Her 17-year-old demeanor was sweet, polite and respectful, but what she said seemed demonic. This articulate college student admitted she had an abortion without remorse. I asked if she had to personally kill a baby, how would she do it. “Kill a baby?” she retorted. “Yes, do you know how they do it?” I asked. She responded matter-of-factly, “They cut the baby up and pull it out piece by piece.” When I asked if she thought that was OK, she proudly said “Yes.”
The young college co-ed with the pleasant disposition and seared conscience was just one of many abortion advocates I interviewed for my video documentary called “Seven Reasons.” I suspect that her calloused heart was the product of an education system that has convinced millions that humans and chimps share a common ape-like ancestor, as opposed to human life having intrinsic worth as special beings created in the very image of God. But if people really believe that human beings are merely offshoots of an ape, then when their kids get sick, why don’t they take them to a veterinarian?
The unproven and unprovable theory of evolution appeals to this world because if it’s true, there is no ultimate right or wrong; we are merely raw machinery. That means that the pleasures of sin—fornication, pornography, adultery, etc., and the convenience of having an abortion—are morally acceptable.
Despite the fact that Darwinian evolution cannot be scientifically supported, a generation has embraced it with both arms. The consequent tragedy is that they reject the Old Testament Book of Genesis as nothing but an unscientific myth. And that leads them to dismiss the claims of the Gospel.
Consequently, while defending the sanctity of human life, I sometimes find it beneficial to address the subject of evolution in an effort to open a path for the Gospel while also defending the sanctity of human life. I talk about the glaring difference between human beings and animals. For example, we believe in justice. We set up court systems, with judges and juries, to give justice to those who have transgressed civil and criminal law. Animals don’t do that. But we do, because we are uniquely made in the image of God.
While we must address the evil of abortion, we should always keep in mind that it is only one symptom of a generation that has become godless. It is a branch, not the root. Our agenda as Christians isn’t moral reformation, but to see sinners saved from the Day of Judgment through the righteousness of Jesus. He saves us from wrath to come (see 1 Thessalonians 1:10). And the fruit of the Gospel will be that men and women forsake all evil.
The moment I became a Christian, I became pro-life and supported the Biblical definition of marriage—one man and one woman in a lifelong covenant. I stood against adultery, blasphemy, pornography and fornication. Everything that God loved, I loved, because He had written His moral law upon my heart and caused me to walk in His statutes (see Jeremiah 31:33). That’s what it means to be born again.;
Back in 1974, when I was just two years into my Christian walk, someone showed me a black-and-white picture of a bag full of dead babies from a Canadian abortion hospital. I will never forget that moment. I was horrified. Until that second, I was ignorant as to the nature of abortion. I immediately had the small photo enlarged to 2 feet by 2 feet and took it with me as I went to preach the Gospel at Speakers’ Corner in my home city of Christchurch, New Zealand.
On that day, it so happened that there was a pro-abortion display about 50 feet from where I would be preaching. When I noticed that the group’s arguments for abortion were lacking photographic evidence of what they were suggesting, I put my photo on their display board. That’s when a woman hit me with her handbag; such was my introduction to this very volatile issue.
Since then, I have been a passionate advocate of exposing this modern-day holocaust. That includes going to colleges and interviewing students for online videos, some of which have been seen by millions—such as our “180” pro-life documentary. The video shows eight abortion advocates changing their minds and becoming pro-life, simply because they were asked a thought-provoking question.
When I talk with a college student about abortion, I use the topic as a springboard to share the Gospel. And when I do so, I have two great confidences. The first is that God has given light to every man. Despite the conscience being seared, it agrees with the moral law. Romans 2:15 says, “They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.”
When parsed grammatically, conscience means “con (with) science (knowledge).” Unlike animals, God created humans with a conscience to know intuitively right from wrong. For example, we know it’s wrong to lie, steal, commit adultery, blaspheme and murder. And so when I ask college students and pro-choice advocates alike, “It’s OK to kill a baby when?” I often hear a pregnant silent pause while respondents wrestle with their God-given conscience. Then, when I show them my “Life in the Womb” Gospel tract, which includes a photo of a 9-week-old baby sucking its thumb in its mother’s womb, their “it’s not a baby” avoidance mindset often relents.
Another confidence I have in the sanctity of human life apologetic is that God has written eternity upon our hearts. Ecclesiastes 3:11 states: “He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” People don’t naturally long to die. The Gospel is God’s answer to that intuitive will to live.
And the Bible teaches that even before human life begins at conception, God’s creative power is at work. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations,” God told His Prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:5). A baby is not a liver, a heart, a lung or a kidney. It isn’t an organ a mother can live without. A baby in the womb is not an appendage to a mother’s body. You are not your mother, and you never have been. Because God left Heaven and came to Earth, in the fullness of time, including three trimesters of gestation in Mary’s womb, shouldn’t a mother’s womb remain a safe place for babies to develop and grow until their time has come to be born? ©2020 Ray Comfort
Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version.
Ray Comfort is founder and CEO of Living Waters, the bestselling author of more than 90 books about evangelism and Christian apologetics, and executive producer of dozens of video documentaries and movies. His award-winning “Way of the Master” television program is broadcast globally, and his YouTube channel has garnered more than 140 million views.