Vengeance is Not Ours
- 06.01.09
- Abortion, Evil, Dr. George Tiller, Operation Rescue
- 5 Comments
Yesterday was an incredibly sad day.  Dr. George Tiller, one of the nation’s few providers of late-term abortions was shot and killed while serving as an usher at his Wichita church. The 67-year-old doctor was murdered in the foyer at the beginning of the service. He leaves behind his wife, four children and 10 grandchildren.
Dr. Tiller had been shot once before (in both arms) in 1993 and survived, but yesterday he was not as fortunate. A 51-year-old suspect with a long history of anti-abortion activity has been taken into custody.
Regardless of your position on abortion, this is a tragedy. Regardless of how vehemently you may oppose abortion, this is a tragedy. And even if you find yourself agreeing with Randall Terry, a veteran anti-abortion activist who called Dr. Tiller “a mass murderer and an evil man whose hands were covered with blood,” this is still a tragedy.
There will be many who will say of this killing that justice was served. They’ll say that because he was a killer of babies that his murder was justified, but this is not true. The Lord makes it clear in His Word that dishing out vengeance is His responsibility and not ours. As members of God’s Kingdom, we do not have the right to decide how justice and vengeance should and will be doled out. This responsibility belongs to the Lord alone.
Christians must use peaceful means to fight against terrible injustices like abortion…not violence. And as we do, we’re called upon by the Lord to cry out to Him and wait for Him to move in the hearts of men and women. Taking things into our own hands is never an option no matter how strongly we feel about an issue.
Operation Rescue is a nationally-known anti-abortion organization that fights tirelessly for the rights of the unborn. After the murder of Dr. Tiller, its president released this statement: “Operation Rescue has worked for years through peaceful, legal means, and through the proper channels to see him brought to justice. We denounce vigilantism and the cowardly act that took place this morning.”
As Christians – those who are citizens of God’s Kingdom where He is the ruler - we must also denouce and condemn what happened yesterday. Please pray for the family of Dr. Tiller, pray for those worshipping at His church who witnessed this heinous act, and pray for the anti-abortion movement in America that its efforts to protect the unborn will not be jaded or thwarted by this cowardly and sinful act.
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'>: You know what happened a couple of months ago? My bike was stolen, I may or may not have.. http://tinyurl.com/n28gjq 07/03/09 10:26am
'>: what a night!!!! 07/03/09 10:26am
'>: Not that this work is mind-numbingly dull or anything. 07/03/09 10:25am
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'><a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23gacorlando">#gacorlando</a> <a href="http://twubs.com/gacorlando">http://twubs.com/gacorlando</a>: 07/02/09 07:29pm
'>: shoud I say things? LOL 07/02/09 07:29pm
'>: >>>> 07/02/09 07:29pm
'>: Your choice. CHOOSE!! 07/02/09 07:24pm
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'>: Yeah you are sooo Great :D 07/02/09 01:51pm
I think this would be an example of someone choosing not to cry out to the Lord for help in a time of trouble and not waiting on the Lord to act (or perhaps becoming impatient while waiting for the Lord to act). It is a tragedy. There is nothing good that happens, either for the witness of the gospel or for the pro-life movement, when someone tries to stop abortion by taking the life of an abortionist. There is never anything good that happens for the witness of the gospel when Christian people resort to the tactics of the world in order to see their goals accomplished (consider the Crusades). We can only pray that somehow good can come out of this. Perhaps if pro-life people are truly remorseful over this killing, and if we show love to those people and groups who oppose us, the light of the gospel will shine through the darkness of this day.
Thank you for your insightful blog, Mike.
Couldn’t agree more.
Vision Forum has posted a piece entitled, “Who Should We Mourn?” It suggested we mourn all of the unborn who died at this man’s hands, as well as for the future children whose deaths will be justified by Dr. Tiller’s murder. It instructed us to mourn for our nation and for the Church. We most certainly should mourn those children who were brutally deprived of life. I believe we should also mourn for Dr. George Tiller. We cannot be pro-life and rejoice in the murder of an enemy. We should mourn for his family. We must love our enemy by caring for his loved ones. Perhaps there were those who loved him as Christ commanded even as he was an enemy to the unborn. I do not know. I do not believe that we can be selectively pro-life.
Well put, Mike!