What part of Innocent Don't You Understand?

Taking a Stab at Abortion and Capital Punishment

by G J Gillespie


HAVE YOU EVER been at the beach and noticed when the tide changes? The water ebbs out for a few hours then a tipping point occurs and it begins to flow in. As we mature we may notice tide changes in our lives as well. 

A sea change occurred for me in November of 1985. I think of it every year. The shifts were occurring before then to be sure. I had just completed a Masters thesis on abortion rhetoric. It examined metaphors on both sides of the issue. It was well received by my committee.

A social movement study of abortion was a topic suggested by an advisor. I was determined to treat the issue fairly and with open mind and began heavy research. After reading hundreds of articles and dozens of books on both sides of the issue my desire for neutrality crumbled. The stories, statistics and mounting data drew me to the conclusion that mass abortion was a social evil.

It was then that I began to doubt my liberal outlook. My professors, role models and politicians who I had admired were defending aborting the lives of unborn children as a civil right. Now I was sure that they were wrong. I remember thinking: if the liberals are wrong about abortion, maybe they are wrong about Nicaragua? Maybe they are wrong about economics?

In the years previous, I had studied feminism and made fun of President Reagan. For some reason I wanted to gain the favor of liberal professors mentoring me. I certainly didn't want to let them think that just because I held to Christianity meant I ranked among the despised conservatives. I wanted to be cool. And enlightened. For my first presidential election in 1984 I chose to support liberal third party candidate John Anderson. I told surprised friends that I disagreed with him on some issues, but didn't like Carter and couldn't vote for Reagan.

Then the tipping point occurred. Newly hired at my dream job to teach at a small college near Seattle I received a phone call with bad news. My close friend Jeff Putnam, who I had been corresponding with while he lived in Mexico City with his sister and brother-in-law, had been murdered. I cried on the floor of my apartment, contemplating all the joys of life that Jeff would miss.

Grief was like entering an encompassing black abyss. It didn't seem real that such a good, vivacious person could suddenly be no more. Jeff who kept a notebook of his prayers so that he might marvel at checking off the answers. Jeff who had written about how disturbed he was to see poverty. He daily fed peanut butter sandwiches to two neighborhood boys, Jose and Lucio, because he couldn't tolerate living next to hungry children.

Jeff was out walking at 11:30 PM on November 9th (we don't know why) when he was confronted by a thief who stabbed him deeply in the abdomen. When the robber discovered that Jeff didn't have any money or wrist watch, he took the only possession of value he could find. His pair of glasses. Laying on the concrete sidewalk, covered in blood and in terrible pain, Jeff was able to give a passerby the phone number of his brother-in-law who reached his side in minutes. An ambulance was called. But, he died on the street at 12:15 AM. He called out for his mother as his last words. "Mom, mom."

Jeff and I shared a similar world view. We were idealists. Typical sophomores (literally "wise fools").  Outraged by the injustices and materialism of our elders, we spoke and wrote about creating a better world. We agreed with author G. K. Chesterton who said: "Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried." If only we could follow the example of Christ. He accepted death on the cross rather than fight back. Shouldn't we? We became dorm room pacifists. No true follower in Jesus Christ, we reasoned, would go to war. He called us to take up our cross and follow him. Jesus wouldn't want us to resort to violence.

Based on the result of my graduate studies, I confided with him my new zeal against abortion. We laughed at the list of names I collected for the fetus used to justify "terminating" the life of the unborn. The dehumanizing labels sounded familiar to other acts of historic genocide.

My list of euphemisms straight from the pages of pro-choice literature included: "tissue, fetal matter, fetus, embryo, parasite, the feto-placental unit, mass of cells, fetal wastage, ejaculated-leavings-swelling-up-in-utero and -- my favorite -- the Products of Conception or POC for short. Jeff even had a tee shirt made for me as a gift for when I attended pro-life rallies. The back read: "Product of Conception." I loved wearing that shirt.

We desired to be consistent. So in addition to the wrong of abortion we equally objected to capital punishment as well. We concluded that capital punishment was a barbaric act of violence. It was wrong to kill unborn babies. It was wrong to kill criminals. We took as wisdom slogans like "Why should we kill people who kill people to show people that we shouldn't kill people?"

I spent a lot of time with Jeff's family in the weeks after the murder and even had the privilege of speaking at the funeral. None of us, as far as I knew, desired that the killer be executed. We had learned that the murderer had been caught and was in prison. We were glad that he was being punished. I don't know if he was executed.

We were simply stunned by the loss. One afternoon, I agreed to help his mother Billy clean up his room. It was strange to put familiar items of clothing that he wore into boxes for storage or for giving away. I was given some boxes of his writings -- notebooks of essays, poems and musings -- to take home as a caretaker.

We never thought that we would know the pain of families and friends of murder victims. But, we were not alone. That year 18,960 other American families also received the bad news that changed their lives forever.  18,960! 11,11980

Philosopher Emmanuel Kant argued that the only just punishment for taking a life is execution by the state. Any other punishment is of less value than the life taken, so to apply the lesser penalty is unfair. He may have been right. To execute a killer sends the message that murder is the ultimate crime because each human life is of utmost value. Capital punishment then does not devalue human life -- it upholds it.

Some proponents of capital punishment argue that a greater number of murderers should receive the ultimate punishment. Opponents take the opposite view saying that the punishment can never be fairly applied and should be abandoned entirely.

After thinking about these issues for a while now, my take is that both extremes are in error. Maybe we shouldn't execute every killer, but there are a few cases when capital punishment is most certainly just. (It doesn't take a lot of research to learn about these cases).  While capital punishment and abortion both take a life, the two are hardly equivalent.

Who are Innocent?

To clarify my position let me ask two questions: Who are the most innocent members of a society and who are the most guilty?

It would seem that by far the most innocent members of society are those people who are incapable of defending or taking care of themselves. These people cannot be held accountable for wrong doing based on a lack of physical power. Unborn children, babies, young children, and the mentally handicapped. These people have done nothing at all worthy of guilt. They are unstained, morally pure and blameless.

Now who are most guilty among us?

Well, that would be murderers, especially those guilty of premeditated murder in the first degree. Here a criminal did not act in a moment of passion, but deliberately planned to kill their victim and to escape detection. Sometimes murderers torture their victims. There are cases that include rape, torture then murder.

While we would like to believe that anyone who commits a viscious murder is insane, as is certainly the case at times, there are many examples when murders are carried out by people who are not technically insane, but are acting with the full resources of a sound mind.

While opponents of capital punishment argue that the possibility of executing an innocent person is justification for banning the punishment altogether, DNA evidence now makes proof of guilt extremely reliable.

And there are cases when murderers admit that they committed the crime. In cases when DNA or other evidence is ambiguous, the death penalty is rarely applied. In the vast majority of executions in the United States there is no doubt of the murderer's guilt.

In fact, only about one percent of people who commit murder are executed. Our society reserves execution for the very worst cases. It is reasonable to defend that system.

If capital punishment is unjustly applied, or is the result of racism, that is an argument against the justice system, not capital punishment itself. It would be like saying that since police radar is inaccurate 30 percent of the time we should refrain from giving anyone a ticket. No, that is an argument to fix the radar detectors. In the same way if a court is corrupt or racist, we need to correct the corruption and ban the racism.

If we haven't heard stories of horrendous murder crimes that cry out for the most severe punishment possible we are either uninformed or naive to the extent of evil in our world. To refuse to face the reality of evil is a serious flaw of imagination.  Adam Lanza murdered 20 children, ages 5 to 10, in their Connecticut school classroom. (It is true that he was mentally ill, but an example of evil is harder to find.) Timothy Mc Veigh killed hundreds -- including a day care full of children -- in the Oklahoma City bombing. Ted Bundy sexually tortured up to 100 women before killing them. There are cannibal murderers. Child murderers. Murderers who are imprisoned then released only to kill again.

While most murderers are rightly given life in prison as punishment, there are cases of murderers given prison terms who continue to kill -- fellow prisoners or guards or others when released early or while on parole.

Society has a right to protect citizens from these extreme killers. In fact, not to prosecute -- and in some cases execute -- murderers would be immoral. Just as most people fail to object to the right of police to use deadly force to stop violence against citizens or the right of our nation to send in the military to kill an enemy attempting to cause wide spread death and destruction, so capital punishment is moral.

Often the existence of capital punishment on the books is used as a bargaining chip to elicit those complicit in a murder case to cooperate and turn in accomplices. "If you cooperate and help us solve this crime, we will not press for the death penalty." With out this chip, many murder crimes would go unsolved, adding more pain to families of those killed.

Life sized model of a fetus at 12 weeks

When we think of abortion we discover that more than 30 percent of all pregnancies are aborted. Most abortions are done in the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, but even at early stages there are recognizable anatomical features and brain cells developing. Unborn children routinely killed in abortions have finger nails, eye lashes, and a beating heart. Hundreds of thousands are performed in the later terms when the there is no doubt that the child feels pain. Abortion for these babies is truly violent and cruel.

Why do some people have more compassion for serial murderers than they do for innocent unborn children? It is illegal to cruelly kill a kitten or destroy the eggs of an endangered bird. Yet it is legal to destroy unborn children for any reason that a woman chooses. Women may be pressured into the decision by boyfriend, parents or ideologically driven counselors and later come to regret the choice.

Founding feminists knew that abortion is a false solution for women. Susan Anthony, in her publication The Revolution, observed:


"Guilty? Yes. No matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death; But oh, thrice guilty is he who drove her to the desperation which impelled her to the crime!"

                      (Anthony, Susan, The Revolution, 4 (1):4 July 8, 1869)

In response to the pro choice chant, "Not the church, not the state, let women decide their fate!", pro-lifers shout: "Not the woman, not the state, let unborn children decide their fate!"

Where one group sees a choice, the other sees a child. When it comes down to a choice or a child, I will side with the child.  Seen this way opposition to abortion must become a civil imperative.

It is a biological fact that the human fetus is not part of the woman's body, since it has its own set of organs and unique DNA and sometimes a different sex or blood type. To claim otherwise is to deny reality.

The unborn child is as human as you or I and in a just society would receive full rights as a person. We know that the worst crimes of history -- slavery, genocide, death camps -- were based on the premise that there are some human beings who are not fully human and thus expendable. Labeling the pre-born as non-persons in order to justify killing them is the crime of our generation. No, the pre-born child is human. These fellow human beings are completely helpless and worthy of our compassion.

If a woman is in a difficult place and feels abortion is the only solution, we need to help her -- as the thousands of pregnancy help centers operated by abortion opponents across the nation tirelessly provide.

So, convicted murderers are guilty and unborn children are innocent. It is wrong to kill the innocent and it is right to punish the guilty. Therefor abortion of unborn children should be illegal in the vast majority of cases, just as capital punishment of killers should be legal in extreme cases.

I could be wrong. Perhaps another sea change of opinion is in store for me someday. If my friend Jeff were around, I sure would like to ask him what he thinks. I miss those discussions.






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Postscript: In this personal essay I share why I became a conservative. 

Now I see everything though a different filter. Human dignity and freedom is harder to defend than we might think.

Ronald Reagan said it best in this 1983 article which I invite you to read: Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation.

Organizations Focused on Capital Punishment

Down and Deep

Souls descend beneath slabs of rationality

Through fathoms of subterranean silt

To granite caverns dark and still

Where headwaters seep and 

Streams immortal brew

Up and far

From secret plots of solitude 

The living cast their prayers 

Past clouds of bronze

To quench desperate desires 

and wash troubled brows 

By and by

Dreamers sleep

and rest their heads on rocky beds

Dampened by rain and sleet

Where roots grow thick in sweet earth

And eternal boughs do shade 

-- GJ Gillespie

Fearful Symmetry

by G J  Gillespie


Go tell of symmetry
Ringing in the world
How it slips down the slough 
Spinning tentatively

Gasping with excitement
Spurred to reach the gate
We lift our heads to see
Final complementarity

A hundred bright spots
Burned up today
Leaving gray the sky
Balancing night with light

And with each sigh
Sings a somber lullaby
Longing too intense to taste
Music to fill empty space

Hear now this stellar narrative
Bringing mystery inside
To drive away dust and decay
In time to meet the dawn

Then hands will join
With hugs of kin
Lost centuries ago
In sunny contemplation

Away into a snow storm
Feathers beat in peace
Until all hope is made secure
And comfort sits like kings

 

 

 

 

Uncovered Dreams

Bare branches twitch
Narcissus break ground
Yellow tips like pursing lips
Struggle to speak

Eyelids spread in gleamer
Decrepit dreams yearn again
To balance between stone pavers
Like bags of rags in dirt

Covered in thick mulch
Frost bitten fingers
Clinch where rain steeps
Longing to burst with tongues of fire

Decaying debris stick together
Beneath the boxwood hedge
Limbs of purple crocus
Crack the mud patina

Bulbs swell in black beds
Blind stems stretch
Up from shallow pits
Of forgotten desires

Divinity of Christ 3. The Scriptures declare: His sinless life -- Universal Brokenness has its Root in Flawed Human Consciousness.

“We cannot grasp the true meaning of the divine holiness by thinking of someone or something very pure and then raising the concept to the highest degree we are capable of. God’s holiness is not simply the best we know infinitely bettered. We know nothing like the divine holiness. It stands apart, unique, unapproachable, incomprehensible and unattainable. The natural man is blind to it. He may fear God’s power and admire His wisdom, but His holiness he cannot even imagine.”

- A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy

That we live in a broken universe is a physical fact. After the Big Bang when time, space and matter began to cool, different features we observe cascaded into existence. Once everything existed in a microscopic super hot primordial. As things cooled, each of the fundamental forces were formed -- gravity, the strong and weak nuclear forces and the electromagnetism. Each force "broke off" from a more unified state before, putting us in the middle of a physically broken universe.

In the same way, human society and psychology is broken. 

The brokenness may go deeper. It seems that human consciousness may have contaminated the universe with a backward in time effect that limits the potential that the Creator intended.  Flawed human consciousness -- that is there is something quite wrong with how we observe, think about and then act toward the world, ourselves and other-- is the source of all suffering, hurt, conflict war, alienation and even death itself. 

Sin is a word that means offense. It is an attack upon God's inner observation of the outward expression of reality. 

A world without sin would have harmony between this inner observation of information and its outward expression. The idea and its expression fit together to form something beautiful. For example, a great work of art inspires awe in the mind of the observer. The inner aesthetic observation is perfectly tied to the artifact.  In a similar way, the act of seeing natural beauty -- an orchid, mountain lake or child's face -- is ennobling.  

The experience of seeing the perfect connection between the act of conscious observation and the reality observed produces a feeling of harmony. There is no information that is disconnected. This harmony is what sinlessness is like. 

The reality of the world that we live in differs from the ideal such that we are surprised by brief episodes of beauty that we do encounter. To see beauty we need to turn our attention to unspoiled natural landscapes or to great works of art or literature to get glimpses of perfection. 

Ultimately we encounter perfect holiness when we encounter the person of Jesus Christ.  He embodies sinlessness. By getting know Christ we find that some of his holiness rubs off. By identifying with his life, death and resurrection we over come the effects of sin and begin the process of being changed into his likeness.  

Teologian A.W. Tozer refers to the quality of holiness almost as a luminous presence or fire that we can enter. We can gain knowledge of the holy. 

"The original root of the word holy was of something beyond, something strange and mysterious and awe-inspiring. When we consider the holiness of God we talk about something heavenly, full of awe, mysterious and fear-inspiring. Now, this is supreme when it relates to God, but it is also marked in men of God and deepens as men become more like God. 

"It is a sense of awareness of the other world, a mysterious quality and difference that has come to rest upon some men - that is a holiness. . . . Theologians long ago referred to it as the numinous, meaning that overplus of something that is more than righteous, but is righteous in a fearful, awe inspiring, wondrous, heavenly sense. It is as though it is marked with a brightness, glowing with a mysterious fire." ( I Call it Hersey, Chapter Five, "Holiness is Not an Option", by AW Tozer, 1974)

The radical brokenness of the universe -- which affects our own ability to think -- cuts us off from experiencing the presence of holiness. We are blind to the light of God's moral perfection and may not even realize that our existential nature is offensive. When we do approach his awesome presence we rightly experience mystery and overwhelming awe.

We sense a disconnection between our own "ought" and "what is". We aspire to live up to certain ideals, but fall short. We experience alienation from our own set of values. That which we know is right and desire to do, we do not do. 

Saint Paul, author of the book of Romans in the bible, put it this way:

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. . . . What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

Romans Chapter 7: 15 - 17, 24a - 25.

The holiness of God mends the brokenness and begins to conform the inner information that makes up who we are -- the genetic,  linguistic and cultural information pattern -- with the reality of our lives. The Holy Spirit fills the gap and applies the redemptive work of Christ on the cross to abolish the effects of sin. We must bask in the gaze of God. When we permit his consciousness to observe our inner being, our sin is burned away and we are transformed into his image. 

As the "new man" to replace the "old man", the mind of Christ makes up for the universal contamination of Adam's sin that spreads to all known reality both before and after. Christ is the first person born without sin and he himself never sinned. That is because the inner information of his being is in perfect harmony with God's observation of the outward expression of his life. Christ has led the way into a new kind of human existence marked by holiness. With God's help we are able to take this holy path towards Christ-likeness. We have hope to live without the effects of sin. In part now and fully one day. 

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Divinity of Christ 4. His miracles: Authenticating Proof of the Trustworthiness of Christ

When we consider that all reality is ultimately information miracles become plausible. Time, space, matter, living organisms, even our thoughts are information patterns that could be expressed as a mathematical algorithm. Therefor if those algorithms could be re-written, the outward expression of reality would change.

Now if the divine Logos sustains the universe at each moment by his conscious observation then it is possible for him to choose to re-arrange the constituent information to produce new effects in the physical world. Just as changes in computer code produces different graphic effects on a screen. 

Christ performed miracles as recorded in the New Testament to prove that he was the Son of God. Two of his best known miracles was turning water into win and walking on water. Study of the stories show that details of the miracles were meant to convey larger truths. The wine from water signaled the beginning of Christ's mission which would end with wine served at the last supper and in the new Jerusalem of heaven. Walking on water symbolized God's control of physical forces such as entropy and death. 

Christ's greatest miracle was his resurrection from the dead. You have to admit that if this happened, it would prove that Christ was God in human flesh. 

The point is that lots of prophets and holy men in history have made fantastic claims about themselves.  Only Jesus Christ lived a life to confirm that his claims were true. 

The Christian does not have a problem believing that on occasion God intervenes to influence the flow of cause and effect in our universe -- and even in our personal lives. God might perform a miraculous healing of a disease or ease a physical hardship. God might reveal to another person a "word of knowledge" about another person to inspire faith in a new believer. 

While miracles are uncommon they do exist. There are many testimonies of God healing people and providing tangible help in times of need, including healing of diseases after prayer. 

Unlike pagan concepts of magic, prayer is asking for the divine mind to act. It is God who has the power to cause an effect, not the supposed power of the person praying. Although there are personal benefits from composing a prayer such as helping the person imagine what he or she really wants, we should not think of prayers for miracles are mechanistic formulae like taking a drug. Such prayers are more like going to the top in an organization to get an immediate answer from the boss. The CEO may answer your request. He or she is not automatically obliged. 

Besides requests for healing or to meet some physical need, it is possible to ask God to reveal himself in your life. He may act in such an uncanny or surprising way to convince you that he is indeed real. 

Consider his words in John 14:1-8 comforting his disciples at the last supper the night before his death on the cross. Here he claims to be the "I AM" or the divine mind that created the universe. He also offers to help seekers find the way to know and experience God through him. 

"Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going." Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him." Philip said to him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father."

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Divinity of Christ 5. His Substitutionary Work on the Cross

A question to consider is: how do you deal with guilt? Perhaps you hurt another person or chose to do something that you knew was wrong and the memory troubles you. Do you try to put guilt out of your mind and ignore the feelings of self condemnation? That doesn't work well. 

The existence of God adds to the mix. He is the standard of perfection, making our own limitations for goodness apparent. When we approach the holiness of God we may realize the extent of our own faults and tendency to do wrong as never before. 

The reality is that we are alienated from our own best intentions, from others and ultimately from our Creator. Alienation from God is called sin. It is the root of human wrong. We could say that sin has short circuited our hardwiring. 

A brief review of human history with all the manifestations of inhumanity makes the pervasiveness of our existential brokenness clear. 

The guilt we feel is a symptom that the human condition is broken and needs repair. 

Is there a way to resolve personal and spiritual guilt? Christ offers a solution to guilt. 

Everyone in the western world has seen images of the cross and Christ dying on the cross. We might wonder why the paintings and films showing a man tortured to death on a post could be so meaningful to believers. 

Essentially the idea is that Christ took our place on the cross. That is his death stands for our own. The cross of Christ makes possible the destruction of human guilt. 

Paul in his letter to followers of Christ in Rome said: 

Rembrant helps in Crucifixion

"You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.

"Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. ...

"For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!" 

(Paul, Romans chapter 5 )

When we contemplate the execution of the Son of God -- the eternal Word of God -- being nailed to death on a wooded post and cross bar the believer will say: "He took my place. Christ died in my stead."

In his painting of the crucifixion, Rembrandt put himself in the scene, helping to hang Jesus on the cross as a reminder that his sins caused the Lord's death. 

The imagery goes back to ancient times when the Jewish tribes practiced animal sacrificial rites. Moses taught that certain animals should be offered up to God in spiritual ceremonies. The Hebrew priests of Yahweh  would kill goats, bulls, calves or doves, burning the meat and using the blood in purification rituals. 

At the annual Day of Atonement the high priest would lay his hands on the heads to two goats, confessing over them the sins of the people that year. One of the goats would be killed, it's blood used in ritual. The other, known as the "scape goat" would be chased into the wilderness, banished from the people. 

Paul and other New Testament writers argued that the ancient sacrificial system pointed to the reality of the final sacrifice for sin in the crucifixion of Christ. 

Identifying guilt with the sacrificial animal -- then killing the animal -- could be explained as a form of symbolic projection that relieves a person by psychological catharsis. Aristotle believed that tragic plays in which heros died violent deaths had a healing affect on audiences. 

The bible seems to say that the death of Christ on the cross was something more than catharsis. It along with the resurrection opened up a new reality analogous to the big bang creation of the universe. Now all things are new. The old life is gone. Absolute meaning is now accessible. 

Remember the Triangle of Meaning. Words stand for things. Symbols represent referents. Just as the sacrificial animal killed in the days of Moses represented the killing of the offenses of the people, so Christ as the Word of God, the universal Logos (meaning behind the universe) has taken our place, blotting out our sin and killing our guilt. 

We could say that the gospel -- the "good news" about the work of Christ -- is the ultimate message, encompassing all that is best about other human messages. It is the substance, like glue, that binds and give coherence among the chatter and absurdity.

All language is substitutionary. Symbols take the place of objects. Each symbol is "sacrificed" when it gives meaning to a referent in the sense that the word is now limited by the concept of the object (referent). 

The Word of God -- the person of Jesus Christ -- steps into our world to give us meaning, purifying us of sin and resolving our guilt. His death and resurrection gives us a new identity. We are free from the burden of past wrong doing. 

And amazingly, the cross of Christ has a forward in time effect. Not only are past offenses forgiven, but Christ has promised to save us from any future sin which we may commit.  
This promise is called grace and reminds believers that our salvation is independent on our own ability to live a perfect life. Rather we depend on the perfect work of Christ on the cross. 

This semiotic view of human salvation requires the sacrifice of Christ just like grammar is required to give meaning in language. He is the missing part that makes sense of our world. 

Martin Luther King, Jr. summed it up this way: 

"I would urge you to give priority to the search for God. Allow his Spirit to permeate your being. To meet the difficulties and challenges of life you will need him. Before the ship of your life reaches its last harbor, there will be long, drawn-out storms, howling and jostling winds, and tempestuous seas that make the heart stand still. 

"If you do not have a deep and patient faith in God, you will be powerless to face the delays, disappointments, and vicissitudes that inevitably come. Without God, all of our efforts turn to ashes and our sunrises into darkest nights. Without him, life is a meaningless drama in which the decisive scenes are missing. 

"But with him, we are able to rise from tension-packed valleys to the sublime heights of inner peace, and find radiant stars of hope against the nocturnal bosom of life's most depressing nights. "Thou hast created us for thyself, and our heart cannot be quieted till it find repose in thee".

( Martin Luther King, Jr. Strength to Love, "Three dimensions of a complete life." 1968. )

You can be free of guilt by asking God through Christ for foregiveness in a simple prayer.

By becoming a part of a Christian community, called a church, you can get the support you need to more fully experience a life of forgiveness. 
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More Comments on the Creeds to come

Disturbing Nature

Blue jays squawk

Makes discordant song 

Jars us awake

To wipe away dawn

Life Cycle by GJ Gillespie. 

When sun arises

Rooster is calling

Proving we're denying 

Jesus all over again

Self righteous peacock 

Screaming in midst of a strut

Beautiful and he knows it 

Damnable thing

Near inaudible chatter 

Of chickadees flocking

Twitching eyes flicker

They know you are sinning

Murder of crows gather 

On bare limbs of winter

Like black robed judges 

Conferring to rule

High perched hawk

Whistles cries from afar

Who welcomed you to witness our music? 

Sink back into sleeping once more

by GJ Gillespie 

Morris Graves

Morris Graves

Uneasy Journey

Race to the top

Dali 

Gaining naught

Hunkered down

Uneasy sojourn

We've come far

To sustain our thirst

Arriving first

To feel the rain

No matter foe

Forward we go

Into a night

of lofty woes

Peace shall reign

Like knights of old

And fall like leaves

into the cold

Then sing we all

Tunes learned long ago

Riding ships

to fairer shores

by GJ Gillespie