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Born Identity

Jeremiah 1:5

 

Jeremiah 1:5
Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

I believe that at the moment of conception a never-dying soul is born.  Nine months later that human’s body is born.  The soul was born before its parents could conceive of the fact that they had conceived, and long before they could consider preventing its body from entering the world.  Even if the baby’s body dies their never dying soul does not!

 

And so, we are all born with an identity given to us by our REAL Creator.  Today, we remember those we call the 'unborn.'  And let's be careful not to forget that the Sanctity of Life should also apply to all of us whose bodies have been born as well! [special needs / elderly / orphans / trafficked / imprisoned / impoverished]

 

I don’t just want abortion to be illegal.  I want it to be unthinkable!  I wish that in the future, Sanctity of Human Life Sunday would seem as unnecessary as a Reality of Gravity Sunday.  It's a natural understanding:  The earth holds us to it.  And life is just as natural a realization, and GOD will hold us to that!

        Abortion is unnatural.  And we live in the last days in which the Bible says love will wax cold and mankind will have unnatural affection.  This weighs heavily upon us.  Let's consider today the gravity of our situation!

 

The gravity of our situation is this:  As I’m preaching there are babies warmly nestled in wombs who won’t be there tomorrow. I’m reminded that there are children, maybe even blocks from this pulpit, who’ll be slapped, punched, and burned with cigarettes before nightfall. I’m reminded that there are elderly men and women languishing away in loneliness, their lives pronounced to be a waste.

 

But there is some good news today.  God is good, no matter how bad mankind becomes.  And when I think about the fact that I serve a congregation that is on board the right to life movement, and who believe in adoption, my spirit leaps! And I love to see men and women who have aborted babies find their sins forgiven, even this sin, and their consciences cleansed by Christ.

 

We're a church.  We won't stop celebrating Christmas. We’ll always remember Easter. But I hope and pray, please Lord, someday soon, that Sanctity of Human Life Sunday is unnecessary.

 

There's more good news to come, but first, let's face the bad news...

 

In God’s eyes, Life is Sacred, but in America, Life is Scared! And now in Ohio.

 

Margaret Sanger was a racist / wanted black children aborted / founded Planned Parenthood.  What a reputation.  What a mockery!

 

The new law in our state was carefully crafted to be deceptive, and it was  hatched in the halls of hell!

 

These things make our blood boil...as they should!  It's called righteous indignation, and Jesus showed it on behalf of innocent blood, which cries out to God! 

 

Have you ever seen an apparently healthy driver pull into a parking space marked "Handicapped" at the store? A feeling of indignation rises in your chest, doesn't it? "They shouldn't take advantage that way!" you comment to your companions.

 

Yet when someone is pregnant with a child that the "experts" say may be less than perfect, they are encouraged to eliminate it. Or when an elderly person has been partially incapacitated by illness, some advocate facilitating their demise.

 

Why is it that, in the first instance at the store, being disabled engenders a desire to protect, to defend, to stand up for; and in the other two, there's only a desire to get rid of "the problem?" The unborn need a voice.

 

We must not overlook those who have challenges in this life.

 

I say this not only as the preacher today, but as the father of a little autistic boy.  Jesus showed special concern for the lame, the blind, the woman with the issue of blood, the lepers. In our day we mustn't forget.

 

Ill.--Some studies report that as many as 90% of couples faced with an amniocentesis report of probable Down's Syndrome will choose to abort. Yet, do you know anyone with a Down's child that doesn't tell you that child is the light of their life, an absolute joy, the most loving person they've ever known?

 

Our Lord placed great value on those whom society has shuffled aside.

While on his knees, the leper begged Jesus to make him clean. The Bible says in Mark 1:41

    And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and touched him, and saith unto him, I will; be thou clean.

He TOUCHED a person with leprosy.  An undesirable.  He took a risk and did what no one else would do!

 

God has led that this message be one of good news, and here it is:

 

Aborted babies go to heaven!  They do exist!  Their soul was born at conception and they received their identity, and it is every bit as real as yours or mine!

Stillborn babies go to heaven.

Miscarried babies go to heaven.

Young children who die go to heaven.

 

"Will my baby go to heaven if it dies?"  "Can my mentally challenged youngster get saved?"  As a Pastor I get the first question a lot.  As the parent of a special needs child, I have asked the latter.  What does the Bible say on this subject?

 

I once heard a preacher say that because of I Peter 3:20 all the babies in Noah's flood went to Hell:

I Peter 3:20

...while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.

His reasoning was, because it said that just eight souls were saved, all those babies went to Hell. Of course the phrase is referring to the eight in the ark being saved by floating on top of the water, NOT soul salvation. We don't actually know that all of Noah's family was born again!

 

Ready for your BP to go up again?  The Hyper-Calvinist believes that only the elect, including just the elected babies go to Heaven, the non-elected babies burn forever in Hell. All the "nuts" ain't in the "nut house".

 

What does the Bible really say about this?

 

The most common answer given by Bible literalists is the story of David’s baby that died.

 

II Sam. 12:15-23 – David had sinned with Bathsheba, and Nathan the prophet is confronting the king for his adultery and the murder which followed.  The wages of sin is death / The soul that sinneth, it shall die

 

God struck the baby with an illness and he died.

2 Samuel 12:23
But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.

This is a special illustration that little ones are safe until they are old enough to be saved.  And it’s special to people like my wife and I who have lost a little one.

 

Most of all today, it stands as a bright beacon of hope in the midst of the abortion holocaust.

 

But the Bible has much more to say on this subject than this classic answer.


Genesis 18:25 ...Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?

Yes, He will: Let’s look at some Scriptures that will shed some light on this very important subject.

Genesis 2:17

...of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Deuteronomy 1:34-39 And the LORD heard the voice of your words, and was wroth, and sware, saying, Surely there shall not one of these men of this evil generation see that good land, which I sware to give unto your fathers, Save Caleb the son of Jephunneh; he shall see it, and to him will I give the land that he hat trodden upon, and to his children, because he hath wholly followed the LORD. Also the LORD was angry with me for your sakes, saying, Thou also shalt not go in thither. But Joshua the son of Nun, which stinted before thee, he shall go in thither: encourage him: for he shall cause
Israel to inherit it. Moreover your little ones, which ye said should be a prey, and your children, which in that day had no knowledge between good and evil, they shall go in thither, and unto them will I give it, and they shall possess it.


Children are safe until they have a knowledge of good and evil, not just right and wrong. You can teach a baby right and wrong, but you can't teach him good and evil. This comes to different people at different ages.


Why do some babies die?


Because of Adam's sin, he died and we all came from Adam, then we will all die because we all sin. Whatever happened to Adam's blood was passed on to his descendants, that's all of us.


Romans 5:14

Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned (babies and the mentally challenged) after the similitude of Adam's transgression...


What about babies, they don't sin?


Romans 5:19

For as by one man's disobedience (Adam) many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one (Jesus Christ) shall many be made righteous.


They were made sinners because of Adam's sin.


How do you know babies aren't in Hell then?


Romans 4:8

Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.

        “Impute” = to assign, place, pin on, put on the account of.


Does the Bible say there are sinners whose sin isn't charged to them?


Romans 4:15 Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression.
Romans
5:13 (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.)


You don't have to worry about the delayed/retarded people, small children, and babies that die in infancy and birth, The fact that that child is born dead in trespasses and sins means absolutely nothing at all, because sin isn't imputed to the child.

BABIES ARE NOT ACCOUNTABLE BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT UNDER THE LAW.

 

II Peter 3:9

The Lord is ... not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

If God is not willing for any to perish, and He isn't, then if babies die and go to hell, God is responsible, because they had no opportunity to be saved. In other words, if a child dies because of Adam's sin, which, by the way, they sometimes do...

Romans 5:12

Wherefore, as by one man (ADAM) sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

...then the child died without knowingly committing a sin, therefore he can be saved without an act of receiving Jesus Christ.

Romans 4:6

Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,

 

Thank God for the truth of imputation.  For God imputes righteousness to us at salvation.  Then thru a lifelong sanctification process He imparts more righteousness.  But what He imputed was already enough for heaven!

 

Thank God He doesn’t impute sin upon these little ones until they have knowledge of good and evil.

 

James 4:17

    Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.

 

        The Lord doesn't charge sin to a mentally challenged person, if it’s beyond their grasp.  However, salvation is simple…even a child…ESPECIALLY a child, can understand and receive it!

 

The same goes for a baby that dies in infancy or any boy or girl that died before they come to place in their life that they had knowledge between good and evil. The Lord doesn't charge sin to those of us who are saved -  do you think He'd charge it to a baby?  We need only to keep our kids in church, and we must be living it at home, and in time they will be privileged to come to that knowledge at a good age for them.

 

What age will that be?  It’s different for each one.  Having them under the gospel and teaching them right at home can speed things up...not that we should try to push it too quickly.  Truth is, they also have to come to the knowledge of evil and sin, not just the knowledge of the truth.  And they will naturally come to understand right and wrong whether they are in church or not.  Every day millions of children reach the 'age of accountability' and most of them don't know how to be saved.  We must reach them!

 

And for those who ask, what if God takes them just after they come to that knowledge?  If He did that it wouldn't be fair and right and the verse says:


Genesis 18:25 ...Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?

        You know He will!

 

Ill.--Max Lucado tells in his book, The Applause of Heaven, about a sweater that hangs in his closet. He says he seldom wears it -- it's too small, the sleeves are too short, the shoulders too tight, some of the buttons are missing, the thread is frazzled. Logically, he says, he should throw out that sweater since he has no use for it and will never wear it again. It simply takes up space in his closet.

        That's what logic says. But love, he reports, won't let him.

Why not? What's unusual about that sweater? To start with, it has no label, no tag telling you "Wash in cold water." That's because it wasn't made in a factory, produced on an assembly line as the product of a nameless employee earning a living. Rather, it was the creation of a devoted mother expressing her love -- his mother. That sweater is unique, one of a kind, irreplaceable. Each strand was chosen with care, each thread selected with affection.

And so, even though that sweater has lost all of its use, it has lost none of its value. It is valuable not because of its function, but because of its MAKER. So is each life.

[Some material gleaned from Pastor Tommy H. Heffner Sr.]

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