How Sacred is Human Life?
by
Pastor Robert Bruce Record
The hue and cry of many in our day has to do with the sacredness of human life. They shed alligator tears and work themselves up into a lather over the rights of unborn babies, regardless of the moral circumstances under which they are conceived. They play on the emotions, and they make a lot of claims which have no basis in fact. They even go so far as to decry the practice of capital punishment as being inhuman and bestial, and in doing so, they would have you believe that they are more righteous than God.
Let us look at man for a moment. The Bible declares that man was made in the image and likeness of God. Since God is a Spirit, then this likeness is not a bodily, but a spiritual one. Yet in the creation of man, God formed him out of the dust of the ground, then breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul, or a breathing creature. He was a spiritual being indwelling a body. He was not just another animal, but a creature with a nature like unto his Maker. And as such, the life of man is sacred.
But hold everything. Something happened in the very beginning to corrupt this creature called man. Sin entered the human race causing man to rebel against God and to commit all manner of evil and wickedness. But even so, man was not to take the life of another into his own hands. Thus it is that we find God saying in Gen. 9:6, "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made He man." What God is saying here, is, that the penalty for premeditated murder was death to the murderer. He must pay for his crime with his own life. And for the execution of this sentence, God instituted government with laws which were to be observed and carried out. It was not the right of the individual to take the law into his own hands.
How sacred is human life? Turning to the sixth chapter of Genesis at a time when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, we read in verse 5, that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Only Noah and his family had not corrupted themselves. You say, "All human life is sacred and should not be taken?" What about these antedeluvians? The Bible declares that God sent a flood and destroyed them all---save for Noah and his family.
And what shall we say of the vile sinners living in Sodom and Gomorrah? Were their lives precious and sacred? They were not so sacred as to prevent God from destroying the two cities with fire and brimstone, once Lot and his wife were removed. The fact of the matter is, the Bible is ful of illustrations in which wicked and evil men were taken and destroyed. Need I say more?
But we are living in a day when even professedly Christian people have discarded the Law of God as something outmoded and done away. We are thus left without any absolutes---no laws that say, "Thou shalt,: or "Thou shalt not." Man is given to making his own laws and to taking the way that seems right unto him. We are thus no longer sin conscious and have become permissive and compromising. We have been sold on the idea that we are a democracy---a people ruled by what the majority want. And we are becoming more and more like Sodom and Gomorrah. Humanism is fast supplanting Christianity, and the tragedy is that there are many who do not know the difference.
The Bible looks upon rape, incest, adultery, fornication, premarital sex and homosexuality as sins worthy of death. Read the 19th, 20th, and 21st chapters of Leviticus, and Deut. 22:25-29. The violators of these laws were put to death and thus were not allowed to live so as to produce children. But we moderns are too holy and civilized to thus deal with moral perverts. We call sin by different names and look upon evil as good. By failing to execute the righteous laws of a holy God, we compound the sin and its problems. Having convinced ourselves that all life is sacred, we labor under the delusion that regardless of the immorality involved, and regardless of the failure of our rulers to execute the offenders, we should allow the fruit of sin and immorality to ripen and come forth.
It is passing strange how people can cry out against abortion (and I am not for it) but make little or no protest against the sins which make the abortion necessary. Neither do you hear them demanding the death penalty for sex offenders. Consistency, thou art a jewel.
by
Pastor Robert Bruce Record
The hue and cry of many in our day has to do with the sacredness of human life. They shed alligator tears and work themselves up into a lather over the rights of unborn babies, regardless of the moral circumstances under which they are conceived. They play on the emotions, and they make a lot of claims which have no basis in fact. They even go so far as to decry the practice of capital punishment as being inhuman and bestial, and in doing so, they would have you believe that they are more righteous than God.
Let us look at man for a moment. The Bible declares that man was made in the image and likeness of God. Since God is a Spirit, then this likeness is not a bodily, but a spiritual one. Yet in the creation of man, God formed him out of the dust of the ground, then breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul, or a breathing creature. He was a spiritual being indwelling a body. He was not just another animal, but a creature with a nature like unto his Maker. And as such, the life of man is sacred.
But hold everything. Something happened in the very beginning to corrupt this creature called man. Sin entered the human race causing man to rebel against God and to commit all manner of evil and wickedness. But even so, man was not to take the life of another into his own hands. Thus it is that we find God saying in Gen. 9:6, "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made He man." What God is saying here, is, that the penalty for premeditated murder was death to the murderer. He must pay for his crime with his own life. And for the execution of this sentence, God instituted government with laws which were to be observed and carried out. It was not the right of the individual to take the law into his own hands.
How sacred is human life? Turning to the sixth chapter of Genesis at a time when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, we read in verse 5, that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Only Noah and his family had not corrupted themselves. You say, "All human life is sacred and should not be taken?" What about these antedeluvians? The Bible declares that God sent a flood and destroyed them all---save for Noah and his family.
And what shall we say of the vile sinners living in Sodom and Gomorrah? Were their lives precious and sacred? They were not so sacred as to prevent God from destroying the two cities with fire and brimstone, once Lot and his wife were removed. The fact of the matter is, the Bible is ful of illustrations in which wicked and evil men were taken and destroyed. Need I say more?
But we are living in a day when even professedly Christian people have discarded the Law of God as something outmoded and done away. We are thus left without any absolutes---no laws that say, "Thou shalt,: or "Thou shalt not." Man is given to making his own laws and to taking the way that seems right unto him. We are thus no longer sin conscious and have become permissive and compromising. We have been sold on the idea that we are a democracy---a people ruled by what the majority want. And we are becoming more and more like Sodom and Gomorrah. Humanism is fast supplanting Christianity, and the tragedy is that there are many who do not know the difference.
The Bible looks upon rape, incest, adultery, fornication, premarital sex and homosexuality as sins worthy of death. Read the 19th, 20th, and 21st chapters of Leviticus, and Deut. 22:25-29. The violators of these laws were put to death and thus were not allowed to live so as to produce children. But we moderns are too holy and civilized to thus deal with moral perverts. We call sin by different names and look upon evil as good. By failing to execute the righteous laws of a holy God, we compound the sin and its problems. Having convinced ourselves that all life is sacred, we labor under the delusion that regardless of the immorality involved, and regardless of the failure of our rulers to execute the offenders, we should allow the fruit of sin and immorality to ripen and come forth.
It is passing strange how people can cry out against abortion (and I am not for it) but make little or no protest against the sins which make the abortion necessary. Neither do you hear them demanding the death penalty for sex offenders. Consistency, thou art a jewel.