The True Meaning of Choice

This post is a deviation from the normal posts you are accustomed to seeing on Carla's Corner. This is her mom and in light of the reality of her brother Isaac now being in heaven, I have some thoughts to share. They are lengthy but there is a reward for those who read it through - there are some precious pictures of Isaac that a dear friend of ours took following my words.

What does it really mean to be pro-choice? In the western world it has come to mean respecting a woman's right to choose what she wants to do with 'her body.' Which is a way of abstracting the real choice at hand - what to do with the life of the new little body within that pregnant woman. When we learned at my 20 week ultrasound that our little son had a genetic disorder called Trisomy 18, we were told it was fatal. When we asked about statistics on his chances for any kind of prolonged survival we were told that the data wasn't very good because the majority of women who receive this diagnosis choose to terminate their pregnancies. On one site I saw this choice referred to as 'saying goodbye early.'

In some ways, it was a tempting option to consider; it was painful to wait for nearly three months with the knowledge that if my son lived to birth, he would likely die hours afterwards. But, I am so thankful that I left the choice of life and death in the hands of the One person to whom it belongs - Jesus Christ.

Isaac has already taught John & I so much about our Savior, the brevity of life and the consequences of sin. I have no doubt that those lessons will continue in the weeks, months and years to come. I realize, for example, that I am now pro-choice in the truest sense of the term. I didn't used to be. The Bible is clear that all men are born sinners - "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me." - Psalm 51:5. If left to grow to maturity, the only thing we will ever choose is to rebel against God and not do what He has asked us to in His Word: "There is none righteous, not even one;...All have turned aside, together they have become useless; there is none who does good, there is not even one." - Romans 3:10, 12.

We are not born with the power to choose good. Even with the best environment and upbringing, we do not develop that ability as we grow older. We just grow more adept at choosing sin. That was me. However, about 15 years ago, Jesus Christ opened my eyes to the truth that there is One God who created everything, including me, and that I had sinned against Him. For this, I deserve death and hell but He sent His perfect Son, Jesus, to die in my place so that I could be forgiven and freed. Freed from the awful chains of sin.

Now that I am in Christ, I have the freedom and power to choose life. To choose righteousness, to choose to believe truth. "do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God." Romans 6:13.

And so, today John and I praise God that we can choose to believe the things which He tells us are true of our son Isaac. He is in heaven. Not because he wasn't a sinner, but because God graciously chose to save him. If Isaac was not a sinner, he would not have died for Romans 6:23 tells us that 'the wages of sin is death but the free gift of God is eternal life.' Unlike the rest of us old enough to read and understand this post, Isaac has no deeds on the basis of which to be judged. We do. He is 'innocent' in that sense. But, he still needed a lamb, a substitute, someone to pay for his sin nature. And, that lamb is Jesus Christ. Although we only shared a short time here on earth, we will share our glorious, beautiful, good Savior forever.

Finally, lest you think that we don't love our son because we agree with God's word that he, like all of us, was a sinner, I will leave you with this excerpt from a letter I wrote to our dear Isaac recently:

"Isaac, I will never forget you. I will always love you. There will always be a place for you engraved upon my heart. While my memories of what you felt like - the softness of your black hair, the warm smooth skin on your face, your tiny fingers wrapped around mine - will fade over time, my love for you will not. You have made heaven all the sweeter and my treasure there immeasurably greater. Son, I doubt a day will go by when I don't think of you and smile. Until I too become absent from my body and present with our Lord, I will know that my toil over losing you is not in vain and I will look forward expectantly to seeing and embracing you again and spending eternity with you."

I love you,
Mom