The unborn child and obedience to God

From the preface of Love Your Unborn Neighbour, SPUC, London, 1994

Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering towards slaughter.
If you say, 'But 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?

Proverbs 24: 11-12

This is primarily a plea from evangelicals to evangelicals, although it will be of interest to many others. We would ask those who accept the authority of the Bible, who love God and long to obey God, to look at what is happening to unborn children in our country (and indeed around the world) in the light of scripture. What should the response of the Lord's own people be?

Faith

Justification by faith alone stands at the heart of evangelical doctrine yet, from end to end, the scripture assures us that faith is far more than mere mental assent or an orthodox creed. True and saving faith results in changed lives and obedience to God.

James, in his letter, calls the sort of faith that falls short of this 'dead' and reminds us that even the demons have that sort. He points out that Abraham's faith held nothing back in obedience to God. Rahab's meant coming to the aid of those in great danger. This is the faith that counts for righteousness.

The righteous will indeed live by faith, but John points out in his first letter that: "Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did" (1 John 2:6).

Paul, the great expositor of justification by faith, repeatedly concludes his teaching of doctrine with an ethical exhortation--for right faith must issue in right conduct.

Jesus himself said: "Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them" (John 13:17). In the simile of the sheep and the goats in his striking description of the final judgement he confirms that the righteous will certainly have given help to those in great need. The rest will have failed in this duty.

If we believe that we are justified by faith, it should cause us concern when an outward profession of faith is not accompanied by a life conformed to God's will. Not that we look for perfection, but for evidence that what is professed is genuine, saving faith. Failure in such basic things as respect for human life or protection of the innocent from violence is clear evidence to the contrary.

Hope

In the last quarter of the 20th century the pro-life movement made great advances, both in the United Kingdom and in other parts of the world

The educational work of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) and other organisations means that many more people now recognise and understand the humanity of the unborn child and have grasped the horror of what happens to unborn children through abortion and experimentation. The lives of many children have been saved by this educational work.

Of course, there are reverses as well as successes. In Britain, in spite of strong support from many MPs, front-bench hostility has thwarted attempts to improve the legal position. The British abortion legislation has also been used as a model in many other countries.

The struggle to gain protection for unborn children may sometimes appear to be a lost cause and this impression is certainly encouraged by the distorted and tendentious presentation of the subject in our mass media--the only source of information for many people.

Christians should not be perplexed by the apparent triumph of evil over good. Scripture makes clear that the forces of evil in this world are powerful and destructive. Our duty as servants of Christ is to stand boldly in the spiritual battle, equipped and protected by the full armour of God; for our struggle is not against flesh and blood (Ephesians 6:12-18).

We make this stand with confidence. Our hope is fixed not on the successes of the pro-life movement to date, nor on its gathering momentum among Christians. We put our hope in the living God. For God's word does not just proclaim the sanctity of every human life as the bedrock of society. It also assures us that the saviour whom we serve has triumphed over the forces of evil and that the final victory is already his.

Scripture tells of numerous people who, in this hope, opposed obediently and with vigour the evils of their own day. They did so even though their vision of final vindication was seen only dimly, "as through a dark glass". The same is true of many more recent figures in the evangelical heritage. William Wilberforce, for example, devoted his life to the suppression of slavery, one of "two great objects" which, he said, "God has set before me". In this costly battle, against entrenched opposition, Wilberforce was sustained by his daily communing with God, in whose will he sought to live. This work of half a century ended with the emancipation of slaves throughout the British Empire. Wilberforce heard the news of Parliament's decision on his deathbed.

We have a cloud of witnesses.

Love

Our whole duty towards others is summed up in the second great commandment: "Love your neighbour as yourself". We cannot evade the fact that this is what we are commanded to do. It is not optional.

Commitment to the pro-life cause is sometimes seen as a valid and laudable option for those with a particular concern for personal morality or an interest in ethical questions concerning human reproduction. This is an inadequate view. Defence of the unborn, victims of the greatest outrage in our society, is a requirement, not an option.

It is a requirement implicit in the commandment to love our neighbour. When Jesus was asked "And who is my neighbour?" he replied with a famous parable (Luke 10:30-37). The example of the good Samaritan in obeying this commandment shows us two things in particular about the meaning of love.

Love is not bound by contemporary ideas of who is (or is not) a neighbour. The Jews of Jesus' day despised Samaritans and would certainly not think of them as neighbours. They treated Samaritans atrociously (and similar treatment was returned), but they would not have thought of this as failing to love their neighbour. The parable shows that they were wrong. Our own society has taken a very similar attitude to unborn children, denying their dignity by the regular use of impersonal terms such as foetus and products of conception, and excluding them from the protection that the law gives to everyone else. Our obedience to God cannot be bound by this prejudicial attitude. We must love the neighbour whom society spurns.
Love meets the needs our neighbour presents to us. The shocking thing about the priest and the Levite in the parable was their disregard for the man whose plight was clear to them. They were in a position to help, but did not. In our society no group suffers a more terrible plight than unborn children. Their sufferings compare with the worst to be found around the world, both in degree (deliberate and brutal killing) and scale (at least one in five of all children conceived in the UK is aborted) and yet our society ignores them, passing by on the other side. If we are to obey the commandment, we must come to the aid of those in our midst whose need is so great and whom we have the power to help. Love is not a matter of mere words, it requires action (1 John 3:18). Jesus said "Go and do likewise".

The shame and tragedy of our recent history have been the failure of the church, by and large, to help the unborn. With uneasy conscience we have watched as the unthinkable and the unspeakable have unfolded before our eyes.

The injustices of British law were not challenged. Government was not reminded of its indispensable duty, ordained by God, to preserve justice in a fallen society. The medical community was not warned of its guilt in harbouring the takers of life. Church leaders who condoned and advocated the killing were not exposed. Mothers and their families were not cared for with compassion and truth.

Christians in this country are deeply implicated in the guilt of our society. Called by Christ to be his witnesses, we have been compromised in our preaching of the Gospel by our disobedience. Our message of reconciliation has been discredited because we have forgotten one of its basic premises--the value of human life in God's eyes.

We pray that the eyes of Christians will be opened to the truth, appalling as it is, and that the Church will repent of its disobedience. God's word lies open to us:

...if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

2 Chronicles 7:14

May God have mercy on us yet.