The first section of this message is very necessary,
however. It is necessary to look to the Bible to see what God, through his
inspired text, has to say about life in the womb -- that is life between
conception and birth.
My first verse is taken from the famous penitential psalm
of David, Ps 51:5-6
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
How can one be sinful if one is not a living being. David
said that he was sinful from the time his mother conceived him. So were we
-- so are we.
My next passage is from the wonderful Psalm 139. (Look up
psalm 139 the next time you feel distanced from God):
Ps 139:13-16
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully
made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
"You knit me together in my mother’s womb -- your eyes
saw my unformed body" Here I point out that the so-called "product of
conception" is truly the product of God’s knitting us together in our
mother’s womb. There is value there -- from the start.
Listen to this word from the Prophet Jeremiah:
Jer 1:4-5
4 The word of the LORD came to me, saying,
5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."
I saved the best for last:
Luke 1:39-45
39 At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in
the hill country of Judea, 40 where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted
Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her
womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she
exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will
bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to
me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my
womb leaped for joy.
John the Baptist gave witness to the Christ while he was
in the womb and while the Christ was in the womb.
I hope after those verses that it may be seen clearly
that taking the life of a baby between conception and birth is clearly a
violation of the Commandment: "You shall not murder." Plain and simple
-- it is a violation of God’s Law -- the ending of a life that God has begun
by knitting someone together in his or her mother’s womb.
But it is not a crime in the eyes of the laws of this
country. Like it or not, it is perfectly legal. And it is widely
acceptable. The people who have participated in this act are numbered in the
millions. I can’t imagine that with so many millions of abortions that
have happened over the last few decades, that someone here, perhaps more
than we would expect, have been touched by the guilt of this sin.
I’m talking about medical personnel -- those that do it,
those that recommend it,
I’m talking about women who have exercised their
so-called "choice."
I’m talking about husbands and boyfriends who have
encouraged this action -- maybe even paid for it.
I’m talking about parents who have kicked pregnant
teenage daughters out of the house to fend for themselves during a most
vulnerable time.
I’m talking about friends who haven’t spoken up when
asked their opinion by a woman with an unplanned pregnancy.
I’m talking about parents -- good parents -- who simply
couldn’t face rasing a deformed or mentally handicapped child.
All of these are very real situations -- and the way out
is legal and can seem so easy.
Hopefully what I’ve said so far has been good counsel in
case you face such decisions in the future. And believe me, you might not
expect it, but teenagers -- both male and female, parents, even husbands,
friends, grandparents -- anybody, can become involved.
The best time to avoid a sin is before you are in
the thick of things.
Think about it now-- not when the pressure is on!
Anyway, I said this is a message of forgiveness.
Forgiveness is a huge, all-encompassing, gift that is
offered by a God who has infinite capacity to forgive -- even our greatest
sins -- even our most heinous sins.
No matter what you or any believer has done in the past
-- even sins of life and death -- you are forgiven by the blood that Jesus
shed on the cross. In God’s eyes, you are cleansed from that sin.
The first murder on the earth, committed by Adam’s son
Cain, was forgiven. God sent him away, but he sent him away with a mark on
him that prevented anyone from harming him or avenging the murder.
Moses killed the Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew. Moses
was forgiven.
David conceived a son with Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah
He tried to cover his sin by having her husband, Uriah, killed in battle.
The baby died, perhaps as a sign of the consequences of David’s sin, but
David was forgiven for the murder of Uriah
Barabbas the murderer was set free and Jesus was
crucified in his place. Just like Jesus was crucified in our place.
The Apostle Paul stood watch over the people’s cloaks
while they stoned Stephen -- the first martyr -- to death. The Bible says, "And
Saul was there, giving full approval to his death."
So what does this mean for you if you carry any guilt due
to abortion? It means you are forgiven -- plain and simple. It means
that some of the suffering that Jesus did while being beaten and crucified
was pain that paid for you sin. That is whether you willingly and directly
participated in the sin or whether you were removed yourself from the
process and sinned by omission -- by not warning the mother of the gravity
of her actions.
The point of this sermon is about forgiveness. I think
we’ve done a pretty good job of pointing out the guilt over the previous
years. Now I hope that we can point out the forgiveness.
One final word that I’d like to leave you with now is
this thought: God in heaven has forgiven us every sin that we have ever
committed -- no matter how heinous. When we refuse to forgive ourselves of
the sins that God has forgiven, we are placing our own verdict and
conviction over God’s verdict and the forgiveness won for us on the cross of
Christ. Think about that.
Let’s join Paul and bask in the length and breadth of
God’s forgiveness:
1 Tim 1:15
This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptance,
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
