Kennystix's podcast
Jesus Christ and the Fight for Life
The following message is by Pastor John Piper. More information from Desiring God is available at www.desiringgod.org. We pray one more time, and ask the Lord's help. Father in Heaven, this is tremendously serious, what we're about here. And I pray that you would cause the ripple effect from this little assembly to be beyond all proportions. It is your way to take five loaves and two fish and feed 5,000. It's your way to take twelve apostles, imperfect, and turn the Roman Empire upside down in a few hundred years and bring 1.3 billion people under the sway of Christ's name. And it's your way, Lord, to take a Wilberforce and his perseverance and disestablish the African slave trade in Britain. And what would it be here, Lord? I pray that you would give vision to everyone in this room and everyone who hears my voice. But give us a vision for how we might be used of you to make abortion unthinkable in our land. So grant us the proper compassion and the proper intensity and the proper abhorrence so that we communicate the truth that light shines upon our land. Yes, this in Jesus' name, amen. The title is Jesus Christ and the Fight for Life. So I'm going to divide this into two parts, one on Jesus Christ and one on the Fight for Life and how they interweave. What's so clear is that Jesus Christ came into the world to be admired and marveled at and wondered and to be the Lord at the universe and to capture our hearts and our attention for himself. And where that doesn't happen, all manner of sin runs rampant, including abortion. And so it is absolutely imperative that we lift up Jesus Christ as King and as Lord. And as I was pondering, how do you do that? How do you help Christ shine in this little assembly and then rippling out from here? What I want to do is to talk about Christ in His works, how they relate to the pro-life efforts. We've got about eleven aspects of the work of Christ to walk through with you and then talk a little bit about the fight for life. Number one, His work of predestination and how it relates to the pro-life effort. Listen to these words, Ephesians, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. And as He, that's God the Father, chose us in Him in Christ before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him. He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will to the praise of the glory of His grace with which He has blessed us in the beloved. So through Jesus Christ, God has predestined us for Himself or not. The implication of that is that the Father and the Son are together in this pre-creation work of giving a destiny to us, which means that when you deal with a child in the womb, you're not dealing with a being who will get His destiny upon birth. This child has a destiny and when you tamper with him in the womb, you tamper with one who has a destiny appointed by God. There's a text that makes that really clear. Remember what Paul said about his own call to the ministry, Galatians 1.15, "God had set me apart before He was born, before I was born. God had set me apart before I was born and called me by His grace." Paul was keenly aware that before He was born, while He was still either non-existent or existent in His mother's womb, God's call landed on Him. We dare not think of beings getting a destiny from God at birth. That would be totally contrary to the Scriptures, though God is only dealing with us after birth, only dealing with us when we're outside our mother's womb. That's one implication of predestination. Another implication is that our own sense of being known and loved and chosen in God, by God, in Christ before the foundation of the world brings a rock solid firmness to our own position in Him and our own destiny with Him and our being loved by Him so that the rough and tumble of life and warfare doesn't knock you over so easy. To be rooted in eternity, not just in some decision that you made, but rooted in God's mind for you from all eternity is a powerful, staying force. Number two, Christ's work of creation, John 1 in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him was not anything made that was made. I am made, you are made by Jesus Christ, therefore we relate to every made human as a fellow image-bearer of Jesus Christ. Jesus makes us, we are His creation. When you put that together with Psalm 139 for you, He formed in the inward parts, He knitted you together in His mother's womb, in your mother's womb, I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. So Jesus Christ is at work in the womb knitting. Remember one of the four life sermons I preached from that text, I drew the picture of why would He choose knitting? Why would He choose the imagery of knitting? I watched my wife knit once or twice in 38 years. I've knitted more in my life than my wife has because my mother taught me how to knit when I was a boy. I knitted a placemap and a rug for the bathroom. And I know the finger work that's involved, you know, you knit. And so to choose that, it's not saying be, embryo, it's rather He's down there, knitting. This is an intimate image that He wants us to see. So Jesus Christ is the creator of these little ones. He's doing it in the womb with His own knitting fingers woe to us if we butt in. Do not trespass written over the knitting work of Jesus. Third, His work of providence, Colossians 1, 16 and 17. By Him, by Jesus, all things were created in heaven and on earth and visible and invisible. Whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through Him, for Him. He is before all things and in Him, all things hold together. It's that last one I'm focusing on. All things hold together in Him. All matter, molecules, atomic subparticles, flesh, bones, hold together in Christ. Just made it for Himself, Christ holds it together. All the processes of the world are Christ's. Everything relates to Him. There is no part that is the part from Him and nothing we do with any matter can be done without reference to Him, including what we do with the baby in the womb. Both His work of incarnation, Luke 1.35, the angel answered, "Mary, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you and therefore the child to be born will be called Holy the Son of God." Mary had asked, "How can this be?" I don't know a man, I've never had sex with anybody. How can I become pregnant and the answer was, "The Holy Spirit will do this, the Holy Spirit will make you pregnant with the Son of God." Therefore, Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, was a zygote, he was an embryo. There's not a word in the New Testament about Him becoming Son of God at birth. Rather, everything points to the fact that the angel arrives and says, "The reason he's going to be called Holy the Son of God is because the Holy Spirit's going to come upon you and cause you to become pregnant with the Son of God." Blow to us if we play fast and loose with this reality in the womb, which was once the very reality that carried the person of the Son of God. Fifth, His work of identification, identification with sinners, Luke 15.1. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to Him, and the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, "This man receives sinners and eats with them." Luke 734, "The Son of Man has come eating and drinking," and you say, "Look at him, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners." In other words, Jesus came and He got down dirty with those who were pushed away. Being involved in the pro-life movement, redemptively, not just accusingly, will mean this, that it will mean talking with, hanging out with, having lunch with, going to the houses of people whose behavior we abhor. In doing it in such a way that a person might say, "This person is a friend of abortionists or abortion providers," had lunch one time with a fellow named Bill, right down here he was doing abortions on the ninth floor of the MMC medical building, and through for life action ministries, I was able to get a connection with him, and wanted a face-to-face with an abortionist to talk to him, and I wonder, you know, what that would have looked like if anybody known. Here's John Piper, seeing across the table from a guy who three days a week is killing babies on the ninth floor up there. I'm going to come back to that and tell you about that conversation later. Just a word about identification, sixth, his work of sacrificial service, Jesus' work of sacrificial service, Mark 1045, "For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." Now, the two relevances to that statement for the cause here, one is he did it for us and had he not done it for us, had he not become a ransom for us, there's no way we could do what we're doing, and I'll come back to that and say why in a few minutes. The other one is simply pattern, go serve. The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. Now, I remember standing here in this room, this building came into being in the middle of the rescue movement. There were rescues in which we rallied in the old sanctuary that's been torn down now and there were rescues in which we rallied in this room. And I was a part of those for about three years, late 80s, early 90s, and this building went up in '91, I believe. There was one last rescue rally here and one of the burdens that I had, one of the reasons the rescue movement did not go where we wanted it to go is cause I failed, we failed in this, I think and across the country there was failure in this. I planned with 100, 200 people that were getting on buses to go out to sit down somewhere. I plead with them, I said, you know, the only thing that will compel the heart of America is our suffering, not our feistiness. Not that we have a clever radio talk show host get the last word attitude. That will never work. It will always increase the alienation. But if we lay our lives down, if there are tears on our face, if it really looks like we care about woman and child, if it costs us something and we don't return evil for evil, they might, they just might soften, that did not happen for many people. There are always weirdos in every group who just can't keep their mouth shut, who get feisty with a judge or feisty with a lawyer or feisty with somebody across the street and a lot of feistiness happened and we are in the grip of feistiness in America today. White-wing people are basically feisty people today and it isn't going to work. And so I just hope that there will be tears in the movement. Jesus came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. That's the only way you make headway in missions, in evangelism, in pro-life is to be willing to lay our lives down the way Jesus laid his life down. It's hard not to get angry and anger is not wrong in the face of this. But if anger dominates your demeanor in the cause, you will go nowhere. Number seven, Christ's work of propitiation. This is very precious to me, I think this is the heart of the gospel. I know that's a very unusual word, it's not a common word. It means that Christ did something in his death that took away the wrath of God against sinners. Here are the key verses for removal of wrath, 1st Thessalonians 5'9. For God has not destined us for wrath but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us. So there you see the connection. No wrath is coming to you because Christ died for you, Galatians 3.13. Christ redeemed us from the curse, the curse of the law, by becoming a curse for us as it is written, cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. So there you have the death of Christ on the tree absorbing the curse in 3 Romans 8.3. For God has done with the law weakened by the flesh, could not do by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, God condemned sin in the flesh, your sin in Christ's flesh. So those three verses at least, Thessalonians 5'9, Galatians 3.13, Romans 8.3 make plain that we were under the wrath of God because of our sin. All of us, pro-life people, pro-choice people, under the wrath of God. Jesus Christ and the Father, conspiring in love, for sinners, insert the Son between us and the wrath of God and the Father ordains that His Son receive His wrath and we don't if we'll receive Him. If we're in Him, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus and you become in Christ Jesus by receiving Christ Jesus if He's in you, you're in Him. Now why is that relevant? It means first that God has freed you from the worst fear in the universe. God's no longer against you. And if you live day by day, hour by hour, knowing God is for me and not against me, you got a backbone in the cause of righteousness like you can't believe. But if you think God's going to zap me at any point where I make a mistake in the pro-life cause, you won't get anywhere. It's the liberty and the strength that comes from knowing I'm loved. I'm accepted. There's no wrath. There's only mercy flowing my way. Second implication for that is that God showed us how great the dead is that He paid so that we could hope for it, for the abortionists, for the fathers, for the women, for the boyfriends, for all the liberal people who use language amiss to justify death. There's hope because God paid such a price to remove His wrath from all who would receive His Son. Third reason that's important, as a model, He did not take innocent human life to enhance His joy, but He gave His innocent human life to enhance His joy for the joy that was set before Him. He endured the cross. The two ways to seek joy, if you're a woman who doesn't want to be pregnant or a boyfriend who doesn't want to be a father, get rid of the baby or sacrifice for the baby. And God did the latter, and we should too. You people are the people that know that best because you're helping that happen. You're making it possible for it to happen. You're coming alongside the women and saying it can happen, can happen, believe another way. Fourth implication, when this really grips you, you become a very, very durable person. First, the wrath of God has been propitiated by the work of Jesus Christ in dying on the cross and rising again. The only thing that flows from God to you is mercy, never wrath, only mercy, which means every moment of every day without exception, the redeemed are receiving mercy from God. That is an amazingly endurance producing faith. I hope you have it. Number eight, Christ's work of expiation. Now that's almost the same as propitiation, but not quite. Propitiation focuses on the removal of God's wrath. Ephesians one, seven, in him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace. The weight of guilt is removed, it's removed from us so that we have the strength to press on in the cause and it can be removed from those who've had abortion so that they don't do it again, multiple or repeated abortions are the major source of abortions. Why? Because forgiveness feels so impossible. So what difference is it? My student, John Enzer, I'm going to close the bill of reference to John a little bit. He was a student of Bethel when I taught at Bethel and he went to be a pastor in Boston and then he resigned his pastor about 12 years ago, I'm not sure, and he founded a woman's concern in Boston, another five pregnancy centers, Christ's pregnancy centers in Boston called a women's concern and he's come to speak here a couple of times and he told me over the years, he said, "John, I used to so long to be effective in evangelism in my pastorate," and I was modestly successful. But since I got involved in these five centers that we planted, I see people come into Christ all the time because they can hardly believe the message I offer them are forgiveness at a moment when they so desperately need it because they know in the depths of their being what they have done is horrendous and it will destroy their lives if they let themselves think it without Jesus. He is so precious at that moment for all of us. Number nine, Christ's work of domination, oversight and death, Colossians 2, 13, and you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of death that stood against us with His legal demands, this He set aside, nailing it to the cross, He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to an open shame by triumphing over them in Him. When Christ died and our, the record of the deaths of our sins were nailed to the cross. At that moment, Satan's worst weapon was stripped from his hand. He can no longer condemn us by accusing us of sins for which we are not forgiven. And if Satan cannot accuse us of sins for which we are not forgiven, he cannot damn us. And if he can't damn us, all he can do is gum us. There's no teeth, the fangs are removed, and he's got some heavy duty gums, causes bruises, but he's not going to kill us with his gums. Now, here's the reason that's so important to realize. This industry is satanic to the core. Satan was, is a murderer and a liar. Those are his two names, liar, accuser, murderer and the deception that reigns in the abortion industry and the killing that reigns must make Satan's mouth drip. Therefore, when you engage, you're coming up against supernatural power and don't take it lightly. Satan will not sit by idly if you try to get near one of those abortion places. If you try to get between anybody moving there, the kind of eyes that you can see, the kind of voices that you can hear, you say, "Where is that coming from?" And you know where it's coming from? It's coming from hell. Satan hates God and he hates every being created in the image of God, which is every human being. And he would destroy God if he could, if he can't, he will destroy what's in the image of God and therefore to hear these glorious words that when he nailed our sin to the cross, he disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to an open shame. Know your enemy and know your victory. Number 10, his work, Christ's work of mediation or intercession today on the basis of his past work, mediation or intercession, Romans 8.33, "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies, who is to condemn, it is Christ Jesus who died more than that who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who is now interceding for us." You have an advocate to apply the atonement, to sympathize with you as a high priest, to pray for you when you don't know how to pray in the perplexity of this cause. And there are many perplexities. He's praying for you, interceding for you. Number 11, two more of these. His work of navigation. I was trying to think of words that rhyme all the way through, that's stretching it. Navigation or lordship, Colossians 2, 3, "In whom in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." What I'm saying is when Christ is raised, He's at the right hand, His Holy Spirit is sent into our life, we desperately need navigation through the perplexities of this battle. There are many situations, many questions in which we just don't know the best ideal strategy or what to say next or what to do next in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Go to Him and you will find a great helper in lordship or navigating the waters of the pro-life effort. And finally, on this point, number 12, His work of preservation, John 16, 7. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away for if I do not go away, the helper, the helper will not come to you, but if I go, I will send him to you. And if he comes, he is Jesus in the Spirit, Matthew 28, 20, I will never leave you. I will always be with you to the end of the age. So when we're weak, he's strong. My wife and I were away on our anniversary a few weeks ago and like we always do, we read through passage of Scripture for Corinthians 13 and we focused on verses 4 to 7, which is the definition or the description of what love does there. And we noticed amazing things as we meditated on it in relation to our lives. There are two amazing emphases, not just two, but two strong ones. One is that love is the opposite of pride and the other is that love is the opposite of quitting, giving up. Let me read you the key verses. Love is patient. Remember the old King James word for that? Anybody remember it? Love is long, suffers long. Love suffers long and is kind. Love suffers long, suffers long, long, not short, suffers long in the cause of love. Love suffers long in his kind, love does not envy or boast, it's not arrogant or rude, does not insist on its own way, is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth and then comes a whole battery of endurance words. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. God has been good to give me a life like that and has been good to work in me, some of that. 38 years and I think we're going to finish. It would take a cataclysmic alteration of our faith for us not to finish together, endures all things, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things. Love never ends, love suffers long. It would be realistic, there's marriage and there's pro-life cause and the issue is we last. Or will you just have a little adrenaline spurt, a couple of years in the rescue movement or something and then I'm not going to read those books anymore, I'm not going to look at those websites anymore, I'm not going to send them more emails, I'm not going to be involved in MCCL efforts, I'm not going to be involved in anybody's life, I'm just going to see no evil, hear no evil, or you're going to last. Some of you are my heroes, I look at some of those out there and I know you've been at it for a long time, I admire you so much, I want to be like that. Those are my 12 ways of admiring Jesus by looking at the kind of work that he does in order to summon us into a greater admiration of and worship to and allegiance to Jesus in the cause of pro-life. So I draw a big therefore, therefore Jesus is for us, he provides everything we need in this cause, he's relevant at every turn and we should love him, trust him, treasure him and now I turn towards the fight for the next few minutes. What's needed, what's needed in this fight, it's so obvious that knowledge is needed but let me give you a little story that encourages you that if you know anything, you're needed. If you know anything, you need to open your mouth because there's an apprentice in this church, Joey Rigny, who sent me an email a few days ago and said he was talking to a junior hire, junior hire, junior, this junior hire had never heard of abortion. Not alone whether it was right or wrong, he did not know what it was in America. I mean, I'm really naive, I am so naive, I can't believe that. And that is true, I was telling somebody that today and they said, I suppose, and then they referred to a 9 and 11 year old, I don't think, they know the word, and I suppose it's possible to grow up in homes where parents should not want to talk about it with kids, absolutely not because issues rise that they don't have any answers for, and then if they go to the right school and just navigate their way through, I suppose it's possible. The point is, it would help if America knew what it was and therefore open your mouth, which I had a million pastors to talk to because I know that they're churches that never say a word about this, they are so cowardly. You're not, I'm preaching to the choir here because you're here because you agree with me. So just know that if you've got people around you who think they have nothing to offer, if they just know what it is, they've got something to offer. So knowledge matters, somebody, I'm going to walk through a few things we know, and all of these are arguments and reasons for why we should be so involved and so energized. Number one, I'll just tick them off real quick. We know that in Minnesota there's a fetal homicide law that makes a person guilty of manslaughter or worse if he kills a baby in a mother's womb unless the mama wants the baby dead, that is unless it's an abortion. The implications of that are horrific because they mean they imply that might makes right. The difference between whether it is homicide when a baby dies in the womb or legal when a baby dies in the womb is one thing, will the will of the strong? I want it dead or I don't want it dead. If I want it dead, it's legal. If I don't want it dead, it's illegal. That's horrific. That's anarchy to the core. If that is not seen, if that kind of logic is embraced by a culture, it will come down. Number two, we know that there's an inconsistency between doing fetal surgery on a baby to save the baby's life at a similar stage when down the hall the baby is being aborted, maybe even a cousin, maybe even a twin. Steve Calvin is one of the most articulate pro-life spokesmen and an expert in neonatology and involved at the university and down at Abbott pointed that out a few years ago in one of his regular articles to this Tribune that babies are being saved with surgery here and being aborted over regions at the same stage. Third, we know a baby can live on its own somewhere around 24 weeks, it's getting younger. It's very difficult, it's very expensive and yet pro-choice people say it can be killed even at the end and beyond this stage if the mother is distressed by its live birth more than by its abortion. What morally significant factor makes that difference? We know fourth that a baby living with or without an umbilical cord is not a morally significant criterion of human personhood and the reason we know that is because we live in various kinds of dependencies like that after we're born, it might be a respirator or it might be a dialysis machine, your personhood does not rise and fall with whether you're getting your nutrition independence on other people. Number five, we know that the size of the human being is irrelevant to personhood because outside the womb we don't accord a six-year-old anymore dignity than a two-year-old or a right to life. Number six, we know that developing reasoning powers is not the difference. I won't belabor these because I think Hale is going to mention them in his sled acronym. So a little baby and an older human is not less deserving of care. Number seven, scientifically human beings are genetically human from perception. All the genetic make-up is there, utterly different from monkeys, rats, elephants, left to themselves, they just grow up, that's all they just grow up. Number eight, we know that at eight weeks all the organs are present, brain functioning, heart pumping, liver making blood cells, kidney cleaning the fluids, fingerprints formed and yet almost all abortions are done after eight weeks. There was a booklet handed out in high schools here some years ago called NEON, yes, NEON, yes, in which in the section on abortion it discouraged high school girls from getting abortions before the seventh week because it doesn't work as easy. It's just easier, it's more effective if you can do it just at the optimal time. So little babies like that are almost all of them. Number nine, we know that ultrasound is giving a stunning window on the womb that shows the unborn at eight weeks sucking his thumb, recalling from pricking, responding to sound, amazing pictures, pictures are so helpful, the good ones and the horrible ones are both have their place, I think you just need wisdom to know when and how to use them but not to use pictures. Remember, the starch of human is a very liberal paper and a very pro-choice and I remember when the anti-capital punishment effort was strong a few years ago, they said in their lead editorial, one videotaped execution in the electric chair of a man being burned with skin coming off of these parts on his skin and jolting would end capital punishment like that. I wrote them a letter, you know what I'm going to say because they're the ones who mock the use of videoed abortions, like this is not a spectator sport or the women have rights or blah, blah, blah and they know, they know in their hearts that if you go tonight, let's tell you where you can watch one, if you want to be sick when you go to bed, just go to abortionno.org, be ready, there's no warning. It comes up live and moving and abortion in process, hands and arms and legs being taken out piece by piece. You can watch it online tonight, abortionno.org, don't go there unless you have a very strong stomach, it's taken me a long time to get able to just eat. Number 10, there is a principle of justice, we know this, that when two legitimate rights conflict like the right of a woman not to be pregnant and the right of a baby not to be killed, when two legitimate rights conflict, the right that is least costly to human life is the one that governs and so yes it would be nice if men and women were responsible enough and nobody had to be pregnant when they didn't want to be pregnant. But once one is pregnant then there are two conflicting rights, not just one and the taking of life and the being pregnant are not commensurate moral realities, we know this, 11. We know that the Word of God says they shall not kill, now let's go back to my lunch. I went to the lunch with Bill, the abortionist, with a piece of paper with 10 reasons why you shouldn't kill babies, and I pulled it out and I said look I just want to understand you and if you let me try to help you understand me, I've got 10 reasons here why I think you should stop doing abortions and I said these are all reasons, some from reasons, some from experience, some from the Bible, that you shouldn't kill, you should know you're killing babies and shouldn't do it and he just put his hand up and said you don't need to read those because I know I'm killing babies, he just pulled the rug out from under me just like that, I was floored, I did not expect him to say that, so I just said why do you do it then, you know what he said, my wife pressures me to do it, that's what he said, I said why? And he said because for her, and I'm going to support her in this, it is the most important justice issue for women in America, explain, look he said, when two people have sex and a baby happens, the guy walks away and the woman can't walk away, that's not fair, that's unjust, therefore to make equality happen you give her the right to be in the same condition he's in, that was the issue, it's a justice issue for women, now behind the justice talk is also liberty to have sex any time you want and be able to walk away from it without consequences, but that was very, very illuminating for me, the Bible says you shall not kill, not even to preserve your reproductive freedom and twelfth and finally almost done, we know that James 4-2 says you desire and do not have so you murder, you covet and cannot obtain, you fight and quarrel. The deepest reason why there is abortion is because the deep longings of the soul are not satisfied by Jesus Christ. Christ came into the world to be our King, our Lord, our Savior, our friend, our treasure. Where he is rejected, the human soul grasps for sex, for food, for power, for fame, for all kinds of things, idols, the true God that satisfies is spurned and abortion becomes an essential peace in the idolatry that replaces Christ. So we must be about the exposure of this and here I'm just going to close by referring to where I'm going on Sunday because I've spent a lot of time on the message for Sunday which is the peace I have left out here and that's why the sermon on Sunday is entitled "The Evil I Left Out" in 1992 because some of these pieces are just taken from a 1992 sermon and the evil I left out was abortion and race and it's going to be a very risky sermon. It's going to get me in trouble. It's going to be all kinds of people who will call it racist, the way I talk and others will see what I'm trying to do and be more sympathetic so you can pray about that. The text for Sunday is this. Let know what is Ephesians 5, 6 following. Let no one deceive you with empty words for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience therefore do not become partners with them for at one time you were darkness but now you are light in the Lord. Walk His children of the light for the fruit of light is found in all good, all that's good and right and true and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in unfruitful works of darkness but instead expose them. Now what that means I think for the pro-life movement is that every angle at which you can see evil in this you should put light on it. There are so many evils in abortion, so many. Grandmama evil and mama evil and boyfriend evil and husband evil and social evil and baby effecting evil and God word evil and Christ word evil and Holy Spirit word evil and racial evil and on and on and on the ripple effects of this evil in our culture is so great we should be shining light on all of them. So I'm not going to talk about that here. I'm going to close with a word of hope. In the last 35 years, 34, 2,300 crisis pregnancy centers have arisen to care for women, most of them by Christians. I remember the days standing over during rescues and after that at Fort Parkway at the Planned Parenthood Center I remember the kinds of taunting that would be given about you don't care this, you don't care this, you don't care this, you know I don't hear much of that anymore. Maybe I'm naive and maybe I'm not on the streets as much as I used to but as I'm listening in the media and beyond the pro-choice people have had their mouths shut when it comes to Christians don't care about women. They just care about babies and they only care about them before they're born not after they're born that is old talk that doesn't hold it anymore not with 2,300 centers ready to stand with you before during after for years give you everything you need find a home for your baby help you make a home for your baby there are so many now that that is so easy to gain say I don't hear it so much anymore and we should praise God for that. Let us out care Planned Parenthood does not care about the poor does very little to help the poor with their babies. John Inzer who I referred to I close with John has seen something that I'll try to make plain in my message on Sunday namely that today abortion happens the bulk of it in four states New York Florida California Nevada and in those states and the others it mainly happens in cities in the cities in the urban centers for example in Florida 40% of the abortions happen in Miami in Miami there are 40 abortion clinics and one ultrasound equipped crisis pregnancy center. John has spotted this so has focused on the family so has care net they've they've seen this is an urban issue this is an urban phenomenon 94% abortions happen in urban centers which is what gives the racial flavor to it most crisis pregnancy centers are not there so John and the others are teaming up John's vision is called heartbeat of Miami and he moved there a month ago with his wife from Boston to begin to plant pro-life pregnancy centers in Miami and the idea is canvas the nation and go face to face at the heart of the beast in the city here's his closing word the abolition of abortion is in sight the word abolition is used not by happenstance the abolition of abortion is in sight and will be looked back on by future generations the way we currently look back on slavery when the pregnancy center movement is established in our cities and led by the black Latino white Christian community I think we should focus a lot of prayer there I know that I'll be mainly talking to white people on Sunday just like I am right now but I hope somehow God will grant the message to be heard in the Latino and the African American community join us join us in this why would you be content with 13 million black babies destroyed one third of your population like a size cutting through the community why would you be content with that in order to stay politically where you are so I would just plead Lord would you come now and grant us to be ready to trust Christ work in the name of Christ draw on the strength of Christ lift up the honor of Christ and keep our hands on the plow in this cause and would you grant that the whole African American church and the whole Hispanic church rally so that the movement gains traction right across the racial spectrum and it becomes as unthinkable to be publicly pro-choice as it is to be publicly racist I ask this in Jesus name thank you for listening to this message by John Piper pastor for preaching at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis Minnesota feel free to make copies of this message to give to others but please do not charge for those copies or alter the content in any way without permission we invite you to visit desiring God online at www dot desiring God dot org there you'll find hundreds of sermons articles radio broadcasts and much more all available to you at no charge our online store carries all of Pastor John's books audio and video resources you can also stay up to date on what's new at desiring God again our website is www dot desiring God dot org or call us toll free at one eight eight eight three four six forty seven hundred our mailing address is desiring God twenty six oh one east Franklin Avenue Minneapolis Minnesota five five four zero six desiring God exists to help you make God your treasure because God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. 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There are several reasons why we must be engaged in the fight for life, and the various aspects of Christ’s work in redemption directly relate to the efforts of the pro-life cause.