Pastor Robert and TaQuaris Smith
Pastor Robert: Praise the Lord. Good morning. It's good to be with you this morning. Amen. If they haven't, I think the children, are they gone yet? They can be dismissed. Go to Sunday School. Praise God. Hallelujah. Well, before we get started, I just have a couple of things to announce. Obviously for today, today is Sanctity of Life Sunday, and so we'll hear all about that in, in a little bit. Um, but we also want to let you know that coming up in February, on Friday, February 17th, we want to invite everyone that's new to our faith community at Hope for a newcomers fellowship that's going to be right here, the church building. If you can sign up for that, see Rachel. Rachel is back there for those in the house. See Rachel. She's at the table. She can register you and those that are in our online community, and we can have a way for you to sign up as well. We want to see you if you are new. We are going to introduce you to the staff and, and break bread and say hello and maybe even have a little fun. We like to have fun. We'll have a fun evening. That's Friday, February 17th at 7:00 PM Amen. Amen.
Well, interesting enough today, it's a very significant day. I want to talk to you about history. I'm not going to be political. Those of you that have known me at Hope for now, I'm not a political guy. I'm just a guy that loves Jesus. So that, that's what dictates and drives my life. I'm not getting on anybody that's political. I'm just saying the statements I'm going to make now and read to you and things we are going to say later has nothing to do with politics at all. The Lord has been really pressing on me as I learned I would be speaking today. And so I've been anxious to let it rip as they say, but also to teach and to impart truth. That's our goal today.
Historically, today is known as the National Sanctity of Human Life Day. It's a lot to say, right? That's officially historically what today represents is National Sanctity of Human Life Day. It's an observance declared by several United States presidents who opposed abortion, typically proclaimed on or near the anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade. Actually, President Ronald Reagan issued a presidential proclamation on January 13th, 1984, designating Sunday, January 22nd, 1984, as National Sanctity of Human Life Day, noting that it was the 11th anniversary of Roe v Wade, in which the Supreme Court issued a ruling that guaranteed women access to abortion.
President Reagan himself was a strong anti-abortion advocate, uh, who said that in Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court struck down our laws protecting the lives of unborn children. Reagan issued the proclamation annually thereafter, designating Sanctity of Human Life Day to be the closest Sunday to the original January 22nd day. And here we are on January 22nd, 2023. So it's the actual day that it was actually instituted way back in 1984. The reason why I made the disclaimer about it me not being political, because it is an unfortunate fact that all of the Democratic presidents that were elected in office since Ronald Reagan have not recognized or observed sanctity of human life Sunday. Unfortunately, for them, this issue has been and always will be political, but I'm not a politician. I'm a preacher. I'm going to speak concerning what the Bible says and what the Lord has placed in our hearts.
The very thing that as we were preparing this message, the Lord spoke to me, and actually, the title of this message is that all human life is precious to God. All human life is precious to gung. I think that a Christian in honoring that fact, if a Christian is to have a commitment to the sanctity of life, then it needs to be worked out in all areas of life, not just in abortion, not in just in things like euthanasia, but I believe our commitment as Christ's followers is to work for the protection of human life in all points in life between birth and death.
TaQuaris: So every human life is precious. And if life is sacred, then all lives are sacred. And if we are going to take a biblical approach to the sanctity of life, this means we have a responsibility to help the unborn, the poor, the widow, the orphan, the elderly, the immigrant, the disadvantaged, and the undeserved. We cannot cater to one group of people over another. This is not a political statement by the way, but a biblical one.
Pastor Robert: With that in mind, it behooves us today to talk about, and we are going to talk about some issues, especially, there is a lot of pressing issues today concerning the sanctity of life. But we are going to talk today on four areas pertaining to human life. The first thing is foundational to me; we are going to talk about is being created in the image of God. Secondly we are going to talk about the beginning of life. Thirdly, we are going to talk about the end of life. And then lastly, we are going to talk about the treatment of children and the disabled and the elderly.
Human beings are created in the image of God. I wish that I could have a platform to preach this around the world every day, because I believe it's important that we understand that everyone understands that human life has intrinsic value because that life derives from God. Life derives from God. We are made, life is made, us human beings are made in his own image. We see this in Genesis chapter 1, verses 26 through 27.
TaQuaris: Then God said, let us make human beings in our image to be like us. They will reign over the fish in a sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, and all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground. So God created human beings in its own image, in the image of God. He created them, male and female, he created them.
Pastor Robert: It's interesting, we see in the Bible itself, it said, let's make man human beings humanity in God's image. The Father, son and holy spirit, let's make man, and they will reign or have dominion over all the animals in everything. And it's funny, if you look at laws and look at, we govern society. There is more laws to protect animals than it is to protect human beings. Yeah, I'm going there today because it's--- We've bought into these lies. You know, we, we see it in science fiction, we see it in movies. All this indoctrination about the inferiority of man, where here it is right here in the first chapter of Genesis. It said, God made humanity in his own image for us to have dominion over all of this creation, not the other way around.
And it's sad in some cities, in some states, in our union, we can go to jail longer for killing a dog than we can another human being. Those of you have dogs, sorry. I don't have any dogs right now neither do I have a desire anymore. I've raised 10 dogs in my lifetime. I'm good. The children are begging and asked for it, but I'm good. So you can say Pastor Robert, he's not an animal lover.
TaQuaris: I'm an animal lover.
Pastor Robert: But I'm not going to be harmful or distasteful to animals. But I'm definitely not going to hold them higher than I do my fellow human being and neither does God. I know all dogs go to heaven was a great money maker, but God doesn't look at that the same way. As a matter of fact, if you read throughout the scriptures, especially in the Old Testament, God was very specific about his value on life. And that's where we get the moral code that started with, if you violated God's value in life, then your life was forfeited. Because blood, life is in the blood, blood is precious to God. And so he doesn't look lightly at the spilling of innocent blood, so he said thou shall not commit murder. As a matter of fact, we see in the Bible, when Kane killed Abel, it said that the blood cried out for vengeance, justice, whatever you want to translate it as. It cried out to be a venge because it was not right. It was an innocent blood that was being shed.
I had a very interesting experience about blood crying out before in my life. I was born-- most people don't know they; they think of Chicago when they think of me because I grew up in Chicago, which I'm not ashamed of by the way. But I was born in Vicksburg, Mississippi. If you know anything about US history, Vicksburg was a site of major battle during the Civil War. I had a family reunion that was scheduled to be in Vicksburg some years ago. I had not been back to Vicksburg since I was born. I've been around it, Jackson, Mississippi, Yazoo, Yazoo City, Mississippi. Vicksburg is about 30/40 minutes away, Vicksburg on the Mississippi River. It was a major battleground for during the Civil War. When we had the reunion, I was blessed to go. One of the activities for the reunion was to take a tour of the battleground site. I had never been there before in my life, but when I stepped foot on the ground and started walking around the site, I became overwhelmed with grief and sorrow, and I just started weeping out of nowhere.
And it just was speaking to me in my spirit, just the awareness of the amount of blood that was shed in this place, let alone the amount of blood that was shed in the Civil War. And so it's like, to me, the blood of those lives that were lost was crying out, speaking out to me spiritually. Can you imagine what it does to God? We can look at it at one point when innocent is shed, which he doesn't like, but God doesn't want anyone to lose their life. Every human being is God's creation, which he loves.
That's the problem with humanity: that we don't love God's creation when it comes to us as human beings. We have so many of our differences and our factions and our groups and all of the things that we do to separate. God doesn't separate us that way. He said, "This is my creation." As a matter of fact, when God created, when God created the, the world after everything that he created, he said, what? It is good. But what did he say when he made man?
TaQuaris: It is very good.
Pastor Robert: He said, "It is very good." Did you know that? After every other creation, he said it is good. It's complete, It's perfect. But when he made man, humanity, he said, "It is very good." It's like he said, I didn't make any mistakes. There is nothing to change about it. It's precious. This is my most prized creation, humanity. It's very good. Think of it that way. How much do we owe this great creator for our life?
If we look at the words in the beginning of the US Declaration of Independence, it says that we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I have to tell you, when I see these words, it's kind of bittersweet to me because I believe in everything that these words say. But I have not seen this played out in our society as these words were pinned I relate this to every human being, being created in God's image. If we take a moment for every human being to hold humanity in that same light, to that same value, how much work of brotherly love and life supporting efforts would we have in living out these words, that we would truly believe that all men are created equal, all men have certain unalienable rights, which is not the least among them, is life, the right to life? If only we could, as a human race with our eyes, with our vision, with our heart, with our spirit, believe that every single one of us on this planet has a right to life because it's a life that was given by God.
It's like, I can go be with Jesus if that was all the case. But we have a lot of work to do to get at the heart of men when it comes to seeing the value of human life. The major point is that all have a right to life, all have a right to life, including in this very important subject that seems to be at the forefront with major warfare and battle today. That's the beginning of life. One of the major issues when it concerning abortion revolves around when life begins or when personhood begins, and you have all of these debates and various views pertaining to conception and implantation or birth. When has the process began? When is it a life?
You wonder where some people make up their worldview. A lot of people, they depend on science, so-called science, medical reviews, medical information, sociological standpoints, but I'm convinced, and you'll hear me say it again and again, I'm convinced on what the Bible actually teaches. We can see what God has to say about this in the great Psalm. Psalm 1:39, starting in verse 13.
TaQuaris: You 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. You watched me as I was being formed in other seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.
Pastor Robert: So to me, debate is closed. But for me, I hold the b the Bible with intrinsic value. Unfortunately, everyone doesn't see it the same way. And there it lies the root of the problem. One of the things, we have a God problem, we have a Jesus problem, and we have a heart problem. Until we deal with those things, then we will have these slanted views concerning life, especially the beginning of life.
TaQuaris: This scripture here is, this speaks volume to me. I'll just share a little short testimony. I'm the baby of five and some people kind of know this testimony. When my mother and my father, after they had my sister who was right above me, they separated. They kind of broke up. And then my mom started dating someone else that she dated previously before, and she got pregnant with me. And somehow her and my dad got back together and my mother was going to have an abortion. My dad said-- and I'm just so appreciative and I wouldn't even be here. God is just amazing. My dad told my mom, no, do not kill her or kill the baby. I will raise her up like she's mine. And so I never knew I had a different father until maybe I was like 13 and things like that. It's just so important to me because what if he didn't do that? I wouldn't be here.
And so when we talking about being made in seclusion in the womb, I was alive in the womb and God had a purpose for me in the womb. I just thank God for my dad's compassion. It's just a beautiful testimony. I know that we are going to talk about the end of life too, but I just want to add this before we get there. God used my father to save me physically, but then he ended up using me to help get him saved spiritually. So it's just such a blessing, you guys. It's just such a big testimony with all of that.
Pastor Robert: I'm thankful for the men and women who have put in countless numbers of hours, blood, sweat, and tears to protect life at its beginning stages. I'm not really sure. I'm probably too young to understand, but I'm not sure where the shift took place in this country, especially because culturally-- can I speak culture for a minute? Culturally, it was very taboo-- the whole thing of birth, especially out of wedlock has been taboo in many cultures, but it was even more taboo to do away with that baby, whether the mother would have that child or not. We had a society culturally that would make sure that someone took care of, someone raised that child. We wouldn't decide to terminate that life because of inconvenience or circumstance.
And we understand that a lot of young girls get pregnant and, you know, it seems like an impossibility or an unbearable thing for that girl to raise a child. Anybody with a conscious or heart understands that, but it was just something about our society culturally that said, well, that wasn't reason enough to make the decision to terminate that life. Either an auntie or a grandma or somebody would raise that child. As a matter of fact, that's why I'm here. My mom was giving up at birth from her mother, her biological mother. Thankfully, she had someone in her family that raised her. That's how I was born in Mississippi. My mom was born in Chicago, but she was given up by her birth mom and she was raised in Mississippi.
It hits home with us. My mom could have been aborted. As a matter of fact, I was born just a year after Roe v. Wade. So thank God for them. But I thank God again for the men and women who have put forth, given up their lives, put their lives on the line to protect that life in those beginning stages. You've heard me state before, I had the privilege of about 12, 13 years ago now, running into a phenomenal staff at Robbinsdale Women's Center. I don't have time to talk about all the testimonies that I saw there, but God is funny. Do you know God has sense of humor?
There was a young lady that I met there. I was a lot less gray when I met her. I remember her, but Joanne Ecklin, who I met way back then, she's the boss over at the clinic, she's the boss. I'm going to say it. And God has purposed me to be one of the board of directors now at Robbinsdale Women's Center, and we've been busy. There is a lot of things going on in the fight to protect the innocence of life at these early stages. I would like to invite Joanne Ecklin up here now, and we are going to talk to her a little bit to get you updated on what this great group of men and women are doing. Robbinsdale Women's Center in this fight for life. So let's welcome Joanne.
It's good to be here with you. It's good to come full circle with you. I could rave about Robbinsdale Women's Center all day. I love the staff, the executive director, Peggy, awesome woman, person director. I've seen her through ups and downs and discouragements. I've stayed in touch over the years, but I'm grateful that God has purposed me now to get back involved for such a time as this. Joan will tell you in a minute. It's such an interesting time. First question Joanne, I want to ask you is put into context, Robbinsdale Women's Center now post the Roe v Wade decision in the courts.
Joanne: Well, God has really been gearing us up because as you know, the state is looking to not have any limits on abortion nor who can perform them. Even right now we get a lot of calls from out of state because people know Minnesota's quite liberal in that. Truly, the Center is a ministry, a mission ministry just like some other ministries overseas. I mean, really we've become that. People are unchurched; they don't know Christ. The women that come to us seeking and knowing about abortion, finding out how far along they are, the reason mostly that they are choosing to pursue abortion is that they don't themselves have value.
If you don't have value in yourself, how can you value a life? if we can pour into this woman value that Christ has for her, she's going to value that life. So we are seeing about 60% and most women that come to us are abortion minded. 60% are choosing life that we can confirm. God is preparing us to move on to a bigger location. A lot of people are saying, well, how can you leave? Because right now we are across the street from an abortion clinic. How can you leave that location? But we are just moving two miles down the road. And ever since Covid-- some good things have come out of Covid actually. When Covid hit, we-- Our building is a hundred years old. It's a house and that's our clinic and it's out of compliance and OSHA and they have really made more regulations. We would have to probably tear down that building and restart.
The other thing is, we have no parking. I mean, there is just no parking. In the winter these women have to park down the street and they walk a long way. And then the other big thing is being across the street from the abortion clinic, we are not getting women in who think we might be the abortion clinic because of our location, because the abortion clinic has on their homepage a picture of our building saying that we are a fake clinic. Don't go there. Then they have escorts in the parking lot; they'll come across the street and get the woman and walk her back. They are not supposed to do that. We've had women who are coming to us and they are coming across the street to get them and they are like, well, they are all confused.
It has been a lot of doors closing, but as the Lord closes those doors, or even as the enemy tries to, he opens new ones. We are right now in the middle of building out a new facility that's at Crystal Shopping Center. It's a retail area, so there is a lot of foot traffic. We will have more exam rooms. We are going to have a classroom for the moms and dads and we'll have a lab so we can expand our medical services. It's really very exciting to see where we've come from and where the Lord is bringing us.
Pastor Robert: God has really provided, just to give them a perspective. I was able to, with some of the other board directors, go and tour the new site. It's like moving from a closet to a mansion. Seriously. I mean, and the potential for more exam rooms-- I mean, for someone that has been apart and seeing where the beginnings were and what the conditions that this amazing staff has had to work under and even the clients coming, I was just blown away. We ask God for things, but he always blows our minds,
Joanne: Hey, he does.
Pastor Robert: I'm, so I'm looking at like-- and just the potential in strategic location and availability in the parking and, and all the things that-- it is an amazing thing. For those of you that have supported Robbinsdale Women's Center over the years, thank you.
We praise God for you. Keep it up. There is more work ahead. But Joanne don't want to keep you too much. But you had shared something. We were talking before and in our message, we've been talking about humanity and the heart of the matter with seeing a person as a human being, seeing life as intrinsically valued by God. Can you share with them what we talked about? We are very upfront who we are when these women, the clients come in. There is a unique distinction with our care towards these women. Some of the things you do, you provide an ultrasound.
Joanne: When they come in, we give them a free pregnancy test, all our services are free. And then if they are pregnant, then we give them an ultrasound and they will be able to see their pregnancy. It's like, we can see at five to six weeks we can see the sac and then we have them come back again and for a follow up to see how it's going along. We forged this relationship with them and they trust us. And we just pour just love into them, share the gospel with them, encourage them. Because we respect them, they actually make that decision. , they look at that screen and they are like-- we did have a couple women recently say, "Is that human?" That's where our culture is right now. They are not understanding.
Pastor Robert: Can you imagine that question? Is that human?
Joanne: Yeah. But there is so much confusion on humanity and gender, and the enemy is just doing a job to confuse people that they don't have this worth. They don't have a set identity in him. They don't know it. But we are fortunate and blessed to be able to share that, to encourage them to choose life. So we keep in touch with them. Another thing that's kind of cool is a few years down the road, they'll bring their baby in and say, this is my little girl, or this is my little boy, thank you so, so much. We've never had anybody say, why did you let me keep this baby? We've never had anyone come in angry that they chose life. It's common for every once in a while, someone will come in with their baby or their toddler or an older child and say thank you that we were there. We have women say, oh, I never even knew about you. I didn't know that these services are here.
TaQuaris: That is so true because when I was a teacher, I was mentoring this young lady, and I unofficially adopted her in my family. She was like my little sister. She ended up getting pregnant and she was going to have an abortion. At this time I was just mentoring a lot of young women. I was going to different churches where Pastor Robert was. I had her come there and I just kept bringing her to Pastor Robert to pray for her. I didn't know him like that either. I just knew his spirit. He connected her to Robbinsdale Women's Center and she kept her baby. I remember on a Thursday, I said, Lord, I’ve got to work, but I need her to have this baby tonight. She wanted to go to church first. So we went to church and Pastor Robert prayed for her and we went home, and then we was in the hospital and she had the baby. I cut her on biblical cord and it's just a blessing just to see this young lady right now and her daughter. It's just phenomenal. It has just been such a blessing.
Pastor Robert: She didn't tell you she was like they would do at the center. She came back a year later and brought the baby to the church service to show me her baby. That was just one of many highlights of my life. Well, Joanne, I thank you for your work. Thank you for the work of RWC, soon to be CWC, Crystal's Women's Clinic. We'll keep the Hope Community informed of what we are doing.
Joanne: We'll have an open house once it's done. I'll let you know. and you are invited.
Pastor Robert: As a faith community, what are our prayer priorities for the center?
Joanne: Well, I think right now is just timing the build out with being able to see women during that time. We don't really want to break that flow. Also, just continue financial and prayerful support so we can finish it.
Pastor Robert: And so we plan the completion to be in--
Joanne: Probably the end of, well, they say the end of March, but I don't know, maybe the first part of April. But they are working really hard to try to get us to the end of March.
Pastor Robert: Then one thing, the annual banquet gala this year.
Joanne: Yeah. We have the gala on April 14th, so if we move in in April-- That's the way it goes. We just run on adrenaline.
Pastor Robert: Well, again. Thank you, Joanne. God bless you. Praise God. We can always use others in that fight. There are a lot of volunteer opportunities and will be some more coming up. If you know any OBGYNs that would like to get in the fight and help, you can let Joanne know or let me know because I know we are in need of that service. Just let us know for them. As a result of the fall, meaning Adam and Eve's fall, physical death is inevitable for all people. We know we are all going to die. If we look at Romans 5:12. So you are not looking at me like, why are you telling us that Pastor? The Bible says it,
TaQuaris: When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam's sin brought death, so death spread to everyone for everyone's sinned.
Pastor Robert: So death is inevitable for all people, and the process of dying frequently is accompanied by illness or suffering and pain. And because of this, the practice of euthanasia is one way people have sought to eliminate that suffering at the end of life. Euthanasia occurs when a terminally ill person dies as a result of deliberate act of commission, which is called active euthanasia or omission with mission, which is passive euthanasia by another person seeking the hasten, the ill person's death in order to end his or her suffering. And again, there are all kind of debates, all kind of politics, all kinds of things surrounding this issue. But as a person who values life at whatever capacity it is, I would like to make this statement that whenever there is a reasonable chance of recovery or improvement of the quality of life, it should be pursued, period.
Our ways are not god's ways and as much as we are created in his image and likeness-- and that's another teaching moment. The term image and likeness are not two different things. It's kind of like a parallel-- I forgot the terminology, but it's a parallel description. It's just fortifying itself. So it's not two different things, but it's important that understanding of likeness because just as we are made in the image of God, we are not God. We are a likeness of him, but we are not him. We are not God.
And so therefore we cannot play God when it comes to life. If anybody has watched anybody suffer to the end of life, it's not an easy thing to do. It's not. But yet in God's mysterious ways, it can be a beautiful experience to endure. And I'm not just saying something tongue in cheek; I'm talking through experience, as I've watched a family member take their last breath. They had gone through an adequate amount of suffering. But in the natural process of dying, especially when the presence of the Lord is there, it can be a life-changing experience. And it has changed my life.
I'm a believer that God is with us at every step of life, every stage of life. God is working in us, with us, through us in every stage of life. I don't want to interfere with that. I believe those moments, those waning moments between this life and our new life, God is still working on our behalf. I don't want to interfere with that. I don't want to rush it. I don't want to slow it down. I just want to let God be God and life, be life and let it run its course.
If we get to the root of certain things, everything is not what it seems to the natural eye. There is a lot of things that happen behind the scene and we can't lump everybody together. But at the spirit of a lot of these things, whether it's abortion, whether it's euthanasia, it comes down to dollars and cents, to be very blunt and transparent about it, the almighty dollar, mammon, money, someone or someone's benefit financially over your life. And that's a very sad state that our society has come to. Which brings me to another point. And that's how we treat life in general: people's lives, children's lives, the disabled lives, elderly lives, those who can't care for themselves. Are their lives less important? Are they of lesser value? Maybe to people, but not to God.
Again, it goes to how we view or how we value life. Like I said in the beginning, our starting point, if we are to, if we are going to have the ultimate respect for life, our starting has to be, is that this life derives from God and is created in his image all human life. If someone starts there, it's very hard to then be discriminate in whose life you value. How do we solve the racial violence in this world? We first remove the race equation and we see each other as god's created humanity. Period.
It's when we make the division of black and white and brown and yellow, that we have this devaluing system. Because you don't value all life the same because of these manmade markers of discrimination. I told people these past couple of years as we witnessed some challenging times in this nation, in this state, in our cities, even in this church, I can choose which lens that I use to respond to things around me. We all have our biases that we grow up with. I'm a young African American guy, grew up in the heart south side of Chicago. That's a whole different reality than where I currently live in Plymouth, Minnesota. It just is.
It's a whole different reality, just experience in life and the skin that I I'm in, which I love dearly, I wouldn't change anything about it. But everyone doesn't see it that way. I wish that they would see it for what it is. It's just a variation of God's creation, nothing superior, nothing inferior, just the flavor of life. What I've witnessed in this country in the past, I mean all my life, but especially as things are so viral now, it's ingrained in our soil, in our language, in our culture to make these distinctions. We turn on the news, and what's the news headline say? "Black men killed in South side of Minneapolis by a white gunman" or vice versa.
Why do we need those descriptors in the first place? Already we are setting people at odds by using these descriptors. How different would it be and how much a bias would be taken out if it says another man was killed by another man this evening. Period. What does it matter what skin color it was? A life was taken. When I saw the video of George Floyd, my God's, the honest truth, my first reaction was not like the media's, was not that this white police officer is kneeling on the neck of this black man and kills him. You know what my first response was? I wept because I saw this man's life expire.
I didn't get into all of the background of what happened and all of that. The humanity of the thing is I saw a man die in front of my eyes and I immediately wept without even thinking about it. When I had the realization like, oh my God, he is no longer breathing, I couldn't believe it. This man is dead. And so that's where my advocacy is. I can't ignore that my skin color is black and yours may be white and yours may be brown. I can't ignore that for the visual, but I can't ignore it when it comes to a bias. Because what supersedes that bias is that we are all God's creation, created in his image, and every life is precious. Every human life is precious to God. If we could just get to that point of upholding life, whether it's a unborn life, whether it's a middle life, whether it's an elderly life, whether it's a disabled life, whether it's a poor life, whether it's a rich life, we would just uphold life for life.
As advocates of Jesus, ambassadors of Jesus Christ, I believe we have a mandate to push, push aside all the rhetoric and ask ourselves what would Jesus do and say and advocate for in this moment? And who would he advocate for? If we know anything about Jesus, we are already going to, we can fill in the blank. It's not going to take us long to know who Jesus is going to advocate for. Human worth does not fluctuate with the level of perceived usefulness of a person in society. If that's where we are as a society, we should just pack it up and call it quits because we are done. If we can't bring ourselves to dignify all human life, what hope is there for us? Last scripture, I just want to make sure we get to that, it just speaks to just our moral conscience, I think. It comes from Zacharia chapter 7.
TaQuaris: This is what the Lord of heavens army says: Judge fairly and show mercy and kindness to one another. Do not oppress widows, orphans, foreigners and the poor, and do not scheme against each other.
Pastor Robert: Use this in context of what we are talking today. I just think it's a measuring tool for us to use when it comes to life in general. Because I think that if we value all of these segments of life, we would not perpetrate these abuses that it talks about here in scripture, that we would value a disadvantaged person's life just like we would someone that was fully capable of doing anything. We wouldn't look down upon the elderly. I hate the way this country does our elderly. And I said I hate the way this country does our elderly. It's embarrassing. It's grieving. I love the efforts that we are doing to protect the unborn, but I'm urging us to have the same effort, same spirit, same heart, same energy, same advocacy for every aspect of life.
I think it's incomplete. I think it's not full hearted. And I think we give into political bias when we focus solely in one area over the other. I believe it's the God thing to do, that we advocate from the cradle to the grave as they sing.
TaQuaris: Or from the womb to the tomb.
Pastor Robert: But I do think it starts-- we can't advocate and we can't value life at the end if we don't value it in the beginning. So I think we, in this day and age where anyone who doesn't believe that it is becoming more violent. Our response is not violence. Our response is not hatred. Our response is not segregating. Our response is not and cannot be us versus them. We, when I say we, because I see I'm sitting and speaking amongst believers, Christ followers. We have to see this as an opportunity as my brother, Pastor Jeff often says, an opportunity to bring Jesus. I'm paraphrasing, bring Jesus to the party.
The tendency has been, the fleshly approach is to dig our heels on our side of the line and go at it. How about trying the Jesus way, Pastor Jeff? How about trying the Jesus way? What's the Jesus way in this matter? It's the same type of approach that the staff at Robbinsdale Women's Center does. They don't jump down the throats of the women that come and say, you shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do this. Shame on you for thinking this way. How could you and all of this stuff. They don't do that. I'm an eyewitness. They don't do that. They embrace these women. They show compassion and mercy and understanding and they meet them where they are at and make them feel like they are love and worth something and someone cares and someone would advocate and someone's going to tell them the truth of the matter and show them love and show them Christ without Bible thumping. They are able to come to make that decision to choose life not out of coercion or obligation but out of love.
We have people in our fellowship circle that has various different views on certain things like life. And they've taken the attitude and approach to separate, because we offer a different solution to those who think differently than we do. I'm very pro-life, but I'm not pro-life to the point that I'm going to devalue someone else's life who thinks differently than me. Instead, that just shows me I have another opportunity to show you Jesus. The heart of the matter, this issue is just basic, plain on human dignity.
It's funny, another area where we devalue one another is in the area of religion and denominations. But you know what, I'm going to give the Catholics kudos right now because you know what dictates their outwork, the outreach? One of the principles that moves them to do their social outreach, they have a principle of what's called the principle of human dignity. That everyone is a child of God created in his image. And we are burdened by that to treat and to value every human life the same regardless of who they are and where they come from. I think we can learn a lot from one another. I think that God has a lot to show and has shown us how he feels about life. And I think that gives us an opportunity to share what God thinks of life one person at a time. Pastor Jeff.
Pastor Jeff: Wow. Thank you, guys. Do you see that first Sunday of January? We talked about how Pastor Brian set the bar pretty high. I think you made the mark. I just received that. I just let the Lord stir our hearts to understand where love will take us and it will take us every, everywhere that Pastor Robert just suggested. And that's really a powerful, powerful thing.
So just raise your hands. We are just going to receive this from the Lord. I'm going to bless you. Holy Spirit, we just received the words that we just heard. We believe and trust that they were breathed out of your very heart. We understand so clearly how your thoughts are higher than our thoughts. And we just confess right now, Lord, that we desire to change our thinking, to repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand and your thoughts are here for us to embrace and you are here gladly to renew our minds, change our thinking and form your heart in us in a way that it actually motivates how we live, how we talk, how we think. We open our hearts to You, Holy Spirit, to do that work in us. Thank you for changing our lives as your children, as your people, as the church that we can represent you well.
It really begins with understanding the value that you have. And that comes because you are made in the image of God. If you are listening, if you are hearing these words and you've never experienced the love of the Father in your life, that's where it starts. You experience his love. You understand you have value. It's really hard to value anyone else's life if you don't value your own. And so I just make an invitation to anybody who will hear this message, to open up your heart to Jesus and just say, I receive your love. And that's where the journey begins.
And now all those who are listening, I just want to bless you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I bless you going in and I bless you going out. I bless you as you labor, and I bless you as you rest. I bless you when you are here and I bless you when you are away. I bless you every day of your life. For the Father's blessing will rest on you and lead you each day of your life. Amen. Go in peace. Have a wonderful day and a wonderful week. Good to be together.
Can I have the mike? Hey, Dave and Lou are serving communion this morning. You are welcome to come and receive communion and we have people praying for you. Come and get prayer because it is real.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 1-22-23. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.