:: The S.I.C.L.E. Cell ::

:: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 ::

Tori Amos sings a song entitled "God" I received a copy of this from a mom with a SICLE who experiences the anger that many of us can connect with at times when we think of our own poor choices and wonder why God didn't save us (and our children) from ourselves. I in no way mean to condemn this mom, because sometimes, I admit, my depression can send me into a funk and I get mad at God for "singling me out" to get an illness so bad that it would make my husband and I take our 15-week-old baby to an abortion clinic. But there is a reality check, and the finger always ends up pointing away from God and directly at me.

I'm going to publish the letter I wrote with a disclaimer that this is only what I understand to be true about God. This is my supposing and in no way a claim that this IS "100% God - believe it or burn in hell." I am not a Bible scholar but only a seeker. If you feel something is amiss, I am interested in what you have to say. Email me.

Here's the letter:

"Don't envy me. I don't know that I will definitely see my baby again, but I do have hope, and I know that I wouldn't even have that without God.

You and I have the same taste in music. I was listening to a Tori Amos CD when my dad was in the other room dying of cancer and I was 19 years old. My mother died of cancer four years later. I was an orphan by 25. Then I killed my first child in the second trimester because of an illness. Then I miscarried my second child on Christmas after suffering from the disease. Then they told me my third child had Down syndrome (after again suffering so much from the disease). [He didn't have Down's but I thought he did for 18 weeks of staring at a wall thinking about it.] Where is God when the wind blows? I have felt that way many times in my life.

In the last few years I have wanted to know the answer to that question more than ever before, and I have been doing what anyone who wants an answer does: seeking. I found a church quite by accident. I've never been in a denomination before, but these cats were Presbyterian. I went and the preacher was my age (32). He was hip and really good. I started reading the Bible again, but I was a different person now, so it was like the first time. Verses I never understood before started opening up to me because of what I had been through. I started to understand that God has always been there for me, just like in that sappy "footprints" poem. The thing was... I was not there for God.

Now I'm going to tell you something that I hesitate saying, because I don't want to hurt you AT ALL. But I want you to consider your partnership with God who never forces you to make all decisions according to His will but allows you to choose your own response. This is not to say that God is "pro-choice" in the way that "religious" abortion supporters claim. Their claim extends to morality; they say that the goodness or badness of abortion is also your decision. That is not true, as God has many things to say that relate to abortion.

In your situation, was it God who abandoned you? Did God leave you without any word on what you should do? Or did you abandon Him ignoring what He told you about children and life?

"Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, that you and your descendants might live!"
Deuteronomy 30:19

"Children born to a young man
are like sharp arrows in a warrior's hands.
How happy is the man whose quiver is full of them!
He will not be put to shame when he confronts his accusers at the city gates."
Psalm 127:4-5

"Children are a gift from the LORD; they are a reward from him."
Psalm 127:3

"I knew you before I formed you in your mother's womb."
Jeremiah 1:5a

"Rescue those who are unjustly sentenced to death; don't stand back and let them die."
Proverbs 24:11

These are just a few of the things God said to you (and me and all of us) in relation to abortion. To summarize the above, from the start God was telling you:

*Abortion is available, but don't do it. Choose life so your kid will live and so your health won't be risked.
*Children are a blessing, and they will enrich your life.
*Children are a gift from Me. Look upon them as a reward (i.e., love, honor, respect and cherish them).
*Your Creator created your child.
*Do what you can to prevent the deaths of the innocent.

These are not only your truths and your convictions, they are mine, so I'm not spewing something at you that I am not guilty of myself.

Just yesterday I read a post from a woman with terrible HG. She suffered and suffered, but she had her child, did not kill him, as I killed mine, to rid myself of the horrible suffering. One of the differences between she and I was that she clung to the Bible and read over and over again the verse that says God formed you in your mother's womb. That sustained her because she practiced her faith, and it was not dead to her. SHE BELIEVED and God was able to use her faith to get her through.

When I was pregnant for the first time I thought I was a Christian, but my faith was as dead to me as my parents. The Bible was just words on pages, a daily affirmation of sorts, something to be purchased at a "Hallmark" store for a "General Foods International Cafe Vienna" moment. The Bible stuff I didn't like, I tossed. The stuff I did like, I couldn't cling to as anything particularly special, because the whole thing meant so little to me that I felt I had the authority to gut it in the first place. The assistance was there, but it couldn't help me from my trashcan.

"For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and on the unjust, too."
Matthew 5:45b

Bad things will happen in this life, and God doesn't prevent them from happening to YOU, but HE GETS YOU THROUGH THE BAD TIMES through your faith in Him. At least, this is the way I understand it today.

So the real question you have to ask yourself is:
Is it God who disappears when the wind blows or is it your faith?

Lastly, Tori Amos' god disappears because her god is herself. She's also a flaming abortion supporter who has this to say about abortion:

“The fragility of it is amazing. It’s such a mystery—where these souls come from and where they go. Of course, I’m still pro-choice—you have to believe in the independence of women. But sometimes I wonder whether women are aware of their huge responsibilities.”

As you can see, abortion is what SHE wants it to be. Feminism is what SHE wants it to be. God is who SHE wants Him to be. In reality however, God does not conform this way. Tori is so mad at her god for seemingly hating women, but God is only a personal idea to her. He has no authority over her, no philosophy over her own, His affinity for human life plays second fiddle to the "independence of women". Tori's god is not really the One true God at all. She does what she wants to do and then blames God for the fallout. That explains fully the reason why she thinks God leaves when the wind blows. And it makes you wonder why she continues to cling to the god of her invention. She can't bring herself to accept truth that she cannot understand or is personally not happy with.

I guess sometimes it's just easier to complain.

Love,
Ash"

:: ashli 8:59 AM # ::
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