Title: A Voice for Life 01/22/12
Text: Psalm 139:13-18
Purpose: Sanctity of Life sermon
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Introduction
A. Describe the birth of daughters, standing there cutting the umbilical cord
B. Describe holding a baby in my hand as it was born premature
C. Describe the sanctity of life
There is probably no other issue that divides Americans, than this issue over life.
• Political elections have been won and lost on the issue
• Families have suffered through it
• Friends have been divided over it
• Even the church has been dragged into it
And it typically revolves around one question:
Question: Who or what is a human being?
TEXT: Psalm 139:13-18
I chose this text because it states right from the very beginning that God had a hand in forming you and me.
It wasn’t by chance you have become a living being, but a plan and a purpose. While it may have been conceived in various ways, each life has purpose and value.
Question: What is a human being? (When does personhood begin?)
There are two very different answers
1. Bible: says we are creatures that God made especially in his image. Jesus says that we are of much more value than the birds of the air.
2. Rather complex: It says that we are here more by random chance than creative design. That we evolved more from primates than the hand of God. That just the right mix of molecules and chemicals had to come together, than a purposeful plan of God.
How we answer this question will determine what we are willing to do to each other.
Again, I’m fully aware of the arguments and stances that have driven our social culture. But for the Christian, it will be imperative that we start with Scripture.
Question #2: Who gets to determine when life starts and when life stops. Who gets to determine what we do with this life, either at the beginning, during, or at the end.
I. Question: Is life God created?
We have to start with the premise of God’s word. Is God’s Word, God’s Word to us? For the Christian, as in the Bible, God begins with the premise that God is.
Genesis 1:1 says, “In the beginning, God…” It doesn’t try to defend God, or prove God, it just starts with, “In the beginning, God.”
For the Christian then, we hold that Scripture is the authoritative word of God. It’s OUR starting point. (It’s a whole other sermon about the authoritative word) but for right now, we will hold that God’s word is the authority on how we should live our lives in Christ.
A. Genesis 1:27 “So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
1. What does this tell us?
a. That we are made in the image of God
i. Now that is not to mean that we have hands, and feet, and eyes like God, because God is a spirit.
ii. So what is it that we are created in his image? (1)
We can reason
- We use our brains for more than hunting for food, socializing, preserving and reproducing ourselves.
- We can contemplate our own existence in the world and plan our future
We have a social ability
- We use our higher thinking and communication skills to relate with other people and with God.
- We love them and give ourselves in service to them.
We have a moral ability
- Our conscience makes us aware of right and wrong
- A moral imperative created within us by God gives us a nudge in the direction of right
We have a creative ability
- We can’t speak things into existence like God can, but we can imagine things in our minds and fashion them out of raw materials.
We have responsibility as God does
- He makes us caretakers of creation, our families, and each other
We have a soul
- Beyond our physical, psychological and emotional features lie our spiritual nature
- We have a never dying soul that will live throughout eternity
So not only did he create us in his image, but…
b. It also tells us that he made us different from one another.
i. “he created them male and female”
ii. While we are all created in HIS image, we are not created in each other’s image.
iii. You are a product of your parents
B. Genesis 2:7 “Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.”
a. The Hebrew verb for “formed” is commonly used of the work of a potter with clay. (2)
i. It conveys the idea of molding and shaping with careful, loving care.
ii. Here God acts as the potter taking clay or soil and forming man.
b. But it also says that he breathed into him…
i. It was God who gave man a life unique to mankind.
ii. Animals had life too, but man had a portion of deity within him because he was made in the image of God.
iii. But this image is more than just a potter forming a lump of clay, it also depicts the essence of God’s desire for a relationship with man. (3)
1. Whether we use the illustration of a lifeguard on the beach or not, it is clear that the image presented is one of the closest possible contact and relationship between God and Man. It is what sets us apart from the other part of creation.
Life is God created, and created for relationship.
II. Is Life God Valued (Precious)?
A. Exodus 20:13 “Thou shall not kill…”
a. This goes back to the idea that man is created in the image of God.
b. To destroy man is to destroy the pinnacle of God’s creation.
c. Jesus expands this idea in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:21-22 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘you shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’ But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.”
d. Not only does Jesus broaden the commandment, he makes it more strict.
i. Destroying the reputation of another is a form of killing.
ii. Abortion and euthanasia both raise the question of this commandment
Part of this question of value is this question:
Question: If God said, “Do not murder, or kill, then who gets to decide when life ends?
a. Certainly the issue arises with abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide.
b. For much of it, it comes down to the issue of “who gets the right to choose?”
Let me say it this way, as I interpret scripture.
1. We live in a sinful world and the issue of “self” dictates many decisions.
2. I also realize that there are consequences of sinful decisions.
a. Rape
b. Incest
c. Promiscuity
3. There are countless arguments of why or why not “I should be allowed to choose…”
a. Most of them have to do with “ME” and “MY RIGHT” rather than what God would say.
There can be alternatives to decisions.
a. Even in the case of rape and incest, there are those who would lovingly care for the birth and life of a new born baby.
b. That child had nothing to do with the choice of coming into the world.
c. And even when the choice is made to put ourselves into a place where pregnancy can occur, that is the choice, not later. Again, there are alternatives.
d. We in the church must exhibit love and mercy to those who are caught with such a decision. We can stand on God’s word, but we can also stand there with open arms to welcome life as it comes.
It is my opinion, that the same generation that embraced the taking of life on the front end of life, (Birth) will be the recipients of that thinking at the end of life, when society, or family chooses to end it prematurely and we feel that life at the end is not worth saving.
Jesus valued life.
Luke 10:27 says, “…You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Matthew 6:25b-26 “Isn’t life more than food and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for their heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are?”
Matthew 25:40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
Over exposure leads to desensitization, which leads to devaluing life
Summary:
1. Is Life God Created?
2. Is Life God Valued?
III. Is Life God Redeemed?
Matthew 5:6, 8-9
“When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners….But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation.”
There are many, who feel that because of life choices, either because they’ve made them, or that because others have done things to them, that they feel trapped and unable, unloved, to accept what Christ wants to do for them.
Statistics
1. Nazarene Safe Statistics (4)
a. 1-3 girls and 1-5 boys will be sexually abused by the age of 18
2. Focus on the Family Current Status (5)
a. •The number of annual reported abortions in the U.S. peaked in 1990 at 1.4 million abortions before dropping in subsequent years.
b. •More than one million abortions are performed in the U.S. each year.
c. •Based on current abortion rates, about one in three women will have an abortion by age 45.
d. •Forty-four percent of women who had abortions in the U.S. had at least one previous abortion.
e. •Eighty-two percent of women who had abortions in the U.S. were unmarried.
f. •Fifty percent of U.S. women having abortions are younger than 25 years old.
Side effects: (6)
Here is a list of potential side effects that may be of concern to you:
• Regret
• Anger Relationship issues
• Guilty feelings Suicidal thoughts and feelings
• Shame Eating disorders
• Loneliness or isolation Depression
• Impaired self-confidence Anxiety
• Insomnia or nightmares
Dr. David C. Reardon, wrote an article entitled “Restoring Hope, Finding Forgiveness.” (7)
We observed that most women who choose abortion feel trapped by their circumstances or the demands of others. While their maternal side may want to nurture their child, at the same time they fear that if they do not submit to abortion, they will lose something, or even “everything” they already have–the love of their parents, their husband or boyfriend, their career, their freedom, or whatever.
Abortion, then, is an act of despair. And because despair is the opposite of hope, the abortion decision encompasses the woman in a spiritual battle. On one side is Christ who asks the woman to hold onto hope by trusting that He has a plan for her life and the life of her child. On the other side is Satan who insists that the only way to save the life she already has is to seize control of her situation and make the choice to give up this one thing (her child) for the sake of saving everything else.
But once she has chosen abortion, Satan turns on her and becomes her fiercest accuser. He charges her with the crime of an unforgivable murder, a secret shame of which she can never be free. His goal is to build up despair in her life for three reasons: to generate misery, to encourage more sin, and to create doubt in the unfathomable mercy of God. Christ, on the other hand, continues to invite post-aborted women to embrace the virtue of hope by trusting in His mercy and forgiveness.
Closing: www.avoiceforlife.com and watch the trailer
Footnotes
1Frank Moore, “Coffee Shop Theology” Beacon Hill Press of Kansas City. Pg. 87
2 Holman Old Testament Commentary: Genesis. Holman Reference, Nashville, TN. Pg. 26-27
3The Preacher’s Commentary, D. Stuart Briscoe. Thomas Nelson Publisher, Nashville, TN. Pg 39
4 http://www.nazarenesafe.org/
5 http://www3.focusonthefamily.com/socialissues/social-issues/abortion.aspx
6 http://www.americanpregnancy.org/unplannedpregnancy/abortionemotionaleffects.html
7 http://afterabortion.org/1999/restoring-hope-finding-forgiveness/
