Abortion 2023

Introduction

English Standard Version Chapter 13

13 Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 4 for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer.

We see here that all governmental authority comes from God and his law, not man, or what we may think is right in our own eyes. Government was not invented by mankind, but by God, therefore a government’s authority does not comes from man, but from God. The Apostle Paul describes here in Romans 13 that the government is God’s deacon, that the government is God’s servant, that all governments have the purpose and function of serving God and his law.

Therefore, because the government’s authority is derived from God, it is also constrained by God, it is constrained and informed by his law. The government is not free to govern as it sees fit, but as God sees fit, it is only free to govern according to God’s law, and no other. The government is not free to call good what God calls evil, or to call evil what God calls good. The fundamental purpose of government is to uphold the law of God.

The Apostle Paul teaches us here that our governing authorities are to be a terror to bad conduct, that if you do wrong, to be afraid, that the government does not bear the sword in vain. Our rulers are to give approval to those who do good, and disapproval to those who do not. Government is intended to punish the wicked, and to protect the innocent.

However, the government of the United States of America, for many years now, has not defended or protected the lives of its weakest citizens, but it has instead given its people license to murder those who are the most vulnerable among us. Our government has given approval to those who murder their unborn children, under the guise of so-called “women’s healthcare” and “women’s choice”, all so that sexual promiscuity can be protected, all so that its citizens can engage in sexual immorality without consequence. Countless unborn children have been sacrificed on the alter, to uphold the notion of “free sex,” and a multitude of other reasons, and for more than 50 years the government has provided legal cover for these heinous acts.

Our government has failed to uphold the law of God, it has failed in its responsibility to protect the lives of its citizens, more than 63 million of its people have been legally murdered over the last 50 years. The prophet Isaiah once wrote, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness.” Exodus 20:13 says, “You shall not murder.” Proverbs 6:16 says, “the LORD hates … the hands that shed innocent blood.” And in Genesis 9:5-6 we read, “And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.”

Murder is one of the most heinous acts perpetrated by mankind, first and foremost, because it is an attack upon the image of God, found in man. You see, life is sacred because God is holy. The snuffing out of human life is a direct assault upon the image of God, murder fundamentally seeks to suppress and destroy the image of God. The value of human life is not found in man himself, or in what he can or can’t do, but in his maker. Human life is precious because God is precious, and we bear his image. Therefore, when a government and its people fail to honor God, as they should, they will necessarily fail to honor human life.

This is why, today, we pray for repentance. Our desire is to see repentance granted to our rulers and our neighbors. As the Apostle Paul says in Acts 17:30-31,

English Standard Version Chapter 17

30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

Without a doubt, God will judge the world in righteousness, and if he were to mark iniquities who could stand? Not one of us could. Many scoff at the notion that God will come and judge the world for its sin, but what appears to some as his absence is rather, his patience toward us. He is patient that we might repent, and until he comes we realize that today is the day of salvation. That there is still time for repentance toward God, for we do not know whether we have tomorrow.

That no matter how heinous the sin, God is willing to forgive your sin, but we must repent and believe in his Son. For if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. You see, God has not left us in our sin to perish. Instead God is longsuffering, he is patient, and he has provided a way of salvation for us from the punishment of our sin, even murder. It is because God is holy, righteous, and good that he must punish sin, and it is also because he is merciful that he has not left us in our sin. For he sent his Son into the world to pay the penalty for sin. Jesus bore in himself the righteous wrath of God for our sin that we might be forgiven. You see, God is both just and merciful, and both just and the justifier.

We cannot justify ourselves before God by our righteous actions, rather we’re only justified before him by the all sufficient sacrifice of his Son. The righteousness of God’s Son is given to us like a white robe to clothe us. This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and it’s ultimately the only remedy for our broken world. It’s what saves us and it’s what compels us unto righteousness, righteousness in every sphere of our lives . Therefore, we pray that our rulers would repent, and that our neighbors would repent. That God’s law would be upheld, and that the lives of countless unborn children would be protected.

While Roe v. Wade has been overturned, the threat of murder against children in the womb remains present throughout our country. Many states, such as our own, continue to provide legal cover to those who intend to murder their unborn children. Therefore, we plead, today, that our town and our state would enact laws that would protect the unborn. I pray that the church in this town would be like a city set on a hill, a pillar and buttress of the truth.