes 

timony from them in a court of law, sent Mary Magdalene as a witness to his disciples (read men) about the most important event in history, his resurrection (John 20:17-18). Paul could tell Philemon that he should consider Onesimus his real brother and not a mere slave, a very revolutionary approach for that time (Philemon 1:15-16). Both Jesus and Paul strived for fellowship and equality within their limiting contexts so much that I would say that they would have marched with us today in solidarity with those whose lives are cut-off in the womb and those who seek to maintain God’s purpose to replenishing and subduing the earth.