Consequences of Pro-Death, Steps for Pro-Life

Consequences of Pro-Death

1. If death is the answer to an inconvenience at the beginning stages of life, death will eventually become the solution to inconveniences at the final stages of life. And just as with unplanned pregnancies, the arguments for euthanasia will be emotionally charged and angled in such a way that to disagree with ending life will be viewed as inhumane.
2. If the child in the womb is believed to be nothing more than a group of cells that can be nurtured or discarded, if personhood is removed from the infant, the value of the child outside the womb will steadily decrease. And you end up with mothers secretly having their babies and tossing them into garbage dumps. You end up with physical and sexual abuse of children on the rise because after all, they are inconveniences, they are not persons.
3. Morality in ethics becomes fuzzy or non-existent, so that the cause of those we as a society deem to be humans outweigh the the cause of those we as a society deem to be non-human beings. Therefore, it becomes a moral right to destroy human embryos!
4. Once life becomes redefined, it becomes meaningless. If there is no God, if we are products of evolutionary chance, if people are just animals, then murder is no big deal at any level in life. Have you asked yourself lately when you hear the horrid tales of abuse and murder, “How can someone be so hateful and so cruel and so brutal?” The answer is in part that we are now living in a generation that has been convinced through education and through the media that they are accidents, that belief in God is ignorant, and that they are the sole deciding factor for their own lives. How could we ever expect any different results when we remove God and remove the value and sanctity of life from a society?

Steps for Life

1. It begins in the home! Don’t buy into the world’s philosophy that the best you can do for your children is to have no more than two so that you can provide them with more material possessions than you had when you grew up! Don’t buy that! Have children, more children. And enjoy one of God’s most precious blessings! And train them up in the Lord, and experience the joy of being a God-centered family. Have family worship.
2. Pray about being a foster home. Take in those who have been put out, and give them the love of Jesus!
3. Pray about adoption! Take a complete stranger into your home and make them part of your family! That’s the Gospel!
4. Support a local pregnancy care center with money, time, and gifting.
5. Pray to God for a sweeping revival.
6. Pray to God to send his man to turn our hearts!
7. Stay informed so that you can get involved and know how to pray. ww.aul.org
8. Vote for the pro-life candidate.
9. Stop ignoring the issue.
10. Ask yourself, in the face of 800,000 innocent lives being taken this year, what will I do?

Saving Babies, Pleasing God!

Our church observed Sanctity of Life yesterday. I took Exodus 1:8-21 as our text. Within the narrative itself, Joseph and his rescue of Egypt from famine has long been forgotten. A new Pharaoh sits on the throne and does not have much feeling for the Israelites, especially since they are multiplying exceedingly fast!

His first plot to “stunt” their growth was to put them under hard, taxing slavery. This didn’t work. In fact, they just multiplied all the more. So he instituted another plan. He orders two Hebrew midwives to kill every male child that is born!

Because they fear God far more than they do Pharaoh, they disobey him and allow the children to live. As a result, God blesses the midwives with families of their own and causes the people to continue to multiply!

The following were the observations I made of the text that are applicable today in the stand for life!

1. God’s Law Supersedes the Law of Man! (vv 15-17) Several things stick out in this text.

1. First, Pharaoh has essentially mandated population control! Population control is a man-made solution to a man-made imaginary problem! God’s plan has always been to “multiply and fill the earth” because God wants worshippers! Lots of worshippers. Lots of different kinds of worshippers! Man’s plan is the opposite. “Let’s stifle the population. There are too many of us!” Population control inevitably ends up in abortion, and humanly speaking, nothing good comes from it. Take China for example. The “One Child Policy” of China has resulted in a generation of men who can’t find wives because there are hardly any women in China! The results will be loss of morals in relationships and marriage and national and international problems!
2. Second, Pharaoh’s policy is akin to partial-birth abortion. As soon as you can tell that the child is male, kill it!
3. Third, the midwives knew some fundamental truths that run deep.

• They knew there is a God, and if he exists, He is Creator, and He is in charge of life - who lives and who dies!
• Life is a precious gift from God that is not to be at the whim of man’s selfish nature.
• Life is one of those primary, fundamental issues where God’s will overrides anything man says!
• While it was in the power of the midwives’ hands and while they were under the protection of the king to do away with the life of these babies, their conscience before God would not allow them to do such a horrific act!
• Over in Acts 5, Peter and the apostles are arrested and brought before the high priest. They are told to quit preaching Jesus or face the consequences! And the replied in v29, “We ought to obey God rather than men!” Now long before the apostles made that stance, these Hebrew midwives said, “We ought to obey God rather than the king!" 2. God is 100% for the Preservation of Life! (vv 18-20) Just take note that the people multiplying and growing strong was the will of God, and therefore, in the saving of lives, the midwives were in line with the will of God while being opposed to Pharaoh!

Life is God’s business. Procreation is an absolute miracle! That a male and female come together, become one physically, and as a result a new human being is created is absolutely astounding! The delivery ward of every hospital is essentially a miracle factory! Over and over, babies are pulled from the womb or removed from the womb and begin to breathe on their own and receive nourishment through the mouth instead of through the stomach, and cry, and move, and open their eyes! I have only seen it twice, and both times I knew I was in the middle of a miracle!

3. Children are a Blessing from the Lord! (v 21) The reward for the midwives protecting life was that God GAVE them families! God gave them husbands. God gave them children!

A couple of philosophies have merged in our culture to produce a tragic result. The feminist agenda, a woman’s right to her body, along with the ever-present craving of materialism and status achievement and more honor so it seems in the workforce rather than in the home - these things have culminated together with the end being that children are a bother. Children are a distraction. Children are another bill payment. Children are in the way. Children are a burden.

God says in Psalm 127:3 that children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb is a reward! Children are a blessing of incredible joy! Having a big family was once seen as a blessing from God! Now days if you have a large family, people think it so odd you end up on TV with your own reality show! It seems unreal and it used to be the norm!

May the Lord grant us the resolve and conviction of the Hebrew wives to save babies and please the Lord!

In my next blog, I will post ways we can be like the midwives and stand for life!

Take the Challenge

If you have browsed my blog at all this past year, you know that I read numerous books by Puritan authors - 12 to be exact. I took the Puritan reading challenge issued by Timmy Brister for 2008, which I did in 2009. You are supposed to read one book each month, and by the end of the year you will have been exposed to a variety of Puritan authors and some of the more noted works. It took me 13 months to complete - the Puritans are not easy, casual reading. But it was worth it. Puritans are thoroughly biblical, deeply doctrinal, and clearly practical. This was a refreshing, challenging, learning experience for me.

If you would like to take the challenge, go to http://timmybrister.com/2008/01/07/join-the-2008-puritan-reading-challenge/.

Book Review: A Sure Guide to Heaven

A Sure Guide to Heaven. By Joseph Alleine. Carlisle: Banner of Truth. Reprint, 2007.

A Sure Guide to Heaven has enjoyed one the largest distributions of books in the English language and has served as a sure guide for such men as George Whitefield and Charles Spurgeon. Written in the great Puritan tradition, Sure Guide is basically an evangelistic tract.

The purpose is to provide a thorough explanation of Christian conversion, but in so doing, Alleine is pleading for his readers to be converted! The subjects are: (1) what conversion is, (2) the necessity of conversion, (3) the marks of the unconverted, (4) the misery of the unconverted, (5) the means of conversion, and (6) the motives to conversion.

The following are some lessons on conversion. These are Alleine’s own words and thoughts. Conversion is not taking up the religion of Christianity, being baptized, moral righteousness, conforming to rules of piety, or chaining up corruption by human will or means.

The author of conversion is the Spirit of God. The efficient cause of conversion is free grace and the merit of Jesus. The instrument of conversion is the ministry and the Word. The end of conversion is the glory of God. The subject of conversion is the elect sinner.

Conversion turns the balance of judgment so that God and his glory outweigh all carnal and worldly interests. Conversion turns the bias of the will. Conversion turns the bent of the affections. In conversion we turn from sin, Satan, the world, and our own righteousness. In conversion we turn to God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Without conversion, the infinite God is engaged against you, Satan has his full power over you, the guilt of your sins is upon you, your lusts enslave you, the furnace of eternal vengeance is ready for you, the law curses you, and the gospel condemns you.

In the final chapter, Alleine extends the Gospel call to his readers by convincingly sharing with them that the doors of heaven are thrown open to them by the work of Christ and that all the grace needed for faith and repentance are given by God.

It is a great study to remind believers what God has done for us and to offer unbelievers their only hope: the grace of God in the conversion of the soul!

God and Haiti

In times like these when a nation with a history and economy like Haiti is devastated by an earthquake, believers need to be grounded in sound, biblical theology to make sense of it and be able to help others maneuver through the many questions. Dr. Albert Mohler has provided an excellent post that upholds the sovereignty of God without veering off into wrong-headed conclusions. You would do well to read this post and share it with others. And let's do our part and pray and help Haiti with what means the Lord has blessed us!

www.albertmohler.com title: "Does God Hate Haiti"

Christmas in Myanmar

We received this update from Pastor Joseph, Emmanuel Ministries, Myanmar right after Christmas. Currently, we are trying to raise $1,500 to sponsor the needs of the seminary students for 2010. Please pray for Myanmar, Pastor Joseph, Emmanuel Ministries, and the success of our project. If you would like to help, please contact us.

1.In Jail ministry eight peoples are saved through Nei' evangelism and joined to sixty believers whom won by Nei to Christ. Unfortunately some prisoners are die daily at least one person in a day because mostly dysentery and purgation and weakness. They are the prison who are working outside the prison.

2.Josiah who is sent into the darkness from our seminary won recently three Buddhist' family to Christ. Now his new believers are occupied at their worship home. We need to pray for church planting there.

3.The name Buty who has nice family are immigrant from India flee to Christ from Hindu background by the evangelism of our missionary Aung.

4.Those who baptized are our Bible students who came from different places.Some are R.C and some are baptist. The boys were who used alcohol and other drugs before they came to our seminary and they were not changed by the Lord.
Nevertheless when they are trained and teaching daily at our seminary, the Lord touch and changed their lives and they began to follow the step of Jesus and they are in the next step of the better world which Jesus made the way for His peoples.

Book Review: The Reformed Pastor

The Reformed Pastor. By Richard Baxter. Carlisle: Banner of Truth. Reprint, 2005.

One of Puritanisms most remarkable pastors, Baxter left an invaluable treasure for other pastors through the ages with Reformed Pastor. By “Reformed” he does not mean the system of doctrine otherwise known as Calvinism, but he means reformed in its purest form, “changed.” Baxter is calling on pastors to reform, to change, to be the kind of pastors the Bible calls us to be. Baxter himself modeled the reform he called for, so much so that 82 years after his ministry the famous evangelist George Whitefield remarked that “good Mr. Baxter’s doctrine, works, and discipline remained to this day.”

Reformed Pastor is the result of a lecture Baxter was to deliver to a group of pastors. As it turn out, his health prevented him from attending, but he sent his manuscript to be read to the men. The biblical basis for his call of reform is Acts 20:28. “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.”

Baxter easily divides his work into two parts, taking heed to ourselves and taking heed of the flock. For pastors, Baxter first calls on us to make sure we have the faith that we preach to others! And that we live that faith. For the flock, Baxter calls for a return to biblical church discipline and the careful, personal instruction of people in their homes from the catechism. As stated earlier, Baxter modeled this pattern. He preached two one-hour sermons each week and spent two whole days each week going from home to home catechizing his members. He argues that it is in this personal, home teaching that one can really find out what his parishioners know, if they are truly in the faith, and instruct them more fully in the core doctrines of the faith.

Reformed Pastor is a giant of a book and every pastor SHOULD read it.

Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

1. Oh what aggravated misery is this, to perish in the midst of plenty! - to famish with the bread of life in our hands, while we offer it to others, and urge it on them!
2. To see and admire, to reverence and adore, to love and delight in God, as exhibited in his works - this is the true and only philosophy.
3. Take heed to yourselves, lest your example contradict your doctrine...lest you unsay with your lives, what you say with your tongues.
4. Take heed to yourselves, lest you be guilty of that which you daily condemn.
5. a holy calling will not save an unholy man
6. Take heed to all the flock implies that flocks be no greater than we are capable of overseeing
7. We are attracted to novelties rather than to great things (Seneca)
8. I hate that preaching which tends to make hearers laugh, or to move their minds with tickling levity, and affect them as stage-plays used to do, instead of affecting them with a holy reverence of the name of God.
9. For if the holy and unholy are all permitted to be sheep of the same fold, without any means being used to separate them, we defame the Redeemer, as if he were guilty of it, and as if this were the nature of his people.
10. Mere sloth will tie the hands of many

Kenya Church Update

Construction on the worship facility in Kenya is 99% complete. Team of 24 will visit in October to dedicate the building to the glory of God. Please pray for Search And See, Kenya!

Book Review: The Christian's Great Interest

The Christian’s Great Interest. By William Guthrie. Carlisle: Banner of Truth. Reprinted, 2002.

William Guthrie, student of the great Samuel Rutherford and minister from 1650-1664, was known in his day as the greatest practical preacher in Scotland. He inherited this title because during his ministry, he led many thousand people to saving faith in Christ. By “interest,” Guthrie means relationship with God through Christ. By “closing with Christ” he means receiving or embracing Christ as Savior and Lord.

It becomes readily apparent that Great Interest was written by a great evangelist because the book is essentially a plea for the Gospel. Guthrie opens his work by describing various hinderances to true faith such as slothfulness or dependence upon evidence. He then works through the ways men are drawn to Christ and the evidences that a sincere interest in Christ has taken place such as becoming a new creature. Guthrie also addresses the difference between a true believer and a hypocrite, why some believers doubt, what it means to “close” with Christ, objections and answers, and personal covenanting with God in Christ. As can be seen, Guthrie covers well the ground of evangelism.

One point of departure for me was Guthrie’s handling of the sin against the Holy Ghost. Guthrie understood Jesus’ condemnation of those who sin against the Holy Ghost to be the same offense as what is condemned in the warning passages of Hebrews. I see those as two separate violations. The sin against the Holy Ghost seems to be committed by someone who has no inclination for faith in Christ at all and attributes the saving work of the Spirit to Satan. Hebrews seems to be a warning against those who appear to have faith in Christ but actually do not.

Having said that though, as with other Puritan works, Great Interest is a great read. It will bring understanding to the believer and serve as a plea for the unbeliever to truly come to Christ. That was surely Guthrie’s intention, and he accomplishes his task.

Christmas Project a Success!!

Thanks to our supporters we met our goal of $1,000.00 for the orphan ministry of Global Ark, South India. The day was filled with gifts, a party, dinner, and a worship service.

We praise the Lord for the opportunity to care for orphans on this very special day halfway around the world!

The Holy Bible and a Happy New Year

For 22 years now, one Christian discipline has been part of my life, that is, the annual reading of the Word of God. It has proven to be one of my greatest joys! I wish I could say that I have been as successful in other areas of discipline, but I am thankful for the grace given me to maintain this one. I will be encouraging and challenging my church this coming Sunday to join me in reading through the Bible in the coming year. The following are some reasons why it is good to do so.

It is the Word that teaches us salvation (2 Tim 3:15). It is the Word that brings us to salvation (Rom 10:17). It is the Word that sanctifies us, that is, separates us from the world for service unto the Lord (John 17:17). It is the Word that perfectly, actively examines our hearts (Heb 4:12). It is the Word that strengthens us and equips us to carry out the will of God in our lives (2 Thess 2:13). It is the Word that is the perfect, true, trustworthy revelation of God to man (2 Tim 3:16, 2 Pet 1:19-21). It is the Word that is able to guide us in all matters and decisions of life (Psalm 119:105). It is the Word that emboldens us and strengthens us against sin (Psalm 119:11). It is the Word that becomes in our lives as a sword against the onslaught of the evil one (Eph 6:17). Simply put my dear fellow believer, the Word of God creates, sustains, nourishes, and carries the believer through this life to run this race well and enter into the glorious presence of our Lord!

There could be no greater pursuit or resolution for this coming year than to read the whole counsel of God, the complete, written revelation of God to man, God’s self-disclosure, the Bible.

In order to help and encourage such a massive task, I am going to present our fellowship with two tools. First, we have a reading plan. You can find the plan we are using at www.sermonaudio.com/searchandsee. Then click on “eDocs.” Many other plans are available as well. It is not so much which plan you choose as it is that you do have a plan to follow. A plan will keep you on track, focused, and working toward the goal.

Second, I am putting together a blog specifically for our church. It is called “Wonders in the Word,” and is based on Psalm 119:18. “Open my eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” The blog will keep up to date with daily reading assignments and provide a format for us to share questions, insights, and lessons with one another as we read through the Bible together. You can find it at www.wondersintheword.blogspot.com.

We will begin Sunday, January 3. Join us in this delightful journey of discovering the treasures God has for us in his perfect, written revelation! Feel free to join our discussions on the blog as well!

Read my friend. Read and be amazed!