Friday, June 10, 2016

Human Value and Values .................. Parables 443

October 18, 1994

Losses from 40 years of highway and drowning accidents added to the loss from over 115 years of war (including the Boer, WW I, WW II, Korean, and Persian Gulf wars) equals a total death count of nearly 360,000 Canadian people. In less than half that time, from 1970 to 1991, there have been 1,249,601 abortions.

Statistics from the United States reveal 1,300,000 died in the American Revolution, the Civil War, WW I, WW II, the Korean and Vietnam wars. The number for legal abortions in the U.S. to 1981 is over 12 million. Many more have occurred since.

The law says swimming pools must hire life guards so people will not drown. Speed limits are enforced to make driving and highways safer. For the same reason, automobile manufacturers are given a list of standards they must meet. World leaders hold extensive and expensive summit meetings trying to end war. Yet, according to the above statistics, there are inconsistencies in how our leaders evaluate human life.

What is Canadian policy on population? We supposedly need more people, thus we open our doors to immigrants from other countries. Unlike China, we have no laws telling couples one child only. The laws is not against numerical growth, but we do have a law that allows destruction of our greatest resource.

Some who favor abortion argue human life does not start at conception. To them, it is not a person until it is actually born, or at least well along in development. But it is alive. The heart beat begins 28 days after conception. Brain waves can be recorded very early. If it is not a live human, what is an unborn child?

Others say the pregnancy was unplanned and the baby unwanted; it is better to abort than bring an unwanted child into the world. What about those parents who want babies and wait up to seven years before any are available for adoption?

Maybe the problem has more to do with values. In that regard, God is far more consistent than we are. To Him, life is important from the womb to the tomb. He even expresses interest in every stage of development.

For example, consider what King David of Israel said: “From birth I was cast upon you; from my mother’s womb you have been my God.... You created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”

Jeremiah is another instance. The Lord said to him: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

A third example is a young woman who was told she would have a child. He would be “great and will be called the Son of the Most High... he will reign... and his kingdom will never end.” This child was conceived before she was married. The man to whom she was engaged knew the baby was not his.

If Jeremiah’s or David’s mother had decided to abort, we would not have the 23rd and a host of other Psalms, nor would we have some of the most amazing prophetic utterances in Scripture. If Mary and Joseph had decided they did not want their baby, the whole world would be without a Savior.

Freedom of choice supposedly makes life better. In this case, statistics can give us only numbers. We may never know what we have missed.

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