Abortion and Planned Parenthood

     Many of you probably know that Planned Parenthood has been selling aborted babies and their body parts, profiting from the death of the unborn. This dark truth has just recently come into the public eye thanks to a series of videos released by the Center for Medical Progress. For those unaware of what's happening, please take a look at Doug Wilson's writeup on the story (http://dougwils.com/s7-engaging-the-culture/ghouls.html) and watch the video below.
     I thought I'd take this opportunity to share an excerpt from a report presented to the General Assembly of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in 1971. It's not exhaustive, but it provides a solid groundwork on the topic:     

As we search the Scriptures for God's will concerning abortion, we find that the whole abortion issue can be reduced to one question: Is the fetus in the womb of the mother a human life? If the answer is yes, then abortion for the sake of convenience is murder, and the Christian church has the obligation to teach its members to protect and nourish the life of the unborn child. The sixth commandment gives an absolute prohibition against murder (Exodus 20:13), and so murder is never, under any circumstances, to be regarded as a moral option.    

 Often supporters of abortion confuse the issue by pointing to the financial and emotional hardships that both mother and child will face if a pregnancy is carried to full term. Certainly, the pressing social hardships surrounding unwanted pregnancies are enormous, but if an unborn child is a human life, some way of treating the problem must be found other than licensing the hospitals and clinics of our nation to perform mass executions of unwanted children.     So is a fetus in the womb of the mother a human life? I believe the Bible answers with a resounding yes! Consider the following evidence:

1.  God relates in a personal way to the unborn child (Ps. 139:13-14; 51:5; Jer. 1:5; Luke 1:44). He does so because the child is created in his image.[2]

1.  The Bible teaches that both conception and birth occur because of the sovereign rule of God (Gen. 21:1-2; 30:1-2; 1 Sam. 1:19-20; Job 31:15; 33:4; Ps. 100:3; 127:3). "It would be a willful act of defiance against the Creator intentionally to kill an unborn child whose conception is so intimately a divine as well as a human act."[3]

1.  The Greek word for "child" in Luke 2:12 (brephos) is used in Luke 1:41, 44 to refer to John the Baptist while he was in his mother's womb. A Hebrew word for "child"(yeled) is used of the unborn in the mother's womb (Ex. 21:22).[4]

1.  Theologian John Jefferson Davis points out that "the personal history of the Son of God on earth begins not when he was 'born of the Virgin Mary,' but when he was 'conceived by the Holy Spirit.' His human history, like ours, began at conception."[5]

1. John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit even while he was in his mother's womb (Luke 1:15).

The Bible treats human life, from conception to death, as a continuing experience. To willfully terminate it for reasons of convenience is murder. Faithfulness to the Word of God demands that this truth be taught in the church of Jesus Christ.  

(Taken from: http://opc.org/feature.html)

Pro-life Christian

Every Friday some friends from church, and I go down to a Planned Parenthood. We're there to encourage and edify others that children are a blessing. And we're there to pray over the innocent lives that have been lost, and continue to be lost. We've had many police and security men walk up to us, and tell us that we're too close to the building, or that we're doing something illegal. But we're called to pray.
Let’s begin with the Bible’s constant and consistent message condemning the taking of innocent life. Exodus, Deuteronomy, Psalms, Revelation, Matthew — all of these books engrave this truth into stone. Psalms, in particular, has a very relevant verse: “They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons, and they shed innocent blood, the blood of their sons and their daughters… desecrating the land with bloodshed.” Question: is abortion the taking of a life? Yes. Call it a fetus, call it an embryo, call it a moose if you like. What you can’t call it is inanimate matter. Therefore, it is a life. Another question: is that life innocent? Yes. And I shudder to think that anyone would suggest otherwise.

The Bible repeatedly condemns the killing of innocents, but abortion kills the innocent.

Who is still confused?

My favorite pro-life verse is that obscure passage that reads: “Thou shalt not kill.”

Yes, “kill” must be understood as “murder,” and murder can’t be understood to include justified and righteous killing like self-defense, or the defense of a loved one. It is not hard for me to understand “thou shalt not kill (except in matters of self-defense and just warfare). But it is a little difficult to comprehend this version: “thou shalt not kill (unless you’re killing your young child).”

The Bible also teaches that God specifically commanded the human race to “be fruitful and multiply.” Abortion would seem to fall short of that directive.

Scripture says that life is sacred (“I came that they may have life” – John 10 “There shall be no more death” – Revelation 21 “Thanks be to God who gives us victory” over death – 1 Corinthians 15 “He will destroy death forever” – Isaiah 25) and that children are a “gift from God” (Psalm 127).

Most compellingly, the Bible repeatedly says that God creates and forms every human being (“God created man in His image” – Genesis “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you” – Jeremiah). Unless you believe in a flawed and clumsy Lord, you must not think that any life can be accidental, or that God wishes for any of the beings made in His image to be exterminated before they even emerge from the womb.
 God has a plan for all of us, and our job as parents is to guide our children in following
and understanding that plan.

Further, Jesus makes it clear that whatever we do or fail to do for “the least of His brothers” we did or failed to do for Him (Matthew 25). When we abort a child, we are therefore aborting Christ.

I feel sick even typing that sentence, but there is no other way to interpret the matter.

But the most shocking Biblical attacks against abortion cannot be boiled down to one or two sentences. The central point — the Ultimate Moment — of Christianity is, among other things, a stunning rebuke against abortion. Indeed, if there is one issue today that most offends and
desecrates the Christian Message, it is abortion.

Think about it: Jesus was miraculously conceived in the womb. He spent his first nine months on Earth as a “fetus.” If abortion wasn't a grave sin up until that point (even though it was), it would have become the gravest of sins afterwards. Jesus elevated all of mankind when he became one of us. And He became one of us through every stage, so every stage was elevated and sanctified.

Let me repeat this: if you are a Christian then you believe that CHRIST HIMSELF was a “fetus.” How can the “fetus” be anything other than sacred life after such an event?

Just a glob of cells? Is that what a Christian would say of his Savior?

We don’t know what Christ looked like exactly, ("He has no form or comeliness;
and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him." ~Isaiah 53: 2)
but we know he once looked something like this:

And how did Jesus’ life end? He sacrificed Himself for the our sake.

Sacrifice.

Christianity is a religion of sacrifice, while abortion is a sacrament for those who wish to avoid it.

Sacrifice. Love. Life.

Abortion stands opposed to all of these things, and so it stands opposed to God, and so it stands opposed to Christianity.

That doesn't mean that pro-choice people can never be Christian, and it certainly doesn't mean that post-abortive mothers aren't welcome. Far from it. Christianity is also a religion of forgiveness, and thank God for that, because I am in constant need of God’s eternal mercy.

Christianity is a faith for all people, but it is not a faith for all notions and ideas. You cannot simultaneously profess the Faith while also defending the murder of the innocent.
I pray that whether or not you're pro-life or pro-choice, that Christ will convict you to pray for our nation.