I don't have a lot of time to write today but I am devoting pretty much all of it to do this reply...so I hope you are happy about that.

In the beginning of this whole thing, I made a statement that said, "I suppose you could argue that there are more dangers in society now; more creeps out there who want to abduct children. I don't know. But is it really that much worse today than it was back then?" And Godspell got very upset, almost took my head off, and wrote, "Are you a BL actually saying there are more creeps out there? Come on man, you think there are more BLs born today for some reason than 30yrs ago or 100 or 1000yrs ago? and you call them creeps? I know some of them are bad people but most are not." Ok, first of all, all I said was the word "creeps". By "creeps" I could have meant a whole list of people. In fact I did mean a whole list of people. There are people who would wish to do harm to children who are not BL's, and that is what I was actually talking about. Some of those who would wish to harm children may call themselves BL's or may be pedophiles, but not all of them are. Perhaps not many of them are. I simply used a big, huge brush to say what I wanted to say in the word "creeps". I did not call all BL's creeps, nor would I ever. Now, having said that, and after having read all the responses to my post (and after having some time to think about all of this), I must admit that I was probably wrong in using that word. It is perhaps not politicly correct, or in good taste...or both. Probably what I should have said was "I suppose you could argue that there are more dangers in society today now; more people who would want to harm children. I don't know." Oh, and please notice that I also said "I don't know" at the end of that statement. So I apologise for the use of the word "creeps".

What I won't apologise for is how I feel. You are right, Eldad, the ground is level at the foot of the cross, and I thank God that it is. I freely admit that I am a sinner and it is only by God's grace that I am forgiven and lifted from the bondage of sin. I also freely admit that I do fall to temptations, some big, some small, every day. I am no different from anyone else, including those who would want to harm children. Although willfully doing something harmful to a child is not on my list of sins, there are plenty of things on my list that would probably more than make up for that. So I have never, nor would I ever, claim to be any better than anyone else. I do claim to be better off than those who do not know Christ....better off, but not better than. I am better off because I have a Savior who has forgiven me and who has saved me by His blood. But, like I said, I won't apologise for how I feel. My use of the word "creeps" was wrong, but it is how I feel.

Let me put it this way, Jesus commands us to forgive. We are to forgive even our enemies, which is a difficult thing to do. When someone harms us, we are not supposed to try to get revenge, but forgive that person. And I am sure this extends to those who harm others whom we love and even others we don't even know. In other words, we are to forgive the same way that God forgives. A very tall order, right? How do you forgive someone who you really don't want to forgive...or actually feel like forgiving? Believe me, I have had a LOT of training in how to forgive in my life. I have been used and abused by my own family members in terrible ways. And a lot of people who were not family besides. I did not want to forgive them at all, but I have learned how to do so, even though to this day I still don't feel very forgiving towards some of them. Forgiveness is a choice, not a feeling...that is the crux of what I have learned. So when I see in the news recently that a man somewhere in China walked into a school and brutally murdered a bunch of kindergarten children with a meat cleaver:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/12/man-kills-eight-china-nursery

all I can think is "Oh my God!!!!". I cannot even begin to describe how I feel about something like that but I assure you that if I could put it into words, I wouldn't be using very nice ones. Yes, something like that does indeed cause a gut reaction inside of me and it isn't pretty. Am I any less of a Christian because I have feelings like that towards something so horrific? I don't think so. I am a Christian by the blood of Christ Jesus and because of that, because of what he taught, I know that I can even forgive someone who does something like that. If God has forgiven me, than I can forgive others. Do I try to make myself out to be any better than that man who commited that crime....no I do not. Indeed, the ground is level at the foot of the cross. I think it would be a very good thing to pray for that person, his family, the poor children who were murdered, as well as their families and everyone else who was involved. But still, I am human and I have really human feelings, and I always will. God gave us all the ability to feel. It is what we do with those feelings that is the important thing. Some seek revenge for a crime like the one I mentioned, while hopefully we as Christians do our best to forgive and pray and help in whatever way we can.

There! There is my lengthy reply. At first I did not want to reply like this because I was really mad about people jumping down my throat. In fact, I still think there is a much better way to disagree with someone, especially in this forum, than doing something like that. I really don't appreciate it at all. However, while that is how I feel, I choose to forgive.