LIFE MATTERS

REFLECTION: Psalm 24:1

SCRIPTURE READING: Genesis 1:26-31

BENEDICTION: Revelation 4:11

INTRODUCTION

It seems today that everyone’s opinion matters. Everyone’s ideas matter…when they’re inclusive. Exclusive claims are not welcome in public discourse.

Here’s a reality check: it is not possible to foster a culture of LIFE and a culture of generous-hearted self-denying LOVE WITHOUT the exclusive claims of the Bible.

Our city is up to 49 homicides so far this year, with 44 Black victims, according to police data. Sixteen of the homicide victims were between 4 to 24 years old.

TRANSITION

As Christians, we affirm the dignity of every person and uphold the value of every life precisely because of our belief that humans are made in the image of God. God establishes this in His word…firmly.

We also believe that murder is wrong because it demonstrates flagrant disregard for human life. For Christians, both justice and love of neighbor require us to stand firm in these beliefs.

Life matters because..

1. God uniquely DESIGNED us.

Mankind is a good creation!

Genesis 1:31 ESV

31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Like other days of creation, God said it was good when he designed mankind. While we are a part of God’s good creation, we learn all throughout Scriptures that we are unique in the scope of God’s creation!

We humans are NOT equal with the rest of the creative order. God has given us a moral, intellectual, spiritual compass that the rest of creation does not possess. This does not give us the right to be brutal or cruel, but God gave man alone dominion over creation.

The Gospel & Abortion Chapter 2: What Does the Gospel Say? (Matt Chandler)

Humans wrestle with some things that no other created thing does. For example: If you’re watching the National Geographic Channel and they show a little baby antelope, you think, Oh my gosh! That’s so cute. Then three minutes later, there’s a female lion ripping it to pieces. You’re kind of like, Oh, I can’t . . . ! I just can’t . . . ! Oh my gosh! Right?

Do you know who is not thinking that? The lion.

The lion is not thinking, I shouldn’t be doing this! There’s no moral quandary in the lion. Later that evening, as she’s licking the blood off her paws, she’s not filled with regret and shame. She isn’t thinking, I did it again! I need some help! She is driven by instinct alone. She is not wondering about her future. She is not sitting and contemplating what will happen when she is too old to hunt. She is a lion. She is magnificent, but she has no moral or spiritual compass.

But people do. We lie in bed at night with regrets. We wrestle with what is right and what is wrong, or whether we should or shouldn’t do something. The animal kingdom doesn’t wrestle with those things. Mankind

As we look further at this distinction, we recognize God says things about us in the Bible that he DOESN’T say about the animal kingdom. Theologically & Biologically, we are distinct.

We’re uniquely designed, on a THEOLOGICAL level.

The Bible tells us that God knows all about us before we were formed.

Jeremiah 1:5 ESV

5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Think about that reality. God knows us before our parents conceive us.

When it comes to matters dominating public debate as to when does life begin...Biblically speaking, this is strong evidence that God regards the child in the womb as a human life.

In addition do God’s knowing us prior to being formed We’re uniquely designed from a BIOLOGICAL level.

This AWESOME God that Genesis reveals to us, created the Heavens and the Earth and everything that is made…this same GOD that upholds the universe by the word of His power according to Hebrews 1…

GOD formed US. God Formed the WOMB. God sustains the universe and He is at work in the development of every child in every womb!

It’s not just in Jeremiah, though...

In Genesis 25:23, God explains to Isaac and Rebekah that the children fighting in her womb are going to be two great nations, showing that God knew them and had a plan for them before they were even born.

In Judges 13:5, Samson’s parents are told, while he is still in the womb, that God is going to use Samson to deliver his people Israel.

In Luke 1, Zecharias and Elizabeth are told that John, their son, will be the great prophet who will prepare the way for the Messiah.

Probably the greatest expression of this comes from David in Psalm 139

Psalm 139:13–16 ESV

13 For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

There is theological acknowledgement and biological engagement attached to the PERSON in the WOMB. It’s not a stretch, on this one verse alone, to affirm that the lives of unborn children are precious in God’s sight.

Jim Hamilton writes, passages like these “tell us that God has a personal, comprehensive knowledge of people prior to their conception, that the formation of a human being in the mother’s womb is the work of God, and that God oversees the development of babies in the wombs of their mothers. And from these things we gain invaluable perspective on the beauty and sanctity of human life.”

TRANSITION

These littlest ones are endowed with the full measure of dignity extended to all human beings because they are made in God’s image.

Mankind is in God’s image

Genesis 1:26 ESV

26 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.”

The Bible never lumps people into the category of animals. Instead, it separates the creation of people from all other beings and attributes the most privileged roles in creation to humans alone.

We are unique because we have been made in the image of God. This thought will bleed into our next point on development, but let’s stay with design for just a moment.

In verse 28, it becomes obvious that God intends for humans to be fruitful, multiply, and cover the earth.

Why?

An image is a reflection of the one it represents. To be made in the image and likeness of God is to be a visible representative of the invisible God. The Lord made human beings so that in their subduing the earth and exercising dominion of the world they would make His invisible character visible in all creation.

LIFE MATTERS TO GOD! HE SHOWS THAT BY HOW HE

UNIQUELY DESIGNED US...

WE ALSO SEE IN THIS TEXT

2. God uniquely DEVELOPS humans

Mankind has purpose

Genesis 1:26 ESV

26 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 1:28 ESV

28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

God made us as image-bearers!

God blessed us as image-bearers!

God commanded us to be fruitful as image-bearers!

God’s plan is for us to have dominion as image-bearers!

Why?

God wants the world to be filled with people because from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting, God wants His character to be seen.

God wants the world to be filled with His glory like the waters fill the seas, so He made man and woman in His image and told them to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

Recognizing that mankind bears the image of God is important because of what it represents. Again, because of the image, we believe that every human possesses intrinsic dignity and value. We believe that man is valuable because God is valuable. God receives glory as we reflect His image.

At a fundamental level…foundational to our Biblical worldview, God has revealed that He UNIQUELY DESIGNED AND DEVELOPS MANKIND FOR HIS PURPOSE.

It’s also clear to us that...

3. God has a unique DESIRE for humans

Mankind is created to ENJOY God and His creation.

Genesis 1:29 ESV

29 And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.

Genesis 2:15 ESV

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

Because of our sinful nature, we’ve seen all these great beginnings abused. But it’s worth mentioning here that God’s intention was not that we would exploit creation recklessly.

Rather, God’s design was for us to take care of the world he made, to cultivate the garden he placed Adam and Eve in.

Some refer to this as the “cultural mandate”, which was God’s instruction to us to go out and discover and develop what he had made.

In addition to that privilege of overseeing the world God made, he also gave us the privilege of walking with him.

Adam and Eve enjoyed a relationship with God that we can barely imagine—they could even hear him walking in the garden with him.

Mankind is created to GLORIFY GOD!

Genesis 1:26–28 ESV

26 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.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

When you read all of Genesis 1, you’ll find that the creation of humanity is the crowning event

When you listen to culture, you find that humanity is a parasite on this earth of natural resources. Or in Thursday’s headlines, you see the current nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management called for population control to protect the environment stating, “we must breed fewer consuming humans.”

This is the ideology permeating our universities and now public school systems…we are a problem that needs to be solved. The earth is rejecting us.

Yet they consistently get it wrong. The dire predictions of the 70s of mass starvation and didn’t come true. We are feeding more people on the earth than we ever have.

These arguments are intellectually dishonest, but they make great headlines, galvanize political movements, but they are from a broken worldview that cannot stand against the truth of God’s Word.

The pinnacle of creation IS NOT the spacious skies or amber waves of grain, or purple mountain majesty above the fruited plains…

The high point of creation IS NOT the vastness of the ocean waves or shorelines take our breath away...

Look around you today. We may not look like much, but we are much!

The pinnacle of creation is humanity.

We are made in God’s image.

We have life that is sacred.

We are to resemble our creator, who has revealed Himself through His precious Word, …resembling Him in character, speech, and actions so we might have relationships of fellowship and worship with Him and with one another.

LIFE MATTERS TO GOD.

We are agents of God’s rule on earth -

Psalm 8:3–6 ESV

3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? 5 Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. 6 You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet,

And it would be awesome with that kind of beginning…if everything stayed on course that way...

So with these realities about the Imago Dei the spiritual potential of humanity is immense.

But as we know, the fall did come. No category can adequately express the tragedy. Mankind remains in the image of God, but as a “grisly shadow of himself.”

Image-bearers can hear God’s word and ride it to untold spiritual heights.

Image-bearers are innately regal beings meant to rule over all creation.

Image-bearers are the created offspring of God, with real possibilities of eternal sonship.

We see man as the apex of a fully formed and filled creation made by God for him. Man and woman are glorious indeed.

There they stood before the fall—vicegerents of creation in a state of spiritual, social, and ecological perfection.

Mankind had everything it needed...God had given every seed-bearing plant and fruit-bearing tree for food (cf. vv. 29, 30). They were at peace with God and nature. “And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day” (v. 31).

People failed by their sin (Ch 3), corruption (6:5–6), and rebelliousness to fulfill their image-bearing responsibilities (11:1–9; cf. Ps. 2:1–2).

Yet our merciful Lord, in His kindness renewed the mandate of fruitful multiplication to Noah (Gen. 9:1, 7) and to Abraham (12:2; 17:2, 6, 8). He similarly blessed Israel (Ex. 1:7) and promised to bless her as she humbly obeyed (Lev. 26:9). Yet, again and again, Israel failed.

John 3:16 ESV

16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

HOPE

Jesus Christ, however, as the second Adam, fulfills God’s image-bearing purposes and enables God’s people to do the same.

The apostle Paul speaks of “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4; cf. Col. 1:15).

Jesus is the image of God that we were intended to be.

And as we are united to him by faith, God sees us as his children, clothed in the righteousness of his Son, to whom we are conformed (Rom. 8:29) in righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:24).

Jesus lived a perfect life and suffering the penalty for our sin as the perfect God-man.

He provided for us to be renewed in the image of God through faith in him (2 Cor. 3:18; Phil. 2:6–7; Col. 3:10).

Today, we see God’s original goal of spreading his righteous rule throughout the earth is being realized by the proclamation of the gospel of grace throughout the world (see Col. 1:6, 10).

The early church is spoken of as reproducing and multiplying (Acts 6:7; 12:24; 19:20; Col. 1:8–15).

God’s desire for us is to glorify Him through replication, multiplication - DISCIPLES MAKING DISCIPLES!

---

Even though sin was introduced at the fall of man, we place our hope in God’s promise of a restored humanity that comes through faith in Jesus Christ - the descendant who overcomes evil, crushes the head of the serpent and restores all that has been lost or distorted because of our rebellion.

Life Matters to God so much that He sent His Son!

But don’t miss how this happens. At the most fundamental level, salvation is possible because “unto us a child is born…a Son is given.”

This means that whole story of redemption hinges on the birth of a baby.

--

One of the most sinister attacks on this Biblical truth. One of the most savage, brutal, unjust interruption of God’s work is ABORTION.

Think about it, as this glorious God’s work is forming that child in the womb, abortion circumvents this good work. In the place of new life, abortion introduces death.

ABORTION IS NOT A POLITICAL ISSUE. That’s a lie.

IT IS A THEOLOGICAL AND BIOLOGICAL ISSUE…A GOSPEL ISSUE.

Not just abortion, but the culture that embraces it.

PRO-ABORTIONISTS no longer have “science on their side”…when they try to claim that LIFE DOESN’T MATTER UNTIL DELIVERY - THAT IT’S NOT EVEN LIFE.

When Roe v. Wade was handed down in 1973, there was no 3D ultrasound. We didn’t have the ability to watch our babies smile at us before they were born.

With all of society’s cries for justice - the mix worldview of absolute autonomy and this culture of death is madness.

All fifty states in the US have strict laws protecting animals from human beings. If you kill a puppy, then you go to jail. Kill a baby, and you’re fine.

Yet thirty-eight states have fetal homicide laws, and at least twenty-three states have fetal homicide laws that apply to the earliest stages of pregnancy (“any state of gestation,” “conception,” “fertilization,” or “post-fertilization”).17

If a pregnant woman gets in her car to drive to the abortion clinic and, while driving there, a drunk driver hits the car and kills her baby, that driver gets charged with homicide. They get arrested, prosecuted, and sentenced to jail. But if she makes it to the abortion clinic, a doctor can kill that baby for profit.

That’s a seared conscience. That’s madness. That’s the type of argument that’s no longer rooted in any type of thoughtfulness.

YOUR LIFE MATTERS TO GOD.

THAT LIFE MATTERS TO GOD.

AND BECAUSE LIFE MATTERS TO GOD…IT MATTERS TO US!

We will stand in the gap for the voiceless and the vulnerable. We are FOR LIFE not because of a political position - BUT BECAUSE OF A GOSPEL RESPONSIBILITY.

God is for you!

He uniquely designed you!

He uniquely developed you!

He uniquely desires for you to enjoy Him and glorify Him forever.

God sent his Son to prove it!

Our pro-life conviction compels us to share this good news, the Gospel with our neighbors and the nations, too…to be fruitful and multiply…to cover the whole earth with His Glory!