SUMMARY:
Abortion
By Rev Dr PETER BARNES, Presbyterian Church, Sydney
THE God who has revealed Himself in His inerrant Word reveals Himself as the God of life. To choose Him is to choose life; to depart from Him is to choose death (Deut.30:15- 20). He is the God who says that we are not to murder our fellow human beings but to love our neighbour as ourselves (Ex.20:13; Matt.22:39). He is also the God who makes it clear that life begins at conception, not at quickening, the end of the first trimester, or birth. Each of us — whether king or commoner, corporate giant or servant — has been formed by God in our mother’s womb (Job 31:1315). The recognition of this truth is meant to arouse compassion for our fellow human beings.
Therefore we read that the child in the womb can move and leap (Gen.25:22; Luke 1:41), be consecrated in God’s service (Jer.1:5; Gal.1:15), be filled with the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:15), and be blessed by God (Luke 1:42). In the womb the child is not a protoplasmic mass or foetal tissue but a child.The same Greek word which describes the unborn John the Baptist in Luke 1:41, 44 is also used to describe the newborn baby Jesus in Luke 2:12, 16 and the young children who were brought to Jesus in Luke 18:15. Indeed, when the Word became fiesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14), He became fiesh not at birth but in the womb of the virgin Mary (Matt.1:18-25; Luke 1:26-38).
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...from conception to death, a human life
is God's handiwork.
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It thus logically follows that to kill the
child in the womb is not to terminate a
pregnancy but to kill a child. When the
Bible refers to the killing of a child in the
womb (e.g. in Jer.20:17), it uses the same
Hebrew word that is used to describe
David’s slaying of Goliath (1 Sam.17:50-
51). The Bible will use euphemisms
for sexual activity but not for killing,
whereas the modern age reverses this.
In Psalm 139, as King David contemplated
life in God’s presence, he realised
that he was fearfully and wonderfully
made. It was God who had created his
inmost being and knitted him together
in his mother’s womb, and assigned him
his length of days even before he was
born (Ps.139:13-16). Life is a continuity
from womb to tomb. As MichaelWilcock
puts it: ‘Not just from birth to death, but
from conception to death, a human life
is God’s handiwork. Psalm 139 is his forthright
“No” to those who for reasons of
their own would cut it off, by abortion at
one end or by euthanasia at the other.’
Footnotes:
About the Author...
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Appeared in Issue CETF NR 33 2005
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-Last revised-
Monday, October 09, 2006
