Choosing Life (2)

Text: Exodus 20:13

Theme: Biblical ethics is rooted in a Holy God who has decreed that human life is sacred.

Date: 01/17/2021 File name: ChooseLife.wpd ID Number:

Today is Sanctity of Life Sunday, and on this day Christians must be deeply concerned about the advancement of the culture of death. It took a significant lurch forward on January 5 when both Georgia Republican Senate candidates lost to candidates who are radically pro-abortion. The result of the election means that on January 21 there will be a clattering, clanking, grinding sound coming our of Washington D.C. It will be the sound of policy gears rotating in one direction suddenly being shifted into the opposite direction. The most pro-life administration in my lifetime, will be replaced by the most pro-abortion administration in my lifetime. “Elections have consequences” as the saying goes, and this election will have deadly consequences for hundreds of thousands of the unborn. The incoming administration will immediately begin dismantling pro-life policies in the various departments of the U.S. government. It is a clarion call reminding us how quickly policies can change, and that we can never relax our support for, and defense of the lives of the unborn.

Sanctity of Life Sunday is a day when Bible-believing churches and Bible-believing Christians acknowledge that God is the Creator, and the Sustainer, and the Protector of life. This must not be the only day we affirm this, but on this day especially, we must.

No single issue divides the American people more than the abortion issue. We see evidence of this even among the people called “Baptist.” Rev. Raphael Warnock, newly elected Senator from Georgia, and pastor of the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, is openly, unapologetically pro-abortion, and proudly supports Planned Parenthood—an organization that murdered 30,656 Georgian babies last year; 63% of them black babies. (So much for “black lives matter). Then there is Rev. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville. He took a lot of heat last week when he said, in response to Rev. Warnock, “Can religious people be pro-abortion? ... Well, the answer is of course religious people can, but I would argue that consistent Christians cannot. You cannot be a faithful Christian and be pro-choice.” I stand with Dr. Mohler on this. Church history is on our side, but more importantly, the Bible is on our side, and anyone who would tell you otherwise is lying.

I’ve chosen as my text this morning Exodus 20:13. It is the shortest of the Ten Commandments; “You shall not murder”. I’d like to help you understand all the ramifications of that verse.

I. THE COMMANDMENT TEACHES THAT HUMAN LIFE IS NOT BY THE WILL OF MAN

1. life is God's wonderful gift

a. every single pregnancy that occurs is because God’ creative will is at work in the womb

“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, 16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” (Psalm 139:13–16, NIV84)

2. the source of our life is Jesus Christ himself

A. JESUS GIVES THREE KINDS OF LIFE

1. Jesus Gives Physical Life

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.” (Colossians 1:15–16, ESV)

a. the very reason, you are here with your heart beating, and your eyes is seeing, and your ears hearing, and your lungs breathing is because Jesus is the one who gave you life—Jesus was the means of God’s creative work.

b. do you see what the Scriptures tell us in this passage from Colossians?

1) the Bible says that all things were made by him

2) Genesis teaches us that it was through Christ, that God created all things— including us

“Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”” (Genesis 1:26, ESV)

3) throughout the centuries Jewish Rabbis have pondered who the us and our in this passage refer to

4) the teachings of the New Testament give us the answer

c. the "us" in Genesis 1:26 is a reference to the Godhead, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but especially to the Son, Jesus Christ

1) parents, teach this to your children, because they will not be taught it in the public schools

2) there is no way ever, that any evolutionists can explain the origin of life

3) to say that life came about by accident through some spontaneous generation out of some fortuitous concourse of atoms coming together is contrary to all that the Bible teaches us ... and to common sense

d. now, I freely admit that I am a theologian, and not a scientist; I have no expertise in Genetics, Biology or Physiology so let me quote for you someone who does

ILLUS. Dr. George Wald, was professor emeritus of biology at Harvard University and who won the Nobel Prize in biology in 1967. In an article appearing in Scientific American entitled Innovation and Biology, he wrote, “There are only two possibilities as to how life arose. One is spontaneous generation arising to evolution; the other is a supernatural creative act of God. There is no third possibility. Spontaneous generation, that life arose from non-living matter was scientifically disproved 120 years ago by Louis Pasture and others. That leaves us with the only possible conclusion that life arose as a supernatural creative act of God.”

1) now, so far, that sounds pretty good coming from a Nobel Prize winning biologist from Harvard ... but listen to the rest of what he wrote:

ILLUS. / will not accept that philosophically—that man and the world were supernaturally created by God, because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore, / choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible.”

2) notice that he does not say, "/ cannot accept ..." but that "I will not accept ..."

3) I submit to you this morning, that based on what Dr. George Wall writes, it takes more faith to be an atheist and accept evolutionary theory than it does to become a Christian and trust the accuracy of the Bible!

4) the Apostle Paul refers to such people in Romans 1 when he writes of those individuals who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them

2. Jesus Gives Spiritual Life

“Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” 3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”” (John 3:1–8, ESV)

a. Jesus gives supernatural spiritual life to all those who come to Him in faith

1) Christians are not just nice people who are trying to live better lives or who have accepted some creed or confession or code of conduct

2) we are new creatures having been regenerated supernaturally by God the Holy Spirit, having received the unmerited grace of God the Father, who sent God the Son who died a sacrificial death to forgive us our sins, and who indwells us through the Holy Spirit

3) our life in Christ is a supernatural spiritual life that we did not have when we were still dead in trespasses and sin

3. Jesus Gives Eternal Life

“And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” (John 17:3, ESV)

a. eternal life means that we will forever be with Christ; we are his and we shall never perish

b. but eternal life means more that merely “living forever” ... even the wicked are immortal

c. eternal life speaks of the quality of the life we will have with Christ in his kingdom

1) it involves joy and healing and understanding and perfect restoration to and fellowship with the eternal Godhead—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

ILLUS. In the New Jerusalem, the apostle John sees a river flowing from “the throne of God and of the Lamb,” and “on each side of the river stood the tree of life. . . . And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations” (Revelation 22:1–2). In Eden, we rebelled against God and were banished from the Garden and tree of life (Genesis 3:24). In the end, God graciously restores our access to the tree of life. This access is provided through Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).

4. Jesus gives life

B. WANTONLY TAKING LIFE CREATED IN GOD’S IMAGE IS EVIL

1. every time God gives us a negative commandment, there is a positive force behind it

a. in the case of the sixth commandment, the inference that we can draw from the negative injunction thou shalt not kill, is the positive injunction thou shall embrace life

b. God calls His Church to embrace life, and to contend for life at every level—in the womb, and in the nursing home, in the hospital ward, on the streets, in the schools ... everywhere

2. sadly, we live in a society that some refer to as a Culture of Death

ILLUS. That phrase was first used by Pope John Paul II in his 1993 encyclical, The Gospel of Life. In this encyclical, John Paul II wrote about the intrinsic value of every human life, which must be welcomed and loved from the moment of conception to the moment of natural death. Here is a quote from this encyclical in which he defines what he means by a Culture of Death: “A person who, because of illness, handicap or, more simply, just by existing, compromises the well-being or life-style of those who are more favoured tends to be looked upon as an enemy to be resisted or eliminated. In this way a kind of 'conspiracy against life' is unleashed.”

a. the Culture of Death is a culture where "it is the strong who decide the fate of the weak”

b. Planned Parenthood is the epitome of a conspiracy against life

1) it is the nation’s largest provider of abortions and euphemistically refers to abortion as women’s reproductive health care

2) there is nothing “healthy” about abortion ... it is wantonly taking the life of a human being in some of the most cruel ways imaginable

ILLUS. If our justice system executed prisoners the way Planned Parenthood kills babies, there would be such an outcry in this nation—and rightly so—that the death penalty would be forever banned as cruel and inhuman.

3) how depraved is this organization?

ILLUS. In 2015 Planned Parenthood was caught red-handed selling fetal body parts to various medical researchers. That’s a Federal crime. Were the leaders of Planned Parenthood arrested and put on trial? No. But the individual who uncovered the crime and secretly recorded Planned Parenthood workers making deals for the hearts and livers, and brains of dead babies, that man was arrested and tried, found guilty and ordered to pay Planned Parenthood $2.2 million in damages.

3. if God is the author of life ... if mankind is created in God’s image ... than life is sacred and must be protected from those who would wantonly take life

II. THE COMMANDMENT TEACHES THAT GOD HOLDS HIS IMAGE-BEARERS AS SACRED

1. the sixth commandment is God’s provision that guards those created in His image

“You shall not murder.” (Exodus 20:13, NIV84)

2. the obvious meaning of the verse is that we are not to intentionally take another's physical life for malice

a. the only exception given to this commandment is found in Genesis 9 in what we call the Noahic Covenant

“And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man. 6 “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.” (Genesis 9:5–6, NIV84)

3. the 6th Commandment has three specific applications

A. WE SHOULD NOT KILL BY HOMICIDE

1. the 6th commandment in the KJV reads Thou shall not kill

a. the Hebrew word translate as kill in this commandment literally means to dash to pieces and is more rightly translated as murder

2. God's Word is clear—you do not have the right to take away from someone what God has given them—life

a. and yet, we live in a culture that seems to take life so lightly

ILLUS. Dennis Prager, an Orthodox Jew, journalist and public speaker, regularly asks American college students the question: "If your dog and a stranger with both equally in danger of drowning, which would you try to save?" Prager says that the majority vote is always against the stranger.

b. that is tragic and just one more indicator of how lightly we have come to treat human life in our culture

3. western civilization is on the brink

a. civilization cannot exist without an affirmation of human dignity, and a high view of human life and its value

b. but western culture is now imperiled by an insidious array of assaults on human dignity, human life, and the most vulnerable among us

1) western culture truly has become a culture of death

ILLUS. Pope John Paul II was correct, evil forces, acting in the name of personal autonomy and the public good, have unleashed a conspiracy against life.

B. WE SHOULD NOT KILL BY SUICIDE

1. no one has the right to take their own life

a. it is not yours to take—it belongs to God, and He has a purpose for your life up through its natural end

2. incurable of diseases, constant pain, personal troubles or heartache, or even persecution are not a valid reason to end one's own life

3. God does provide the needed grace when we call upon Him

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28, NIV84)

a. that verse is not a cliche to recite in the good times, but a promise to claim in the worst of times

C. WE SHOULD NOT KILL BY INFANTICIDE

1. I consider myself a patriot ... I love America ... I believe in American exceptionalism, and that this country has been the greatest force for good in the history of the world

2. but I don’t imagine for a moment that God will hold this nation guiltless for the unimaginable slaughter that has taken place over the last 48 years in the name of autonomy and a woman's right to privacy

a. for going on five decades, life has been denied to sixty-million unborn babies in America alone

b. the culture of death has unleashed a warfare on the womb unprecedented in its destruction and which the next administration has embraced whole-heartedly

1) there has been a cauterization of the American conscience so that the multitudes do not even understand this issue in moral terms any longer

ILLUS. Twenty-eight years ago, then President Bill Clinton defended abortion as a fundamental constitutional right that should be safe, legal ... and rare. Three decades later, abortion remains legal. But it is neither safe, nor rare. It was certainly not “safe” for the 700,000 children aborted in 2020. That number also does not make it “rare.”

2) the cauterization of the American conscience has gone so deep that not only is abortion considered a fundamental right, but a fundamental right that we must celebrate, and damn you if you don’t

ILLUS. In November of 2018 a group of various “faith leaders” performed a blessing on a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in Columbus, Ohio. They referred to the building, whose primary function is killing babies, as “Holy Ground,” and “Sacred Space.” They billed the gathering as a “celebration of conscience and moral decision making.” What they really celebrated was mutilation and death.

“Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” (Isaiah 5:20, NIV84)

c. the most damning indictment of the pro-abortion movement in America today is that almost everyone now readily admits that these are children that we are killing by the hundreds of thousands each year

1) there was a time when Planned Parenthood and pro-abortionists went out of their way to deny that what was happening during an abortion was the death of a child

2) the unborn child was merely a biomass or unwanted tissue in what was euphemistically described as the product of conception

3) some cauterized their conscience by admitting that a baby in the womb was a potential human being, but that it wasn’t actually a human being until it was born — as if the six inches of a woman’s birth canal is the magical difference between personhood and non-personhood

ILLUS. Several years ago Mary Williams writing for Salon.com, and an ardent pro-abortion advocate, coldly conceded what the pro-life movement has contended all along—that from the moment of conception the unborn child is undeniably a human life. And yet William writes that this unborn human must be terminated if the mother so desires. That a woman's autonomy over her own body trumps the rights of the child growing in her womb. Williams coldly maintains that "[The mother's] life and what is right for her circumstances ... automatically trumps the rights of the non-autonomous entity inside of her. Always." The unborn baby, which Williams fully believes is human, is a "life worth sacrificing."

3. Christians who care deeply about the sanctity of human life must face one monumental question: How can the American conscience be so apparently untroubled by the reality of abortion?

a. God holds high the sanctity of human life

b. God has always been concerned that the innocent and the weak, the poor and the persecuted be protected

“There are six things the Lord hates, seven that are detestable to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood," (Proverbs 6:16-17, NIV)

4. to wantonly take a life for personal gain or because it is inconvenient has always been evil in God's sight

"Cursed is the man who kills his neighbor secretly." Then all the people shall say, "Amen!" "Cursed is the man who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent person." Then all the people shall say, "Amen!" (Deuteronomy 27:24-25, NIV)

5. the Scriptures seem pretty clear

a. in a moral and ethical society, there must be restraint and prohibitions about how life can be taken away and who can do it or anarchy will reign

b. these Scriptures remind us that a moral and ethical society must regard human life as divinely created and as sacred before God and before each other

c. with all due respect to those here this morning who's political opinions are different than mine, I agree with Dr. Al Mohler ... You cannot be a faithful Christian and be pro-choice

1) Church history is on our side, but more importantly, the Bible is on our side, and our job is conform our thoughts and attitudes and behavior to God’s

6. God is high on life and the right of all men and women—even those who are yet unborn—to live without fear for their life

In a culture that denies the existence of sin, people resist the idea that they have done something wrong when they have had or encouraged an abortion or dishonored the sanctity of life in other ways. While many Christians can readily see that abortion and other practices that devalue human life are wrong, some Christians do not realize they can take constructive action to protect human life.

Christians much oppose the assault on human life that is rampant in Western culture.

We must speak the truth in love and declare forthrightly that wantingly taking a human life is wrong. The message will be unpopular and resisted. But as Christians, we must not only oppose evil, we must also promote what is right. When a culture of death threatens vulnerable lives, champions of life must arise to protect them. I'm asking you to be a champion of life.

We must support organizations that provide alternatives to abortion such as the Vitae Foundation or our own Missouri Baptist Children’s Home.

We must encourage our teenagers and young adults to remain sexually pure so they don’t have to worry about what to do in case of an unplanned pregnancy, and in the case of an unplanned pregnancy we can love them and encourage them to deliver the child.

We must offer a gospel of hope to women who have made the choice to abort a child, and remind them that forgiveness is real.