The Sanctity of Human Life
By the Reverend Dr. Rob Schenck
Delivered to Cornerstone Chapel, Leesburg, VA,
Sanctity of Life Weekend, 2014
“This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I
have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now
choose life so that you and your children may live.
(Deuteronomy 30:19 NIV)
Today begins Sanctity of Human Life Weekend and Week. I
know you’ve been working through the Book of Joshua with Pastor
Gary (Hamrick) and I’m sure you’ve noticed there’s a lot of living and
dying in the biblical record; In fact, Joshua begins with the death of
Moses and ends with the death of Joshua (but only after his long life
of 110 years). There are births and deaths; a whole generation’s
passage; and harrowing accounts of survival and defeat, and even
divine orders to annihilate whole populations, but also commands for
whole people groups to live. None of this is treated cavalierly or glibly.
In fact, matters of life and death are so important they are a
permanent part of the Word of God. We are reading, studying, and
praying about these incidents of life and death thousands of years
after they occurred. God speaks to us in and through these episodes,
so they are of the highest importance. Elsewhere in the Bible, one of
the Ten Commandments deals with murder; and there are countless
statutes regarding matters of life and death throughout the Scripture.
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The epitome of God’s self-revelation, the person of Jesus Christ,
Immanuel, God-In-Flesh, said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
(John 14:6) He said, “The thief (that is, Satan) comes only to steal
and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it
to the full.” (John 10:10) So the matter of life speaks to the deepest of
spiritual truths, and is at the core of biblical tenets, and is the essence
of God’s presence in human history. In other words, “Life” is really,
really, really important, and is very, very sacred.
We’re going to look at why this is true. But first, let’s pray . . .
I. What is the origin of the “Sanctity of Life?” Where does this
idea come from? Where does it originate?
A. Unlike a single book of the Bible, or even a cardinal doctrine,
the idea of the Sanctity of Life is hard to locate in one spot, or in
one passage, or even in a limited number of passages.
1. Instead, the Sanctity of Life is a thread woven
throughout all 66 books of the Bible. (“Bible,” BTW, is the
Anglicization of the Greek τὰ βιβλία , or “The Books.”
“Bible” not always bound together in single volume: In
ancient times was a collection of loose scrolls, sheets of
paper. Pastors would ask a deacon, “Did you bring “The
Books?” Very cumbersome to carry to church! We’ll look
through a lot of “The Books” today.)
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2. So today, we’ll break from the normal textual, verse-byverse exposition used here at Cornerstone, to look at a
series of passages that together form the biblical theme of
the Sanctity of Life.
B. “Sanctity” comes from the Latin, “sanctus” which, in a
Christian context, means “holy.”
1. “Sanctus” is a translation of the Hebrew ‫( דׁשֶ ֹ֛ק‬kodesh)
and the Greek ἅγιον (Ha’-gi-on). It refers to what is
“sacred.”
a. Something consecrated, dedicated to God, holy.
b. And this is in a superlative form: it is of the highest
order. In other words, there are things that are “more
holy” than other things;
2. So, there’s “sacred” and “really sacred.” We’re talking about
the latter: something utterly sacred—in this case, human life.
II. Now, why would we talk about human life as “utterly sacred”?
A. First, because God is the author of Life—in a literal and
figurative sense.
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1. God created all forms of life: Gen 1:21, “So God created the
great creatures of the sea and every living thing. . .”
2.”Every living thing,” of course, includes human beings: Gen
2:7, “Then the Lord God formed a man [‫]םדָֽ ָֹֽ֛ה‬
ָֽ from the dust of
the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and
the man became a living being.”
a. “The man” = Hebrew “Adam” from “ah-dah-mah”—
“ground” or “soil”
b. There is a similar link in English: The word “human”
comes to us through the Middle English and AngloFrench, but started as the Latin “humanus,” – which is the
same etymological root as “humus” – the organic
component of soil
c. This is why Everett Fox, in his Jewish translation of the
Pentateuch, entitled The Five Books of Moses, translates
Gen 2:7, “God, formed the human, of dust from the soil”
So this being—that emerged from the soil—received the
breath of life directly from God—and is a “living soul”
because of that divine breath.
- Now, Ah-dahm—“The Human”—is both a singular
reality—that is a real person in time and space—but is
also a metonymy; a part that represents the whole. In
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other words, Adam, the one man, symbolizes all of
mankind or humanity. God created each—and every—
human being and is the source of our living.
B. Second, Life is utterly sacred because God sustains life:
1. Acts 17:28a: “‘For in him (that is God) we live and
move and have our being.’
2. Our existence is tied inseparably to God in Christ—and
this is true of more than we humans:
a. Heb 1:3: “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory
and the exact representation of his being, sustaining
all things by his powerful word.”
b. Col 1:17: “He is before all things, and in him all
things hold together.”
c. All that constitutes “reality” is grounded in God as
revealed in Jesus Christ.
C. Another reason Life is utterly sacred is because: God values all of
His creation, including every human life—from it’s inception to its
natural end: The Psalmist declares in his prayer, “For you created my
inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.” (Ps
139:13) And God says through the profit Isaiah, “Even to your old age
and gray hairs; I am he, I am he who will sustain you.” (Isa 46:4)
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1. We are precious ever and always to God. He says in
Isa 49:16, “I have inscribed you on the palms of My
hands.” (Sense of staining or tattooing-not fleeting, but
permenant!)
2. Psalm 91:11 says, “For he will command his angels
concerning you to guard you in all your ways”
3. Ps 135:4, God refers to His own as “‫”ֹו ָּתלֻגָֽ סל‬
ֽ (l’sih-gulah’-tow) “My prized possession.”
III. So what does all this say to us today? Why is the sanctity of
human life something we need to mark with a special day—and
special events—special organizations, ministries, publications?
This week our ministry in Washington, DC, Faith and Action, will, for
the 20th year, sponsor the National Memorial for the Pre-born and
their Mothers and Fathers
1) Largest in-door annual pro-life prayer and preaching service
held in the nation’s capital
- details
2) Following will be the annual March for Life
- details
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3) Hundreds of other events will take place around the Capital
4) I serve on the board of the National Pro-Life Religious
Council – represents scores of ministry programs that promote
the sanctity of life from conception until natural death
5) Maybe you’ve attended a fundraising banquet for a
pregnancy care center, or you volunteer for one, or benefited
from the care of one
6) Maybe you’ve done something else to bolster respect for life:
maybe you’ve adopted or fostered a child, or cared for the
elderly, or built an orphanage, or staffed a health clinic, or
manned a suicide prevention line
7) This is not just a question of respecting the beginning of life,
but every stage of life, until the end of life.
And why? Why are all these things so important?
A. Because not everyone understands the paramount importance of
life—not even Christians
1. This year as many as 250,000 evangelical Christian women
will have an abortion—which results in ending a life in the
womb, before birth, or even in the process of birth
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2. Several Christian denominations approve of physicianassisted suicide or, as they term it, “hastened dying”
3. Just during the last few months, four pastors of leading Biblebelieving churches in the United States, committed suicide
B. Another reason this is so important is because, while over 60
Bible passages speak to the Sanctity of Life, Christians are
often afraid to examine the implications of those passages
because the subject matter seems controversial or even
“political”
C. Finally, because as Christians, we are charged with the
moral and ethical responsibility for defending life:
Prov 24:10-12a says: “If you falter in a time of trouble, how
small is your strength! Rescue those being led away to death;
hold back those staggering toward slaughter. If you say, ‘But
we knew nothing about this,’
does not he who weighs the heart
perceive it? Does not he who guards your life know it?”
1. Jesus demonstrated special concern for those at risk:
The lame, the blind, the sick, the lepers. He said, “It is not
the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not
come to call the righteous, but sinners."
2. Historically, Christians have:
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a. Saved unwanted Roman babies who were legally
abandoned atop city walls for the ravens to peck to
death. The early Christians would risk their own
lives to pluck those children down from the walls
and raise them in their own homes
b. Christians started the Hospitallers, a religious
order dedicated to taking care of sick pilgrims to the
Holy Land, and from which, of course, we derive our
modern concept of a “hospital.”
c. Christians have dispatched innumerable short-term
volunteer medical missionaries, drilled fresh-water wells,
built schools and universities, and, through ministries like
International Justice Mission, secured the release of
women enslaved in the unspeakable torment of the
international sex-trade
3. Today we can't forget:
a. The woman in crisis confronted with an unplanned
pregnancy or abnormal embryo development such as
Down Syndrome.
Studies show that as many as 90% of couples faced with
an amniocentesis report of probable Down Syndrome will
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choose to abort. Yet, do you know anyone with a Down's
child that doesn't tell you that child is the light of their life,
an absolute joy, the most loving person they've ever
known?
b. We can’t forget the woman who struggles with the pain
that she aborted a child, or the post-abortive father who
walked away from his responsibility and the reality of his
sin.
c. We mustn’t ignore the terminally ill or aged who have
been forgotten or who have outlived many of their family
and friends.
d. We must remember the disabled, the disadvantaged,
the disenfranchised . . .
e. The lonely and emotionally distraught.
Jesus said in Matthew 25:40, “whatever you did for one of
the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for
me.”
Let’s just say in summary: Life is sacred because LIFE—and our
treatment of it—has both temporal and eternal consequences.
In 1 John 5:13, the Apostle says, "I write these things to you who
believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you
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have eternal life." In other words, we can know and be assured of
abundant life while on the earth, and everlasting life in eternity with
Christ.
Here are the steps to doing so:
Acknowledge you are separated from God. (Romans 3:23)
Agree that Jesus Christ is your only hope for salvation. (John 1:12)
Ask Jesus to come into your heart and make Him the Lord, or “boss”
of your life. (Romans 10:9)
Pray with me:
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