Sanctity of Life Sermon
Fr. James Cloud
Many of you may not know, but approximatelyfour years ago I joined the Order of Holy Innocents under the Anglican Priests for Life. This sermon's focus has always been a topic close to my heart and something with which I know is very close to the heart of God. Jesus spoke about a person who simply "offends" a little one and causes them to stumble, much less being the direct cause for their demise. He stated that it would be better for them to have a millstone tied around their neck and to be tossed into the sea than to have caused injury to a little one; and that these small one's angels always behold the face of God.
This past summer the nation was clamoring over fetal tissue cell research. As I pondered the question I turned to the Scriptures to see what the Word of God really had to say about unborn life. I believe the Lord led me to a passage of Scripture in Jeremiah 1:5-6. Jeremiah is receiving his call from God to the office of Prophet. Before the call is stated the preceding verse says, "The Word of the Lord came to me saying..." This is what God says about the unborn. In the final analysis this is all that matters. Political parties will have their opinions, doctors and medical organizations will have theirs, you and I will have ours, but all of them will be judged by the "Word of the Lord." Let God be true and every man a liar. First I would like to examine what the early church thought about the subject, and yes, abortion is not a new concept but, in fact, is a very old one.
The Didache ca 120 A. D.
"Thou shalt not murder a child by abortion." 2:2 "The Way of Death is filled with people who are... murderers of children and abortionists of God's creatures." 5:1-2
The Epistle of Barnabas ca 125 A.D.
"Thou shalt love thy neighbor more than thy own life. Thou shalt not murder a child by abortion." 19:5
The Apocalypse of Peter ca 135 A.D.
"I saw a gorge in which the discharge and excrement of the tortured ran down and became like a lake. There sat women, and the discharge came up to their throats; and opposite them sat many children, who were born prematurely, weeping. And from them went forth rays of fire and smote the women on the eyes. These were those who produced children outside of marriage and who procured abortions." -26
"Those who slew the unborn children will be tortured forever, for God wills it to so." -2:264
Clement of Alexandria ca 150-180 A.D.
"Our whole life can go on in observation of the laws of nature, if we gain dominion over our desires from the beginning and if we do not kill, by various means of a perverse art, the human offspring, born according to the designs of divine providence; for these women who, in order hide their immorality, use abortive drugs which expel the child completely dead, abort at the same time their own human feelings." -Paedagogus 2
St. Athenagoras ca 177 A.D.
"We say that women who induce abortions are murderers, and will have to give account of it to God. For the same person, would not regard the child in the womb as a living being and therefore an object of God's care and then kill it.... But we are altogether consistent in our conduct. We obey reason and do not override it." -Legatio 35
Tertullian ca 160-240 A.D.
"For us [Christians] we may not destroy even the fetus in the womb, while as yet the human being derives blood from other parts of the body for its sustenance. To hinder a birth is merely a speedier man-killing; nor does it matter when you take away a life that is born, or destroy one that is coming to birth. That is a man which is going to be one: you have the fruit already in the seed."
-Apology 9:6
"They [John and Jesus] were both alive while still in the womb. Elizabeth rejoiced as the infant leaped in her womb; Mary glorifies the Lord because Christ within inspired her. Each mother recognizes her child and is known by her child who is alive, being not merely souls but also spirits."
-De A ninta 26:4
Nlititicilis Felix ca 180-225 A.D.
"There are women who swallow drugs to stifle in their own womb the beginnings of a man to be - committing infanticide before they even give birth to the infant." -Octavius
St. Hippolytus ca 170-236 A.D.
"Reputed believers began to resort to drugs for producing sterility and to gird themselves round, so as to expel what was conceived on account of their not wanting to have a child either by a slave or by any paltry fellow, for the sake of their family and excessive wealth. Behold, into how great impiety that lawless one has proceeded, by inculcating adultery and murder at the same time." -Refutation of all Heresies 9:7
Council of Elvira ca 305 A.D.
"If a woman becomes pregnant by committing adultery, While her husband is absent, and after the act she destroys the child, it is proper to keep her from communion until death, because she has doubled her crime." -Canon 63
St. Basil the Great ca 330-379 A.D.
"She who has deliberately destroyed a fetus has to pay the penalty of murder.... here it is not only the child to be born that is vindicated, but also the woman herself who made an attempt against her own life, because usually the women die in such attempts. Furthermore, added to this is the destruction of the child, another murder." -Letter 188:2
"Moreover, those, too, who give drugs causing abortion are deliberate murderers themselves, as well as those receiving the poison which kills the fetus." -Letter 188:2
St. Ambrose of Milan ca 339-397 A.D.
The wealthy, in order that their inheritance may not be divided among several, deny in the very womb their own progeny. By use of parricidal mixtures they snuff out the fruit of their wombs in the genital organs themselves. In this way life is taken away before it is born... Who except man himself has taught us ways of repudiating children?" -Hexameron
St. Jerome ca 342-420 A.D.
"They drink potions to ensure sterility and are guilty of murdering a human being not yet conceived. Some, when they learn that they are with child through sin, practice abortion by the use of drugs. Frequently they die themselves and are brought before the rulers of the lower world guilty of three crimes: suicide, adultery against Christ, and murder of an unborn child." -Letter 22:13
The Apostolic Constitutions ca 380 A.D.
"Thou shalt not slay the child by causing abortion, nor kill that which is begotten. For everything that is shaped, and has received a soul from God, if slain, it shall be avenged, as being unjustly destroyed." -7:3
St. John Chrysostom ca 340-407 A.D.
"Why sow where the ground makes it its care to destroy the fruit? Where there are many efforts at abortion? Where there is murder before the birth? For you do not even let the harlot remain a mere harlot, but make her a murderer also. You see how drunkenness leads to whoredom, whoredom to adultery, adultery to murder; or rather something even worse than murder. For I have no real name to give it, since it does not destroy the thing born but prevents its being born. Why then do you abuse the gift of God and fight with His laws, and follow after what is a curse as if it were a blessing, and make the place of procreation a chamber for murder, and arm the woman that was given for childbearing unto slaughter? -Homily 24 on Romans
Secondly, what does God say about the unborn in this verse?
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations."
God says three things about the unborn here.
I. THE UNBORN ARE PERSONS BEFORE GOD
Many terms are used to describe unborn life today; fetus, tissue, embryo, etc... All sound so cold and frankly inhuman. But God says "before I formed you I knew you." The word "before" here is very significant. God is saying, "Before I began to create the person who would later come to be known as Jeremiah I knew Him." In the mind of God, before Jeremiah was even conceived God considered him a person. Before he began his creative work God considered him a person. How much more was Jeremiah a person after conception? The point seems very clear to me. If God considers the unborn life to be a person before he even begins to create him in the womb, we should certainly consider him or her a person after that creative process has begun. There are other Scriptural examples that testify to the fact that God considers the unborn child a human, a person not a glob of cells.
So human is unborn life to God that he filled a second trimester baby named John the Baptist with the Holy Spirit. Tissues are not filled with the Spirit people are. So human is unborn life that the two sons of Rebecca, as they strove together in the womb were considered by God, "two nations". God not only saw them as individuals before Him, He saw the children that would spring forth from their loins. So human is unborn life that Jesus Christ the eternal "Word of God,” who existed before time began, experienced all stages of human development in the womb from conception to birth. Was Jesus not a person when he was in the womb? If life does not begin at conception then Jesus, the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity, ceased to exist as a being for some time as he was a developing fetus. How ridiculous!
This is an important argument because the first thing that any society does if it is going to mistreat a particular class of people either because of hatred or convenience is to dehumanize them. Some theologians in the 19th century espoused the idea that black Africans had no souls in order to justify the enslavement of the black man. How much easier is it for our society to do it today when the voice and even the form of those who are being dehumanized and mistreated cannot be heard or seen. Their cries are silent. How wonderful it was a couple of years ago when Time magazine put on the front cover a picture of a little child, I believe 21 weeks in development in his mother's womb, as fetal surgery is taking place, reach up through the incision in his mother’s womb and hold the surgeons finger. The world saw what God has always said to be true. The unborn life is a person before God. Not only is the Unborn a Person, God says…
II. THE UNBORN IS A PRODUCT OF HIS CREATIVE WORK
God said to Jeremiah, "Before I formed you." The word "form" in the Hebrew is a word used to describe the creative work of a potter as he molds and shapes a vessel. It is the same word used in Genesis when the Bible says that God "formed man from the dust of the earth." The same purposeful act of God that took place in the dust of the earth when Adam was formed takes place in the womb when God forms life there. You see the unborn is not an accident, he or she is not the product of random chance, and he or she is the product of God's creative work.
Is this not what David echoes in Psalm 139? "For you FORMED my inward parts; You covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Your works, and that my soul knows very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed...." Human life in the womb, regardless of the circumstances involved is a product of God's creative work.
Unborn human life is set above the rest of God's creation because it is made in the very "image of God" Himself. This is what makes the unborn more valuable than Snell darters, spotted owls, and seals.
This vessel that God is forming in the womb is so honorable because it is the only creation of God designed to house the very presence of God Himself. "What know ye not that your bodies are Temples of the Holy Spirit?"
Unborn life is so valuable because it is the object of God's love. Christ died for the unborn. He died for me before I was ever even a thought in the mind of any man. The same is true of you, and the same is true of any child yet to be born.
Is the unborn a product of chance, maybe at times the result of an unfortunate set of human circumstances, or is he or she a purposeful product of God's creative work? The bible says that God saw that Leah was unloved so "He opened her womb", of Hannah it says, "He closed her womb", of Ruth it says, "He granted her conception". The overwhelming testimony of the Word of God is that He is sovereign even over the womb. He is responsible for the creation of human life. Lastly the text says…
III. THE UNBORN LIFE HAS PURPOSE FROM GOD
"Before you were born I sanctified you, I ordained you a prophet to the nations." While Jeremiah was yet to be born, God had already set him apart and appointed him to be a prophet to the nations. Jeremiah's mother, no doubt, reflected upon the unborn baby in her womb but God considered him a prophet.
Oh! A critic may say, this is true of Jeremiah a prophet but he is a special case. Not all children are created with such a lofty purpose. While it is true that not all children share such a lofty purpose in God's plan, to say that all unborn children do not have divine purpose is to contradict God's Word. The bible says that God is "no respecter of persons". If all children are a product of God's purposeful creation, does God make mistakes, or does God make junk. No, every unborn child has a divine purpose. Whether they fulfill that purpose or not is another question. But should they not be afforded the opportunity to do so?
Because of circumstances sometimes it's hard for us to see any purpose for the birth of some children. Sometimes we feel that some children would not have a chance if they were brought into this world. But this choice is better left in the hands of God. We are not God.
I was given an interesting article that illustrates this point. It asks the question. Would you consider an abortion in any of these circumstances?
1) A preacher and his wife living in extreme poverty. They have 14 children and she is pregnant again.
2) A mother has TB and the father has the sniffles. The family has four children already. One has TB, two are deaf and one is blind. Would you consider abortion?
3) A thirteen year old black girl is raped by a white man.
4) A teenage girl becomes pregnant but not by her fiancée. He is very upset. Would you consider abortion?
If you aborted in the first case you have killed John Wesley.
If you aborted in the second case you killed Beethoven.
If you aborted in the third case you killed Ethel Waters the black gospel singer.
If in the fourth case you aborted, you have just killed Jesus of Nazareth.
You see we don't have the ability to play God. Out of the millions of aborted children over the past decades who knows what great purposes of God, what great potential was snuffed out, depriving mankind of great blessing. The unborn child has a great God given purpose and potential.
What shall we do? First we should agree with God about what he says about the unborn. Secondly we should pray for the unborn and their plight in our country and around the world. Thirdly we should use our voices to speak out and speak up for those who cannot defend themselves. Fourthly, we should use our right and responsibility in a democratic society to vote for candidates that support the sanctity of the unborn. Finally, if we have not yet, we should begin to realize our own God given purpose and potential by coming to the cross of Jesus Christ and allowing him to cleanse us of our sin, trusting in the resurrected Christ to give us new life.
This sermon raises another mind probing question though. Can an abortionist or a mother who has had an abortion find forgiveness in the arms of God? The short answer is yes. Though the scars of the atrocity committed has both physical and mental ramifications heaped upon one another. It is a widely known fact of recent date that abortion causes an increase in the abortive mother's risk of cancer. It creates a deep hurt as well that may last for years or even to the end of her days. The doctors, who have murdered the children, once they come to Christ, face a whole slough of emotions from regret and self loathing to deep depression and other emotional distresses which have led both abortive mothers and the doctors into suicide.
The good news is that Jesus washes the blood off the hands of the perpetrators, and he walks with those who must deal with the physical and emotional consequences for their actions. He still loves all the parties involved in an abortion and hopes the best for them and yearns for their repentance and reliance on the cross of Christ to get them through the dark times that typically follow an abortion. It is never more truer of the repentant that the cross they will bear for their days will be heavier and more burdensome but in the end, through their testimony of renewal and hope for the ones who feel hopeless with an unexpected pregnancy, will find love, life, and ultimately forgiveness for the murder of the child within from the child themselves. For I am convinced a child that dies before birth is immediately in the arms of the heavenly Father, who nurtures them and calls them His own.
I want to leave you with this thought today, that there is hope and there is acceptance for the fallen, if but you lean upon the cross and plead for mercy. For the blood of Christ was not shed in vain, but can wash away any stain of sin, and can make you whiter than snow. Amen.
