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When governments deliberately introduce legislation that permit evil – and even to compel it – shame is appropriate and needful.

The trouble is that the parliamentary members who introduce such legislation – particularly when the issue at stake is the intrinsic value of human life – usually also have no concept of what it means to Fear God.

Even when the issues are crystal clear. Such issues can be the shredding of an unborn baby limb by limb, right through to term, for any reason, when it is capable of feeling pain. Or the compelling of doctors to be part of the process.

The absence of fear, the absence of shame, is reflected in the following historical record:

“It was the ninth month and the king was sitting in the winter apartment, with a fire burning in the firepot in front of him. Whenever Jehudi had read three or four columns of the scroll, the king cut them off with a scribe’s knife and threw them into the firepot, until the entire scroll was burned in the fire. The king and all his attendants who heard all these words showed no fear, nor did they tear their clothes.”
Jeremiah 36:22-24

In just a few verses we get a glimpse of complacency, arrogance, ignorance and contempt for the message of God that so characterises some people of any generation. There is no humility, no respect, no remorse, no fear, and no shame.

And in our time

“Repugnance, here as elsewhere, revolts against the excesses of human wilfulness, warning us not to transgress what is unspeakably profound.
Indeed, in this age in which everything is held to be permissible so long as it is freely done, in which our given human nature no longer commands respect, in which our bodies are regarded as mere instruments of our autonomous rational wills, repugnance may be the only voice left that speaks up to defend the central core of our humanity.
Shallow are the souls that have forgotten how to shudder.”
Leon Kass 1997 The Wisdom of Repugnance

But shame is also appropriate and necessary for the person who understands when evil is promoted and yet remains silent.

“When principles that run against your deepest convictions begin to win the day,
then battle is your calling, and peace has become sin.
You must, at the price of dearest peace, lay your convictions bare before friend and enemy
with all the fire of your faith.”
Abraham Kuyper

“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.”
Dante.

“If I profess with the loudest voice
and clearest exposition every portion of
the truth of God except
precisely that little point which the world
and the devil are at that moment attacking,
I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ.”
Martin Luther

And shame is also appropriate and necessary for the person who, when presented with a clear choice at the ballot box, votes for the promotion of evil.

From Choose Life Australia:

Shame on all who sin against the weak and powerless.
Shame on all committing sin against children.
Shame on those who in order to maintain “respectability” cover up the sins of others.
Shame on all those who failed to protect.
Shame on all those who failed to warn.
Shame on all those who failed to warn of the consequences of proposed legislation – not only failing to protect but failing to prevent the facilitation of evil to children.
Shame on all those who did not love their neighbour sufficiently to warn that their children were at risk.
Shame on pastors who failed to warn of the danger and thereby failed to protect.
Shame on all those who voted for those determined to bring in same-sex “marriage” and “safe-school’s programs”.
Shame on all those who voted “yes”.
Shame on all MPs who encouraged and voted for SSM regardless of the consequences.

We need to declare who we are without fear. In our relationships in society may we be unafraid in upholding our liberty to believe, the honour and value of marriage and family as God gave it and the innate value of all human life as created in the Image of God – all of which are expressed so well in the Canberra Declaration.

Therefore, you kings, be wise; be warned, you rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear and celebrate His rule with trembling. Psalm 2:10 NIV.

The Fear-of-God

builds up

confidence,

and makes a world

safe for your children.

Proverbs 14:26 The Message