Tag Archives: pro-life

Aug 2 2015

If You Had an Abortion…

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I used to attend Harvest Crusades with Greg Laurie when I was younger, and during the altar call he would frequently mention this particular sin. Among listing other sins he would say “maybe you had an abortion… maybe you feel tremendous guilt about it…” It always struck me as a very profound statement because I was raised with a biblical worldview respecting the sanctity of life for the born and the unborn.

But Laurie’s call was profound because as depraved as the act of taking a baby’s life is, God’s grace is infinitely larger and is able to cover such a sin through repentance.

The latest statistics indicate that about 28% of American women under the age of 65 have had at least one abortion. I have met patients who have had as many as 8 abortions. It is a common procedure, and it used to be much more frequent back in the 1990s.

If you read these few words and have gone through an abortion, I would like to assure you that God can forgive you of this sin. The passing of time will not make this event disappear from history. It is always going to be there in your spiritual record and it must be dealt with. If you acknowledge that you have sinned against God, the Author of Life , if your repent of this sin and your other sins and trust Christ as your only way to heaven, you will be saved.

I invite you to trust what the Bible says about Christ:

Isaiah 53:5 “But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.”

Jesus Christ took our sins, including the sin of abortion upon Himself to make us righteous in God’s eyes, but only if we repent and trust Him. If you do that, your case can be legally dismissed before God.

The guilt of abortion will dissipate. You will be a new person, and you will live a new life glorifying God. Christ is our only hope.

image: churchleaders.com
Aug 4 2013

Jesus Can Forgive Even the Sin of Abortion

Jesus can forgive in fact any sin if the sinner repents.

As I review my patient’s surgical histories, I come across a high percentage of women who have had at least one abortion.  Many of them are remorseful knowing they extinguished a life, while others would not have a problem wearing a “I had an abortion” t-shirt at a pro-choice rally.

The following comment was left on my blog as a response to one of Delight in Truth’s most popular articles “Face to Face With the Reality of Abortion” (here) .  It comes  from a Christian woman who had an abortion in her youth.  It is an uplifting message of repentance and redemption.  She is an example that the blood of Christ can cover any sin, even one as horrific as abortion.  Her blog The Narrowing Path is here.

“For those who have posed the question…if you want to know how a woman could do such a thing [abort her baby], you could ask one directly. Some of us are more than willing to be honest about our experience.

It is one of the most horrendous things a woman can go through, and only the Lord himself can heal a person from the trauma of it. I know, I had one when I was a young adult. At the time, I was spiraling into a breakdown, and couldn’t even process the information about my “options”. I saw none, and with terrible dread every step of the way, went through with it, knowing it was an abominable thing to do, as my mum held my hand and bid farewell to her first grandchild.

I have wept more than I could have ever imagined over this experience, and it certainly was very poignant when my first son was born a decade later. My two children are such an undeserved gift from the Lord, given the fact that I killed my first child.

I share my story sometimes, as a support to others, and also to remind people who even Christians can backslide into terrible sinning and find themselves in this situation.

There are options, and as Christians, abortion is not one of them. It is humbling when you look at the ten commandments and have to admit to all of them, murder included. Thankfully we have a merciful and gracious God, who washes us clean with the blood of his precious Son.

From blood-red to snowy white.

The Lord has now healed me from that trauma, and forgiven me for that heinous sin. I pray that we can show the same compassion to others who have been through similar situations, without ever condoning the practice at any stage in a pregnancy.”

image credit

Jan 26 2013

The Pro Life Movement as a Civil Rights Movement

The Pro Life movement has been invigorated in recent years like never before.  It is now moving in the direction of the Civil Rights movement, that is a Right to Life cause, despite the fact that abortion legality is here to stay.

The line has been drawn in the sand 40 years ago, but as the Bible tells us, in the last days we are seeing an increasing separation between good and evil.  The contrast has never been greater on the issue of the unborn, primarily because many young people are beginning to see the evil of abortion that their parents ignored.

Many of the staunched feminists of the Roe v Wade era have passed, and the new wave of abortionist feminism is not nearly as dedicated to their cause as the previous generation.  The recent TIME Magazine article on this topic explains the reasons for it.

But the mainstream media will not let you hear of it.

At the superficially covered ‘March for Life’ event in Washington this week where 500,000 pro lifers participated, there was a higher percentage of young people compared to previous marches.  These Christians have made their stand for the fundamental right to life.  And all the pro-life websites are taking notice.

So are the politicians.

Senator Rand Paul (Presbyterian) spoke at the rally and said:

“I have a question for those who don’t respect and won’t protect life: Can a nation long endure that does not respect the sanctity of life?”

“Can a nation conceived in liberty carry its head high if it denies protection to the youngest and most vulnerable of its citizens? Can a country founded on God-given rights continue to thrive without understanding that life is a precious gift from our Creator?”

He called for this new generation to be part of a great “revival” for the country centered on justice and compassion, seeing the present state of the nation as being in moral peril.

I have seen this polarization in my medical career.  I have NEVER met a doctor in my generation who specializes in abortion.  All the abortion doctors I know are from the previous generation, and they are about to retire.  In fact many of them are way past the retiring age because the system NEEDS them and will not let them retire.

New doctors coming out of med school do not want to do abortions.  Many find it morally wrong, but most find it absolutely hideous.  The idea is absolutely physically repulsive and is in stark contrast with our committment to healing.  We will not become a tool of the abortionist activist movement.

There is a song by Jesus Culture ( 😉 ) called ‘Break Every Chain’ that talks about an army rising up in the name of Jesus to proclaim the power that is in the name of Jesus.  This young generation of believers may be the ones to finally match the abortionist’s activism… but do it in the name of Jesus.

Roe v Wade will not be overturned.  But the fight to limit it at the state and federal level is intensifying.  On the spiritual front the fight is the fiercest it has ever been.

Could we be seeing the beginning of a new spiritual revival… possibly the last one before Christ’s return?

image credit: Drew Angerer/The New York Times

Jan 10 2013

Face to Face With the Reality of Abortion

 

I had passed many times by this door.

My naive mind always wondered why a door in the middle section of a hospital ward would have a “NOT AN EXIT” sign on it.

“It should be obvious this is not an exit… it is right in the middle of a large a building… “ I thought.

It was next to one of the elevators of a large level-1 trauma county hospital and very close to the obstetrics ward.  Dozens of happy new mothers would pass by this door every week on the way home with a beautiful newborn baby in their arms.

It was the summer of 2000, and I was a 24-year-old newbie medical student on the surgical clerkship when the issue of abortion finally became as real as it gets.  It was time to rotate through the anesthesiology service as part of the surgical experience, and I was spending some time with a 2nd year anesthesia resident.  We were on our way to prepare the obstetrics operating rooms for scheduled C-sections that day.

“Hey, I’ll show you a neat short cut to the operating room…” he says.

He headed straight for the mysterious door with the puzzling sign on it, and we entered.

To my amazement it felt like I stepped into another world.  I just went from a noisy environment of sick patients, infections, trauma, alcoholism and other plagues associated with county hospitals, into a large pre-operative waiting room filled with a dozen young and healthy looking women dressed in hospital gowns.

The room was filled with a silence as thick as death itself.

“They are waiting to get their abortions done” he whispered to me as we hurried on our way.

My heart sank as I saw the nervous, worried and guilty looks on their faces.

A horrific big picture fell into place for me that morning.  A picture that is replicated thousands of times across America in slaughter houses called “family planning clinics.”

A few months later I returned to the “county” for my 2 month OB-Gyn clerkship, and during orientation the coordinator of the slaughter-house showed up.  To this day I remember her first and last name, her face, and the air of feminist liberation in her voice.

“We are excited you will spend a week with us in the abortion clinic where you will participate in these procedures which stand for freedom of choice for women” she said.

“God, how am I going to make it through a week of this…? God, help me exercise the faith You put in me… I don’t care if I fail this clerkship, but I know You will not let me participate in shedding innocent blood”

I raised my hand and I said:

“My faith in God precludes me from participating in abortion. I hope this will not interfere with my OB-Gyn clinicals…”

There were 5 med students on that rotation, and to my surprise a female student echoed my sentiment.  If I remember correctly she was a Catholic.

Imagine the shock on the abortion coordinator’s face when light (the mention of faith in God) penetrated the darkness in her heart.  She was hardened to the point where she could not understand why we did not accept the “greatest” achievement that has ever occurred in the feminist movement, the holy grail of their agenda- a woman’s right to terminate her baby.

“Why are you even here? Why are you wasting your talents and your education? Why can’t you have an open mind and accept what we deem right as a society?”

Thank God for another reasonable clerkship director who honored our request.  Not all Christians are quite so fortunate.  There are reports in the media of nurses who lost their job because they refused to participate in termination of pregnancy.  They underwent legal recourse and lost that too.

By the grace of God I spend one week there without participating in the murder of the unborn.  I spoke to many teen girls who were about to undergo abortion.  I even tried secretly, yet unsuccessfully, to show them other options.

Ultimately, God taught me a lesson as He turned an anxiety provoking situation into a blessing.  In the end I earned an “honors” grade in Ob-Gyn.

It was a lesson that God wanted to teach me.  To put my trust in Him, and He would deliver me against evil.

Psalm 84:12 “O LORD of hosts, blessed is the man that trusts in you.”

Jan 9 2013

TIME Magazine Misses the Mark… Again

Image of a doctor's surgical bed with stirrups

Well, TIME magazine has a predisposition to exaggerate, and add shock value to their covers.  It started in 1966 when they claimed in big bold letters on their cover: “GOD IS DEAD.”  That title was laughable.  This one is NOT.

“GOD IS DEAD” was laughable because we know that God is exactly where Isaiah saw him “high and lifted up,” and where John saw him in Revelation chapters 4 and 5 receiving the worship of angels, elders and heavenly creatures.

This title however, is built on the 55 million babies who were slaughtered in their mothers wombs since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion.  55 million murders of tiny persons was not enough for the abortion platform to declare victory.

TIME has declared itself as an abortion platform by lamenting the so-called “losing ever since” war. Wow…

The article is only available to subscribers but here are the top complaints of the pro-choice activists:

  • abortion has been regulated at the state level and abortion has become too restrictive
  • 4 states have only one abortion clinic in operation
  • there was a significant drop in abortion doctors in the last 20 years
  • only 41% of the American public identify themselves as pro-choice
  • in-fighting among feminists (young vs. old)
  • defending the status-quo is always harder than fighting to change it
  • ultrasound technology makes the babies look… human

These abortion activists must be living in a parallel universe!

Here are the numbers again: 55 million aborted, that is 1,375,000 million abortions per year! Almost 40% of the US female population has had at least one abortion!

If this was a physical war, the casualties are all one-sided.  This is not a losing war for the abortionists, its is a hands down epic slaughter of tiny innocent lives…

There is one point in the article which is true.  As a physician in a metropolitan area, I know hundreds of other physicians, and there are thousands of physicians in my city.  Among all doctors, there are only two who provide abortions.  One is in his 80’s and another is probably in his 70’s.  The new generation of physicians are grossed out by abortion and they do not want to do it.  We view it as a creepy field to specialize in, and therefore we now have a dramatic reduction in those willing to provide abortions.

For those who are bewildered as to why Christians are so vehemently pro-life, we go to Luke chapter 1 where we read the following about a certain baby who later became the greatest prophet prior to Jesus, John the Baptist:

“he [John] will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb.”

“And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb.  And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit… …For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy”

An unborn baby exhibits the qualities of a PERSON.  He is filled with the Holy Spirit.  He is able to experience the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5:22), joy.  He leaped for joy!  How can any Christian ignore such strong language?

Many Christians will only read about abortion.  They will never encounter abortion other than being aware of the statistics.

On the other hand, as a young medical student I came face to face with harsh reality of abortion…

It was an early morning in an old county hospital in July, 2000…

to be continued… (here)