Miracles

I had a strange day last Wednesday.

I had been rostered on for Antenatal Clinic (my favorite!) - where I get to scan pregnant tums and marvel at the miracle growing within.

And somewhere in the middle of my clinic was a woman who had booked an appointment in my clinic to discuss the various options of how to go about aborting her 6 week old miracle.
I stared at her in shock. My mouth dried up.
"But this is the antenatal clinic" I said, "we don't plan abortions here!"
And then she began to cry.

I didn't know what to say and had to excuse myself from the room. I didn't want any part in plotting the death of this baby, but I felt like my hands were tied - I had an obligation to help this woman.

Fortunately, my boss walked by at this moment and I was able to defer to her.

I have just looked at abortion stats for Australia which showed an overal number of abortions exeeding 71000 in 2006, the vast majority (28000) were women between the ages of 25-34, ie the age group that probably are working, educated, even in stable relationships... so, not the group of women that have no other option. It seems abortion has become so accepted that it no longer is the choice of the "last resort"....

*sigh

Diamonds

When we got engaged 5 years ago, my husband, who is just so romantic and creative designed the most beautiful ring. We were on the beach and he drew the lines in the sand, using shells to represent where the shells would be.

The finished product is platinum, shaped like the Greek symbol for infinity and it encases this beautiful diamond. It's a tension setting and the platinum hugged the diamond quite tightly. The problem was that when my husband had designed the ring we had thought only of the properties of platinum – being so much stronger and more valuable than gold, that we hadn't stopped to consider the physical properties of the diamond. It wasn't just good to look at, it is so much harder than any metal we could have set it in.

Gradually, over time, the diamond wore away the platinum. After a few years of wearing the ring I noticed that sometimes the diamond could make a little ½ turn in the setting. And then over time, the little ½ turn became a full turn. Next thing I know it wasn't only turning around, it could now move up and down as well. It had taken a few years, and it had been doing it so subtly that I hadn't even noticed, but the diamond had been changing it's environment, reshaping its setting and was now just about ready to escape its platinum bonds.

Naturally I was rather distressed about the possibility of losing my precious gem. I was thinking about this ring when I should have been having my quiet time, and I felt God say to me that we should be like that diamond. As Christians, we should be shining, true and consistent. But by being like diamonds, those properties will cause us to change our environment. Gradually we will erode the World from it's grip on our lives. Christians will determine the environment they're in.

So often we think that our lives are inconsequential, that our actions don't achieve much in this world. We don't realize the impact we're actually having. It's like ripples in a pond, it starts out small, but the effect is far-reaching. Slowly, by continuing to walk with Jesus, we will change our environment, a little every day.