Christianity and Abortion | Full Sermon | Jeremiah 1:5

[Music] [Music] all right hey guys welcome to Mercy Hill tonight I want to welcome you especially if you are newer with us I want to begin our night before we dive into our sermon with a quick celebration you guys that have been around mercy Hill know this we are one Church in four locations okay right here then Edgeville Road Clifton in High Point but we are really a church that across those four locations pumps community groups okay we believe the church gathers on the weekend and then it scatters during the week and over 150 community groups meeting all over the Tri I made up at 10 to 15 people that come together to work out the principles of the Bible in everyday life and really kind of you know move it along in terms of their Christian discipleship and we believe that discipleship happens in community well one of things I want to celebrate with you guys and I've done this across all of our locate all of our services this weekend it's just I found out this week that across all four locations okay just in 2020 alone we have raised up 10 new apprentice leaders to plant new community groups this year can we celebrate that together all right there is a lot of man there is a ton of discipleship that goes into people being in a group and being raised up to plant a new group and all of that and so we are just praying for them across all of our locations and man that represents about 150 new spots for people to dive in and get into a relationship with one another and so we really want to see that happen over the course of the year so just keep them lifted up in your prayer time or whatever all right all right today we're gonna dive in to Jeremiah chapter 1 and we're gonna look at one verse of the Bible tonight now the way I want to set up this sermon is by just kind of giving you a very generalized illustration of the Christian life right at first and then we'll dive into the truth today that we're trying to work out but here's the deal with Christianity especially some of you guys might be have been believers for a long time some of you might be newer I mean lat you know maybe last five years or even last five months in the faith or whatever some of you might not even be there yet one of the things about the Christian faith is this there are no beliefs in the Christian faith that don't end up having a corollary behavior or action that follows them okay there's nothing in the Christian life where you say oh great academically I now know that it doesn't work like that whatever you end up knowing and finding out about God and about what he wants for us and about his people there ends up being an action that follows it all right now some of the actions are easy and some of them you may have to do a little bit of work to figure out let me give you one you might have to do a little bit of work to figure out because that's how our our time is gonna be today I was just thinking of Christian beliefs that don't have like a real easy one step you know that's what we do because we believe that and one that popped in my mind was the belief that our body is a temple you know if you've ever thought about like man you know our body is a gift and like man we're not just spirit we're not just spirit on earth we're not gonna be just spirit in heaven like God has made us embodied people hey how does it work its way into our everyday life and what new Christians do differently than the world or should they or at least what is their motivation you know and pushing them to a different kind of conclusion than the world on these things and I got to thinking about it and I thought well your body is it simple what does that mean it means you take care of it maybe that means exercise maybe that means you know eating a certain way or whatever you know what I thought about it means for me you know I don't know about you there is nothing I like less on earth than going to the dentist okay can anybody say amen to that I know we're not a real talk back church I wish we were but somebody's gonna say Amen about the dentist okay I don't want you to get I don't want you to misunderstand I'm not an anti dint tight okay I like dentists and I'm fine with that okay but I'm pretty kid when I stand up and I preach about heaven and the kingdom of God I am envisioning a place where there are no dental practices okay I'm not saying there's not gonna be dentists there but they're not gonna be practicing dentistry there okay so I'm just kind of being a little bit funny but I think about man there are things that we do there are things that maybe we even don't love but we do there are a lot of things that follow the Christian doctrine of man God gifted you with the body you're supposed to take care of it right okay big big truth there's no belief that doesn't have an action that follows it all right well let me talk to you about the belief that we're gonna dive into from Jeremiah chapter one today you ready the church stands for life that's our action why because God forms life well we're going to talk about today from Jeremiah chapter one is this that God is the ultimate painter with a god paintbrush and only he can paint the beating heart only he can bring life to gather y'all we're gonna talk about God forming life in the womb he is the author of it he is the only one that creates something as beautiful as a child there is mystery in it there is wonder in it there is all in it God is mighty in creation and because we see the beauty of it and because we believe that then Christians are called to stand for life in every belief there is an action that follows it a biblically informed action and so the Bible is filled with verses just like this one Isaiah 1:17 it says seek justice defend the cause of the fatherless you know Jeremiah 1:27 says this pure religion is looking after the orphan you could say it like this what God creates we value and what we value is shown in what we do do we pray for the unborn do we pray for moms that find themselves and just about and impossible what they feel like is an impossible situation man are we gonna take action steps like the ones that I'm gonna give you guys today especially towards the end of the sermon that's what we're gonna talk about let's talk about the beauty of life what God has done and how we can all take our stand because of what God has done and let me give you two caveats before we dive into Jeremiah 1 all right the first one is this I know across all of our services across all of our campuses I bet here tonight I know there are some people in here right now that are probably already rubbed it's like man just the way this is culturally just the way this is with all the politics that go with it and just and just everything about it it's like man is I'm even bringing it up it's like starting to be a little bit of rub it's inside of you and you might already be thinking man I feel like I'm gonna disagree with everything you say and this entire sermon and that might be where you are here's what I ask you to do hey would you hear the Christian position and listen maybe would you not put me in that box that your mind is forming for me because because maybe by the end of the sermon maybe you're gonna look back and say man I agree or I don't agree but maybe you're gonna look back and I hope what you will say is man there is grace and compassion and care even if I don't agree man maybe they're not who I think that they are and I'll just pray you give me a hearing okay hey the second thing I would say though is this in a church our size and in a room this size there is no doubt that across our church there are hundreds on hundreds of people this again that this issue of life and abortion and all of that it is not a debate on some college campus somewhere it's not a political thing for hundreds of people across our church men and women there are those of you that this has touched your life you have walked through the tragedy of abortion you have helped with a friend that did that maybe somebody pressured you maybe you were one that pressured somebody else okay there's gonna be hundreds of people who have walked through this and to you right at the beginning the sermon this is not all I'm gonna say about this we're gonna talk about this a lot but I want you to hear this you gotta understand that where you are tonight is in a church that understands that abortion is not the unpardonable sin and that every single Christian knows what it's like to have their sin end up putting Jesus Christ on the cross then abortion is not way for you it can be stigmatizing culture or whatever but we understand that whether it's greed or pride or sexual sin or idolatry or whatever it is every one of us have things every one of us have sins to the heart every one of us have skeletons in the closet and God is not scared of those things and the cross is bigger than those things and His grace is deeper still all right we're gonna talk a lot about that but I want you to hear that right on the front end now let's dive into Jeremiah chapter one we're only gonna look at one verse tonight okay so it might be worth reading it a couple times so let's read it twice and then I'm gonna walk through and we're gonna break it down that's going to be almost all of our time right at the end we'll come back we'll tie it all together with a few applications that we can kind of take out of here that'll be our time together tonight all right before I formed you in the womb I knew you and before you were born I consecrated you that just means I had plans for you I set something aside for you I appointed you a prophet to the nation's he's speaking there to Jeremiah before I formed you in the womb I knew you before you were born I consecrated you I had plans for you and I appointed you to be a prophet to the nation's y'all what I want to look at today from this passage of Scripture is the beauty of what God does when he brings life into this world I'm talking about the beauty of his formation the beauty of the fact that there is a God in heaven that wants to know us that he is not ad istic God that winds up a clock and kicks it off oh no he forms us he knows us and this idea of a consecration he has plans for us you could say like this God forms us he knows us and he has plans for us and that's gonna be what follows we're gonna kind of follow that pattern as we walk through this all right it's a beautiful thing here's what I want to spend our time on I want to spend our time talking about what God does because man I think if we see it we're gonna see the beauty in it you know what you know what I found out a couple just through some reading this week this is interesting to me you know when they're training a federal agent to spot counterfeit money they spend no time talking about the counterfeit money they spent they don't they don't train somebody to spot counterfeits by looking at hey see that's wrong that's wrong you see how this is wrong you know how they train somebody to spot or counterfeit they stare deeply day after day for a long time at the real thing and whenever you're looking at the real thing long enough all of a sudden the counterfeit shows itself and what I want you guys to hear tonight is this I honestly believe that the world when it comes to life and the value of life and all of that continues to set forth a counterfeit idea and as and as we as believers I think can come to the Word of God and what we can do is we can look in and we could say man let's stare at the beauty of the real thing and when we see the beauty of what God actually wants for life and what God actually wants for grace and even those in post abortive situations what he wants for all of our lives and relationship with us and all of that I think then we're gonna be able to spot the counterfeit that the world is trying to peddle all right let's just walk through this verse and just go right through it okay remember formed new and consecrated or had plans number one before I formed you in the womb I knew you this is all about formation what the Bible says is that God makes babies and that doesn't happen after they are born it says that God is integrally involved at every stage of human life he is involved at the very beginning and here's what I want you to hear and I know everybody's not a believer I know everybody in here may not even be a Bible person okay but one of the things you got to know about the Bible and what Christians believe should because the Bible says it as clear as day is this idea y'all there is no ambiguity about life in terms of biblically speaking there is no ambiguity it's not really up for debate Brian Larissa pastor says it like this every believer who believes the Bible is true should fight for the unborn why because the Bible is not ambiguous on this issue there are gray areas in the Bible and and I'm a big proponent of this when there's a gray area we should not draw in pen and ink what God has drawn in pencil and we can't quite see it sometimes I'm a big believer in that but when it comes to life that's just not the case we could go to Genesis 1 we could go to Psalm 139 here we're in Jeremiah chapter 1 the Bible is not ambiguous we are formed by God and therefore for the believer we kind of point out some of the world's arguments much of the debate about abortion and and life and all of that it really hinges on this idea of you know when you're thinking about what's the difference in a baby in the womb or out of the womb what do people think well it's it's size difference it's a level of development difference it's an environment of where the baby is difference it's a dependency level you know if you think about those things it's like yeah an unborn child is different than an adult in those areas but then again so is a toddler you know they're there there's a lot of it there's a lot of argument that goes around all these types of things location size all that what I want you guys to hear is that for the believer how big somebody is or cognitive ability or location you know these are not where the argument is what we've got to do is Center on the Word of God and realize no no God forms and fashions and knits together every child in the mother's womb God is you could say like this forming at every stage including the embryonic stages God is doing this that when the egg is fertilized within three weeks you have a beating heart and gender is determined y'all within six weeks brain waves are detected and the baby's hands are moving with seven weeks a child and I've seen this on ultrasound they begin to move their head back and forth y'all at seven weeks old they begin to interlock their fingers and sit like we do like this you know at eight weeks old my baby is either right-handed or left-handed at nine weeks old it's sucking its thumb at ten weeks old the baby is beginning to yawn when it's tired God is inner Glee forming at every stage not just as a toddler or youth or or whatever he is forming at every stage the book says and this is just what the book says the book says that in the womb before you're born God is forming you and I just want us to pause for a moment and realize that y'all if that's true and God is forming and he is painting with a paintbrush that none of us can that there is nothing on the face of this planet that rivals what God has done in the creation of that baby there is beauty that is there that is unrivaled I thought about some things that take a long time you know in Japanese war culture samurai culture of old you know they have these katanas okay they bit you know sword samurai sword or whatever hey it took fifteen men six months a full time labor to create one that's how intricate it was that's how balanced it was that's how how serious it was I think about a cathedral in Barcelona Spain the Sagrada família maybe some of you have heard of it construction began I think in 1882 it won't be finished till 2026 they knew it was 150 year project the day it started spires 560 feet up in the air all the architecture all the stone all of all of that stuff man there are things in this life that are beautiful but nothing compares to God holding the paintbrush why we can create all these things but not one of us can paint the beating heart not one of us can bring life where there was none only God can do this and because of that y'all we should value what he creates what God creates we should value all right if he is the former if he is the author if he is the one that is painting with the paintbrush then believer we read the word and then we value greatly what God is doing can I say - can I say two things about this and we'll move on okay to the idea of God knowing you two things about it number one I think that this is a truth that all of us get intrinsically and intuitively we understand that what God creates we should value especially life in the womb I think that what ends up searing our heart away from that is either years of philosophical and political argument or maybe somebody in a bad situation in their back being up against the wall and not knowing what else to do and maybe in their mind they just feel like they got a table at or whatever either way it's a searing of conscience we know this intuitively when we see a baby in the womb when we know it I think about my son ap was seven years old a year and a half ago we went just like our church was gonna do this weekend this is the cards we're gonna talk about this but we when I took them to pray at the abortion clinic I'm not a protest not to holler at moms oh my okay this is not what we're about to go and to pray to get on our knees and to pray and I took my boys that morning and it didn't occur to me till we were eating breakfast that morning when he asked me what are we going to do that I had never had the conversation with him and it caught me off guard he's seven years old I didn't quite know how to and I'm backpedaling and I'm talking and I'm trying to and and you can listen you may not know me I pray that you'll give me a little bit of grace with this okay I was not loading the language a bit that's for some political commentator somewhere else on a news TV show that wants to load up the language not when you're talking to somebody that's real not when you got a real child that you're trying to explain what's going on in the world there's no loading of the language I was backpedaling to the point of almost not being honest with him his tears are flowing in his eyes tears are flowing in my eyes it was the same timeframe where New York State had passed their legislation to rollback any and all protections of the unborn all the way to the point of birth if you remember this a year and a half ago and man it was the shouts heard around the world when the legislature was just cheering and slapping each other on the back when they had rolled back all of these protections all the way to the point of birth and he had heard about that actually school even a seven years old and this is how it affected him emotionally y'all four weeks after this conversation and going to to pray for weeks at night when we would pray he would say to me dad I want to pray he wouldn't say the word he would say I want to pray for that thing we talked about you dad you know the thing in New York you know the laws I want to pray that they changed that tears in his eyes multiple nights y'all wheat this is my point we know it takes a searing of the conscience maybe through philosophy on some college campus or maybe it's because somebody gets in a really bad situation maybe it wasn't even their fault that they got put there and it begins to start searing at the conscience when they begin to think what am I gonna do what am I gonna do either way what I want you to hear is that we know this all right it is tattooed on the human heart we understand that God creates something we should value hey the second thing I'll say very quickly is this there is a critique that comes even from I mean from Bible believing godly Christians that I think a church like ours needs to hear and here's the critique there are some that come from maybe a different background or whatever and and some say hey you say that Christians are supposed to value what God creates but it sounds like you it seems like to me you only do that when you're talking about abortion that's a critique that we need to hear when somebody says hey it don't seem like you value creation all that much it don't seem like you value people when they're incarcerated all that much like we need we need to hear that and I just kind of I just want I just want to say me if that's where you are listen I do hear that okay and we wrestle with that humbly I would also say and this might you know you may agree with this or not I would submit to that argument hey I think that that's a good critique that we need to hear now I do think that it's an argument that we need to care about creation more not babies less okay so we got to make sure we all understand that we're on the same page with that but assuming we're on the same page with that I do understand that we need to speak fatica ly about other things not just this but y'all that doesn't mean that we need to stop talking about this and doing it in a way that is full of grace and compassion y'all what God creates we value God forms hey second thing I want you to see is that he knows us there is a relationship here look at verse 5 again before I formed you in the womb I knew you in the womb he says he knew you and what the Bible said when you don't want the Old Testament the Bible talks about God knowing you that's intimate there is relationship there that's what the Bible is trying to get us to see that God loves you that God wants you that you could say it like this that God has been thinking about you for a long time hey I know that for some of us it's like hey you know God God's thoughts about me or or whatever I'm not sure what he thinks about me one thing I want you to hear is that the pheno you get into your teenage years or late you start thinking about God the first time you had a thought about God was not the first time he had had thoughts about you I mean he's been thinking about you for a long time and he loves you and he wants you you are Genesis 1 the crown jewel of his creation and even despite our sin man he wants us in a relationship with him every single human being is born into being a created you know part of a special crowning you know jewel of creation we're born into being God's child in that way that we're all humanity with His image but y'all every one of us have sinned and run away from God it's not just about the issues of life and abortion we've run away from God and pride and greed and hurtful things that we say and sexual sin and idolatry we run away from God in all these types of ways through addiction all these things we run away from God and yet he knows us He loves us he wants us he beckons us he calls us this is a beautiful truth today alright the God that knows you sent his son to die on a cross so that you could know him even despite your sin even despite the things that we've done wrong in rebellion Jesus Christ died on the cross so that we could know that God who knows us this is what Christ has come to do that he took on the sin of the world that he ends up y'all wrestling it to the ground he ends up canceling our debt before God he takes a penalty that we deserved and now we have the opportunity to know him y'all God knows us he knows every hair on your head he knows the secret thoughts of your heart he knows what lights you up inside your dreams he understands these things he knows also your sin he loves you anyway he knows you he wants you to know him and I think there's some maybe in our church even now as I begin to say this and I'm saying God knows you God knows you God knows you and some of you right now might be thinking to yourself I don't know that I want God to know me all the way down to the deepest level like you're talking about maybe you have some of this stuff that we're talking about today abortion things about life whatever in your background somewhere and you're like man I don't I don't know that God could love me if he knows that about me can I just try to hit that head on I understand that these issues of life bring great sadness to us I mean they really do I've talked to moms that are that are decades later after an abortion and and there are nightmares there are things that go on in their life I know that I know the secular world doesn't want to talk about that but it's a real stuff I mean when you actually know people that have come forward and are walking out of these things they this is stuff that they deal with i sat with a man this week in my office 40 years ago he helped a friend who is another man financially take care of a situation you understand what I mean forty years ago he's setting off as he wept I wept y'all this is a hurtful thing there is sadness to it but for some in here that remorse is turning into guilt and shame that is crushing it's making you want to run away from God and I want you to hear that your sin is not bigger than the cross that God's grace is deeper still and here's what the enemy does Satan wants you to believe that you're alone he wants you to believe that you're the only one which statistically speaking is not true even in a room this size okay he wants you to believe you're the only one anyway he's got this thing in your mind that keeps saying yeah but of all the things that people do you're the one that shed innocent blood and here's what I want you to hear every Christian knows what it's like to shed innocent blood every single Christian knows what it's like if they understand the gospel they know what it's like to have their sin result in Jesus Christ dying on a cross for them that is not unique to you you see I shed innocent blood hey all of us did the sin of the world was hung around his neck and he went to the cross and his blood flowed for every one of our sins but it covers us man your sin and abortion is not bigger than the cross God's grace is deeper still and this is a church that has its arms wide open to you don't let the enemy try to crush you with this God forms you no matter what we have done he knows you he wants you to know him okay there is there's an intimate knowledge here he knows you he wants you to know him and then thirdly and finally let me just say this quickly here before you were born I consecrated you I appointed you a prophet to the nation's he he forms you he knows you and then the scripture says he has a specific plan for your life he's got plans for you one of the things that's interesting even now about those who maybe don't even come from religious background maybe they don't even maybe they've got nothing in their life in terms of thinking about life or thinking about abortion or whatever many young people are turning to more of a lie oriented kind of way of looking at the world and it's I think it's very simple the reason why is because the millennial generation may be a little bit older they were the ultrasound generation they were the ones that remember what it was like to see their little brothers and sisters on the ultrasound machine and it's like it's kind of like what I was said earlier with my son it's like you can you can do all the years of philosophical argument trying to get that out of you but it's like man when a child is 12 years old they look in there like that's my brother you know that's my sister they just sort of know here's what I want you to hear God had plans for that child on that ultrasound in the womb the plan's didn't come later on in their teenage years in their 20s or 30s or whatever no no the Bible is telling us this is just what the book says that before we were even born these plans he had for our life now we can get all awry we can end up messing today he's got plans for each and every one of us and here's what this means for the issue of abortion you know when it comes to abortion it's not just snuffing out of life it's nothing out of destiny a purpose and a calling its snuffing out something that God was intending to do and I know some when it comes to this issue y'all especially those who have walked through it especially those who don't come maybe from a background the I come from I know somebody's gonna say man you don't know what it's like to grow up in abject poverty and abuse and all this kind of stuff and the answer is you're absolutely right I don't know what that's like and it makes me want to pause and try to try to sympathize and try to slow down and try to say man I got to try to understand because there are some that as crazy as it is to my mind with my background some say hey you don't understand with my background you know abortion is mercy I mean therapy you know there's some of you might even hear that that kind of view that and I'm like man you know what the more I think about it I can understand how you're getting to that position but what I've got to tell you today is this whether you come from privilege whether you come from abject poverty none of us are God and we don't have the ability to look in and snuff out a calling and a purpose and a destiny I'm trying to be empathetic and trying to understand and I'm like man I can understand if somebody says man I was abused my whole life every adoption foster care story ain't like the ones you put on the screen okay I'll bounced around foster care my whole life there are people that maybe have that story but even if that's you well you probably have more credibility to speak into some of these things the fact is you're not God and I'm not God and we're not the ones who get to decide whose story and purpose and calling is worth living or not you know the thing is that you know you think about Jeremiah I mean some of you might know this but Jeremiah is called the weeping prophet for a reason his life was really really hard okay people I mean he should have been called the persevering prophet God was tough as nails determined visionary leader his life was harder than most any of ours in this room I know that God had plans for him he used him in mighty mighty ways just because something's hard doesn't mean that God is not going to use that life and it is not up to us one way or another to decide if it is worth living or not here's what the Bible says God forms us he knows us and he has plans for us all right this is just what the book says now let me try to draw your attention back to the intro okay because we're gonna start getting to application remember there is not one Christian doctrine that doesn't have some things we're supposed to do with it we don't do things to you know get approval from God or anything like that it's not when our hearts are changed and we begin to see the beauty of God we begin to act differently remember if we think about our body as a temple we end up going to the dentist that's torturous as it is okay we have that man we do things and here's what I want you to do here's what I want you to see hey God forms life so stand to be counted for the cause of life man is your life hey some of us most of us probably in this room not maybe not everybody but most of us in this room are probably gonna say man I'm for life like I'm for life I get that hey saying we're for life ain't the same thing as being for life I mean when we talk about things and we say we believe things but you look back and you say man there was just no action behind it there was nothing that we ever did I mean even even as simple as praying or even as simple as giving to the adoption fund or giving to you know something with the care center or volunteering some time or what it's like if we look back and we go man there was never anything in my life that really kind of showed that I was thin in what sense are we really for life we say it but are we for it well let me try to clear this up and just just say well let's talk about some things we can do all right if we are for life let's talk about some things that we can do the analogy that I want to call the church to this weekend is the idea of prophet and priest okay Jesus talked a little bit about this when he talks about being salt and light there are there is really a couple of roles that the church needs to play in the culture and you can extrapolate some of this from the Old Testament into the New Testament but I want you to think about the two roles okay what's the role of a prophet the role of a prophet is to speak the truth into door into dark places the role of a prophet is to call for repentance the role of a prophet is to shine the light in when nobody else wants to open their eyes that's what the role of a prophet is and that's what the church needs to be now the role of a priest is to Minister grace the church needs to be that as well we need to be both I want to try to talk to you about when we're supposed to be either okay the first one is this the church should speak prophetically to the culture there is a culture that is cut off from its creator and therefore it is a culture who champions and celebrates death it doesn't talk about life and the beauty that it should be and for that church with care and compassion we don't sound like a political commentator what we sound like is a compassionate Christian who stands and shines the light and what we say is things like this no no the Word of God tells us to seek justice to look after the orphan Psalm 82 says defend the cause of the weak Jeremiah 22 3 sells us not to shed innocent blood we speak the truth in care and compassion it's a tough line to walk it's a line where we say man we don't want to show or be mean-spirited but that's not the same thing as not being serious so we got to walk that line okay and that's what we got to be caring compassionate but dead serious the other thing I think the church has got to be is sharp I try to call our church to this man we have got to be ones who read the culture who read the moment who see it for what it is we've got to be a people who are willing at times to speak prophetically draw out the irony of a culture that champions death you say what does that look like I think it means like asking people questions until they ask you a question I mean asking people questions that are so unsettling that it ends up being like man I wonder what do you think about these things you know say what are some of those questions well I would say some of the questions are kind of like this hey I here all the time that abortion is totally and only about women's health care it's a women's health care issue that's what I hear well then here's my question why do you screen the baby for Down syndrome if it's all about women's health care then why can we not do altra sounds in countries like India because if they find out through the ultrasound that the baby's a girl it will be aborted at a disproportionately high rates if it's all about women's health care then why is it this over here we've got to be able to ask the question it's not yelling it's not a protest it's a question we've got to be able to say hey how do we live in a culture where the laws make no sense you tell me how this makes any sense that somebody could get drunk lose control their car smash into another card that has a 1314 week old you know 1314 week along pregnant woman causes her to abort and that drunk driver ends up going to jail for manslaughter yet that same person can go to school become a doctor make tons and tons of money through their career through abortion and be championed as a you know champion of a freedom of choice we've got to just be able to lay it out and just say man you explained it to me I mean it makes no sense we understand that it makes no sense we've got to be a people who are willing to step in and to say hey I've been told and we have been told for decades that we need abortion because fathers aren't stepping up to the plate but you look at the plight of fatherlessness since Roe verse what abortion has done to the state of fathers in our culture we've got to be able to stand in compassion and care but dead serious and say things to the culture like this hey I've heard so many times in my life you nobody knows when life begins that's what people say they hit man we don't know when life begins well the problem with that is I mean a Christian says well I don't really agree with you but if that's what you believe that's about the greatest pro-life argument I've ever heard I mean honestly I've shot a lot of guns in my life and you know what not no one if somebody's behind the target is a reason not to shoot it's not a reason to pull the trigger you understand there's a thousand things we could continue with this okay we could talk about these things and we need to be sharp on these things but this is what I've come this weekend to tell our church and it try to push us okay here's the deal the problem with churches and the problem maybe even with us maybe even with me is that there are so many times where what the culture needs and what individual families need is the care of a priest and instead we choose to shout like a prophet we need both there are debates on the on the college campus there are political things that go we need to be able to stand and make an argument and scare Scripture I understand that but I think sometimes y'all we can't figure out why the arguments aren't persuading preaching a Board of mothers and ones who are actually going to the clinic we can't we can't figure it out we've got the logic the drunk driver issue all the illustrations all of this I'm gonna tell you in a sentence why the prophetic arguments aren't working in those situations do you know why because many of those moms that find themselves in that situation they already agree with you it's not a philosophical debate for them they don't know what else to do their backs against the wall they're in a really really tight tough situation that maybe some of us have never fathomed being in in our life and that's what's going on we're shouting like a prophet and what they actually need is somebody to come along and care like a priest the church administer grace like a priest there are people that end up at the abortion clinic and what they're trying to figure out is not the philosophy of this whole thing they're trying to figure out how they're gonna make it they're going back through all the different foster care experiences they had in their life and scared to death that this baby is gonna be in the same boat they're thinking of himself I can't even care for myself how am I gonna care for this child and that's what's going on in their mind now am I saying that makes it okay Church you know me you know the word it doesn't mean it makes it okay what I'm saying is the church has got to be sharp enough to understand that when somebody's in that spot they don't need to be shouted out like a prophet they need the care of a priest and you say what does that mean well I'll tell you what it means it means that a church like ours gets a this is care of a priest get a really really good track record on adoption in foster care that's caring like a priest and can I just say Church we're on our way hey we had one of the counties call us this very weak they said hey we had a child that has come up legally free for adoption out of foster care she's a little bit older we're just sort of trying to figure out if there's some families or whatever we had five families for mercy he'll step forward in one hour praise God right this is how you begin to start showing the culture and showing the world around us man we care it's not just some philosophical deal we care we want to minister grace we want to bring you to the throne of grace we all understand what it's like to have shed innocent blood because of our sin know that you're not a pariah we want you to come in this is what the church has got to do continue to have a track record on adoption and foster care people need to see more partners at the care center than they need to see protesters people need to begin to see churches open their arms to post a board of parents and they need to see a church that is willing to stand and be counted not a protest but to pray and they need to see these things and when they do y'all they're gonna see the care and love that the church is supposed to dispense hey let me move toward a conclusion conclusion here okay there are four groups of people that I want to address all right four groups let's knock them out and we'll be done that the first one is this there are some of you in here even tonight that this is not some debate somewhere it is not a political thing it's like man I've walked through this our family walked through this I helped a friend walk through this I was pressured to walk through this I pressured somebody else to walk through this it was just last year it was 40 years ago whenever it was okay here's the deal maybe you've covered it up maybe nobody else even knows probably what needs to happen in your life is some serious care there probably needs to be some people who have walked that road that can help you navigate that and I want you to know there is a ministry this is awesome it's led at the Pregnancy Care Center in Greensboro it's some people at Mercy Hill that lead it okay that are post-abortion recovery groups and we want you to get the help that you need and the care that you need okay man we love you we have our arms wide open to you we don't see you as a special you know section of sinners or anything like that but we do understand that this is a serious thing and it's a tragic thing and you probably need some hell with people who have walked this road before and know a lot more about it than I do we want you to get that help mercy Hill Church calm / chosen is where you can go to get all the contact information for the abortion recovery group at the Greensboro Pregnancy Care Center second group of people there are some of you in here right now that are like man I came in here and this is what's going on in my life right now I'm considering an abortion if that is you as humbly as I can I would plead with you don't don't go through that white because for some reason God has brought you to a church that wants to throw its arms wide open to you and I promise you this if you lean in to what we are doing here there are so many people that will step up to the plate for you you feel like you don't have anybody else there are people that are here I'm talking about helping you get through the medical part of it helping you with the mentoring part of it not just before and then when you have the baby okay you carried it to full term and now you're gone mentoring after lean in to what the church has for you here I promise you there is a church our number one desire for you is to parent your child you to parent the table that's what we want we will help work with you and if that kind of if it comes to where that's just not an option and there are families here that would be willing to open their arms to your child and it's not what you think there are dozens of families at Mercy Hill that would be fine and one and desiring a relationship with you and your child not to tell you to go take a hike or anything like that listen that's not who we are I hope you'll take us up on that if there's somebody that yours walking through that today come forward talk to one of our prayer counselors at the end third group of people up for okay and it was a lot third of four hey there's some of you in here maybe even right now and I know that our campuses as well today and our college services tonight y'all pray for our college services every single thing I've said today you're like man I disagree with everything like not one thing that may be where you are if that is where you are please hear me say this you have been super respectful thank you for listening to the Christian position on these things all right if there is any sand if you're like man didn't make a dent well okay thanks for listening man if there's any sand that shifted under your feet what I mean by that is a question mark come up in your what I mean is what you're thinking right now is like I don't agree with you but you're thinking but some of that stuff I need to think about a little bit more if that's where you're at then I want to call you to get in a community group our key our community groups don't it's not like every week we talk about abortion or so I'm not but what happens is you get in relationships with people and as you begin to know them the serious stuff about life begins to get talked about and so what I'm hoping is that you'll get in a community group hey March fourth is our next on-ramp to groups it's a starter groups thing you can learn all about it them online man get on our website and and and mess around on their starter groups March 4th hey get in community that way you can begin to get around some other believers and work some of this stuff out all right fourth and final group is everybody okay everybody's in this group and what I want to call you too is to get this card out right here okay this card let me let me talk to you about what we're doing this week we have adopted a week with a ministry called love life love life is in Charlotte Raleigh Greensboro and New York City they're a growing ministry that mobilized the church to pray for the unborn to pray for these mothers not to protest not to say some holler at a mom that is not us that is not them that's not who we are it's not who they are they mobilize the church to pray and to go be counted I mean praying that the abortion clinic now okay and that's what we're gonna do so here's what I'm calling everybody to do on the back of this page on the back of this little card there's a spot here for your name and all that stuff and this is where you're gonna get the information about like hey this is the address this is what we're you know this is the prayer points for Wednesday or whatever what you're gonna see is two things I pray that everybody is gonna mark these two I know that's not gonna be everybody there's somebody in here this like man I'm just not where you guys are on this hey maybe you could still pray we'd love for you to join us in that but here's the two things that we're doing this week Wednesday is a prayer day it's a prayer and fasting day summit for all of our church the whole church some of you were like man I'm new to this I've never fasted what is fasting fasting is saying I'm gonna go I'm gonna I'm gonna neglect physical food for a meal or a day if you're if you're new to it I would say man just take lunch I'm gonna neglect lunch physical food because I want the spiritual food and I want I wanna I want to come to God I want to bend his ear man I want him to Humble me and put me in the place where I know nothing will put you if you remember the sermon a couple weeks ago into childlike dependency ting okay that's what the idea is that we would fast and we would pray that's happened in Wednesday all right hey right here I'll crawl I know we got four canvases but right here at regional these doors are gonna be open from 12 to 1 over the lunch hour our whole staff all of our all of our people all of our pastors man we're gonna be here faces on the you know knees down faces on the chairs praying and I pray you could come hey maybe you can come for 15 minutes 30 minutes whatever you pop in we're gonna pray it's not gonna be a super organized thing we're gonna have prayer points and all that we want people to come and be able to to pray so come and do that with us hey do you know that when we pray we move the hand that moves the world right like this like for the last few decades the abortion clinic in Greensboro has operated seven days a week until two years ago in 2018 when love life began to mobilize the church to pray on Wednesdays and now the abortion clinic here does not do abortions on Wednesdays and then now the church goes out there during the 40 weeks of life they have seen the abortions at that clinic drop by 70 percent on Saturdays when the church is present not because we're saying something to moms because we're praying and God is moving okay and so hey let's pray on Wednesday the second thing is this right here Saturday prayer walk all right this is what I'm calling all of our church to do every single person may enjoy me and my whole family out there Saturday the parking lot of destiny church 9:00 a.m. you're gonna want to get there a little bit early to get parked what are we gonna do we're gonna worship I'm gonna say a few things and then we're gonna march and we're gonna walk it's not a long walk we're gonna walk over the abortion clinic and we're all gonna pray together the God would end abortion in our generation is that a walk in the park is that an easy thing to do no it's not I've been out there it's super hard and I don't want to mischaracterize it to anybody I'm taking my kids out there I want you to do what you feel like you need to do with that it's not a walk in the park but I'm calling our church to this moment and here's why this is I want to close our sermon today y'all we get robbed of this and the American church and the American middle-class church here's what we don't get to do is take much risk for the kingdom that is unlike our brothers and sisters all over the world who risk it all and we have an opportunity right now to stand and to be counted and to take a risk for the kingdom of God and to go and to pray that God will end abortion in our day and here's what I want you to hear y'all God made the church four moments that are just like this one he brings us to these moments he made us for these moments Ephesians 2:10 you know what I'm gonna say for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which he prepared for us beforehand that we should walk in them Jesus didn't die to create spectators he died to create servants workers not watchers he died to create a bunch of risk takers who when the word is preached decide I Sam for life I'm gonna take a step for life and I'm going to be counted I don't know about you but this is my reality with a ten year old in my house she reads her history books and hears the things that she asked me she says daddy what would you have done during slave trade what would you have done if you lived in hay what would you have done during the expansion of the West and manifest destiny and all of these things that we look back on our nation's history you know what I have to tell her because I'm linear and logical and this is just the truth I have to look at her and I have to say baby I don't know what I would have done I could tell you what I'd like to think I would have done but the fact is I wasn't there we're not responsible for the moment that God puts us in that's his work but we are responsible for what we do at the moment that he puts us in and this is the moment that we are in every single one of us have woken up in this cultural moment with this moral tragedy and we have got to ask the question hey what will we do I know that our grandchildren will look back and they will ask us what did you do and we're not going to be able to say I wasn't there proverbs 24 11 tells us rescue those who are being taken away to death hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter and if you say behold we did not know this does not he who weighs the heart perceive it does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it and will he not repay man according to his work we cannot say that we didn't know so what will we do will we stand and will we be counted to pray and I'm praying that you guys will make your decision right now not like we're gonna look and see who's got ballgames or see what we can do or what no it's like man I'm gonna fill my card out and I'm gonna put it in the bucket here in a minute and I will stand and I will be counted Jeremiah 528 tells us man the mark of a people that are far from God is the ones who don't care about the fatherless and the weak that's the mark of people who are far and a mark of a people who the Spirit is moving in stand in times like this and I pray that we will like our adoptive and foster families have said y'all if not now then when and if not us then who now is the time I pray you'll make your decision just like I have with my family all right let's pray god I pray today that you would galvanize this church you create us for moments like this and then you bring us to these moments this is a moment that we have to stand and to be counted and to pray on behalf of the unborn and let us rise to the challenge God I pray across all of our community groups this very week that we would provoke each other to good deeds I pray that we would step out in a way that most of us have never done before and God I pray for the one who thinks they can't that you would put courage inside of their heart and convinced them to take a risk and a dare on you in Christ's name we pray amen hey guys thanks for stopping by our YouTube channel we hope that this this message is encouraging to you we hope it stirs up your affections for Christ if is doing that we would encourage you to subscribe to our channel you can also share this message if it's working in your life maybe God wants to use it somebody else's live so you can always do that let me say a quick word to those of you who might be seeing this for the first time or maybe you've been following our YouTube channel or listening to our teaching but you haven't quite made that jump to come into the church yet we know in today's society most people listen to the teaching ministry returns before they ever check it out so we know that might be a lot of people out there if that's you I would just encourage you to take that step if you don't have a local church man don't rely on the teaching ministry on youtube to be the local church because it's not the local church we would love for you to come in and plug in to use your kids to get into some relationships where people can actually push on you and you can be ministering in their life there's no such thing as a lone ranger Christians so man come join us take that step love to meet you last thing I would say is this hey we know guys that the mission of God goes about as far as the generosity of God's people takes it if this message is a blessing to you or if you could see how it could be used in other people's lives we would really encourage you to financially support the ministry here at Mercy Hill and you can do that by going to Mercy Hill Church comm and going right to our give page and giving dare we love to see that happen as we continue to expand all right thanks a lot guys see you next time

Channel: Mercy Hill Church

Views: 2,609

Rating: 4.891892 out of 5

Keywords: jesus, gospel, mercy hill, mercy hill church, andrew hopper, abortion, is abortion wrong, what does the bible say about abortion, pro life vs pro choice debate, abortion debate, views on abortion, christian view on abortion, sermon, expository, jeremiah 1, jeremiah 1:5

Id: A_N5QeERc7U

Length: 50min 25sec (3025 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 24 2020