Guilty as Charged

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.

                        Psalm 139:13-14

I am writing on National Right to Life Day. Our church observed it by inviting a representative from the local crisis pregnancy center in to speak for a few minutes and making abortion the topic of our sermon. It was titled “Who Made You?”

We started and ended with Psalm 139 where David so clearly teaches that there is nowhere we can go to get away from God. He knows our thoughts, He knows our movements, He knows our ways, and marks out the path for us. We cannot hide from Him according to verses 7-11, in fact it is He who takes us wherever we go. David says that we are fearfully and wonderfully made by God. He says we are “intricately woven” together. He knows the number of days we will live before we start living them.

We also looked at Isaiah 5:20, “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!” Clearly this is what our nation has done with the issue of abortion. We have killed the baby that God has made and called it “legal” to abort it if it is an inconvenience. According to God it is still not legal but how many unsuspecting young women have trusted the “judicial authorities” who have been entrusted to make wise decisions for us?

I have been looking at statistics about abortion for a couple of weeks. Only 1% of abortions are because of the fear of harm to the mother if they go through childbirth. (Two source are: http://www.abort73.com/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics/ and http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html). 75% of the women who have abortions do it for social reasons. They say they don’t have the money, a child will interfere with their work, they don’t have a partner to share the parenting with, or other social circumstances aren’t conducive to having a child.

For most Christians we don’t really need to be taught that life is precious to God or that He is the only One who should ever determine the number of days a person lives. We know we are knit together in our mother’s wombs so we already know that at the moment of conception that mass of cells is a person.

So, why preach to us about it? Why would a Pastor spend so much time and energy making the point to His mostly saved congregation that we are fearfully and wonderfully made and that everything that happens in our lives God will use for our good?

I went from that sermon to a Sunday School class on 1 Samuel 13 – 15. Saul heard Samuel tell him to go to Gilgal and wait seven days for him to come. In chapter 10 Samuel had said he would come then and “tell him what he should do.” Saul did not wait for Samuel but took matters into his own hands when things started looking difficult (from a military point of view). He made a sacrifice that was not for him to make and God promised to take the Kingship away from Saul for his disregard of His word.

Then, in chapter 15 God told Saul to kill all of the Amalekites, man, woman, child, and beast. They had been a deadly threat to Israel and God wanted them all killed. Saul did not do it. He saved the King and some of the best cattle. He did things his way…..again.

One of the points we made from this is that we cannot just listen to the word of God taught but we have to obey God’s commands to us. James 1:22 says, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.”

As I was thinking about this combination of teaching I received this morning I wondered what it is that God would have me do with it. I was challenged again about living in a culture that thinks nothing of killing 1.2 million babies every year while I sit and study my Bible. How do I protest this carnage? What can I say or do that will make a difference for the Kingdom of God on this particular issue?

The conviction this morning is that I have heard this teaching before. I KNOW that every baby is fearfully and wonderfully made, that every pregnancy is a gift from God and so is every child God gives us. I know that abortion is murder. I know I serve a forgiving God. Have I done anything to persuade others of these truths? In other words, “am I just listening to the Word – or am I acting on it?

Guilty as charged. –

“Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,” does not He who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not He who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will He not repay man according to his work?” Proverbs 24:11-12