 Good morning, how are you guys? You sound a little more awake than first-service, but that's how it always is right you're all in here first-service like where's my latte Well, it's really awesome to be here with you guys I have a special place in my heart for Calvary chapels while I've never been actually a member of a Calvary chapel I did grow up in the church and Calvary Chapel leadership and pastors from various churches around Orange County in Southern, California Have poured into me in significant ways through my walk with the Lord over the last decade or so And so Calvary Chapel has a close place in my heart and I have such respect for your Leadership here in your pastors who don't shy away from preaching the full counsel of God even when it may be Inconvenient for their reputation. So why don't you go ahead and give your yeah a round of applause? By the way, your pastors asked me to say that I'm just kidding they didn't but I would have if they had because I believe in it And it's a real pleasure and honor to be here with you. I want to start with just a couple opening comments I'm not going to assume that every single person here this morning identifies as pro-life Think it's safe to say most of you are But I'm not going to assume everyone is and so if you identify as pro-choice Meaning you believe a woman should have the legal right to have an abortion or if you identify as Personally pro-life the idea that you wouldn't get an abortion and you kind of think it's bad But you think it should remain legally protected Then I would invite you to engage with me with an open mind I'm not here to demonize anyone that believes differently than me And because I believe in the intrinsic dignity and value of all human beings I believe that those who disagree with me have that same value So if you do not hold what would be described as the pro-life position, but you are a follower of Jesus I would ask you to pray right now to the Lord and ask if there's anything Specifically that the Holy Spirit would want to teach you And put that prayer before the Lord and see if I'll answer it not because I have anything phenomenal to tell you But asking the Holy Spirit if there's something he wants to teach you a Friend of mine Dr. Mike Adams a professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington a Christian and an outspoken pro-life advocate Earlier this year debated an abortionist in a public forum on the moral question of abortion is abortion a moral right or a moral wrong and The name of this abortionist is dr. Willie Parker Dr. Willie Parker is an interesting man to put it lightly You see dr. Willie Parker describes himself as a Christian abortionist and He wrote a 2015 New York Times opinion editorial called why I provide abortions Here's a segment of what he said The good Samaritan in the parable Reversed the question of concern to care more about the well-being of the person needing help Then about what might happen to him for stopping to give help. I Realized that if I were to show compassion I would have to act on behalf of those women my concern about women who lacked access to abortion Became more important to me than worrying about what might happen to me for providing those services So according to dr. Willie Parker the Christian abortionist Abortionists are just like the good Samaritan because they show compassion and love to people needing help of course except the unborn children Who they slowly dismember? But otherwise they show compassion and care to people who need help This is some deep spiritual confusion and My friends this confusion has seeped into the church Not necessarily this church, this is a very pro-life church, but in the capital C church this confusion is in the church There is a growing number of people who identify as Christian and pro-choice She's like saying you're a Christian, but you support the legality of slavery in In response to this type of spiritual confusion friends we as Christians need grace and truth and Love and light and we need the real Jesus to show us how to engage on this issue By being a voice for the unborn and by bringing grace and truth We cannot sacrifice truth on the altar of grace or grace on the altar of truth We need both So I'm actually gonna start this talk in our conversation together with the parable of the good Samaritan and Rather than finding some strange Spiritual justification to pursue a career as an abortionist. I think we're gonna find a very different message From the creator of the universe who came down in bodily form as Jesus Christ and The parable of the good Samaritan is very important for our conversation this morning on abortion Because the parable of the good Samaritan reminds us of God's most important Commandments, but also our utter failure to obey those commandments And you know this parable, right? So a lawyer stands up and he puts Jesus to the test and he firstly says Jesus. What must I do to inherit eternal life? That's an important question How do I get to heaven? How do I get eternal life and Jesus says what is written in the law? How do you read it? He said you should love the Lord your God with all your heart all your soul all your mind and all your strength and love your neighbor as yourself nailed it Jesus said you have answered correctly do this and you will live But he desiring to justify himself Asked Jesus and who is my neighbor? And who is my neighbor in response to the question? How do I get to heaven and who is my neighbor? Jesus chooses to tell the parable of the good Samaritan Those are two very big questions and those are questions that we need to answer together So he tells his parable, you know, I had a man's traveling on the road. He's beaten. He's mugged. He's robbed He's left for dead as he's sitting on the side of the road bleeding out Two different religious men walk by don't they Levite and a priest Men who like the lawyer would have answered correctly by saying I know the law of God I'm a religious leader. I know the law of God. Love the Lord your God. Love your neighbors yourself And when they had the opportunity to love a neighbor who was bleeding They walked by on the other side of the road. I see you, but I don't see you I don't want to love you you're inconvenient to love It was the good Samaritan The bleeding victims natural enemy because remember Jews and Samaritans hated one another Who loose gospel says when he saw the man he? Had compassion He showed compassion to me his faith evidenced itself in works He went and he bandaged the man's wounds. He poured on oil and wine. He put the man on his own donkey So he had to walk he took him to the nearest in he cared for him more then he told the innkeeper I got to go but when I come back, I'm gonna pay you For any other costs that accumulated and caring for this man while I was gone Radical sacrifices friends of his time his energy and his money to love his neighbor a bleeding neighbor a bleeding victim culturally defined as His enemy so this is the parable the good Samaritan This is a story Jesus Jesus to tell in response to the question What must I do to get eternal life and who is my neighbor? So does this lawyer ask who is my neighbor because he just really wants to make sure he doesn't leave anyone out of the definition a neighbor Right, that's why right. He's just he's just such a self-righteous loving dude. He said Jesus I just want to love people really good. Can you tell me who my neighbor is so I so I don't leave anyone out of the definition a neighbor no He wants to figure out who he can still hate and get into heaven He only asked Jesus and who is my neighbor in order to figure out who isn't his The lawyer wanted to define some people as neighbors and some people as non neighbors So he could shirk himself of the responsibility of loving those that were inconvenient to love and those that he didn't want to love and Jesus and his brilliance friends Switches the question from who is my neighbor to are you a good neighbor? Am I a good neighbor friends the answer to that question should humble all of us Because the standard of love that Jesus lays out in the good Samaritan in fact in scripture is A standard that is indeed impossible to achieve Perfect love for an enemy and you know the standard of love that Jesus requires don't you? You know what is expected and demanded of us as Christians Jesus says in Matthew 543 you have heard that it was said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy But I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you Not easy Jesus raises the bar again and John 1334 and says a new commandment I give to you that you love one another that are easy to love No, just as I have loved you you also are to love one another. Oh, man Lord Because if you ask yourself the question, how did Jesus love us? That answer is to the grave to the cross To the wrath of God and then he says as I have loved you You also are to love one another Who loves like that all the time? Do we even love our families like that all the time? Any wives want to vouch for their perfectly loving consistent husbands or vice versa? Yeah, I didn't think so No one's married to Jesus, right? Much less our enemies Much less those that persecute us much less those that we Feel like we want to hate and that are inconvenient to love Remember Jews and Samaritans hated one another So this is an example of someone loving an enemy That would have been easy for him to be happy to see him bleeding out. Yes, that's my enemy Finally justice and he loves him with his time energy and money Friends we have all been like the Levite and the priest Too often we've walked by neighbors who needed our help and done nothing about it On the issue of abortion. We've all been like the Levite and the priest We've known that there were bleeding victims and we've done this We knew they were being killed, but we pretended like we didn't see them so friends Applied to the topic of abortion this morning the parable of the Good Samaritan is bad news for everyone For all of us Because whether you've had an abortion or not no one in this church indeed no one anywhere on the planet Loves their neighbor the way that the law of God commands None of us can meet that standard of holiness Mother Teresa fails that test The best pro-life advocate you know fails that test the local pregnancy resource center director fails that test I Fail that test and you fail that test in short we are not righteous and we need an alien righteousness That Jesus freely provides to his people So this is important friends because I'm not here to pass blame on you this morning I'm not here to blame abortion on the church and tell you that you've failed and you're not doing enough I'm here as someone who has also regularly failed to love my neighbor Regularly failed to love my unborn neighbor the playing field is level before the cross We have all failed to love the way that Jesus requires. So what's the good news? This is bad news, right? What the heck do we do? Jesus is the greater Good Samaritan We are either the Levite and the priest avoiding bleeding victims or were the lawyer trying to create definitions of neighbor and Definitions a non-neighbor so we can conveniently apply the definition of non-neighbor to people. We don't like We're not the Good Samaritan Jesus is the greater Good Samaritan He's the one that comes to us while we're bleeding out on the side of the road in our own sin and muck and loves us to the uttermost If we just repent and accept his freely given grace First John 410 and this is love not that we have loved God But that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins to give us an alien righteousness To fulfill the standard of perfect love that we couldn't and then apply that to us This is the good news So we respond to this by loving others first John 419 says we love because he first loved us Whoever loves God must also love his brother. So I want you to hear my heart. Don't get me wrong I'm not telling you to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps and just will yourself to have a more perfect love Come on. Just love people better Get the gospel get it in your head and love people better. It's not what I'm saying I'm saying that our response to the gospel and what Jesus has done for us ought to Naturally manifest itself by seeking to love our unborn neighbors and their mothers and fathers and Seeking to save them from death as those who have been saved from eternal death That's what I'm saying Our motivation to love our unborn neighbor is not to earn God's love We do it because we already have it. So what does this mean for us on the issue of abortion the playing fields level? We've all failed to love our unborn neighbors appropriately How do we bring love and truth and grace and light to the issue of abortion as image bearers of God who are told to Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. Well, I think the answer is simple I think the answer is we need to love our unborn neighbors Love your neighbors yourself the second greatest commandment is the unborn our neighbor This is very important because just like the lawyer in the parable of the Good Samaritan wanted to define some people as non neighbors and some people as neighbors friends the unborn children in our midst are Regularly defined by the culture as non neighbors Non-persons non-humans clumps of insensate tissue for which abortion gently suction out the contents of the womb They're defined as non neighbors because if you can Create a class of human beings and deny them personhood Deny them humanity. It becomes easier to justify their extermination So we call abortion reproductive health care feminism and women's rights Because we do not see them and treat them as neighbors and friends society has such a bloody history of Defining people out of existence in order to justify their mass extermination This is not new I'm thinking the Holocaust and slavery Nazis and racists who said that those Jews and those blacks are okay They're human beings, but they're not persons and because they're not persons We can treat them however we want This is a very dangerous ideology and Now it's being applied to unborn children friends for 47 years of legalized killing the United States of America So maybe you don't think that the title neighbor Appropriately applies to the unborn. Maybe you hold a different position Maybe when you hear the verse love your neighbor as yourself You don't think that applies to the unborn or maybe you think it does But you've never known how to defend that in the secular culture to your pro-choice friends family members and co-workers Who don't share your Christian worldview? So together let's examine who the unborn is. Let's you let's see who they are Let's see if there are neighbors and our persons or not And if they are how we can defend that position with grace and truth in the spirit of Jesus Christ Well friends, there's only one question We have to answer to determine if the unborn is our neighbor if they're a person Or if they're just a blob of tissue that you can suction out of the uterus only one question We have to answer You've been told that the abortion issue is what deeply complex right deeply complex. It's very simple And there's only one question we have to answer to bring simplicity and clarity to the issue of abortion This will equip you to defend life so to tell you what that one question is I want you to imagine for a second that you're standing at your kitchen sink cleaning dishes one evening, okay? By hand unfortunately because God hasn't blessed you with a dishwasher So as you're standing there cleaning your dishes God forbid your three-year-old toddler walks up behind you Your back is turned and you hear your toddler say mommy or daddy. Can I kill this? Now what's gonna be the first question out of your mouth in response to that question? What is it? Kill what exactly because if you turn around and he's holding a cockroach Dad might say here son. Here's a hammer have fun. Don't tell mom But if he's holding the newborn neighbor kitty You might have a different response unless you hate cats in which case no judgment But if he's holding his little sister by the throat You need counseling So you couldn't answer the question can I kill this until you answered the question? What is it? What's he got kill? What for goodness sakes? We cannot answer the question. Can we kill the unborn? Because everyone agrees abortion kills Something until we first answer the question. What is the end? Do you see how central that question is as great cocoa a Christian apologist says if the unborn are not human No justification for abortion is necessary You don't need to justify your abortion if the thing being aborted is not a human In that case abortion is no different than clipping your fingernails But then he says however if the unborn are human No justification for abortion is adequate No justification in defense of the dismemberment of your baby in the womb Suffices to defend that choice if the thing being aborted is a human being like you and I What is the unborn indeed? That is the central question Additionally if the unborn is a human being then the unborn is our neighbor Because scripture teaches that all human beings are our neighbor. So what is the unborn? Let's answer that question because this is a question that the larger culture is going to avoid like a wildfire Because as it turns out the answer is not very conducive to maintaining the pro-choice position So what is the unborn? I'm gonna answer this question this morning friends in three ways. I'm gonna answer it scientifically I'm going to answer it theologically and I'm going to answer it philosophically We're gonna start with science because as it turns out science is a pretty good objective measure to determine if you're a biological human and this pro-choice movement always claims to be pro science So let's meet them where they're at and Use the things that they claim to use to defend abortion and see where it leads us. So notice I'm not going to the Bible. I'm not going to partisan politics to answer the question. What is the unborn? I'm just going to science because it's something that those who disagree on this issue can agree to meet in the middle on What does science teach us? According to the science of embryology friends, which is simply the study of human beings before birth It's the biology of unborn humans the science of embryology teaches us that from the earliest stages of development and That means conception the unborn child is a distinct living and whole human being I didn't come up with these terms. You'll find these in any embryology textbook on any university campus Distinct living in whole unless those universities have banned truth, which is more common Distinct living in whole these are the words to describe human beings from the moment of conception and even abortion Advocates admit that the unborn is a human from the moment of conception Because the science is clear. Now. What do these terms mean? Well distinct means separate doesn't it distinct means unique distinct means You're not me, and I'm not you you're a distinct human being The unborn is a distinct human being But what's the mantra that you hear from defenders of abortion my body? My choice that argument assumes that how many bodies are involved is that true? Well according to the science of embryology if you care about objectivity if you care about facts if you care about truth regardless of where That truth leads you then you have to say that the body in your body is not your body and Because abortion always kills something why aren't all women dead after abortions? Because the body that was dismembered was not hers So the unborn child is indeed distinct by the way if unborn children are part of their mother's bodies We have to accept some very strange intellectual conclusions such as that pregnant women must have 20 fingers and 20 toes Two brains two hearts two different DNA codes potentially two different blood types, and if she's pregnant with a boy Pregnant women now have male genitalia Figure that one out Because you laugh We have to accept the premise that they are not part of their mother's bodies They're distinct and they're living because guess what dead things don't grow and the unborn child meets all of the requirements for a living thing So I have a near two-year-old His name cedar justice much stronger name than mine So I watch my wife be pregnant. Here's something that never happened My wife never woke me up in the middle of the night shaking me saying Seth wake up wake up wake up Remind baby to grow come here whisper to my uterus remind him to grow The reason why that didn't happen to any of you either is because parents do not will their unborn children to grow They develop themselves from within So they're living distinct living and whole WHLE do not confuse being a whole human being with being a developed human being These are entirely different because we're always developing correct But being a whole human being simply means that you have everything you need to Realize your full growth and development as a participating member of the human species. Here's what I mean by this. I'm 28. I'm not 40 Do I have everything I need to realize a 40 year old's level of development? Yeah, I'm not lacking DNA. I'm not lacking a limb, right? I'm gonna get to 40 unless someone kills me Unless someone dismembers me and calls it reproductive health care So the unborn child has everything they need from the moment of conception to realize their full growth and development is one of us Unless someone kills them So we're always developing they say men don't reach their mental peak until their 40s, which was very good news for my wife recently So you see I'm still developing aren't I? Do I have less of a right to life than those of you over 40 because I'm less developed No, because we have everything we need to realize our full growth and development Even if we're at different levels of development than other people Just like the unborn child is everything they need to realize their full growth and development Even if they're at an earlier stage of development than you and I Distinct living in whole this is what the science of embryology teaches us So what is the unborn there a human being the baby is a baby shocker living things only reproduce after their own kind So male fathers and female mothers can only produce rate human beings This is what the science teaches us So the unborn is a human being plain and simple. This is undisputed scientific objectivity Now let's answer the question theologically. What is the unborn from the Bible? Theologically is Christians and this is important because there is a growing number of self-proclaimed Christians in America That identify as pro-choice So we need to be able to reach them in a gracious and loving way as well And we can do that by looking at what the theological case is because if you're a Christian You have to believe in the authority of scripture if you believe in the authority of scripture You have to follow where the facts lead So what does the Bible teach about the unborn is beautiful as many beautiful pro-life verses as there are I'm actually not going to turn to any of those pro-life verses Because abortion is wrong regardless of whether the Bible condemns it or not There's a plenty of things that the Bible doesn't condemn right doesn't mean it condones it No, because abortion is wrong whether the Bible says it's wrong or not So let's just see what the Bible says about killing human beings and what gives human beings value Well, we can start at the beginning of the human story Genesis 126 says so God created human beings in his own image in the image of God He created them male and female he created them in the image of God. This is called the Imago day So the same God that breathed out the Milky Way and dropped oceans breathed life into you So you have intrinsic dignity Value and worth in virtue of being a human being created by the creator of the universe This is what the Bible teaches about human value so The Bible teaches that human beings are created in the image of God and what we just learned from the signs of embryology that unborn children are humans So if all human beings are created in the image of God and the unborn child is a human being then the Unborn child bears the image of God So the prohibitions against the shedding of innocent blood in scripture would apply equally to the unborn Would apply equally to abortion because the Bible strictly forbids the shedding of innocent blood Jeremiah 22 3 says thus says the Lord do justice and righteousness and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him Who has been robbed and do no wrong or violence to the resident alien the fatherless and the widow nor shed Innocent blood in this place don't shed innocent blood Proverbs says that God hates hands that shed innocent blood What is abortion, but the shedding of innocent blood of a human being in their mother's womb located six inches away So when the Bible says don't kill the innocent don't shed innocent blood guess what those commandments would apply to abortion as well Because abortion is the shedding of innocent blood. So what is the unborn according to science? They're human beings According to the Bible their image bearers of God and therefore it is wrong to kill them Now what is the unborn philosophically? This is really important friends, and I want you to catch this more than anything else I say this morning because there are a Massive group of people in our country who would agree with the science they would literally sit here and go he's right unborn children are humans I'd be a fool to say that that's not the case They are biologically human, but we still need abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy and your tax dollars should fund it What? How can you admit that the baby's a baby the unborn is a human and still say it's okay to kill baby humans? The way that they're going to justify their position friends is by separating the term human from person By saying that unborn children are human, but they're not persons And because they don't meet the criteria checkbox that I as a pro-choicer have constructed to to grant human value Therefore they're not persons and I can kill them friends every time a society has separated the term human from person disastrous consequences have followed Namely millions of dead innocent people That's exactly what Nazis and racists did to Jews and blacks They said that they were humans, but they weren't persons the German Supreme Court and the United States Supreme Court Both said that the term person did not apply to Jews and blacks When you dehumanize an entire class of human beings and strip personhood from them It becomes very easy to convince the society in question that that violence and against those people is perfectly acceptable if they're not Now you and I would probably never separate the term human from person We would say that those are synonymous if you're a human you're a person But when you can separate them and convince the society that there's such a thing as human non-persons It becomes more intellectually tenable to be pro-choice and this is what we do with unborn children So our philosophical case for the value of the unborn child is very important Because they will admit that it's a human But still say it's okay to kill that human But when you say that human value is based on arbitrarily Randomly selected criteria like skin color and size and level of development and wantedness and convenience You dehumanize all human beings because none of us share those capacities equally So abortion ends up destroying human equality Because it says human value is not based on our human nature that we have in common It's based on random capacities and functions that the power class gets to decide That's what racists did. That's what Nazis did And now that's what the pro-choice movement does to unborn children by denying them personhood So I'm gonna show you how to make an argument for the equal value of the unborn child To you and I that they have the same value as you and I and We're gonna make a simple argument without citing Bible verses to make our case so that you're equipped to defend life to a Culture that has no respect For the authority of scripture, but because all truth is God's truth. We're still defending God's truth It goes like this. There's no meaningful difference between the embryonic human being that you once were and The adult that you are today that would justify killing you at that earlier stage There's no meaningful difference between you the embryo and you the adult that makes it okay to kill you the embryo Does that make sense? Now are there differences between embryos and teenagers between embryos and grandpas? Yes, of course And if I held up a four-week photo that your mother still has of you in utero or eight weeks or 12 weeks And I held it up to you. You would look different. I'm not saying there's no differences between unborn people and born people I'm saying that those differences do not matter To your right to life Because your value is not found in those differences. It's found in your human nature And guess what our human nature is the only thing we share equally Because look around the room you all differ don't you we all look different. We're not the same So our value can't be found in our differences. It has to be found in what we have in common Which is a human nature? So what are the differences between unborn people and born people? Well, there's only four and They're summarized in the acronym sled Sled this is a very difficult concept for Southern Californians because we can't even spell the words no but work with me sled and guess what these are the four differences that most pro-choice advocates will use to justify abortion They'll say because the unborn differs from us in these ways we can kill them Let's see if those differences grant a right to life or not Size yes, it's true The unborn child is smaller than the newborn child, but our newborn children smaller than toddlers Aren't toddlers smaller than teenagers who here is under six foot three You have less of a right to life than me because you're smaller than me What a silly conclusion right and you laugh because you recognize the self-evident truth friends that human value was not based on size But what do pro-choice individuals say about babies in the womb? Because the unborn child is smaller. I mean come on you can't even see the baby at four weeks You said you're saying that's a person with human rights Dehumanizing unborn humans who are biologically human and justifying killing them simply because they're Smaller, but if it would be wrong to kill you because you're smaller It's equally wrong to kill unborn children simply because they're smaller L stands for level of development. Yes, it's true The unborn child is less developed than the newborn child, but aren't newborn children less developed than toddlers Aren't toddlers less developed than teenagers If you're older than 28, you're more developed than me because you're older Do you have a greater right to life? How about your grandchildren? Are they have less value than you because they're less developed? Of course not because human values not based on our level of development But what do pro-choice individuals say about unborn children? We can kill them because they don't feel pain They don't have a heartbeat. They don't have brainwaves that are detectable and they're not viable What does it take for an unborn child to realize those capacities a Level of development they will reach that level of development eventually So we dehumanize babies and justify killing them because they're not at the same level of development that we are But that we used to be at we used to be in the womb. We're unaborted. We came from wombs We used to be at that same level of development and now we say it's okay to kill other babies Who are in the same position? We once were if it's wrong to kill born people because they're less developed than us It's equally wrong to kill unborn people simply because they're less developed than us if They're human beings and the sign says that they are Size level of development e stands for environment. He just means location environment. Where are you? Yes, it's true. The unborn child is located in a very unique environment, correct? His or her mother's womb by the way, it's where that baby is supposed to be It's the most natural location for a human being to be at that level of development. Like I said, we all came from wombs and Sadly friends the womb Has become the most dangerous place for a human being to reside in the United States of America Estimates are that a third of Americans are missing Where are they? They were aborted. They were ripped limb from limb and we called it reproductive health care But where one is has no bearing on who one is The distance between us is a significantly further distance than the unborn child travels during childbirth The unborn child moves six inches during childbirth through the birth canal and Our country says you can rip them limb from limb as long as they're located in the womb But once they're born congratulations human rights, baby It's the magical birth canal friends. It confers personhood But where one is has no bearing on who one is So if it would be wrong for me to kill you because you're over there It's equally wrong to kill unborn children because they're located six inches away size level of development environment and Dependency this is arguably the most important one because at this point a pro-choice individual would probably tell me fine stuff Value does not come from size level of development or location, but the baby is dependent on the mother The baby can't survive apart from the mother. So it's her prerogative in choice whether she's going to get an abortion or not Alrighty, let's examine that Yes, it's true. The unborn child is dependent on the mother and in the first trimester an early second trimester The unborn child can't survive apart from the mother, correct? now Medical technology and scientific advancements are enabling us to save prematurely born babies earlier and earlier and earlier Which means that we can make them independent Not dependent on their mother Earlier and earlier and earlier now why is this interesting because many pro-choice individuals say okay? I will agree that abortion is wrong once the baby can survive outside the womb once the baby is not dependent on the mother Then I'll then I'll agree with you pro-life for that abortion is wrong But medical technology is enabling us to make unborn children survive apart from their mother at earlier and earlier stages of development So are you saying that a right to life constantly shifts and changes based off of medical advancements? How could human rights be tied to medical advancements? Because it's not because human value is not based on your dependency on someone or something else if it is then we'd be forced to concede that born people like us who are dependent on heart pacemakers kidney machines Insulin and life support can all be slaughtered because they're dependent on something without which they cannot continue to live Anyone like where that reasoning leads? Do you see how the pro-choice argument destroys human equality? Because the arguments offered in defense of abortion can equally be offered in defense of killing born people Because if human value is tied to size level of development environment and dependency Well, all born people don't share those capacities equally if you consistently a prior pro-choice ideology It justifies the killing of born people who don't meet the criteria that you've said Human beings need to meet to have value This is very dangerous dangerous namely because it's led to the death of over 60 million babies in America since 1973 and also because it destroys human equality for all of us so there's no meaningful difference between you the embryo and You the adult that makes it okay to kill you the embryo and the only differences between unborn people and born People are size level of development environment and dependency So the unborn child differs from us in much the same way that we differ from one another Name namely according to size level of development environment and dependency So what is the unborn? They're a human being the science has spoken Theologically they're image bearers of God and therefore if you are a Christian who wants to follow Jesus You cannot remain pro-choice You can be a Christian and be pro-choice But if you care about following Jesus and being discipled and looking more like him You cannot remain pro-choice because the Bible says that unborn children are image bearers of God and Lastly we offer a philosophical case for the value of unborn life By pointing out that the only differences between unborn people and born people are the same differences between all born people This is who the unborn is they are a neighbor. They are an image bearer of God and they are a human being So that's how we defend life Now practically, what does it look like to love our unborn neighbors? We love them by defending them We love them by being a voice. We love them by Proverbs 31 8 doing speaking up for those who cannot speak for themselves But how do we be the hands and feet of Jesus? How do we practically love our unborn neighbors for whom it is currently legal to kill through all nine months of pregnancy and In which every democratic presidential candidate running for president supports abortion to the day of birth Now if that angers you please come talk to me afterwards because I'm not here to preach a political sermon But I am here to make sure you know what's going on in the country What's going on in the country is that every democratic presidential candidate running for the democratic presidential ticket supports abortion to the day of birth Except one and she just draws the line at second trimester, which doesn't make any sense that third trimester rather It's like saying you can kill Timmy when he's two, but not when he's one If it's wrong to kill humans, it's wrong to kill them at all levels of development So there is a war Against unborn children again. I'm not please don't give me. I'm not saying Jesus is a Republican. That's not what I'm saying No, really. I'm not here to tell you that to be a Christian you have to be republic That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that to defend life. We have to defend all life And there's only one political party that wants to kill babies through the day of birth So we need to know what's going on. Why because we've been called to defend life We've been called to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves So how and that's why I'm here I want you to be equipped to do that because so many of you are passionately pro-life I know it but you've sometimes felt like you you're not equipped like you haven't had the tools and resources to engage on the battlefield of abortion So here's how we can defend life and now here's how we can love our unborn neighbors firstly We need to love our unborn neighbors by acknowledging together friends that the unborn is our neighbor This seems self-evident now because I just made a case for the unborn being our neighbor But many of us haven't really thought about the unborn. It's a neighbor before For most of my life when I read the verse love your neighbor is yourself I didn't think of unborn children Because why we don't see them as much do it. It's easy to see our homeless neighbors Right, it's easy to see our neighbors who are suffering because they're born. We see them with our eyes But we often don't see our unborn neighbors So we need to acknowledge together that the unborn is our neighbor and one of the most important ways to do that friends is by seeing them It's by looking at them and it's also by seeing what abortion does to them So we're gonna give you an opportunity this morning friends to see what abortion is and does to our unborn neighbors This is a short 55 second video clip that is graphic and disturbing and the reason it's graphic and disturbing friends is guess what? Abortion is graphic and disturbing. This is not pro-life propaganda created to elicit an emotional response This is the reality. This is what God sees three thousand times a day in a country That was supposed to be founded on the idea of the right to life liberty in the pursuit of happiness You don't get those if you're dismembered You have no liberty or pursuit of happiness if you have no right to life Just as we were shown Holocaust imagery and slavery imagery in school of students because we needed to recognize what happened and not repeat it So too do we need to look at the victims of abortion? Who are our neighbors? I want to warn you beforehand that the video is graphic and disturbing And so if you would like to opt out of the presentation You have the complete freedom to do so if you have high school students you want to step out of the room Feel free to do that. We're not manipulating or tricking anyone into watching this Okay, there is instrumental music over the clip So if you choose to close your eyes and look down at your feet you won't even hear anything you don't want to hear and By the time the music stopped you can open your eyes and you won't have seen anything You wouldn't have wanted to see but we're gonna give you the opportunity So without any further ado, let's play this short video my dear friends never forget that every single one of those abortions was legal I know we have a more visceral reaction to third trimester abortions because it looks more like what we think a baby should Look like but the reality is that those were all babies that looked exactly how a baby supposed to look at that level of development With the exception of that final clip friends those were all babies in the first trimester That's the trimester in which there's the most public support for abortion It's the trimester in which over 90% of abortions are performed and it's a trimester in which there's been the most lies It's just a blob of tissue It's just a potential person It's just a clump of cells This is what God sees 3,000 times a day While there have been 60 million abortions in our country since 1973 There are 50 million abortions a year worldwide friends this makes Hitler install in look like toddlers playing in a sandbox and Those are some of the darkest moments in human history. We don't show you this image you to shame you or condemn your friend If you've had an abortion or if you're a man and you pressured paid for or stood by and done nothing We don't show you this to condemn In fact, I believe that if Jesus were here bodily He would tell you that he's just as eager to welcome you into his arms and forgive the sin of abortion as any other sin Abortion's not a blacklist sin. Abortion doesn't ban you from the grace of God You want an example of this? King David Had a pretty big speed bump in his spiritual journey, didn't he? He's hanging out on his roof rather than fighting on the front lines with his army and he sees a woman taking a shower And he decides he would like to enjoy her more than visually So he brings her into his room. They have sexual intercourse a baby is conceived from that union and now David goes oh shoot Now I need to arrange the death of an innocent human being to hide and cover up my sexual sin Friends, what is abortion but the arranging of the death of an innocent human being and Whether it's done to hide or cover up sexual sin or not It doesn't really matter because the end result is the same right a dead innocent human being But was that the end of David's story Well, no the name the prophet Nathan knew exactly what David did and he confronted David on his sin and David Repents and falls to his knees and asked for forgiveness from the Lord and God renews him and faithful and just to forgive him and Cleans him from all in righteousness calls him a man after his own heart, but there were consequences to David's sin His son died his baby died little baby and he said regarding his baby. He said my son will not return to me But I will go to him I will see him What that means for you who have been involved with an abortion it means that not only is Jesus faithful and just to Forgive you and cleanse you from all in righteousness if you merely repent But it means that your little baby is seated on the lap of Jesus waiting to welcome you into glory with a hug and a kiss Jesus is just as eager to forgive the sin of abortion as any other sin And if you have not healed from it an abortion I would encourage you to seek out Teresa afterwards or seek out one of your pastors and begin that journey Because Jesus wants to make beauty from your ashes friends And he wants to use you to help where you used to hurt by being a voice for our unborn neighbors There are more people working full-time to kill babies than there are working full-time to save them We need you if this is part of your story I encourage you to begin the journey of healing with the Lord and then be used to help where you used to hurt So if we're gonna love our unborn neighbors friends We have to acknowledge that they are our neighbor and we need to rethink Them as neighbors secondly we have to repent for not being a good neighbor Because it always begins with repentance. That's where the gospel begins We have all failed to love our unborn neighbors I have failed to love my unborn neighbor the way that the law of God commands So we need to repent together to the Lord for not being a good neighbor Whether you've had an abortion paid for it pressured it Ignored it treated it as a woman's right issue treated it as feminism or treated it as a non-issue We've all failed to love our unborn neighbor well But there's a beautiful promise in scripture for those of us who repent Second Chronicles 714 says 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 I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and I will heal their land Friends does our land need healing? So we need to repent for not being good neighbors lastly We need to respond with words and with deeds because true faith evidence itself and works We need to respond with words and with deeds on the greatest human rights violation in human history We need to respond with words by learning how to defend life By learning how to communicate our pro-life position and love To a post-christian secular society that doesn't share our Christian worldview And I'm here to help you do that if you would tear off the connect card that you were given this morning You can fill this out and drop it in a little basket on the way out at the gazebo And you'll be added to my newsletter list and get my podcast and get resources and training and videos and articles and how to defend life You need to equip yourself to enter the battlefield of abortion We're fools if we run out onto a spiritual battlefield as dark as abortion without any weapons or armor or defense So I'm here to help you do that We need to respond with words because first Peter 3 15 says but in your hearts honor the Christ The Lord is holy always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you Yeah, do it with gentleness and respect if we need to be prepared to defend the gospel We also need to be prepared to defend how the gospel informs how we view certain issues like abortion We need to be equipped to defend life and we need to respond with deeds And I have four simple steps here for you as individuals and you as a church to respond with deeds on the issue of abortion Firstly create a culture of acceptance and not shame May it be true of this church and in fact all of the Bible believing churches in Southern California that when a woman is Facing an unplanned pregnancy her first thought is not I need to run to Planned Parenthood and get rid of the evidence of my sin Get rid of the evidence of my pre-marital sex. May her first response be I Can tell my pastor and my community and they will love and accept me That doesn't mean that they celebrate the sin It means they celebrate and love you and want to help you choose life So create a culture of acceptance and not shame secondly offer to pay the bills if necessary to help women in unplanned pregnancies Many women choose abortion because they feel like they can't afford to have another child or a child at all Now is financial struggles a justification for abortion? No, just as it wouldn't be okay to kill your toddlers because they're too expensive But it does mean that the church has a role to play in being the hands and feet of Jesus and giving generously to help women choose life Men and women to choose so advertised your church's willingness to do that put an ad in the newspaper Tell the pregnancy Resource Center to run an ad in their newsletter that you're willing to pay for any other cost that a woman would need in order to feel confident in choosing life and Do that on an individual basis too? Thirdly advertise the church's willingness to adopt and raise any child If a mere 50 percent 60 percent of Christian families in our country adopted one child Orphanages would cease to exist But we don't Because it's often inconvenient and difficult to love neighbors So advertise your willingness and this church's willingness to adopt and raise any child get a list of families in this church They would advertise there are X number of families at this church who would adopt your child If you would merely choose life if you would merely carry to term Be the hands and feet of Jesus and lastly support pro-life organizations and your local pregnancy Resource Center This is a very pro-life church that already supports the local pregnancy Resource Center praise God You need to do that on an individual basis friends when there are only a handful of ministries in a given city That are standing on the front lines in the ditches where women choose life or choose death We need to be funding those organizations and helping them save life We all have a role to play to end the slaughter of children, especially when that slaughter is legal and Support other pro-life organizations There are wonderful organizations fighting on the university front the political front the spiritual front to help end abortion If you're interested in what I do speaking to young people speaking to pastors speaking to Christian leaders and speaking on secular University campuses and you can partner with me by filling out the connect card as well So these are the deeds that we can do to love our unborn neighbors and their mothers and fathers so friends all of this All of this leads us to the question That the parable of the good Samaritan finishes with What type of people are we gonna be Are we gonna be like the Levite and the priests who know the law of God who know that babies are being killed who know that There are bleeding victims on the side of the road on the corner at this plant parenthood at this plant parenthood And we walk by and we pretend like we don't see them because gosh It's difficult and inconvenient uncomfortable to stand out and speak out and defend those neighbors Or are we gonna be like the lawyer who challenges Jesus and like these people are neighbors and these People are non neighbors and since these people are non neighbors. I don't have to love them Are we gonna create classes of human beings that we get to love and not love or are we gonna be like the good Samaritan? Who made radical sacrifices to love his neighbor? So I want you to hear the final words in the parable of the good Samaritan friends and rather than picturing the man Who got beat up on the road? I want you to picture the unborn bleeding victims I want you to picture the little babies you saw on that screen because they are our bleeding victims and Hear the final words of Jesus in the parable of the good Samaritan Jesus asked the lawyer Which of these three proved to be a neighbor to the bleeding victim? Who was a neighbor to the man bleeding needing help? And he told Jesus the one who showed him mercy And Jesus said to him you go and do