Tag: #conceptiontobirth

Thought, Mind, Deed

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses.” 2 Corinthians 10:3‭-‬4 NASB

What are your thoughts on life? Does it begin, as God says, at conception? Does life begin when the heart begins to beat at around 6 weeks? Does it begin when the arms, hands, fingers, and toes are fully formed at around 8 weeks? Is it by the end of the third month, when the body and organs are fully formed? The fourth month, when finger and toenails and eyelids and eyelashes appear? Does it begin in the sixth month, when fingerprints become visible? At what point, exactly, does life begin?

While you think about that, I have another question for you. Are you opposed to killing and utilizing baby animals for food?

At this time, abortion is legal in this country, right up to the moment of birth with the “partial birth abortion.” Not in every state, but it is available, and Amnesty International, along with Planned Parenthood are pushing for it to become the law of the land. Now, there are people pushing to legalize post-birth abortion. Do you understand that? Post-birth. That means after the baby is born. Is that murder?

I confess that as a young woman, I was taken in by these groups and pushed their agendas. I’m embarrassed and ashamed that I did that. Where do I get off deciding which innocent child will die? Let’s not get this confused with capital punishment. Capital punishment is for the adult who knowingly and freely killed. How can we apply it to a child who hasn’t even drawn a breath? What if someone wants to kill you? Should they be allowed to?

“For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them. How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them!” Psalms 139:13‭-‬17 NASB

Just wanted y’all to think about all this, especially with election season here. How do I feel about this? What do I truly believe is right? How does the person I support feel, act, believe?

Stuck In The Muck and Mire

“But behold, the hand of the one betraying Me is with Mine on the table. For indeed, the Son of Man is going as it has been determined; but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed!” When He arrived at the place, He said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” – LUKE 22:21‭-‬22‭, ‬40 NASB

When I turned on the radio this morning, and a new song by Matthew West was playing. It’s called “Unplanned.” I was unplanned. My 2 younger sisters and my younger brother were unplanned. Should we then not be allowed to live? How many of you, my wonderful readers, were unplanned by your birth parents? I can’t hear the song without being brought to tears. What a slap in the face of the Creator it is each time an unwanted, unplanned baby is destroyed! We betray our Lord with each abortion that is performed. I supported the abortion industry for years until I realized exactly what I was supporting. I wasn’t supporting women’s rights, I was supporting a massive industry that was all about money. As a society, we are stuck in the muck and the mire of political correctness, in which there is very little that is correct.

“…. behold, the hand of the one betraying Me is with Mine on the table…..”

That hand was my hand. Betraying the God of the Universe; betraying His Son, and putting His life on the line, just as we put the life of every single innocent baby on the line with each abortion performed. Jesus had to bear that sin on the cross!

Charles Spurgeon, one the greatest evangelists to ever live, said this, “for those claiming to be Christians, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper will also deceive you, if you rest your salvation on them; when you are near death you will find them too frail to be supports to bear the weight of an immortal soul’s eternal interests. It will be worthless when you lie dying, if your conscience prompts you to say, “I went to church or to prayer meetings so many times a week.” You will find it a poor dressing to your soul’s wounds to be able to say, “I made a profession of godliness.” Oh, your facade will all be torn away from you by the rough hand of the skeleton called “Death”; you will need a real Savior, vital godliness, true regeneration, not baptismal regeneration; you will need Christ, not sacraments; and nothing short of this will do “at the end.”

Are we merely claiming to be Christians, the Christians Charles Spurgeon talks about, resting our ‘Christianity’ on an outward show of rituals and attendance, or have we put Jesus in our hearts and our consciousness? Are we listening to our Lord apeak in our lives? I am a massive failure at hearing God in my life. Many times, I hear Him and then I do what I decide to do. I know one thing: I do not want to continue to be that hand on the table betraying my Lord! Abortion – or rather, the opposition of it – may not be your ‘sword’, but I believe it should be in every Christian’s arsenal.

Please hear this: There is forgiveness for having an abortion, or for having facilitated one (or hundreds). That doesn’t mean it’s okay to sweep our participation under the rug, so to speak. I am grateful I didn’t have an abortion, even though I was not prepared in any way to raise a baby*. I was blessed beyond measure that a family member was there to step in and adopt my child, and I know that there are hundreds of Christ-followers who would give almost anything to be able to have those unplanned, unwanted, babies. (*I wanted my baby, but was emotionally, physically, and financially unable to care for the child…. and the father was even more ill-equiped than I.)

“For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them.” – PSALMS 139:13‭-‬16 NASB

“Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth.” – ISAIAH 53:4‭-‬7 NASB

Jesus bore the weight of every single child lost through abortion. Like Him, they are lambs, and we are the sheep that are silent. We will do well to immitate Him. As Peter tells us,

“To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit; not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing. For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous, And His ears attend to their prayer, But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil. For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit ….. ” – 1 PETER 3:8‭-‬9‭, 12,18 NASB

Matthew West announced this song on Twitter with the following message, “As long as my God holds the world in His hands, I know there’s no such thing as Unplanned. Watch the music video for Unplanned from the @UnplannedMovie at the link below. https://t.co/hsd7HT0ruT pic.twitter.com/yg1bU2L3WN

“Oh I don’t believe in accidents
Miracles, they don’t just happen by chance
As long as my God holds the world in his hands
I know that there’s no such thing as unplanned“

He Knit Me Together

I LOVE this! Before I was even a thought in my mother’s mind, GOD was with me.

“YOU {GOD} made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank You for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.” – – Psalms 139:13-14 NLT

Imagine! Marvel at His creation! He takes 2 cells, which alone are nothing, and He joins them together to create the complex and incredible thing we call life! Man can join the cells, and man can manipulate the cells, but only GOD can create the life within; what a MARVEL, what IMAGINATION, what CREATIVITY!

My puny little mind has trouble grasping the sheer magnitude of it all. Every single day in this country, thousands of babies die through abortion. According to the CDC (Center for Disease Control) and the AGI (Guttmacher Institute), in 2015 there were over 900,000 babies aborted. Killed. Of those, less than 2% – 2% – were from rape, incest, or the mother’s life was in danger! That’s insane. Basically, that means that 98% of babies who are murdered each year is because the mother doesn’t want to deal with it, for whatever reason. According to the CDC, in 2013, black women were 3.75% more likely to have an abortion than white women. Where are the pro athletes standing – or kneeling – on this issue?

Even if this were not a moral issue, it should be a financial issues. 17 states use public funds to pay for abortion, and about 14% of all abortions in the U.S. are paid for with public funds. That’s our tax dollars at work, people. Putting aside both of those objections, think on this for a moment. There is a tremendous outcry for more gun control because there were 59 people killed and over 500 injured this past week in Las Vegas. The hurricanes this year have taken 34 lives (so far) in Puerto Rico, and over 1oo in the Florida and Texas hurricanes. There has been a vigorous response to all of these tragedies, as there should be. I am by no means making light of these because they are devastating. I’m pointing out that lives lost due to overt violence or through natural disasters are next to nothing when compared to the over 2,400 lives lost every day through abortion. Where is the outrage; the outcry? I don’t hear it.

Did you know that at 45 days after conception, the heart is formed and beating? At 9 weeks, well within the first trimester, there is a recognizable baby, and at 52 weeks, babies have retinas, feet and hands? Check out this fascinating, eye-opening video – https://www.ted.com/talks/alexander_tsiaras_conception_to_birth_visualized .

Not just fascinating, but fantastic, awe-inspiring, breathtakingly beautiful, or to quote Alexander Tsiaras, “The magic, the mystery, the divine that is us.”

Thought provoking? I pray so.