Back in the fall, three young men tortured a llama eventually cutting the poor thing in half. Recently a dentist hunted down a protected lion and killed it. You can barely watch TV or view Facebook without seeing a story about animal cruelty. Planned Parenthood has recently been exposed, via hidden camera investigations, for profiting from aborted baby parts. Years ago the process of abortion was explained to me in great detail and it still horrifies me. I once had a student who had started to fall from a tree (I believe) and grabbed power lines. He lost parts of his fingers and suffered from being electrocuted. Recently a young man, whose sibling I taught, was in a horrible traffic accident with numerous life threatening injuries. I refuse to watch shows or movies involving serial killers because what is depicted disgusts me. Obviously they got the ideas from some sick persons' actual deeds. I know women around the world are being tortured and mutilated in the sex trade. I see images of starving children in commercials or in that famous photo with the vulture. (By the way, the man who took that photo took his own life because he was told to leave the child. He knew what happened and couldn't live with that decision.) I hear of horrific abuse to children, usually when it's too late. When I was a teenager, maybe even a preteen, I heard in graphic detail the suffering that Jesus endured leading up to and being on the cross. Passion of the Christ comes closest to showing what it was really like.
I am not simply outraged by these things. My heart is broken for the suffering around me. Some of us are gifted with being able to visualize things to their extreme, and even then we can't know what it's really like unless we experience it. I am one of those people. It's why I can't watch certain things on TV or even read about them. It will literally keep me up at night being able to imagine the suffering and it makes me sick to my stomach.
ALL of these things, and so many more, are horrifying and outrageous. God created the animals and blessed them in Genesis 1. He told us to take care of them, and since we were made in His image, I imagine we are supposed to care for and love them the way He does. He also made man and blessed him. He has called us to love one another, to care for each other, to treat each other as Christ would treat us.
What's the point of this post? Simply, just because I am outraged over the killing of an animal does not mean I feel any less outraged over the lose of life, especially life that never got a chance here on Earth. I get why people are comparing the two and in some cases people are much more outraged over the lion than the babies, and that is wrong. But I wonder if shaming someone is the way that Christ would want us to deal with the recent news that is circulating. Don't add to the sinfulness of what surrounds us by assuming others don't care and aren't outraged just because they didn't express it as you have. My heart aches for all that is happening and the cruelty of this world is too numerous to even list, but I can't dwell there or it will consume me. I choice to lay it at His feet, weep, and ask what He expects of me.
If He tells me to go and love on a bunch of 5th graders for 180 days then that is what I must do. If He tells me to care for animals and find them loving homes then that is what I must do. If He calls me to go and serve the homeless then that is what I must do. If He calls me to go far away and help rescue those oppressed then that is what I must do. If He calls me to minister to people in prison then that is what I must do. He calls each of us differently and pricks our hearts with different needs to what is around us and needs to be cared for. My calling is no less and no greater than anyone else's. Think about that before you wonder why others don't feel as deeply as you do about a situation, a suffering, a sin. He calls us all differently so that all who suffer can be comforted; so that all who are lost can be found. But we have to listen to the call and obey, and know He has called someone else to the many other needs.
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