By Eric Holmberg
Part 1
ABORTION IN BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE
There is much medical evidence that human life begins early in the development of a fetus. At only six to eight weeks of development it is obvious that the developing fetus is not “a blob of tissue,” as pro-abortionists would like us to believe, but a remarkably developed baby boy or girl.
But medical and scientific evidence is not our primary source of Truth. The Word of God, the Bible, must be our source for determining the sanctity of life from the moment of conception. In fact, the very name of God points us in the direction of the sanctity of life from the time it is conceived in the womb.
Let’s first briefly review what the Bible says about human life in the womb.
The Bible tells us in Exodus 34 verses 5 through 7, the name of the Lord followed by the revelation of His character and nature, Jehovah Rachum, or “God is merciful.”
The root of the Hebrew word for “merciful,” rachum, and “mercy,” rachamim, was the first aspect of God’s character to be revealed to the prophet Moses on Mount Sinai.
Racham is also the root of the word in Hebrew for “womb” rachum. The womb then, in its original Hebrew context, is the center or seat of mercy, the place from which the child, being formed in the image of God, is conceived, formed, nurtured and born.
Jesus declared in Matthew 5:7, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” But the converse is also true. When men, for their own convenience, would send their swords into that place of life and mercy, defiling the sanctity of life within the recham the womb turning it from its purpose, it may be necessary to consider Christ’s declaration of the wages earned by those who take up the sword: “Those who live by the sword, shall die by the sword” (Matthew 26:52).
It is no coincidence that Jesus, the Messiah, would be conceived in a womb and born of a woman after a full term pregnancy.
We need look no further than the story of Jesus’ conception to see that life is indeed sacred from the womb. Christ himself was both fully man and fully God from the moment of His conception.
“And the angel answered and said to her: ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God'” (Luke 1:35).
We see the sanctity of life in the womb outlined clearly in the Gospel according to Luke 1:26-41. Shortly after Christ’s conception was revealed to Mary through the angel Gabriel, Luke tells us: “Now Mary arose in those days and went into the hill country with haste, to a city of Judah, and entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And it happened, when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, that the babe leapt in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.”
In Luke 1:26, we are told that Jesus was conceived exactly six months after Elizabeth’s son, John the Baptist. It was John who leapt in the womb at the greeting of Mary and the coming of the preborn Savior into the house of his father, Zechariah.
Jesus had to be somewhere within the first trimester of pregnancy the time when 88 percent of the abortions in our nation are performed when John “leapt in the womb” at the arrival of the Savior.
It is also interesting to consider that the first “Gospel message” was preached at the coming of Christ while He was still in the first trimester of development. The “Good News” was initiated by the preborn infant John proclaiming the divinity of the baby Jesus that the Savior had come into the world.
It is clear throughout the Scriptures that life begins at conception in the womb.
“For Thou didst form my inward parts. Thou didst weave me in My mother’s womb. I will give thanks to Thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalms 139:13).
“Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. And before you were born I consecrated you” (Jeremiah 1:5).
“… the Lord who made you and formed you in the womb …” (Isaiah 44:2).
According to Scripture, abortion is a sin against God a violation of the sixth commandment,
“You shall not murder.” It is the wanton killing of innocent human life in the womb a place designed by God to be a refuge of life and mercy.
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This was an exerpt from “Massacre of Innocence”, a video production by Eric Holmberg of The Apologetics Group/Reel to Real Ministries. Although produced in 1985, this video has been digitally remastered (2006) and would be a great resource for any pro-life ministry or educational program.
You can purchase this DVD from Eric’s website:
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