A Toothbrush Can Clean Your Teeth in 10 Seconds

Do you need a toothbrush that cleans your teeth in ten seconds? Or luggage that follows you, a “smart” trash can, or a car that talks to other cars?

Perhaps you’re in the market for a toilet with a heated seat, flushing, and “dynamic” lighting you can all control by voice. These are just some of the innovations being premiered at the Consumer Electronics Show, which begins tomorrow in Las Vegas.

Humans are capable of astounding achievements, as last week’s flyby of an object four billion miles from Earth demonstrated. Think about the advances we’ve seen in the last century.

Now think about the wars and conflicts we’ve seen since the “war to end all wars” ended in 1918.

Our remarkable capacity for good stems from a single biblical fact. Our horrific capacity for evil stems from ignoring this fact.

Only nine nations have a higher reported abortion rate than the US

“Shout Your Abortion” founder Amelia Bonow recently released a video of her talking with young children about her abortion. She explains to them that doctors “suck the pregnancy out” and compares the procedure to going to the dentist.

She tells the children: “I feel like if I am forced to create life, I have lost the right to my own life. I should be the one to decide if my body creates a life.”

In related news, a mail-order abortion pill service began operating last year, part of a push to enable more women to perform their own abortions.

Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood has launched a billboard campaign promoting abortion in Iowa. One advertisement pictures a woman who had an abortion with the words, “I had an abortion, and I am not ashamed.”

The campaign comes in response to a law signed by Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds that bans most abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually about six weeks into a pregnancy.

According to the United Nations, only nine nations have a higher reported abortion rate than the United States: Bulgaria, Cuba, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Ukraine.

“He made him in the likeness of God”

When Eve delivered her firstborn son, she testified, “I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord” (Genesis 4:1). When her first son killed her second son and Eve gave birth to a third, she said of him, “God has appointed for me another offspring” (v. 25).

The next chapter states: “When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created” (Genesis 5:1-2).

Note that Scripture describes humans in this way even after the Fall. Even after our disobedience in the Garden of Eden and our murderous sins against each other. According to the Bible, every human is a person of inestimable worth because each human is created on purpose for a purpose.

Imagine a society in which everyone agreed with God’s word.

“Reclaim your primal identity”

Legalized abortion has ended the lives of nearly sixty-one million American babies. Euthanasia is available to more Americans than ever before. Terrorists value human life less than their own radical ideology. Drug dealers, pornographers, and sex traffickers make people a means to their profits.

Valuing people as God does would change every dimension of life today. But to love people as God does means that we must also love ourselves as God does.

Henri Nouwen: “I don’t often ‘feel’ like a beloved child of God. But I know that that is my most primal identity and I know that I must choose it above and beyond my hesitations.

“Strong emotions, self-rejection, and even self-hatred justifiably toss you about, but you are free to respond as you will. You are not what others, or even you, think about yourself. You are not what you do. You are not what you have. You are a full member of the human family, having been known before you were conceived and molded in your mother’s womb.

“In times when you feel bad about yourself, try to choose to remain true to the truth of who you really are. Look in the mirror each day and claim your true identity. Act ahead of your feelings and trust that one day your feelings will match your convictions. Choose now and continue to choose this incredible truth. As a spiritual practice claim and reclaim your primal identity as [the] beloved daughter or son of a personal Creator.”

“Stew” that cannot feed our souls

Why do you need to “reclaim your primal identity”?

Temptation invites us to become less than we are, trading our birthright as God’s beloved children for “stew” that cannot feed our souls (cf. Genesis 25:29-34). Guilt over the past deafens us to God’s invitation to forgiveness and freedom. Fear of the future discounts our Father’s providential care for his own.

Will you “claim your true identity” today?

For more from the Denison Forum, please visit www.denisonforum.org.