HB1957 was passed in the Pennsylvania house of representatives 102-101 on Dec 17th. The vote means that the bill allowing the killing of babies in their mothers’ wombs up to birth will move on to the Senate. The story isn’t over yet but it’s off to a bad beginning.
Like many Christians I was silent about abortion laws for years. There is a lot of innocent blood on my hands. Interestingly, when I started speaking out about the holocaust of abortion in our nation, it was Christian brothers and sisters who pushed back. Now, a few years later, it is the unbeliever who staunchly criticizes that I write about it. I see this as some progress.
It’s interesting to see how, in the midst of all this death, (over 70 million abortions in America have been counted since Roe v Wade was passed), obeying God’s law is not a high priority for many professing believers. If that law is in the Old Testament, it is practically ignored.
There is so much evidence in the Bible about how much God loves the baby in the womb that it’s hard to understand how anyone cannot believe He would hate the killing of that baby. He says that He has formed us in our mother’s wombs (Isaiah 44:2; Jeremiah 1:5). He tells us that children are a blessing, a heritage “from the Lord” (Psalm 127:3). He states the value of the child in the womb in Exodus when He declares that if two men fight near a woman “with child” and accidentally hurt her so that the child dies, the punishment is “life for life.”
We also have a command to “Deliver those who are drawn toward death. And hold back those stumbling to the slaughter.” A child being taken in to be torn apart in the womb is certainly being “drawn to death.” The scriptures also address those who sacrifice a child, which is what abortion is, a sacrifice to another god. The god of convenience, the god of fear, or making the parents a god as they decide on the life or death of their child.
Almighty God says (Leviticus 20:2-3) that sacrificing a child is worthy of the death penalty and profanes His Name. But we have 102 legislators who think they know better and will risk the danger to others of allowing this to be law. “Others” here includes baby and parents.
As a nation, we have forgotten God. We have refused to think that His laws apply to our day. We see no need to warn anyone of the coming judgment if they disobey God. We have chosen to be silent about the innocent blood that has been shed.
The battle for this particular bill (HB1957) isn’t over yet. It still needs to pass another vote (or two). Just because too many Christians stayed silent on this one doesn’t mean that we have to be silent when the vote goes to the Senate. We must make the calls, write the emails to our elected officials, and speak to our neighbors and Church Family asking them to do the same.
Our land is polluted with innocent blood (Numbers 35:33 below). Too much of that is on the hands of those of us who have remained silent when it was time to speak.
You shall not pollute the land in which you live, for blood pollutes the land, and no atonement can be made for the land for the blood that is shed in it, except by the blood of the one who shed it. Numbers 35:33
To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: A time to tear and a time to sew; A time to keep silence, And a time to speak. Ecclesiastes 3:1, 7