This article is not to judge anyone who has had an abortion, nor is it to judge anyone who is planning to have an abortion. Its purpose is to help us better understand God’s perspective on the matter. It is one of the most difficult articles for me to write about, but I am led to write about it. It is a bit long, so please bear with me and keep reading. Thanks!
Many years ago, I used to think that when it comes to abortion, people can do whatever they want to do because, after all, that’s their body. Therefore, I used to have a ‘who cares’ mentality when it comes to abortion until I encountered Jesus, who made me realize that our bodies and our lives are not our own. And later in life, God has also allowed me to experience some things that blessed me with even more revelation about the importance of this special gift called ‘life.’
Anyone living on this planet, whether young or old, has something they enjoy doing in life. Even though their lives may be upside down, there is still something or some things that they enjoy in life. We call it a hobby, and the hobby doesn’t have to be something fancy. It can be as simple as having your favorite cup of coffee or tea in the morning, swimming, cooking, walking, riding a bicycle, shopping, playing soccer, eating popcorn, your favorite ice cream, watching movies, or going on vacation with friends and family. Many of us have enjoyed these hobbies from a very young age, and we still enjoy them.
We always look forward to those times so we can have some fun, and when we do, at that very moment, if someone were to ask us about life, we would say that ‘life is good.’ Therefore, to know that life is good, one must experience it. For some of us, we feel that we must make time for at least one of our hobbies before we even call it a day, as it helps us to relax and gives us that sense of freedom from control. So, we feel like we must take that warm bath or listen to some music before going to bed. And if, for any reason, that moment gets screwed, we tend to become discontented or feel like we’ve been robbed. At that point, all you may be thinking of is, if only I could have a chance to take a warm bath or listen to some music tonight.
Although you may already know where I’m going with this, I would like to share another example with you. Let’s consider Jesus for a moment. Based on His story when He was on earth, we can say that besides prayer, He also enjoyed spending time with His friends. However, He died at a very young age. So, if we consider the human side of Jesus, we can also say that there were perhaps many things about His life that were cut short. This can also imply that during His experience here on earth as a human being, there were probably other things He enjoyed or could have enjoyed that we don’t know about because His life was cut short. And since Jesus is the Messiah, whom the power of the grave could not hold, we know that He also cooked breakfast for His friends after His resurrection. (John 21:1-14) However, suppose there hadn’t been a resurrection, then we would never have known that He was also a Chef, and Jesus wouldn’t have had the opportunity to cook for His friends, so to speak.
***Now, I’m going to switch gears a little. Please stay with me, and the Holy Spirit will make it all make sense.***
When a baby is born, that baby didn’t slip out of God’s fingers as if God didn’t know about his birth. That’s why God says things like “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, before you were born, I set you apart.” (Jeremiah 1:5). Therefore, none of us is here by accident. I can use myself as an example; the very reason I am even able to write an article about such a subject is because God did not allow my mother to abort me. And I believe that God isn’t a God of favoritism; therefore, the same God who didn’t want this to happen to me wouldn’t want this for any other baby. I know that at times, it may seem as if God has become weak concerning certain things, but this is far from the truth.
We all have made mistakes and asked God to forgive us our sins, and have received forgiveness from God. However, His forgiveness doesn’t mean we can continue to do whatever we want with our lives or even plan our sins and then ask God to forgive us later. That would be considered as abusing God’s grace, and it doesn’t work that way. Truth be told, there are always consequences for our actions. For example, Adam and Eve sinned, and they received forgiveness for their sins through the blood of the Lamb. However, they were kicked out of the garden, and the world has been decaying ever since they sinned. Therefore, we must have a genuine relationship with Christ, even in our mistakes, so that He can show us a way of escape in times of affliction, regardless of what we must endure to get to better.
And someone might be saying, ‘Well, what about a child who was born and then died?’ and my response is, this is where the Sovereignty of God comes in. God wants us to see things from His perspective, which means that He is Sovereign. He gets to decide, and we don’t. For example, if we consider the story of David after he sinned with Bathsheba. Though David sinned, he still begged God for the child to live. This makes sense because it was David who sinned; the child was innocent. Yet God did not allow the child to live. (2 Samuel 12:15-19) In that case, we can even ask what the purpose is of allowing the baby to be born at all. God could have just prevented Bathsheba from getting pregnant in the first place since He knew how things were going to play out, right?
By that same token, we can look at situations where the doctor strongly recommends or tells the parents that it would be better to consider an abortion based on the test results. Granted, it is the doctor’s job to tell us what he sees, but it is our job to ask God what He sees, as there will most likely be two different perspectives. But then again, this is where we tend to take matters into our own hands and interfere with God’s Sovereignty concerning what only He can decide. I know this is a very sensitive topic for many of us, and I get it. However, it is better to examine difficult subjects even if they are extremely uncomfortable than to ignore things that matter to God. This then prompts me to invite you to consider a few questions with me:
Have you ever seen a couple who have tried to conceive for years but couldn’t, and then boom, the following year they were able to conceive?
Have you ever seen a couple whose reproductive system God has shut down for a long time or even permanently? This couple can go up the mountain to pray, only to go down. They can try everything in the book, but it will be to no avail. This is different from dealing with infertility due to spiritual warfare because in that case, it would be a totally different story.
And have you ever seen a couple whose doctor told them their child would be handicapped for the rest of his life, and God went against the norm, and the child ended up living without a dysfunction?
And have you ever seen a couple whose doctor told them that their child would not live, and God intervened, and their child ended up living a long and prosperous life?
So, what I’m trying to say to you here is that the decision about someone’s life is not in our hands, and it isn’t ours to decide. If God can say before He formed you in your mother’s womb that He knew you, this means He knew you/baby/person even before the zygote stage, which is the earliest stage when an egg cell and a sperm cell come together to create a new, unique organism. Therefore, if He says that He knew you before He formed you in the womb, He can’t possibly be referring to a sperm and an egg (zygote). He must be referring to a human.
For example, when reading the Bible, we can see that the human heart is vital to God. That is the first thing He looks at, and that’s the thing we are told to guard because it is essential to life. According to the experts on the BabyCenter Website, “In the fifth week of pregnancy, the baby resembles a tadpole more than a human; it is growing fast. The baby’s circulatory system is beginning to form, and cells in the tiny heart will start to flicker. Which means a baby’s heartbeat (at this point, a fluttering of cells) starts as early as 4 weeks after conception or 6 weeks after the first day of the mother’s last menstrual cycle. It will be one of the first milestones the mother will anticipate. A baby’s developing heart is up and running quickly because it’s needed to deliver oxygenated blood and nutrients to other developing organs.”
And the truth is, most women don’t even notice they are pregnant until after the fourth week, when they realize they missed their menstrual period. Upon examining certain images during my research, I’ve learned that between 4 and 8 weeks, the baby does not yet resemble a human; however, a heart is developing there. Therefore, a human being with a heart is already present.
This also reminded me of a movie that I watched on YouTube a few years ago, called ‘Life Changes Everything’ by Corey Paul and Richard Clark Jr. It is about a 12-week pregnant young lady and her 23-year-old boyfriend, who is going to graduate school and wants her to get rid of the baby despite her will. The movie demonstrated how life can change everything by illustrating what her son could have become and how he could have saved his father’s life had he allowed his son to live. I would recommend this movie to anyone interested in this subject.
I know this is a delicate topic, and again, I’m not judging anybody nor am I telling anyone what to do. However, I think that just as we fast and pray about the big decisions in our lives, we should also fast and pray about such a decision before we blindly follow the doctor’s advice.
For example, when David had a baby with Bathsheba, he prayed and fasted so God would preserve the baby’s life. God took the baby’s life anyway, but at least David knew what God’s decision was, and he knew that God is the One who has the final say in every situation. 2 Samuel 12:19-23
David could have said: ‘Well, since I committed a terrible sin, let me take matters into my own hands and get rid of this baby as early as I can, since he was born out of wedlock anyway.’
And again, someone else might be saying, ‘Well, why did God allow that child to be born in the first place?’
And my response to this question is, I don’t know. I can assume in that case that it might be for the same reason God sometimes allows us to learn our lessons the hard way, because He will use our mistakes and the consequences of our actions to help us get ourselves together. We’ve learned that throughout the rest of David’s story, never again did David repeat that same sin. Even on his deathbed, David was careful not to commit that sin again, and the problem was dealt with once and for all. David repented not only because his son died but also because of all the other consequences he had to endure due to his poor decisions. And that doesn’t mean God didn’t forgive him because the prophet Nathan told him that God had taken away his sin, but because the thing David had done was so displeasing to the Lord, correction was necessary. (2 Samuel 12:10-14) Otherwise, David would have thought that it was okay to continue committing that sin.
And sometimes, it’s possible to be in trouble with God and not know it because we didn’t feel or hear any rebuke when we were planning a sin, or even after making a bad decision. Therefore, we think it is okay because everything about it felt like a smooth ride. However, it is our responsibility to seek God before we decide and after we’ve sinned or made poor decisions, regardless of what it is. The truth is, if we don’t invite God into our situations and decisions, He has no obligation to step in because He has given us free will. However, we must also remember that the consequences of our actions are not optional.
Although it isn’t comfortable for me to write about this subject, I want us to consider one last thing, which is the fact that sometimes God could allow a baby to be born with disability, or God could assign a difficult path for him/her according to His will, which might be beyond human understanding. Many of us, if not all of us, can testify that at times God allows us to experience painful circumstances to draw us near Him, to shape our character, to keep us at His feet, sometimes referred to as a ‘thorn’, and/or to reveal His power over our circumstances.
I know, right? How can a loving God operate like this? But we must remember that God always sees the bigger picture. For instance, there are certain things Jesus said in the Bible, I think, that are hard pills to swallow, such as: “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” Mark 8:36 or when He said, “If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.” Matthew 5:29
Then I realized that Jesus was not trying to be mean at all but was trying to get us to understand that there is another life after this one, and we must not miss it for anything, regardless of how pleasant or unpleasant our lives may be down here.
I can use myself as an example. I remember growing up, I despised my story and the way my life was unfolding. I used to think, if God truly loves me, why would He allow certain things to happen the way they did? Now, looking back, I realized that that painful path He had me on all along is indeed the best for me. It has helped me to learn to seek His face, to know Him better, to experience His favor, and it has kept me at His feet. And any other path besides His selected path for me would have led me astray, and I wouldn’t have known who He is because my parents didn’t even know God.
When it’s all said and done, I believe just like we would thank each other for being obedient to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, for bringing a word of encouragement to strangers when they were feeling down or for preaching the gospel to others and led them to Christ, many will also receive thanks from their own child or a kid from the foster home for their support by giving the child a chance to live and to discover all the beautiful things in life and what his favorite hobbies are. Those precious moments could only be enjoyed because his parents didn’t reject him or deny him the right to be here. At the end of it all, somebody will be thanking somebody else because, as a kid, he or she believed that he could enjoy life just like everybody else by giving him a chance to live. And the beauty of it all is that those people will not only get their recognition from those they have helped while living on earth, but they will also get their rewards from God Himself!
May the good Lord help us all to live a life that glorifies His Holy Name, even when it’s hard. Amen!
SCRIPTURES
“Let come to me what may, why do I put myself in jeopardy and take my life in my hands? Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him,” Job 13:13
“Lord, who may dwell in your sacred tent? Who may live on your holy mountain?… The one who despises a vile person but honors those who fear the Lord: who keeps an oath even when it hurts and does not change their mind.” Psalm 15:1-4
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