Fifty weeks and fifty Suns is enough to get your heart pumping. Merry Christmas, Marysville, and enjoy your ten (shopping) days before the 25th!
☀️A Destination, Digital Surveillance, and Death
As we get closer the the close of another calendar year, many of us will review the last twelve months, take stock of our lives, and consider if and what to try different in 2024. It's as good a time as any to remember that our days on earth are numbered. We might ask ourselves: what will we be known for?
Washington State will be remembered as a destination for death.
I prefer not to get all editorial about the same subject in two successive Suns. But a few things conspired together this week to bring me back to the horrors of abortion.
A friend sent me this link about the multiplication of baby-murders in WA. After the Dobbs decision, in a post-Roe nation, the Supreme Court sent authority to stop abortions back to each state. Praise God, many states have made legislative progress to defend the defenseless. And yet, among the numerous GAGs (Grievances Against the Governor) here in WA, we've stockpiled killing pills and promoted ourselves as a destination for death. According to The Seattle Times, the percentage of abortions rose by 23% from 2021-22, with over 20,000 abortions reported in 2022, and more than 1,400 women who live outside of WA coming to get an abortion. It’s right where we live: “More than two- thirds of abortions for residents were carried out in King, Pierce and Snohomish counties.” It's as if we are saying, "Let the blood be on our hands."
I also happened upon the subject from a different angle. This FastCompany article is titles: "E-books are fast becoming tools of corporate surveillance" More than 90% of my book reading for the last decade has been from digital copies, and most of those in the Kindle format. There is convenience, portability, and a couple other parts that fit into my life and workflow. That said, I'm aware of limitations with digital rights, and I'm not ignoring that Amazon can change/edit the content of books I already "own" any time I sync with their servers. So I started reading this article with invested interest.
But I was surprised in the middle when the concern raised was about how the surveillance is looking for women reading about post-abortion care, and claims that this is to track down
“Right now, there’s a concerted effort from anti-abortion lawmakers and vigilantes to discover who is getting or supporting an abortion.... Whether you’re traveling for abortion care, legally accessing it at home, experiencing a miscarriage, or finding support resources for a loved one, worrying that reading a book might betray private medical information should be absurd. Yet in today’s post-Roe landscape of legal, social, and health threats around pregnancy, we need to be concerned that Big Publishing’s new hunger for reader data might put abortion seekers at risk of criminalization and violence.”
First, I know that the tracking technology certainly is capable. Second, I just do not believe that our 1984-esque overlords are doing this recon for these purposes. What federal politicians are (actually, even secretly) in favor of finding and punishing those who have sought abortions? Big tech, or Big Publishing as the article refers to it, isn’t pushing righteous morals. Big Brother encourages and resources death.
That said, this is a shelf we should probably get built into our mental categories. The Fourth Amendment seems applicable: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause....” So our books/underlines/highlights shouldn’t be searchable without a warrant with just cause, we should get warrants and gather evidence against those committing crimes, and certainly murder would apply.
I mentioned last week that politicians are encouraged to go soft when it comes to the subject of abortion. They can't win if they're too abolitionist. Though it's in Oklahoma, Christians should rejoice in the successful Senate seat win by Dusty Deevers. During his campaign, and repeated upon his election, Deevers has said, "Child sacrifice will stop." Amen!
May the Lord raise up more men who submit to the authority of God’s Word in order to stand like this.
And what can we do? We can pray, for God to give His grace in repentance, especially for those who not only allow but promote abortion. We also can love our kids and grandkids. The last prophet of the Old Testament said that the Lord would turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers. In a season where families often gather to celebrate our Lord’s birth, we should double-down in gratitude since families matter. And also, why not find a ministry to support, with prayers and/or dollars and/or time? Our church gives monthly to Antioch Adoptions, a group that continues to hold the line on biblical definitions of family, gender, and sexuality. We can work to make Marysville, and WA, a destination not of death but of life.
☀️More Links
Christian and veteran, Michael Cassidy, tore down and beheaded a statue of Satan in the Iowa Capital. Here is a great article comparing Cassidy’s courage to Gideon, and here is a link to donate to his legal defense.
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The City of Marysville posted the Electric Lights Parade video from the Merrysville for the Holidays event on December 2.
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Be sure to click through and see all the drone pictures of the six-million Tulalip lights.
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KIRO7 reports that our “chances for a White Christmas this year aren’t looking good.”
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Some of you didn’t watch this video last week, and it shows because your cheeks are still dry. Hence why I’m sharing it one more time. 🥹
☀️Christmas Concerts
Just a couple more local opportunities:
Marysville Community Band Winter Concert - tonight, 7:00pm at the Marysville Historical Society. See the event page here.
Grace Bible Church Choir: Sunday, 12/17, 6:00 PM, at 8521 67th Ave NE, Marysville
☀️Friday Fun
Just the facts.
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