Truth for Patriots Salutes

“A Day that Will Live in Infamy”
by Dr. Kenyn M. Cureton from the Family Research Council

Turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy 30:19. The title of the message is "A Day That Will Live in Infamy." Would you please stand for the reading of God's word? Deuteronomy 30:19 says: "This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live." Prayer.

Introduction: You remember that tragic moment in American history when Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese, killing thousands of our young men. It was December 7, 1941 and a somber President Roosevelt addressed our grief-stricken nation, and said: "This day is a day that will live in infamy." The same was said about September 11, 2001, when two planes took down the twin towers of the World Trade Center, another smashed into the Pentagon, and another crashed in rural Pennsylvania. But America will never be the same after 9/11. We lost nearly 3,000 Americans that day, a date that will also live in Infamy.

But did you know that almost 4,000 innocent people will be murdered in America tomorrow? It's true. In fact, we can predict these horrible deaths with chilling accuracy. One life will be snuffed out every 24 seconds. When added up, that's around 1.4 million Americans a year. Over the last 35 years, nearly 50 million have been murdered without mercy in these United States. These individuals have had no trial, no legal representation, and no opportunity to defend themselves. Yet, they have been executed in a cruel, inhumane way. Mark down January 22, 1973 as a day that will also live in infamy. For on that day, the United States Supreme Court made it legal[1] for our nation to murder nearly 50 million of its own by what doctors call an abortion. [2]

Abortion is the American Holocaust, and it is a moral outrage that ought to make every Christian rise up in righteous indignation. So what I want to do this morning is to expose the deceptive arguments of the abortionists, and then show you the declared truth of the word of God regarding unborn human life, and finally give you some things you can do about this moral madness called abortion.

I. DECEPTIVE ARGUMENTS OF THE ABORTIONISTS

First of all, let's talk about the Deceptive Arguments used by the pro-abortion crowd. Let's be honest, the abortionists, who like to be called pro-choice, have a lot of high-sounding arguments they use to shout down their opponents. Maybe some of you have been deceived by these arguments, I don't know, but want you to listen closely to some of their arguments, and see if they really are all that sound when we subject them to scrutiny.

A. Argument # 1-Fetus is not a Baby: For example, there are some who say: "That's not really a baby while its in the womb." Folks, there's a Hebrew word for that, and it is "Hogwash." That's foolishness. A number of years ago a group of 60 prominent physicians, which included former presidents of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, the American Academy of Neurology, met in Cambridge MASS and presented a declaration that said: "The fetus is not a sub-human species...the embryo is alive, human, and unique in the special environmental support required for that stage of human development."[3] The bottom line: The biological facts are absolutely conclusive that the fetus is a living human being.

Today the big debate is about federal dollars being spent for stem cell research. The argument is that stem cells may hold the answer to some of life's most debilitating diseases. You've heard Christopher Reeves, Ron Reagan, and politicians from both parties argue that the government needs to fund embryonic stem cell research. Now I think it is great when scientific and medical advances can bring help and healing to people, and I agree that stem cells show tremendous potential to bring hope to people with conditions that up until now have been hopeless.

However, the moral question we need to ask is this: Should we harvest human eggs and sperm and create and grow human embryos in the lab for the purpose of cultivating stem cells, and then discard those embryos? Should we create a life only to be destroyed in the name of trying to help give extended life? President Bush and some in Congress have said "No!" Why? Not only do adult stem cells show just as much promise for stem cell research as embryonic stem cells do, but more importantly from an ethical perspective, when you destroy a human embryo, you destroy a human life. No human life should ever be produced or destroyed for the benefit of another through stem cell research, cloning, or any other scientific research.

Yet many are deceived by the terminology used by scientists to refer to the human life created in the lab and by the abortionists to refer to the baby in the mother's womb. They talk about embryos, products of conception, and fetuses. Take the word fetus for example. That's a perfectly good Latin word meaning "unborn baby." But its a Latin word. In the middle ages, Catholic priests read from the Latin version of the Bible and few could understand it. Then Martin Luther in Germany and John Wycliffe in England came along and translated the Latin Scriptures into the language of the people so that their people would know what was going on. But the abortionists know how important it is to translate the English words into Latin, so that you won't know what is going on. It's all a part of their great deception.

And then there are those who would agree that it may be a living human being, but it doesn't have person-hood until the birth takes place. That in the womb, it is not a person. That hair-splitting argument brings up some interesting parallels in history. It reminds me of the Dred Scott case of 1857, when the Supreme Court said that the black man was not protected by the Constitution because a slave was not a person.[4] It reminds me of Nazi Germany where Hitler and his regime said that the Jew was not a person. The Nazi's were shrewd enough to know that before you can enslave and exterminate human beings, the first thing you have to do is depersonalize and dehumanize them, semantically destroy them before you physically destroy them. Make them into something less than human. So that's a dangerous argument to say that the unborn creature in the womb is not human. It leads down a slippery slope where virtually all human life becomes worthless--we're heading down that slope right now.

B. What about Rape and Incest and saving the life of the mother?: When you add up abortions due to rape and incest, and those to save the life of the mother, all three account for less than 4 percent of all abortions - 4 percent.[5] But these three account for about 96 percent of the pro-abortionist's rhetoric. Fine, let's cut out the other 96 percent of the abortions and we'll talk about these instances, Amen? But no one would dispute that sometimes an abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother. If a choice must be made between the unborn child and the mother, then indeed the mother's life may be chosen because of first domain. She was here first. So aborting the baby to save the life of the mother is the lesser of two evils. No one would dispute that.

But there is a great deal of emotion attached to victims of rape and incest, and rightly so. But are you going to play God in a matter like this? Are you going to say that a baby conceived by rape or incest should not live? Wouldn't that be following a wrong with another wrong. Let's say a white man raped a 13 year old black girl, impregnating her. Should her parents force her to abort that child? If they had, we would not have been blessed by the Gospel Singer Ethel Watters, conceived by rape. And what about Ruth, a woman who has a book of the Bible named after her, and who is named in the genealogy of the Lord Jesus Christ? She descended from a man named Moab, who was born out of an incestuous relationship. Going to play God?

C. Argument # 3: What About Handicaps and Birth Defects?: Let's say that there's a mother who has TB, she has already given birth to 4 children, one died, one is blind, one is deaf, and a fourth contracted TB from the mother. She's pregnant again, should she abort? Well if she had, then the world would have been robbed of the music of Ludwig von Beethoven. Are you going to play God? I mean follow the abortionist's argument to its logical conclusion. Do you believe that defective people should be put to death? Then a lot of us here ought not be alive, including the one who is speaking. All of us have defects. Just how perfect do you have to be in order to live? Where do we start when we eliminate those who are defective? Where do we end? Nazi Germany, abortion preceded killing of handicapped, elderly, and finally the Jews. We've started, where do we end?

But when you add up all the abortions in the case of rape, incest, saving the life of the mother, and the cases of deformity and handicaps, that's only about 7% of all abortions.[6] What about the other 93%? Well the abortionists try to tell us that abortion laws are primarily for the overburdened and the under aged. Let's say a preacher and his wife are very poor and they have 14 kids already, then she learns that another baby is on the way. Considering the burden it would add to their family, should she abort? If she had, she would have aborted John Wesley, the great 19th century evangelist. Or what about a teenage girl who discovers she's pregnant out of wedlock. And the guy she's engaged to is not the father, he finds out, gets really upset, and threatens to call the whole thing off. Should she go ahead and get an abortion? If she had, she would have aborted Jesus.

Well most women who get abortions don't fit the description. Most are not overburdened or unwed teens. Two-thirds of the women who abort their babies are over 20, white, and middle class. And more than 40 percent of all abortions are performed on patients for the second, third, or fourth time around. But 76% of women who abort their babies are unmarried, and 53% have no other children. So we're not necessarily talking about teenage girls who got pregnant. We're not talking only about poverty stricken women who can't afford a baby. Most of these women have participated in illicit sex and are using abortion as a means of birth control or they are professionals who don't want their lives interrupted by children. The statistics don't lie.[7]

D. Argument # 4: Doesn't a Woman have the Right to Choose?: Doesn't a woman have the right to do what she pleases with her own body? No, not according to the law. In most states, its illegal for her to be a prostitute, to fill her body with drugs, and in most states, to commit suicide. No, a woman can't do entirely as she wishes. But the argument to end all arguments is this: A woman has the right to choose. Choose what? Choose to kill? Choose to steal? Choose to kidnap? No. In a civilized society, a person does not have the right to do as they please. And that's especially true with regard to the unborn child in the mother's womb because we're not talking about her body.

The same 60 physicians quoted earlier had this to say: "A human ovum together with a human sperm produces a biologically identifiable human embryo. It has separate and unique genetic information and biological material. Every cell in a woman's body has exactly the same 46 chromosomes, and exactly the same genes. Every cell is identical in that way, except for the cells in that baby. The baby has a different set of chromosomes and a different set of genes." Listen, the baby even provides its own nest, the placenta and the umbilical cord. The baby has its own blood stream, maybe even a different blood type than the mother. In half of the cases, the baby has a different gender.[8] So we're talking about a guest, a baby, living inside the host, the mother. Run that line of reasoning on out. Let's say a cult member comes into my home to share his heretical propaganda. He is an unwanted guest from the standpoint of his religion. Do I have the right to murder an unwanted guest? Same faulty reasoning with abortion.

II. DECLARED TRUTH OF SCRIPTURE

Well, we've heard their deceptive arguments, what is the declared truth of Scripture? We claim to accept the Bible as the word of God and therefore the final word. Do you agree? If you are a Christian it ought to be. And there are over 100 texts that deal with the unborn.

A. Old Testament: Look with me at Psalm 139:13-16. These verses tell us that God forms that child in a mother's womb, and that child is the subject and object of God's love and concern. Look at the pronouns. This is not an "it," a "thing" that can be removed like a tumor and destroyed. This is a person made in the image of God. And the Bible doesn't distinguish between prenatal and postnatal life. Look at Jeremiah 1:5. Jeremiah was a prophet and God told him: "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, before you were born I set you apart (KJV - consecrated)." You don't consecrate a gall bladder to become a prophet, you consecrate a person.

B. New Testament: In Luke 1:39-45, we read that Mary, who was pregnant with Jesus, went to visit her relative Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist. Listen to v 41: "When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit." I mean, you never heard an expectant mother say: "A fetus leaped inside me or a product of conception kicked me." No. In fact, the Greek word brephos is used when it says that the baby leaped in her womb. That word can mean: "an unborn child, embryo, fetus, a new born child, an infant, a babe." It is the same term that is used to describe Jesus, the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. In other words, there is no distinction made in the Greek NT between an unborn baby and a new born child. No distinction. And remember, Greek is an expressive and precise language-there are 4 words that are used to describe love! But when it comes to describing an unborn child or a newborn child-there is only one term used. An unborn child is therefore not an "it," an unborn child is a person.

Let me ask you, if a mother delivered the child and then decided to kill the baby, would that be OK? What about the university student who received national attention because she delivered her baby, ripped the umbilical cord loose, wrapped the child in a sweatshirt, and threw the unwanted child in the trash? She went to jail. But she wouldn't have if she had simply gotten an abortion. There's no difference between what she did and an abortion, because terminating a pregnancy is, in fact, taking a life.

Do you know how an abortion is performed? It is ironic that the media will never allow you to see one. They will show us some of the 6 million victims of the Nazi Holocaust, they will show us abuses in Iraq, but none of the nearly 50 million victims of the American Holocaust. They will bring the evils of slavery and the horrors of war into your living room night after night, but no babies being aborted. Why? Because as supporters of abortion rights, they know that if the light ever shined in that darkness, there would be such an outcry that abortion would be stopped.

Well what happens in an abortion? Some abortion doctors inject the womb with a saline solution that burns the baby alive. Other abortion doctors use a vacuum device that dismembers and sucks the unborn baby out of the womb. Others use forceps, which the baby fights to avoid, according to the sonograms. They rip off the limbs, crush the baby's head, pull it out of the womb, and throw it in the trash! Thank God Partial Birth Abortion has been stopped, but the other methods are no less deadly.

Prov. 24:11-12 says: "Rescue those being led away to death, hold back those staggering toward slaughter. If you say: "We knew nothing about this." Does not He who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not He who guards your life know it? Will He not repay each person according to what he has done?" Folks, we need to stand up and speak out. Why? Because abortion is wrong! It is pre-meditated murder! It violates the 6th Commandment in Exodus 20:13.[9] And I want you to know that God hates it. Proverbs 6:16-17--"There are 6 things that the Lord hates, seven are an abomination to Him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood." God hates the shedding of innocent blood! And His ears are filled with the cries of the innocent being slain in this nation, and friend there will be a day of reckoning! And we will answer for what we do and for what we don't do!

III. DEFINITE ACTIONS WE CAN TAKE

Well my time is past, but what should we do, what can we do, what must we do?

A. Be Informed: First, we need to be informed, and that's why I preached this message. We need to teach and preach and practice sexual purity at home and in the church. Young people don't even get in a position to have to make such a choice as this. But if you do, choose life. Choose life. And folks when there is a moral failure, especially among our own, secondly, we need to...

B. Be Compassionate: We need to show compassion on the unwed mother, not condoning the sin, but caring for the sinner, leading them to repentance and restoration. Here's my firm conviction: Christians should be just as concerned before the pregnancy and after the pregnancy as we are during the pregnancy. We need to support the creation and operation of Pregnancy Support Centers as they help these young women choose life and then seek to give their children a life.

C. Be Active: Third, we need to get involved in the democratic process. Just speaking for myself, I've come to the place where I will support only those candidates who agree that abortion is murder and are committed to doing away with it except in the rarest of circumstances or altogether. Visit www.ivotevalues.org to find out where the candidates stand on the issue of abortion. Be encouraged by the fact that the Pro-Life movement is making progress. Congress overwhelmingly voted to do away with partial birth abortions, President Bush signed it into law, liberal judges have blocked it as "unconstitutional," but the newly configured Supreme Court with Justices Alito and Roberts upheld the ban against Partial Birth abortion as constitutional. But for now abortions continue to be performed for any reason, at any time during the pregnancy, except at the point of pulling the baby almost out of the womb and killing him or her. Well the Bible gives us our marching orders in Isaiah 58:1: "Shout it aloud! Don't hold back! Raise your voice like a trumpet! Declare to my people their rebellion, and to the house of Jacob their sins." We need to be that voice for those who have no voice.

D. Be Prayerful: Fourth, finally, and above all, fall on your knees and pray to Almighty God that He will change the direction of this nation that has launched out into a sea of innocent blood. We once held to the God-given right to life in this nation, but that day has gone and the night has come. But friend, our nation is not past saving. Nothing is impossible with God. Pray that even as slavery ended, even as the Jewish Holocaust ended, that the American Holocaust might end, that the murder of the innocent unborn might end, and that by the grace of God and our repentance, that this dark night on the soul of our nation might end and that the light of the Gospel might once again shine brightly in our land.

Prayer: Oh God, we pray for your mercy. Our nation deserves to be destroyed for because of abortion alone, even if we had no other sins. We pray for those who have had abortions and for all those who have had a hand in them. We pray that you would lead them to the cross and help them look up to Him whose hands and feet were pierced that their sins might be paid for. Oh God, have mercy on us as a people, for Christ's sake. Amen.

Invitation: When the Bible says to choose life, that not only applies to the unborn children, that applies mainly to those who need to be born again. Some of you can choose life this morning by choosing to trust Jesus as Savior and follow Him as Lord. Others are deeply troubled about what you've just heard, and I hope that it troubles you into taking action. Some might say: "The action I'm going to take is walk out and never come back." I'm sorry you feel that way, but I've counted the costs, and I realize there's a price to pay for preaching the truth.

But I'm also aware that there may be others who would say: "I want to take a stand with a church like that. I want to be a part of a church that preaches and practices the truth of Scripture." Maybe God wants you to make this your church home, to join hands with us to reach people for Jesus, to stand for what's right, and to stand up for these innocent babes who can't stand for themselves. Maybe that's what God wants you to do this morning. Others may want to come and pray for our nation that is literally drowning in a sea innocent blood that God would continue to show us mercy, and that He would enable us to turn the tide against this great evil of our time. You come as God leads you, while we sing.

[1] Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S.; 113, 163-164 (1973).

[2] "Abortion in the United States: Statistics and Trends," National Right to Life, Internet, http://nrlc.org/abortion/factsabortionstats.html.

[3] See http://www.forerunner.com/forerunner/X0717_Abortion__Evolution.html.

[4] Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857)

[5] See the stats provided by the Alan Guttmacher Institute: http://www.agi-usa.org/presentations/abort_slides.pdf

[6] See http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/facts/abortionstats2.html. Statistics can be found at: http://www.agi-usa.org/presentations/abort_slides.pdf.

[7] See the stats provided by the Alan Guttmacher Institute: http://www.agi-usa.org/presentations/abort_slides.pdf

[8] C. Everett Koop, M.D., Koop: The Memoirs of America's Family Doctor (New York: Random House, 1991), p. 264, comments: "It always seemed clear to me that life begins at conception. After the twenty-three chromosomes of the sperm are united with the twenty-three chromosomes of the egg to become a one-celled living organism containing the entire genetic code that will eventually become a you or a me, that single cell requires nothing except nutrition to become a baby nine months later. Biologists seem to have no trouble believing that life begins at the time of fertilization when they talk about lizards, doves, or baboons; it is only when the argument turns to the highest form of animal life, a human being, that there enters a lot of fuzzy thinking about conception and life."

[9] When God set forth the final five of the 10 Commandments to protect people's rights and preserve order in society, the first one is a prohibition is against taking someone's life. In fact, the high value God places on human life is the justification for Capital Punishment. See Genesis 9:6, which says: "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed for in the image of God has God made man." When you murder another person, you have committed a great evil. Why? Because God created man in His image, and your malicious attack against another human being is considered an indirect attack on God Himself. And that crime is worthy of the death penalty. Rom. 13 in the NT talks about the fact that God has ordained government to carry out that penalty-the authority "does not bear the sword for nothing-He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer." Human life is precious in God's sight, the object of his great love. Anyone who takes a life wrongfully, is the object of God's wrath. See also Exod. 21:12-17, 22-23, 29.

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