Dear VSM LifeSharers,
Today’s debates surrounding euthanasia are framed almost exclusively in terms of technology. Such terms as "brain death"; "persistent vegetative state"; "intrusive means of nutrition and hydration"; "heroic" means of "prolonging death"; “the quality of life”; the common paranoia over being "kept alive on machines,” and so on all tend to present society's responsibility to the infirm and severely disabled as a radically new problem because of the advances in this century of medical technology.
Even Christians often act as if modern times have presented God Himself with some kind of dilemma – the forces of science going beyond His scope of action. Such Christians have begun to look at the absolutes given in Scripture in a condescending way. "Well, those were applicable in Jesus' time and perhaps even in the 19th century but they certainly can't be applicable now, at least not in a literal way. We have new problems; we have to find new solutions. We require an up-to-date source of authority to guide us through these murky waters." And who becomes those authorities? A hospital committee? An insurance company? A government bureaucrat? An author whose book is endorsed by Oprah or Ellen?
Don’t play this game. For central to Christianity is the eternality of truth. God’s revelations of His law are timeless and humble submissions to those revelations are always in order – for all and any times, under all and any circumstances. The Bible teaches us that "Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever" and His truth as given in the Holy Scriptures are forever "profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness." The world is still judged by the standards of His righteousness as they pertain to any moral question. And that naturally includes all issues of the sanctity of human life. Therefore, the debate is not, at its core, an argument based upon technology at all but rather upon changing values...
Read the rest of the April LifeSharer letter at the Vital Signs Ministries website right here.
