ANDREW, THE INTRODUCER

   RAYMOND WILBANKS and I met again after many years. During the 1950s, we attended Mountain View Elementary School together from first through fifth grades. His family attended Faith Temple, too. After our fifth-grade year, my family moved to Greer. 

Our first meet-up happened months ago. My wife Barbara’s middle child, Jack, works on cars on Saturdays behind our house. Raymond came to see Jack about his son-in-law’s truck, or something like that, and we renewed friendship.

Raymond played football at Blue Ridge High and then worked for Duke Power. He became a Sunday school teacher and served in churches they attended. I remember him as a quiet, kind, studious, tall fellow who could hit a softball a long way during recess at school. 

On another visit, Raymond brought a book he thought I’d like: Twelve Ordinary Men by John MacArthur. The book’s subtitle is “How the Master Shaped His Disciples for Greatness, and What He Wants to Do with You.” It’s a good book.

Of the 12 disciples, MacArthur calls Andrew “the Apostle of Small Things.” Peter is the best-known of the four disciples in Jesus’ inner circle. Andrew is the least-known, overshadowed by Peter, James, and John.  

Andrew first followed John who baptized Jesus. The day after that famous baptism, this happened:

“John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God!’”

John pointed to Jesus as the Messiah, so Andrew started following Jesus.

“He [Andrew] first found his own brother Simon and said to him, ‘We have found the Messiah’ (which means Christ). He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, ‘You are Simon the son of John. You shall be called Cephas’ (which means Peter)” (John 1:41-42 ESV). 

“Andrew lived his life in the shadow of his better-known brother,” MacArthur says. “Many of the verses that name him add that he was Peter’s brother … where one brother overshadows another to such a degree, it is common to find resentment, strong sibling rivalry, or even estrangement. But in Andrew’s case, there is no evidence that he begrudged Peter’s dominance.” 

Later, Jesus called Peter and Andrew as they fished. 

“While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.’ Immediately they left their nets and followed him” (Matt. 4:18-20 ESV). 

MacArthur compares Edward Kimball to Andrew. Kimball was a young Sunday School teacher who made it a habit to personally give each student in his class an opportunity to accept Christ as their Savior. On April 21, 1855, Kimball went to a Boston shoe store where Dwight L. Moody (born in 1837) worked, according to moody.edu. Kimball, a timid and soft-spoken man, talked with Moody in the store’s stockroom. At the time, Moody was “crude and obviously illiterate … untaught and ignorant about the Bible.” 

Kimball said, “I decided to speak to Moody about Christ and about his soul. I started down town to Holton’s shoe store. When I was nearly there I began to wonder whether I ought to go just then during business hours. And I thought maybe my mission might embarrass the boy, that when I went away the other clerks might ask who I was, and when they learned might taunt Moody and ask if I was trying to make a good boy out of him. While I was pondering over it all I passed the store without noticing it. Then, when if found I had gone by the door, I determined to make a dash for it and have it over at once.”

“Shortly thereafter, Moody accepted the love of God, devoted his life to serving Him, and eventually left the shoe business to become a great evangelist. 

Andrew introduced Peter to Jesus. Kimball introduced Moody to the Lord.

The Bible doesn’t record what happened to Andrew after Pentecost, but tradition says he was eventually crucified — after he introduced many people to Jesus.

FORGIVENESS: WE'RE DESIGNED TO FORGIVE

  “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you,” Lewis B. Smedes said.

People we know slightly may criticize us and stir us to ask What’s wrong with me?, but people we know intimately hold more potential to hurt us — think of the song “Only Love Can Break a Heart.”

“It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend,” William Blake said. 

Dr. Fred Luskin, author of Forgive for Good, says that to forgive is to let go of bad feelings or the desire for revenge after you’ve been harmed. He says that most of the reasons to forgive are for your own welfare. “When you’re remembering a hurt or a wound that you haven’t resolved in your mind and heart, that remembrance triggers stress chemicals. It triggers physical distress. When you remember it often, you are stressing your body on a chronic basis. That has a physical cost.”

Luskin says forgiveness doesn’t necessarily mean reconciling with the person who hurt you, but reconciling is important in the relationships you want to keep — marriages, families, business relationships, friendships, and between siblings.

During a recent Faith Temple (Taylors, SC) Tuesday Morning Bible Study, Pastor Raymond D. Burrows talked about Mark 11:25-26: “And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses” (ESV). Verse 26 adds, “But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.”

(Dr. John Oakes says verse 26 was probably added by a scribe copying the best manuscripts he had but that verse 26 is not in earlier manuscripts. Verse 25, however, tells us what we need to know about forgiveness.)

Pastor Burrows indicated that God is not “out to get us,” but if we do not forgive someone, we stop the process by which we receive God’s forgiveness. We shut off the Divine flow and clog up the spiritual pipeline. Someone said that God designed us to forgive. You may never forget an offense, but Jesus helps you forgive and heal.

Gordon MacDonald, in Restoring Your Spiritual Passion, writes, “One memory that burns deep within is that of a plane flight on which I was headed toward a meeting that would determine a major decision in my ministry. I knew I was in desperate need of a spiritual passion that would provide wisdom and submission to God’s purposes. But the passion was missing because I was steeped in resentment toward a colleague. 

“For days I had tried everything to rid myself of vindictive thoughts toward that person. But, try as I might, I would even wake in the night, thinking of ways to subtly get back at him. I wanted to embarrass him for what he had done, to damage his credibility before his peers. My resentment was beginning to dominate me, and on that plane trip I came to a realization of how bad things really were. …

“As the plane entered the landing pattern, I found myself crying silently to God for power both to forgive and to experience liberation from my poisoned spirit. Suddenly it was as if an invisible knife cut a hole in my chest, and I literally felt a thick substance oozing from within. Moments later I felt as if I’d been flushed out. I’d lost negative spiritual weight, the kind I needed to lose: I was free. I fairly bounced off that plane and soon entered a meeting that did in fact change the entire direction of my life.”

Craig B. Larson says, “Spiritual passion cannot coexist with resentments. The Scriptures are clear. The unforgiving spirit saps the energy that causes Christian growth and effectiveness.” 

“Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive”
(Colossians 3:12-13).

Babies: Conception, Heartbeat ... Personhood?

  The Supreme Court legalized abortion in a Jan. 22, 1973, ruling (7-2) on Roe v. Wade, establishing a national right to abortion.  

“The Supreme Court made up a constitutional right to abortion out of thin air, only citing a constitutional right to privacy, which was also made up out of thin air,” says Stephen Strang, Charisma magazine founder. “Instead of interpreting the law already found in the Constitution, they replaced the law with their own opinion.”On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court overturned (5-4) Roe v. Wade, after 49 years and more than 63 million abortions.

Abortion has not been outlawed. Decisions on abortion laws simply go back to individual states. The Constitution says most laws should be decided by states, Strang notes.

 

HOW DID THIS PLAY OUT?

   

The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States — including former enslaved people — and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.” The Roe v. Wade case began in 1970 when “Jane Roe” — a fictional name used to protect the identity of the plaintiff, Norma McCorvey (1947–2017) — began federal action against Henry Wade, the district attorney of Dallas County, Texas, where Roe resided, sources say. “Jane Roe” sued the state of Texas because under that state’s laws, she was unable to get an abortion. The case went to the Supreme Court.

   

The Supreme Court disagreed with Roe’s claim of an absolute right to terminate pregnancy in any way and at any time, and the Court tried to balance a woman’s right of privacy with a state’s interest in regulating abortion.

 

In 1973, Supreme Court judges said the state had a “compelling interest” in protecting fetal life, but that the compelling interest had to be balanced with a woman’s right to privacy. That ruling struck down most U.S. state laws that restricted abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy.

 

Writing for the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade, Justice Harry Blackmun said that the court held that a woman’s right to an abortion was part of the right to privacy protected under the 14th Amendment. The state of Texas argued that “the fetus is a ‘person’ within the language and meaning of the 14th Amendment.” 

 

Justice Harry Blackmun responded, “If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus’ right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment.” However, Justice Blackmun concluded “that the word ‘person,’ as used in the Fourteenth Amendment, does not include the unborn.”

   

The 1973 Supreme Court set forth a “trimester” framework for legal abortions. First Trimester (up to 12 weeks): absolute right to an abortion in the first three months of pregnancy. Second Trimester (up to 28 weeks): allowed the government to regulate abortion in order to protect the mother’s health, but could not ban it. Third Trimester (up to 40 weeks): Because the fetus is considered “viable” (can survive on its own outside the womb — about 24 weeks of pregnancy), the Court said states could prohibit abortion except in cases when the mother's life was at risk.

   

S.C. law in 2022 outlaws abortion after the point at which a fetal heartbeat is detected. A fetal heartbeat may first be detected by a vaginal ultrasound as early as 5.5 to 6 weeks after gestation (the womb-carry process between conception and birth), sources say. 

 

“Those providing abortions will be required to give the mother an opportunity to view an ultrasound, hear the child’s heartbeat, and receive information about her child’s development,” according to The Greenville News (July 1, 2022). The law allows abortion in a case of rape or incest or to save the mother’s life if the baby is fewer than 20 weeks along.

     

The Supreme Court’s 1973 decision was based on the argument that fetal life does not have constitutional protection. Many people believe life begins at conception and deserves constitutional protection at conception. Banning abortion after conception is the goal of many pro-life groups.

 

“For you [God] formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb” (Psalm 139:13 ESV).