As the anniversary of the Roe v Wade decision comes around this year and conversations begin to revolve around life issues once again, my children have asked me to make them a list of scripture passages to which they can refer when providing a logical defense for their pro-life position when speaking to their friends. Here is something I prepared for their ECF class a while back which just may contain exactly what they've asked for.
As believers we understand that there is no such thing as a coincidence, or an accident. EVERYTHING in life occurs because the Lord our God wills it, or at least permits it. God choreographs our every moment and tailors life as we go along, according to the decisions we are allowed to make for ourselves due to His gift of free will. We may make decisions, but ONLY because He allows it.
Nehemiah 9:6 You alone are the LORD. You made the heavens, even the highest heavens, and all their starry host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. You give life to everything, and the multitudes of heaven worship you.
Isaiah 40:25-26 “To whom will you compare me? Or who is My equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.
Here, God clearly takes credit for the creation and maintenance of the stars of the sky. He calls each of them by name and lets Isaiah know very clearly that each is of the utmost importance to Him. Now, we also know that human souls are of infinitely more value than an inanimate object such as a star, or an animal life form such as a bird.
Matthew 6:26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
It is clear that human life is more precious to God than any other form of life, or any inanimate substance because of the fact that man is made in the image and likeness of God.
Genesis 1:27 . "God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them.
Because man is made in God’s image, he is made, not singularly, but in three: father, mother and children. If we consider this, it becomes clear that the gift of a child is the ultimate fulfillment of the nature of man.
Psalm 127:3 "Truly children are a gift from the Lord; the fruit of the womb is a reward"
God makes it clear to us that it is He who is responsible for the existence of every life and that He knows each soul by name even before we are conceived. Jeremiah is told to go to the ones to whom God would send him and tell them to amend their ways. Jeremiah is hesitant because of his lowly social status. The Lord reminds him:
Jeremiah 1:5 “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.”
Psalm 139:13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb
Isaiah 44:2 This is what the LORD says—he who made you, who formed you in the womb, and who will help you…
Isaiah 44:24 “This is what the LORD says— your Redeemer, who formed you in the womb: I am the LORD, the Maker of all things, who stretches out the heavens, who spreads out the earth by myself,
Isaiah 49:5 And now the LORD says— he who formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him and gather Israel to himself, for I am honored in the eyes of the LORD and my God has been my strength—
If the Lord knew them before their conception, is it fair to assume that he knows all human souls the same way? Here’s what scripture tells us:
Job 31:15 Did not he who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same one form us both within our mothers?
And how do we know that each soul of each unborn child is distinct from any other soul. Are we known by God by name before we are born? When the fetus known as John the Baptist came close to the Fetus which was Jesus Christ, a miraculous thing happened:
Luke 1:41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.
John knew that this baby was Jesus, not anyone else. It is interesting to contemplate the fact that both John the Baptist, at approximately 6 months gestation and Jesus, at about three months gestation were legally abortable in some states of our country. Yet it is clear by the way that they reacted in each others presence, that they were very special and distinct people.
When it comes to understanding God’s perspective when it comes to the protection of the unborn, Fr. Frank Pavone from the Priests for Life organization puts it best. He says that "the killing of children is especially condemned by God through the prophets. In the land God gave his people to occupy, foreign nations had the custom of sacrificing some of their children in fire. God told His people that they were not to share in this sin. They did, however, as Psalm 106 relates:
Psalm 106:35, 37-38 "They mingled with the nations and learned their works…They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons, and they shed innocent blood, the blood of their sons and their daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan, desecrating the land with bloodshed"
This sin of child-sacrifice, in fact, is mentioned as one of the major reasons that the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians and the people taken into exile.
2 Kings 17:17-18 "They mutilated their sons and daughters by fire…till the Lord, in his great anger against Israel, put them away out of his sight"
Notice that this practice was a religious ritual. Not even for "religious freedom" can the killing of children be tolerated.
Abortion is death. Christ came to conquer death, and therefore abortion.
John 10:10 "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full"
The final outcome of the battle for life has already been decided by the Resurrection of Christ. We are not just working for victory; we are working from victory. We joyfully take a victory that has already been won, and proclaim, celebrate, and serve it until He comes again to bring it to its fullness.
"There shall be no more death" (Revelation 21:4).
"Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!" (Revelation 22:20).