Matthew 6:14-15 (NLT)
14 “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. 15 But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

Two of my daughters went to the gun rallies yesterday. Cool, I hope. Senseless murder is senseless murder whether it’s a product of guns, distracted/drunk driving, knives, beatings, abortion, etc., whether it’s in schools, work place, or the home. The violence has to stop.

The violence isn’t isolated to guns, nor should our concerns be. I believe the argument and concern should be about the sanctity of life. If that’s the case, where’s the outrage against gang related violence, late term abortions*, distracted/drunk driving? Where’s the push to protect the sanctity of ALL life? It’s not manifesting itself as national action like we saw yesterday. Nor are we seeing the overwhelming boots on the ground action.

John 3:29 (NLT)
29 It is the bridegroom who marries the bride, and the bridegroom’s friend is simply glad to stand with him and hear his vows. Therefore, I am filled with joy at his success.

James 1:19 (NLT)
19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.

Zechariah 9:9 (NLT)
9 Rejoice, O people of Zion! Shout in triumph, O people of Jerusalem! Look, your king is coming to you. He is righteous and victorious, yet he is humble, riding on a donkey—riding on a donkey’s colt.

What do these scriptures have to do with the sanctity of life? It’s a drum beat. We are Christ’s bridegroom. We are to honor and glorify him. We are to be wise and discerning. We are to be humble, righteous, and victorious. We are to love like Christ loves us. We are to act on the sanctity of life.

So, what are we going to do, enact more laws? Remember, we started with one. That didn’t work so well, so we went to ten. Well, that’s never worked. In the Old Testament there are 613. That didn’t work. Today, we have so many laws, we don’t know how many we have.** There are over 20,000 gun related laws.*** That’s not working either. We can’t legislate our way out of this.

Until we instill and agree that the sanctity of life as the critical lynchpin the discussion hinges on, we’re missing the point and will be ineffective in solving the problem. The sanctity of life encompases all murder, all poverty issues, all mental health issues, all economic disparity issues, all violence issues – in a word, all social justice issues.

The sanctity of life is about loving others enough to do more than march on a sunny afternoon. The sanctity of life is about the quality of everyone’s life. We need to pause the discussion and decide to get serious about doing something about it ourselves, not bitch at others to do it for us.

The sanctity of life is about love and the purest love is that of God, the love Christ showed us. Our actions should reflect that love in our passions and works. If it doesn’t, we should sit down until we’re ready to stand up.

We need to remember that the sanctity of life is why Christ came and died for our sins.

*from https://www.guttmacher.org, slightly more than 9% of abortions occur after 14 weeks, 1+% occur after 20 weeks, a commonly agreed upon gestation period where a fetus can survive outside the womb.
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_statistics_in_the_United_States abortions have been declining significantly, and in 2014 there were 653,639 abortions. Do the math.
** that interesting fact is from the library of Congress research arm. https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2013/03/frequent-reference-question-how-many-federal-laws-are-there/
*** http://www.kowal.com/?q=How-Many-Federal-Laws-Are-There%3F