Bring the Little Children to Me: A Plea for Life

If you have truly experienced the gospel, then you cannot help but live out the gospel. And there are few better and more beautiful and compelling pictures of what the gospel looks like in action than fostering or adoption. I am so grateful for Cheryl, who is a very successful businesswoman not in our church and in the community here, who has learned over the course of her life that there are things even more fulfilling than business success and being involved in that kind of ministry is one of those, as well as the plethora of other Summit families who have stepped forward to love our community in Jesus' name and to serve through one of the greatest ministries that I know in existence in the kingdom of God and that is fostering and adoption. I do not know the exact number, but the last time I checked there were around 300 families here at the Summit Church that are involved with adoption or foster care. In fact, I would love if you are involved in those in any way, whether you're new to it or did it years ago, but this is a part of your life either in the supporting process or you are fostering or adopting, would you stand up at our campuses because we want to recognize you and support you. So stand up right now if you are involved in that, in adoption or in foster care, and we want to express our appreciation to you. Summit Church, one quick thing before we get started, I want to remind you of, and that is our regional prayer gatherings that are happening next Saturday, January 30th at 4 p.m. at all of our permanent locations.

That would be our Capitol Hills campus, our Briar Creek campus, our Apex campus, and our Blue Ridge campus, and our Summit in Espanol campus. This regional prayer gathering is going to be the culmination of 21 days of prayer and fasting, and whether or not you participated in that prayer or fasting, I want to invite you to be there at one of those in-person prayer gatherings if you are comfortable safety-wise. We want to start out, here's why, we want to start out 2021 calling out on God together and pleading with God for his guidance, pleading for his touch on our lives and our families and our church and our community this year. And so I am asking you, I am imploring you, I am cajoling you, I'm doing whatever I am allowed to do up here to make this a priority for you and your family next weekend, 4 o'clock at one of our permanent campuses. All the details and a place to RSVP is at summitchurch.com. If you will go, you can find all the information out for our online-only friends who are joining us even at home right now, and you are not comfortable being there in person. We will also be live-streaming that, and there will be information at summitchurch.com about that also.

But again, if you are able, we would love to be together just to call out on God together this coming Saturday. All right, open your Bible to Luke chapter 18. Luke chapter 18, we are continuing on in our series called In Step, which is basically a walk through the gospel of Luke, in step with Jesus, even if we are out of step with the world because those things will always go together. Luke chapter 18, last year leading up to the election, preached a message from Luke chapter 10 on the Good Samaritan, in which Jesus explained that it is the duty of all Christians to care about any injustice around them, whether it affects them directly or not. Jesus told a story to illustrate that about a Jewish man who had been beaten up and left bleeding on the side of the road.

Two Jewish religious leaders walked right past him. They were good and respectable men, no doubt, but they didn't know the bleeding and they hadn't been the ones who beat him up, so they didn't feel obligated to stop and help him. Through this story, with the story of the Good Samaritan who did stop to help him, even at great cost to himself, Jesus taught his followers that taking care of the vulnerable and the hurting around us is our responsibility. Whether or not we had anything to do with the situation of injustice in front of us, right, injustice in the eyes of God, you see, listen, injustice in the eyes of God is not just cheating somebody.

This is gonna be new for some of you, so pay attention. Injustice in God's eyes, in both the Old and the New Testament, is not just cheating someone. Injustice is seeing someone in need and being in a position to help them out of that need and failing to do that. And so for Luke, that obligation of the strong to protect the weak is a defining feature of following Jesus. That means that if your life, Luke would say, is not defined by caring for the vulnerable, you could no more say that you're a follower of Jesus, and you could if you were openly sleeping around or refusing to read your Bible. You see, that's the backdrop for what we come to in Luke chapter eight, verse 15.

Listen as I read. People were bringing infants to him that he might touch them, but when the disciples saw it, they rebuked those parents. Jesus, however, invited them and said, let the little children come to me, and don't stop them, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly, I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God, like a little child, will never even enter it. The disciples, like many in Jewish culture, did not value children.

I would say that's true in most cultures. Sure, they're cute, but their needs were just not as important as the needs of adults. And in this moment, adults needed Jesus, and so the needs of the kids should be put to the side so that the needs of adults could be prioritized. But Jesus said that children were his first priority. As a matter of fact, children, he says, are the ones in the best posture to receive my kingdom, and unless we grasp that we're all like children, vulnerable and helpless, spiritually speaking, none of us will ever reach out for the kingdom of God.

And when we do grasp that we are all like vulnerable and helpless children in God's eyes, from that point on, once we realize that, we're always gonna have a special place in our hearts for the vulnerable and the helpless around us. Now there are lots of places where we could apply this, but I wanna focus today on the place that Jesus did, and that is with children, and particularly children in their most vulnerable state right now in our country, and that is in the womb. This past Friday marked 48 years since the Supreme Court declared abortion to be a fundamental right. Now, before you tense up, let me just acknowledge, I'm always a little conflicted on this because I do not want to come off like a partisan culture warrior, but here's the thing, this should not be a political issue. Regardless, regardless of your approach to other political questions, Christians should be absolutely united on this one.

And it's been a long time since I've really dived into it like this, and this is pretty unusual, in fact, what I'm doing this weekend, but I know, I know that if I never talk about some of these hard things, then I am failing at my job. So let me just say, okay, going into this, if you have had an abortion or you are considering it, please do not hear me standing up here pointing a finger of judgment at you regarding one of the most painful chapters of your life. I know that some of you felt like you did not have a choice. I saw a study that 64% of women who got abortions said they felt strong pressure from somebody else to do so.

Maybe that was the guy who impregnated them or maybe it was their parents or somebody. I want you to know that Jesus' primary purpose in coming to earth was not to stop abortions. Jesus' primary purpose in coming to earth was to die for abortion-committing sinners like you and me. And that means the heartbeat of the message here at this church is not the legislation of a culture of life.

The heartbeat of the message of this church is the offer of new life in Jesus. So let me be very clear, if you have had an abortion, the Lord Jesus stands before you this weekend not with a finger pointed in condemnation, but with arms open wide in mercy. Now, one final elephant in the room, and that is, some of you may think that I, as a man and as a white man to boot, have no right to talk about this. You say, no womb, no say, but I would just ask you gently to consider, since when is speaking out for justice something only a few of us can do? Is speaking out for the vulnerable something only the vulnerable can do? Is speaking up against the unjust treatment of minorities something only minorities should do?

The Good Samaritan had an obligation to speak out for the man on the side of the road even if he'd never been beaten up himself. What I'm gonna try to do today is present to you scripture and reason. And I want you to evaluate those things on the basis of their merit not my gender. Truth doesn't have a gender, truth doesn't have a race. Truth is truth regardless of whose mouth it's in.

What is happening today and what ought to be happening every weekend is not that you gather to listen to the opinions of a white man or a black man or anybody else. We gather to listen to what God has to say about things. And that means if I say anything today that contradicts what is written in this book I implore you disregard it. But if I say anything that is found in this book then I urge you cling to it because these are not idle words they are our life. So to begin if we're gonna look at the world with the eyes of the Good Samaritan we gotta first be honest about the state of the victim that's lying in front of us.

Listen to this. In 2018 abortion was the leading cause of death worldwide with 42 million victims. That is roughly 7 Holocausts in a single year. Last year right at 900,000 babies were electively aborted in our country which is more than the total amount of American casualties in both World Wars and the Vietnam War combined every year. In Iceland which many consider to be a progressive utopia the abortion rate for children diagnosed with Down Syndrome now approaches 100%. In the United States 90% of preborn humans diagnosed with Down Syndrome are terminated. In Asia widespread sex selective abortions which means you choose to have the abortion based on the fact that the gender of the baby wasn't what you wanted it to be. The sex selective abortions in Asia have led to 160 million missing women in Asia today which is more than the entire female population of the United States right now. And recent studies suggest that selective abortions of baby girls are common in the United States now also.

In New York City each year more black children are aborted than are born. I agree with my African American friend Pastor Thabiti Anyabwile who says it is staggeringly clear that the largest scale injustice the most morally outrageous thing happening in our society today is the killing of children in the womb. Listen are you committed to social justice? Do you want to defend the vulnerable?

Do you want to fight systemic injustice? There are few places where dire urgency meets such moral clarity and clear opportunity as with the cause of the protection of children in the womb. Now I know a lot of people will say well no no it's a lot more complex than that the baby is a part of a woman's body and we need to respect her right to privacy and her sovereignty over her body and I agree that the right to privacy over our bodies is precious. But here's the thing that baby is not part of her body that baby is intimately attached to her body for a period of time yes but it's not part of her body. Listen Thaddeus Williams from whom I'm going to draw on a lot today he says from the moment of conception that baby has its own DNA its own unique genetic code its own unique heart its own unique circulatory system its own unique brain and more if you're saying it is part of her body does that mean she herself has two brains two hearts four arms and four legs no of course not it's a separate person even when intimately attached to her body. Scripture certainly presents the preborn child as its own person the psalmist of Psalm 139 glories in the fact that in the womb God knew me by name as a person and there I was fearfully and wonderfully designed for the purposes that God had for me I was knit together according to his plan and all my days and all his purpose for me was already written down in a book before my mom even knew she was pregnant. Scripture tells us that John the Baptist left in Elizabeth's womb because his spirit in the womb was filled with the spirit hers wasn't but his was which means there are two different spirits going on there his was filled with the spirit when he came into the presence of Jesus. Somebody says yeah but it's still in my body yeah but we all know that our rights over our bodies are not absolute as far as the law is concerned prostitution is illegal in most states and I don't know of anywhere in the U.S. that you can legally pour drugs into your body just because it's your body your rights to your body stop precisely at that place where they begin to affect somebody else's and that's exactly what's happening to the preborn people say well the same life begins at conception as a matter of opinion when you shouldn't force your opinion on others but we're not in the realm of opinion here we're in the realm of biology and scripture hear me out let me get into the weeds for about five minutes just hang with me if you say life begins at birth well the only difference between a baby five seconds prior to the birth and five seconds after birth is location and location seems like a really arbitrary foundation for personhood don't you think scientifically what's the difference in the nature of the baby five seconds prior to birth and five seconds after certainly not that way scripture presents it if you say well life begins with brain function when the baby can experience pain when they are in a sentient or I mean self-conscious state that's when life begins well first you should admit that that contradicts the position that abortion is a fundamental woman's right through all nine months of pregnancy simply because it's in her womb but second does that mean that when we are not in a sentient state that we have then lost our right to life and I'll go ahead and tell you if I go into a coma that you know that I'm gonna wake up from it nine months my strong preference would be that you not kill me you say well no life begins at viability when the baby can live on his own again that seems like a really strange criteria for when personhood begins just think about it isn't viability contingent on the advancement of technology every year doesn't newer and better technology push the length of viability back if viability determines personhood that means whether or not somebody is a person is dependent on how advanced the technology is of the society they live in that means that people who are in advanced societies have more personhood than people were in less advanced societies and that doesn't make sense plus I would argue to you that the more helpless a person is the more vulnerable the less viable the more we as a society are obligated to protect them in the words of Cardinal Roger Mahoney he says we judge societies on how they treat their weakest members not their strongest ones how they treat the last how they treat the least how they treat the littlest and friend even if you're unclear on this and you're like well I'm just not convinced a personhood begins at conception I would just say to you wouldn't you shouldn't you err on the side of life I mean think of it this way if you're out hunting in the woods with a friend of yours and you hear a rustling in the bushes over there and you're not sure whether it's your friend or a deer morality and common sense dictate that you don't pull the trigger and so you know that it's not your friend because you don't want to be guilty of accidentally murdering them so even if you were unclear I would say err on the side of life you say well no no but the problem is if abortion were made illegal today then people are just going to go back to pre-1973 with coat hangers and back alley butchers and a couple things I would say here first just to be clear stories of that are way exaggerated if you look at it a total of 39 women died the year before Roe versus Wade through illegal abortions and that's tragic but compare that to 900,000 babies who die in state sanctioned abortions this year and a second again quoting the Christian philosopher Thaddeus Williams the coat hanger argument misses the point that the pre-born are people and pointing out some negative side effects of a restriction doesn't justify the sanctioning of murder people say well what about in the case of genetic disabilities we shouldn't be bringing babies into the world with genetic disabilities whose lives are going to just be reduced to hardship and unhappiness when people say that to me I'm always like well first you should know that people with disabilities are vehemently opposed to that argument in fact there's not a single organization of disabled people in the world that I know of that is in favor of elective abortions of those who have disabilities second you are making a false correlation hear me out you're making a false correlation between genetic deformities and unhappiness listen to this no study no study I'm quoting this Baltimore study done in Baltimore no study has found that handicapped persons are more likely than non handicapped persons to want to die or commit suicide in fact of the 200 consecutive suicides in Baltimore last year none had been committed by people with congenital deformities none that means if you're trying to say that we should be able to abort those whom we know in advance are the most likely to be unhappy it's not those with genetic deformities that you should start with they're on the happy end of the scale and the point is who are we to determine when another life is worth living again this whole line of thinking just misses the point the preborn baby is a person and what we think they might experience and whether it's going to be hardship or whether it's not going to be not like my life doesn't justify killing them does it and I'd love to introduce you to two church members I was actually going to bring them up here but decided to put their pictures up I'll put their picture up in their Instagram handle because you should follow them Anna Williamson is one she's a friend of our family she's now the manager of the UVA basketball team when Anna was born when she was in her mother's womb they're diagnosed with spina bifida and the doctor said this is going to be really bad and certainly told her that she was in that category that ought to seriously consider this you follow her on Instagram and I dare you I double dog dare you just to make this argument to her Daniel Ritchie is another one you go to the Capitol Hills campus you'll see him walking around the reason that you'll know it's him is because he was born without arms same conversation between the doctor and the mother now Daniel just graduated from seminary over at Southeastern and now he goes around and speaks of high schools and colleges talking about how to discover God's purpose for you even in hardship and I will tell you both those people you will find in them two of the happiest people that are the most full of life that I know I've heard people say well abortion sometimes helps poor women escape crushing financial burdens banning abortion would banning abortion would just cause overpopulation and lead the massive massive property but friend that kind of statement confuses finding a solution with eliminating a problem those are not the same thing I mean think of it this way if the neighbor's dog keeps pooping in your yard and you go out and shoot the dog you have eliminated the problem but you haven't come up with a solution and your elimination of the problem was not a moral one if it was a cat you'd probably get away with that but if it's a dog it's like not good right don't confuse eliminating a problem with coming up with a solution again the point is that the preborn are people you can't justify killing a person because it eliminates a problem I mean if you use that reasoning there where does it stop couldn't you use that same line of reasoning to justify eliminating other financially burdensome groups so yes poverty is a problem hardships a problem let's come up with solutions let's don't just eliminate the problem people didn't say well what about in cases of rape or incest first let me tell you that I cannot imagine the pain it would be involved in something like that it's unspeakable but just to keep it in perspective those tragic and heartbreaking cases make up less than 1% of all abortions so when somebody says that to me I always ask them like okay so let's just be clear you're agreeing then that the other 99% of abortions are indeed immoral but the bigger point the consistent point is this does the fact that that baby got there by rape or incest change the fact that they're still a person does the circumstances of somebody's birth take away from their personhood if a grown adult somehow discovered that they had been conceived by rape and that would be tragic for you to discover that about your past but would that somehow reduce your value as a person or lessen your right to life now you see keep your eye on the central question is the preborn baby a person is it made in the image of God because if they are and they are in the image of God and God knows them by name Psalm 139 and they are an organism with their own life then how they became a person is irrelevant listen that little human life that little person regardless of how they got there you know when it's no bigger than a speck the size of a period at the end of a sentence that little speck is made in the image of God and that speck therefore has more value than all the planets and all the stars and all the cosmos and all the wealth piled up in all the world because it's got a soul that is made in the image of God that Jesus died for and a soul that has an eternal future I'm getting into the weeds here a little bit I know but it's because I want you to see that scientifically and scripturally there's no question about how Jesus feels about these little children let them come to me he says bring them to me their lives are precious and valuable and if you care about me you're going to care about them and you're not going to dismiss them like the disciples do to the children in this story you're not going to dismiss them as an inconvenience I know some of you might be sitting there saying well okay well this sounds like a pretty eloquent defense of life and my mind's already my mind's made up on that but what's my responsibility and that's a great question because the point of the Good Samaritan story is not that we merely think the right things the point of the Good Samaritan story is that we do the right thing as well and what I want to show you is that all of us all of us have a role in that so I want you to keep your finger in Luke 18 and I want you to flip back to Proverbs 31 flip back to Proverbs 31 because this is a passage listen to this that Jesus would have been very familiar with and that would have profoundly shaped his own attitude toward justice you see every Jewish boy was reared on the Proverbs and this section of Proverbs was one of the most well known and if you listen you can hear echoes of Proverbs 31 and the Good Samaritan story because Jesus is taking what he learned in Proverbs 31 and he's applying it to a real life situation again to quote my African American pastor friend Thabiti Anabwile he says that this passage is crucial in instructing us how to respond to the abortion crisis because it tells us first what God's requirement is secondly the scope of that requirement and then even how we learn that requirement and so from that I want to give you some concluding words and I've got a few couple for the followers of Jesus and then I've also got a word to those of you who may be sitting here filled with regret or fear or shame wondering what you what what you should do so just hang on Proverbs 31 the words of King Lemuel a pronouncement that his mother taught him speak up verse 8 here's a pronouncement speak up for those who have no voice for the justice of all who are dispossessed speak up judge righteously and defend the cause of the oppressed and the needy first what is our responsibility verse 8 speak up speak up for those who have no voice what better description of the preborn could there be than those who have no voice nobody hears their screams as they're slain in the womb we know they feel pain through microscopic cameras we can see them flinch as they're injected with poison we see their heartbeat spike as they're killed but we don't hear their voices some of them are old enough that if they were just six inches further out of the womb we could hear their screams but because they're left in the womb when their life is is taken we don't hear so that means that we are obligated to speak for them because they don't have a voice speak up is repeated twice once in verse 8 once in verse 9 speak up the king says speak up say something like the story with the Good Samaritan not speaking up in the face of injustice makes you guilty of complicity in that injustice it's like Martin Luther King Jr. said in regards to racial injustice he said our lives begin to end the day that we become silent about the things that matter silence is support silence is complicity so speak up let me just stop right here and say something some of you don't hear me say a lot I probably should say more I want to ask you to seriously consider whether or not God might be leading some of you to take on the mantle of government leadership for causes like these we need godly people in both political parties advocating for this because it's like I said this should not be a partisan issue much like care for the refugee or respect for the immigrant should not be partisan issues I don't care what your political party is all Christians should be united in seeing the removal of this scourge from our land second Proverbs 31 shows us the scope of that responsibility verse 8 speak up for the justice of what's that word all who are dispossessed all I'm just gonna go on record and tell you if your love for the vulnerable is sincere this is not gonna be the only life issue that you care about I say that because for some people pro-life is like a moral club they use in the culture war even as they ignore the sufferings and the needs of other vulnerable groups around them and I say to you your conviction is not sincere and that's shown by the disposition you take toward other people who are vulnerable around you if you really care about the vulnerable you will see you advocating for life everywhere the poor the marginalized the forgotten of all ages and all races maybe most of all you'll be brokenhearted about those around the world with no access to the gospel if you're a Christian because the greatest tragedy in our world is people dying without the gospel and the greatest injustice in the world is the failure of the church to get the gospel to them a real commitment to life is demonstrated by advocacy for the vulnerable from the womb to the tomb but if I could just flip that for a second don't tell me you're pro-life if you're apathetic about life in the womb just so you know Christians have always been involved in ministry from the womb to the tomb and sometimes I hear people say well you know all you Christians really care about is the pre-born friend that's just not true since I give you a few examples since 1973 for every one abortion clinic in America Christians have built three pregnancy centers for every one we built three pregnancy centers to assist women in crisis and there you'll find them buying groceries and helping set budgets and often financial assistance and counseling to help young mothers get housing or whatever else they need go into foster services and adoption agencies today and there you will find the group represented most are pro-life Christians and their friends Christians have built more hospitals around the world than any other single group in fact for a long time in sub-saharan Africa there was not a single hospital in the entire continent that had not been built by a Christian mission so do not believe the tired trope that followers of Jesus only care about the pre-born it's just not true and a lot of people use that to excuse the fact that they are virtually silent about the tragedy of abortion it is hard to say that you are pro-life from the womb to the tomb if you're apathetic when the womb is a tomb and do note a lot of our ministry here this church to our community centers around this issue go to our church website go today summitchurch.com and you'll find more than 10 ways that we are already deeply involved in 10 different ways in the community around this issue ways that you could get involved with today that range from the fostering and the adoption to serving at pregnancy centers to being involved in all the different stages of the life process that's the scope third how do we learn that responsibility I love this verse one the words of King Lemuel a pronouncement that his mama taught him a commitment to preserve life and a commitment to protect the vulnerable is learned not from Fox News not from some magazine you read it's learned in the home King Lemuel developed this passion from his mama that's where I learned it moms your children should hear you talk about your responsibility and our responsibility to speak up for the vulnerable and they're not gonna learn that from from hearing you yell at the news pundit on the TV screen they're gonna learn that from how you coach that older sibling to care for their weaker and more vulnerable younger sibling and when that bigger sister sees that her younger sister is going for that one toy that one toy that she decides that she wants and that she can get because she's bigger and so she can just take it from her that's the place where you teach her about the sin in her heart and how Jesus wants her to be a young lady who looks out for the younger and the weaker or dads when your son comes home talking about how the unpopular kid was being picked on and you teach him that it's his responsibility to stand up for the week even if it cost him even if he gets a bloody nose in the process you teach him that he can't just walk on by a culture of life is not fomented in the news media a culture of life is grown in the home now finally I want to end this by giving a word to those of you who've sat there through this whole service with a pit in your stomach filled with regrets or guilt or shame or fear listen I told you at the beginning the center of Christianity is not a political condemnation of abortion the center of Christianity its heart is Jesus Christ dying and rising from the dead to save abortion committing sinners like you and me and one of the most remarkable passages in the Bible in 1st Corinthians 6 the Apostle Paul describes the makeup of the membership of the early church he starts listing out kinds of people several categories thieves extortionist abusers the rebellious the apathetic the greedy drunkards drug addicts slanderers murderers and then you can certainly add abortion people who provide abortions people who've gotten abortions people who have been complicit in abortion you could add all those to that list but then Paul ends that little description with the most glorious five or six words of scripture Paul is small and says and such are some of you such were some of you in the makeup of that first church there were a bunch of people whose identity had been that list such were some of you but you now he says you're you're new you're washed you were sanctified you were justified by the blood of Jesus and by the Spirit of our God listen to me young lady your abortion does not define you thank God that in Christ none of our sins define us anymore there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stain you are a beloved daughter or a son of God whose sin Jesus went to a cross to pay for he has put your sin into the depths the deepest depths of the deepest part of the sea and he's put up a sign there like Cory Timboon used to say put up a sign there and that deepest part of the deepest sea that says no fishing allowed what sin he says though your sins were a scarlet I've made them as white as snow behold I make all things new this is the new reality he wants you to live in you cannot change the past see but you can become a protector and preserver of life right now one of our teaching pastors wives had an abortion before she became a Christian she had an abortion and she told her story here last year about 18 months ago she talks about how God not only forgave her God set her on a whole new path a path where she's a mother and a mother to her children now and not just a mother her children but a blessing to other people's children she has been a blessing to my own children I want to tell you he's got a plan for you to see because of the cross your sin is not the last word about you church you say amen to that because of the cross your sin is not the last word about you and because of the resurrection your mistakes are not the last word on you either if any man or any woman is in Christ they're a new creation all things are passed away they're in the grave Jesus buried them all things are become new hey listen maybe you're 16 years old and you just found out that you're pregnant and I know you're terrified I know you are terrified maybe the dad is already long gone and you're scared if you're at one of our campuses this weekend I want you to look around look around this church just right now look around we're here look around there's 500 men at this church that are ready to be a part of this boy's life we're ready to help you raise him there's 500 ladies here who are going to step up and help you mother her we got rooms in our houses you can stay in these ladies are going to mother you as you mother that baby they're going to shower you with so many gifts it's going to be awkward I've seen it we got you we got you financially we got you emotionally we got you practically we got you girl all right relax I'm gonna tell you when that kid turns 18 and that kid walks across that stage of graduating there's gonna be a bunch of us from this church that are there at that graduation cheering for him and calling his name and going and the principal is gonna have to call us down and tell us we gotta show some respect for others but we're not gonna care because we're gonna be part of his life with you and if you can't handle any of this we'll find a family in this church to adopt that baby we're not gonna leave you we're not gonna leave you that man may have run away but we're not because we serve a God who didn't run away from us so please don't be afraid listen to me don't be afraid have that baby have that baby by God's grace you can do this you can his grace is enough for you his grace is enough don't be afraid if your dad involved in all this tell her you will support her be a man don't shirk your responsibility to protect the vulnerable in your life 64% of women who get abortion say they did so because they felt pressure don't be in that 64% have the courage to do in God's way maybe that feels overwhelming to you and we're here to help you too y'all a few years ago I preached on this and I said similar things to what I'm saying today and unbeknownst to me and our congregation that day sat a college-age girl at our Chapel Hill campus who just learned she was pregnant she was scheduled that afternoon to go in and have an abortion I didn't find this out then I find out later that she said that my words that morning and the Spirit of Grace in our church convinced her to cancel that appointment to choose life for her baby and put that baby out for adoption first I heard of this story was a year later when into my office while the family who had adopted this baby to show me how God had used this church and his word to save their new daughter's life in fact I got a picture of when that happened listen I'm gonna get a lot of hate mail when I talk about this whenever I talk about it I get a lot of hate mail and I'm sure that will be true this weekend I'm gonna tell you right now that one picture makes all those hate letters evaporate into the wind for me to speak up something speak up speak up for those who have no voice defend the cause of the needy and all the oppressed these are not games we are playing people's lives depend on our voice and our action the only thing that is necessary for the progress of evil in the world is for good people to do nothing for people who understand righteousness and most of all for people understand the gospel to just be silent and walk on by on the other side let the little children come to us because that's the kingdom of God choose Christ choose the way of Christ choose life why don't you bow your heads if you would bow your heads at all of our campuses or if you're there with us online at home just bow your heads right where you are let me talk first to you mother who's scared hey can you ask God for strength the Holy Spirit is ready right now he's ready he's ready to fill you with strength if you're ready to do it his way maybe you've had an abortion in the past and you're like get my life ever can it ever be right again it can you can't change the past but Jesus can make it all new and he can set you on this new purpose he has for you confess that sin bring it to the throne of Jesus let it be washed in his blood and embrace the new life God has for you some at church are we ready to recommit ourselves to loving the vulnerable whether they live across the street or in the womb of the mother at the local high school are we ready to commit ourselves can we say with Jesus no let him come to me let him come to me because this is the kingdom of God I'm going to pray and then at our campuses our worship teams are going to come and then at the end of that after we worship together for a few moments our campus pastors are going to come and they'll close our service and they'll ask for prayer counselors to come up and stand down front at every campus like they do every week listen if you're struggling with this if you're broken by this if you need help with it you just want somebody to be grateful with maybe you know somebody's going through this or maybe you've got some other prayer need that would just be good to have people in the church pray with you I want you to come as soon as we dismiss I want you to come and they'll just take you by the hand we ask you to wear your mask and they'll wear theirs and they'll take you to the throne of Jesus and let's get help on this okay father I pray I pray God that this would be a place of life not a place of legislation first but a place of the new life that's found in Jesus give us courage to speak where we must give us compassion and humility generosity they'll make us pour ourselves out we pray in Jesus name.