In Part 1 of this message, Adrian Rogers gave three reasons why the Church of Jesus Christ—and individual Christians—dare not remain silent in the face of more than a million deaths in America alone each year due to abortion. This subject, as painful and difficult as it is, is a matter of life, a matter of love and thirdly…
3. It is a matter of logic.
Most of us have been confronted with arguments in support of abortion. And through Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, we have had “abortion on demand” in America for many years. In that time, 57.3 million children’s lives were extinguished before they ever had the opportunity to live. If you think about that number, it is overwhelming.
Christians dare not remain silent. But when we speak, we must be prepared with answers.
Here are a few you arguments you will hear—and the response you must give.
- “It’s not a baby while in the mother's womb. Life begins with the first breath.”
That's foolish. Number one, the child needs oxygen to survive in its mother's womb. Oxygen comes through the umbilical cord. And number two, the child is already alive—his life has already begun. Babies in the womb move, breathe through the umbilical cord—and even sometimes hiccup!
- “But abortion may be necessary to save the mother's life.”
If we must choose between the preborn baby and the mother's life, then, indeed, the mother's life may be chosen because she was here first. But we are not in the business of taking the lives of babies for convenience as we are saving the life of the mother. But with today's medicine, such a need is rare indeed. World famous geneticist Dr. Jerome Lejune gave some of the greatest wisdom I've heard on this subject:
“I would do everything I could to save the life of the mother, but I would never attack and kill an unborn child.”
What does he as a physician do?
“I do everything I can do to save the life of the mother, but I never move in with the purpose to kill a baby.”
Do you see the difference?
- “But what about all those babies conceived by rape or incest?"
First, only 1% of all abortions are performed because of rape or incest. This is a smokescreen designed to deflect and get you to concede that this person, so conceived, is not deserving of life.
Should a baby conceived out of rape or incest not live? The great singer Ethel Waters was born as the result of rape. Ruth, an ancestress of the Lord Jesus Christ, was a descendent of Moab, who was born out of an incestuous relationship.
If you say a baby born out of rape or incest ought not to live, what if there were a one month old baby in the crib born out of rape or incest? Would you kill that baby? What about a two-month-old or a five-year-old? Because the child was conceived under horrific circumstances, should the child be put to death? Remember, the child in the mother's womb is as much a child as one outside—and is completely innocent of any wrongdoing as regards his/her conception.
- “But what if the baby is going to be deformed? Shouldn’t we abort?”
Follow that line of reasoning. Do you believe people who are defective should be put to death? Just how perfect do you have to be in order to live? Where do we stop when we start eliminating those who are defective? What do we do with babies who are born with disabilities? Do we kill them? And when we start eliminating the unwanted, where do we end? What an argument!
And here’s where it leads: The baby’s defective. Let's kill it. Abortion before birth, infanticide after. Euthanasia: the person is old. Let's get the Dr. Kevorkian crowd to deal with them. Genocide: Let's just have some ethnic cleansing and get rid of a whole race.
- “A woman's body is her own to do with as she pleases.”
That's not entirely true. It's not legal for a woman to be a prostitute in most states. Not legal to inject her veins with heroin. Illegal not to wear a seatbelt. We realize that in civilization a woman's body is not always her own to do with whatever she wishes. But, friend, we're not talking about her body. We're talking about a life living in her. She is simply the host, and there's a guest in her womb, wanted or unwanted. Suppose there is an unwanted guest in my house. Do I have the right to murder an unwanted guest, saying “It’s my house”?
- “Personally, I’m against abortion, but what someone else does is none of my business.”
What if, during Hitler’s Germany, a politician had said, “Hitler ought not to be eradicating the Jews. I’m personally against it, but what someone does in the privacy of his own gas chamber—it’s his business.” There is no difference in saying, “I'm personally against abortion, but what somebody does with their own body is their business.” Do you see the parallel?
- “What about the baby who is going to be a victim of child abuse if that child is brought into the world?”
This has always seemed strange to me: “We don't want the child abused, so we'll just kill it.” Did you know that 90% of battered children are the result of a planned pregnancy? Unwanted children are not those who are the most abused.
And if you don't want that baby, there are plenty of people standing in line who would be glad to have that child.
- “But those abortion laws are unfair to the poor. The rich can go out and get an abortion. You're condemning poor people to back alley abortions. It's discriminatory.”
It's probably safer for a rich person to break most any law. They can afford better counsel. They have better means of hiding what they do than the poor. But do you believe, therefore, because it is easier for the rich to do wrong, that we ought to make it as easy for the poor to do wrong? Rich people have a better access to drugs. They can buy it and acquire it more easily. Therefore, would you say that we must supply heroin for the poor because the rich have a better access to it?
No, friend. It's not a matter of who has better access. It's simply a matter of what is right or what is wrong. No mother has the right to kill her children. We are saying that it is wrong and we dare not be silent. Why? It is a matter of life. Life! That little baby is life.
- “A fertilized egg is not human life—a zygote, an embryo—that’s not a baby.”
Somebody once wrote “Dear Abby” and argued this:
To believe that the ovum and the sperm united are human life would be like believing that a vehicle was in existence after a nut and bolt were joined together at the beginning of an automobile assembly line.
They're saying, “Don't tell me that little sperm and that little egg is human life any more than a nut and a bolt joined together is an automobile.”
But this analogy fails horribly. Friend, a nut and a bolt joined together—that's all it will ever be unless you add some other component to it. It is just simply a nut and bolt. But when a sperm and an egg come together, that is an individual, and amazing changes begin to take place! Cells begin to double exponentially. All you do is just add nutrition. You don't add any more parts. Just add nutrition and it continues to develop.
That analogy is terrible and foolish. Anyone with a mind and who thinks, will know it.
Therefore, What Must We Do?
Several things:
1. You need to be informed, and that's why I'm preaching this message.
2. We need to work for and pray for a constitutional amendment that will make abortion on demand illegal.
3. We must teach and preach biblical sexual morality at home, and yes, in the church.
4. We need to have more compassion for unwed mothers. Often we drive them into the arms of the “friendly” abortionists. Thank God for your local pregnancy care clinic that ministers to women and provides alternatives to abortion. Many women have been searching for any alternative, and when they went to Planned Parenthood, killing their child was the only option given. They are searching for something more! Thank God for the ministry of life-affirming clinics.
5. We need to speak out clearly. We dare not be silent.
“Cry aloud; spare not. Lift up thy voice like a trumpet and show my people their transgression and the house of Jacob their sin.” Isaiah 58:1
6. Refuse to be swayed by high-sounding arguments of liberals, humanists, or social planners. What do they know? Ask yourself, what do they know?
“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” Isaiah 5:20
7. We must pray to God and ask Him to have mercy upon this nation and send a spiritual revival.
“If my people, which are called by My name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14
8. We must preach the glorious, saving gospel of Jesus Christ and, thereby get people to know Christ as their personal Savior, changing their hearts and lives.
Do you know what's wrong in America? Do you know who has failed, primarily? We preachers of the gospel have failed. The churches in America have failed. We once had a biblically based morality in the United States, but that has fast receded over the horizon.
Today we live in a different society where it is “morality by majority” and expedience rather than a fixed face of right or wrong. There is little wrong with America today that could not be changed radically, dramatically, and swiftly if we had a generation of preachers who would stand up in pulpits across America and say, “Thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord.” Dr. John Piper has lamented, “The problem today is cowardice in the pulpits.”
America is in crisis, and we dare not be silent. Speak every way you can. Write your Congressman. Write your Senator. Write your President. Speak to your school board. Speak to your neighbors and your family when the subject comes up.
But above all, keep your knees on the floor and pray to Almighty God.
