With the Legislative session now fully two days in the rear view mirror, it's time to provide some perspective on what many are probably thinking of, at least from a pro-family perspective, as a failure.

Although Alaska Family Action was working on several bills, our absolute priority was and is still the effort to put into statute a medically accurate and objective definition of what constitutes a "medically necessary" abortion when State funds are going to be used to pay for it.  According to hours of testimony from experts across the state and country, there is little doubt that we are currently paying for hundreds of elective abortions in our state annually.  This legislation, SB49 in the Senate and HB173 in the House, as much of a Medicaid fraud issue than anything else, would have put an end to the deception being undertaken by abortionists in Alaska who've been using any and all reasons to classify abortions as "medically necessary."

But it was not to be.

The excuses from our allies and foes alike were continuous -

" This is just too controversial."
" We don't have time."
" I don't have the votes to move this forward."
" There are more important matters to deal with."
" We need to have more testimony."
" Politicians don't belong between a woman and her doctor."

And on and on it went until it finally became evident in the final few hours that it was actually not going to happen.

My thoughts that had been building for some time started to become more pronounced -

• Our efforts to "Reclaim Juneau" with a pro-family majority were fruitless. It made no difference if we had a "conservative" legislature or if liberals ruled the roost.
• I was shocked at the inability and inattentiveness of others to focus on this one bill.
• I was sickened by the process and how our priorities were never really others actual priorities.
• I was saddened by the lost opportunity and disheartened as to how it would ever change.

And then God began to open my eyes.

What I so wanted was a victory. Yes it was something I wanted to save lives and right a wrong but the focus was still in the wrong place. It was on myself.

The author of the greatest victory in history was teaching me that He not only uses so called "failures" to achieve victory. He actually prefers to do it that way.

What many at the time thought of as a monumental defeat, the King crucified, was transformed into the greatest victory. Resurrection and hope and life for all who place their trust in Him.

When Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, (literally meaning olive-press in Hebrew) he experienced the weight of what was to be all of the sin over all time - yours and mine and all others. As the olives are pressed down with extraordinary force to yield the oil, so was He pressed by what was to be the weight of the world's sin.

In Luke it says that "And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground." Luke 22:44

We all reach a place where the weight of the world seems upon us. For me, at that place in time, I felt this weight. It was in no uncertain terms, the most disheartened I had been since the ministry had begun in 2005. So many Alaskans had worked so hard and contributed so much to bring our agenda back to the front burner with a new friendly Legislature. We were actually going to save lives.

But God is too great to be glorified only in what we perceive as victories.  We worship a Creator who uses pagan Kings and nations as His servants to exalt His name. He is above the fray. He is always on the throne and is always sovereign.

Temporally, we learned many valuable lessons as we move forward to advance a pro-family agenda in Alaska -

- We learned that we have many allies in place that we didn't know were there.
- We learned that waiting until the end of a legislative session to move creates more difficulties in maneuvering.
- We learned that our friends and the process in Juneau is not perfect but we learned that we aren't either.
- We learned that legislation is not the only/best way to advance pro-family public policy. More later on this.
- We learned that people will always be very slippery on our issues and that it takes time to get a firm grip on intentions, deceptions and manipulations. The sooner you can expose those strategies, the better you can counter them and determine who your die-hard allies really are.
- We learned that many people would prefer that there was not a full time, pro-family voice in the Capitol roaming the hallway as conspicuously as all the others and that, for that reason, we need to step up our efforts even more.

Ultimately, we cannot be flustered with the lower rungs of the ladder. They hold no less significance.

Everything comes from Him
Everything happens through Him
Everything ends up in Him
Always glory! Always praise! Rom 11:36

Thanks for standing with us as we seek to protect families, life, religious liberty and parental rights in Alaska.

Our journey continues.