Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Women and the Fire Department

I work for the Los Angeles City Fire Department on a paramedic rescue ambulance. Quite often I work with an overtime guy when my regular partner is off duty. It is a sad thing to report but for all of the fire departments' talk of high moral character, many of the men that I work with have a very low view of women. There have been many times when we have passed a woman on the street and my partner will make a comment about a part of her body. In the past I would simply not say anything but I have begun to become more bold about this matter. I have realized that if I don't say anything, the issue will come up again and again throughout the course of the day. I have even thought about writing down an actual dialogue that I could simply read verbatim as soon as this came up. Something like this:

"Yes, as a matter of fact there are alot of attractive women in this world. I am well aware of this fact. But there is something I must tell you. I am a follower of Jesus, a Christian. I used to live in a manner that was both degrading to myself and degrading to women, giving myself to sexual immorality in numerous ways. It was a very dishonorable way to live. However, by the mercy of God, I have left that way of life. Now I strive to live a pure life both in body and thought. This means that I do not use my body for sexual immorality and I strive not to even look at women in a lustful fashion, since the Bible says that to look and lust for a woman is to commit the very act of adultery in your heart. God is greatly concerned about the state of our hearts and knows all our thoughts. Although I lived for many years in the outright violation of Gods law, I now desire to obey it. This change is not one that I have caused. It is rather what God has done in my life. Believe me, I did not do this. It is God at work in my life to cause me to leave my old way of life and to follow a new way, the way of obedience to His law contained in the Ten Commandments. So that is why I don't look and also why I will not look. I hope that this makes sense. It is not my desire to cut off our conversation for the rest of the day since this can be a somewhat awkward topic in our day. I would be happy to talk more about this if you would like. Otherwise we can finish the day talking about other things."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I can certainly say that this man is speaking the truth. I know because I live with him. Now that summer is here it seems that the women are wearing less and less these days. Sometimes I feel myself cringing inside when I'm walking with my husband in Costco or pretty much anywhere but I have to remember that before I knew Christ I dressed the same way.

By the way if you haven't figured it out yet he's my husband. God has definetly blessed me with the best husband I could of ever even imagined. Even still I have to hold him with an open hand and cling to Christ more and more.