Ending Abortion: The Way Forward

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Thank you, Pastor Rob. Thank you, Sarah. Ending abortion, the way forward.

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Proverbs 24, 11 through 12 says, rescue those who are being taken away to death and those who are staggering to the slaughter.

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Oh, hold them back. If you say, see, we did not know this. Does he who weighs the hearts not consider it?

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And does he who watches over our soul not know it? And would he not repay a person according to his work?

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Proverbs 24, 11 and 12. If you'll show that first slide. This is not what this presentation is about, but it's the principle.

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Do you ever feel this way in any area of your life? This one says they are voting for the lesser of two evils.

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It doesn't work, but it'll work this time. So they vote for the lesser of two evils. It doesn't work.

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That's not what this presentation is about, but it's the principle. Do you ever feel that way in anything that you do?

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Maybe in how you approach your sanctification or any other area, like marriage, finances.

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You're working with this method, going this direction. It doesn't work, but you feel like it's the right way.

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You try it again and it doesn't work. Maybe you feel that way about the abortion issue.

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Maybe you should, because it's been over 50 years that we've been approaching it kind of with the same method.

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And so we need to look at a different way of thinking. I want to encourage you that there is a way forward with ending abortion.

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And I want to present that to you tonight, hopefully, so you can go to the next slide. Knowingly or unknowingly, we have been brought up or taught a two kingdom theology.

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That two kingdom theology, very, very simply is this. You have the church and you have the state.

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And that mindset kind of goes like this. There's pro -life legislation, there's pro -life conservative legislators, and it's their responsibility, and it's the responsibility of the pro -life parachurch organizations to head the charge in pro -life legislation and work with the state.

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Churches and Christians shouldn't get involved in legislation. The Bible tells us to share the gospel, not make laws.

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Laws can't change hearts anyway. Our responsibility is to support our church, missions, and evangelism.

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It's God who changes hearts. The more people get saved, the more abortion will decrease.

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Plus, there are others who are doing the legislative work for us, and they're doing a good job.

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So really, is there anything else we can do other than continue to support those many pro -life organizations and vote for conservative pro -life legislators?

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That's kind of, I feel like, many of our mindset, many have this mindset currently.

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So what is the narrative? What's the story that we're being told by many?

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Well, for over 50 years, we have suffered through the decision of Roe versus Wade.

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During that time, Christians preached the gospel and supported pro -life organizations, and they supported pro -life legislation, and they voted in.

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They did their duty. They voted in conservative pro -life legislators, and we accomplished the greatest victory thus far by overturning

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Roe versus Wade in June 2022. The courts gave the president and conservatives what they wanted.

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They gave the decision to choose whether abortion was legal or illegal to the states. 14 states had trigger laws in place.

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What are trigger laws? Trigger laws were put into effect that if, when, and as soon as Roe versus Wade was overturned, that this law in that state would be enacted.

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And so in June 2022, when Roe versus Wade was overturned, 14 states and their trigger laws were enacted, and those 14 states became abortion -free.

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The way forward now is to get those remaining states in the same situation as those 14 who enacted their trigger laws who are now abortion -free, and to keep supporting pro -life organizations, pro -life legislation, and pro -life legislators.

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That's the narrative we're being told, that there are 14 states that are abortion -free.

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What is the reality? The reality is in June 2022,

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Roe versus Wade was overturned. Tremendous victory. Really, really good. And those 14 states did enact their trigger laws.

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Now all this, the rest of this information in this section, I got from Foundation to Abolish Abortion.

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So if you can find this information on their website. But follow along with the numbers.

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This is the reality. Remember what the narrative is that we're being told, and listen to the numbers.

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In 2023, when was Roe versus Wade overturned? June 2022.

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In 2023, there were 1 ,025 ,696 recorded abortions.

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This was the highest number recorded abortion since 2010. 61 % of abortions are what they call self -managed, using an abortion pill.

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This is even happening in the trigger law states where they are abortion -free.

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In fact, in those abortion -free states, abortion is still legal.

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There may not be abortion, there may not be abortion meals, and it may be illegal to sell the abortion pill.

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However, it is not illegal for a woman to order, having her possession, and murder her preborn child by the means of the pill or any other means.

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It is not illegal for the woman to murder her preborn child. Many pro -life organizations want us to celebrate, and I got a lot of this information from my brother who's from Texas.

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They want us to celebrate what happened in Texas. Texas was one of the states that had trigger laws that went into effect, and they say now that, in 2023, after Roe versus Wade was overturned, there were only three abortions in Texas.

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It's my understanding that those three were really in the case of the life of the mother issue, which is not really an abortion because doctors, they tried to protect and save the life of both, and in rare occasions, we may lose a child, but it's not really an abortion because doctors are trying to save the life of both people.

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But what is the reality in Texas? Here are the real numbers in Texas. And again,

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I got these numbers from Foundation for Abolished Abortion Organization. In 2021, there were 55 ,000 abortions in 2021.

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In 2022, Roe versus Wade was overturned and the trigger laws were enacted. In 2023, remember they want us to say that, they want us to know that three abortions happened in Texas in 2023.

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In reality, there were 20 to 30 ,000 abortions that took place due to the appeal.

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32 ,000 traveled out of state to have an abortion. So therefore, it is estimated that between 52 and 60 ,000

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Texas babies were murdered in 2023. 55 ,000 in 2021,

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Roe versus Wade in 2022, 52 to 60 ,000 in 2023 after Roe versus Wade.

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Here are some other numbers. This is from the New York Times. In 2020, 465 ,000 in all 50 states in the first six months.

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In 2023, you'll have to follow the numbers.

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So I'm going to say it again. In 2020, 465 ,000 in all 50 states in the first six months.

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In 2023, after Roe versus Wade, 511 ,000 in 36.

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Why 36? Minus the 14 trigger law states. 511 ,000, no, 51 ,100, excuse me, in 36 states in the first six months.

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This excludes abortions outside the formal healthcare system, which would include self -managed mail -in pills from overseas or in other countries.

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Self -managed abortions, the largest pill provider for these self -managed abortion pills is called

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Aid Access, and they sent out 3 ,500 to states where abortions are banned. From within the

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U .S., an estimated 88 % used them to abort babies.

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That's 3 ,000 abortions a month. Calculating the market share access, 40 ,000 abortions in six months in states that are, quote, abortion -free.

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That's 80 ,000 a year. This doesn't include women that leave to go to other states.

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This is the reality of our current state in America. There are no states that are actually abortion -free.

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There are no states where abortion is completely illegal. So in reality, we need to reconsider this two -kingdom theology and think about how we are under the one kingdom of Jesus Christ.

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We need both from Christians. Both what? We need

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Christians to be evangelizing with the gospel, and we need Christians to be involved in legislation.

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So let's look at some facts and some misconceptions. It is true that only the gospel can change hearts.

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It is true that we should expect people to change their mind concerning abortion once they receive

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Christ. We should expect that. But in reality, we will always have sin with us until Christ has defeated all his enemies.

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1 Corinthians 15, Psalm 110. It is true that nonprofits cannot endorse a candidate.

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However, it is also true that a nonprofit can get involved in promoting legislation as long as it's not their main objective to be involved in legislation.

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It is also a reality that God puts governments in their places, and he has also given them their responsibilities.

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So we are right in holding them accountable to their submission to Jesus Christ, especially legislators who claim

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Christ as their savior. It is true that laws cannot change hearts.

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However, we are commanded to protect the innocent with righteous, impartial laws that promote equal justice.

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So what does it mean to be abortion free? Can someone give me a quick definition?

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If you were to say this state is abortion free, what would that mean? What's a one sentence definition?

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Abortions aren't happening anywhere in any form. Anybody else? Bingo.

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Both of those are correct. So we'll say it like this. Abortions are illegal and otherwise prohibited by anyone.

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That would be an abortion free state. So let's keep that in mind as we move forward and we think about our legislation.

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So let's start with the Supreme Court. In reality, did the

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Supreme Court, when they made their decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, did they give the states, they hand over the states to make the decision whether in their state it was legal or illegal to have an abortion?

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Sort of, but not really. They abrogated their responsibility actually to uphold the law.

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Over the Supreme Court building, as you walk in, it says equal justice under the law.

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And the 14th Amendment of our Constitution says no state shall deny any person in its jurisdiction equal protection under their laws.

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So the Supreme Court, what they should have done, was said that from the moment of fertilization conception that this pre -born child is a person and they should have upheld the 14th

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Amendment. But instead, what they did was they handed over to the states the ability to decide who should be murdered and who should not be murdered, who is a person and who is not a person.

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In fact, I think it was one of them wrote this about their decision. If it is true that a pre -born is actually a person, then they should be protected under the 14th

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Amendment. So they intentionally avoided their responsibility to uphold the 14th

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Amendment and gave that to the states. So before we move any forward,

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I want to give this to you. Galatians 3 .24, it says that the law is a tutor to lead us to Christ.

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Now, I know as pastors and theologians and students of God's Word, we often think of that verse as pertaining to God's law, but it is also true when it comes to any law.

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A law should be a tutor that leads us to Christ. It should teach us and lead us to Christ.

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So what does this teach us? What does this decision teach us about Christ?

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It teaches us that man is God and man can make the decision whether a person should be murdered or a person should not be murdered.

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A person should be guilty for murdering someone or not guilty for murdering someone. It makes man

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God to decide which laws are righteous and just and which laws are not.

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That's what it is teaching an unbelieving world Christ looks like. But is that what the

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Bible teaches? I would say that it's not what the Bible teaches about our

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Lord and Savior, that he is God and he decides who is a person, who is not a person, and who should be held accountable and who should not be held accountable.

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So what about Roe versus Wade? Back in 2022, everything that you thought about that decision and situation, was it like you thought it was?

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Did abortions really decrease? Are there 14 states that are truly abortion -free?

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We've seen that abortions have risen and we've seen that there are truly no states that are abortion -free where abortion is illegal and otherwise prohibited by anyone.

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So you are probably most familiar with the term pro -life. Maybe you are beginning to hear this term called abolition or an abolitionist or abolition legislation.

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So what's the difference between pro -life and abolition or an abolitionist? Why have we not been able to abolish abortion?

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My opinion, and I think in many others' opinion, a lot of the reasons come from the deceptions, the philosophy, the motives and actions from not all, but from many pro -life organizations and pro -life thinking.

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Abolitionism is a purely Christian movement. The foundation, the motivation and arguments against abortion all come from God's word.

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And when you hear the word abolition, I want you to think love of neighbor, no partiality, equal protection, there are many pro -life organizations that are not

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Christian organizations. And even those that are, they don't like to involve religion in their arguments.

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Many pro -life organizations have only promoted legislation that denies equal protection to the freeborn.

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These laws, these pro -life legislation only regulate who it is okay to murder and who it is not.

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They regulate who to hold accountable for murder and who not. Though some may claim that they hold the same goal as an abolitionist, their method is only to introduce incremental laws.

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Their argument is, this is all we can get. At least we'll save some.

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But we've already been over the statistics. It really hasn't happened.

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In fact, they've increased. Furthermore, any and every incremental law puts man in charge of deciding who it is and who should not be murdered and who we should hold accountable.

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Not only do these pro -life organizations only promote simple laws, they actively seek to destroy equal protection laws.

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So also remember, when you think of abolition or an abolitionist, the kind of legislation that we're looking for is equal protection laws, equal protection legislation.

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In 2022, Louisiana had the first equal protection bill to make it to the floor to be discussed and voted on.

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But in May 2022, 77 pro -life organizations signed an open letter to the legislators in Louisiana not to vote or pass this equal protection bill.

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In fact, according to a representative from Foundation to Abolish Abortion, our house speaker, our national house speaker,

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Christian Mike Johnson, called the pastor leading the way in Louisiana and called

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Louisiana legislators and discouraged them from passing this equal protection bill.

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And if you want to look at it, I have a copy of it up here. And if you want to see which pro -life organizations signed it, you can look at the back and see which pro -life organizations signed.

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And that will be more relevant at the end when we talk about practical application. So where do abolitionists get their marching orders?

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We get our marching orders from God's word. And that's what I want to share with you right now is

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God's word and what he says. Micah 6, 8 says, he has told you, old man, what is good and what does the

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Lord require of you? But to do justice, do justice.

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Think about our pre -born neighbors and think about justice. The Lord commands us to do justice, to love kindness or some virgins say love mercy.

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And I heard John make this statement. How do we show mercy in this and show kindness?

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If you look at an equal protection bill, you will not see in there what the punishment should be.

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That's up to the due process and juries and judges.

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That's not up to us. And we show kindness and mercy to those who come to Christ in repentance and trusting in him.

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And even those who don't, we seek out to show mercy and kindness to those who are seeking to sacrifice their pre -born child.

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And it says to walk humbly with our God. And what does that mean? You remember the verse that says, and such were some of you.

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There's no one who is innocent. There was no one who is not guilty of breaking

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God's law. We are all guilty. None of us are innocent before a holy

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God. And so as we approach this issue, we approach it with humility that we are all sinners before a holy

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God. Leviticus 19, 18 says, you shall not take vengeance nor hold any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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I'm the Lord, your God. James 2, 8. If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law, according to the scriptures, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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You are doing well. Psalm 89, 14. Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne.

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Mercy and truth go before you. Proverbs 20, 23. Differing weights are an abomination to the

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Lord, and a false scale is not good. Leviticus 9, 15. You shall do no injustice in judgment.

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Think about these verses. A pro -life legislation that allows us to choose who can be murdered and who cannot be murdered.

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Is that equal justice for all the pre -born? Leviticus 19, 15.

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You shall do no injustice in judgment. You shall not be partial to the poor nor defer to the great, but you are to judge your neighbor fairly.

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Isaiah 1, 15 through 17. So when you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide my eyes from you.

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Yes, even though you offer many prayers, I will not be listening. Your hands are covered in blood.

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Wash yourselves. Make yourselves clean. Remove the evil of your deeds from my sight. Stop doing evil.

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Learn to do good. Seek justice. Rebuke the oppressor. Obtain justice for the orphan.

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Plead for the widow's case. Isaiah 42, 4. He will not be disheartened or crushed until he has established justice on the earth and the coastlands will wait expectantly for his law.

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Isaiah 10, 1. Woe to those who enact evil statutes. Do you catch that one?

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Isaiah 10, 1. Woe to those who enact evil statutes and to those who constantly record unjust decisions.

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James 2, 13. For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy.

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Mercy triumphs over judgment. Proverbs 28, 13. He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion.

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Proverbs 6, 16 through 17. There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are abomination to him, haughty eyes, lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood.

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Daniel 10. Deuteronomy 10, 17. For the Lord your God is the

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God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great and mighty and the awesome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe.

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So God says he does not show partiality. And what does he tell us in Deuteronomy 1, 17?

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You are not to show partiality in judgment. You shall hear the small and the great alike.

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You are not to be afraid of any person. For the judgment is God's. So what can we do?

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Remember that Galatians tells us that the law is our tutor. Which legislation is the tutor that leads us to Christ?

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There was, there's a Republican nominee who recently had a commercial that said,

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I support North Carolina's common sense 12 week abortion ban.

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To support any law of partiality and equal justice is not common sense.

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It is sinful and brings God's judgment on our land. Isaiah 10, remember says, woe to those who enact evil statutes.

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What are we teaching? But that God is okay with the murder of innocent image bearers.

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We are in fact teaching that the murderers are innocent. We have told them that they are simply victims.

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We actually turn people away from Christ when we do that. But remember abolitionists are willing to call sin, sin because God is the

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God of truth and God has called us to truth. And remember that abolitionists are also willing to look at themselves and say such were some of you.

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So we are just as guilty. We are no less guilty than anybody else.

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We have all sinned and fallen short of God's glory. No one is too far out of the reach for forgiveness from the savior.

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And that's the good news. We are all sinners and in need of the saving grace and mercy of Jesus Christ.

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So what's the first thing that we can do? First thing that we can do is repent.

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Repent of the apathy of not pursuing love of our pre -born neighbor.

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We can continue to pray, pray for our legislators, pray for our churches, pray for the pre -born, pray for mothers and fathers, pray for the abolition of abortion.

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We can continue to evangelize the gospel as it was truthfully said earlier that it's only the gospel that can change hearts.

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It's the only the gospel that can forgive sins. It's only through Jesus Christ that any of this can be accomplished and that anyone can see the father.

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And to be living out the gospel is to be loving our pre -born neighbors.

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The next thing that we can do is be educating our friends and family about this issue.

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There are some good and great resources online. The first one is you can go to lovelife .org,

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I think. lovelife .org slash legalized life.

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You will see the founder and attorney Bradley Pierce and he does several session video on what

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Love Life is pursuing, what Foundation to Abolish Abortion is pursuing as it pertains to legislation here in North Carolina.

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You can also go to Foundation to Abolish Abortion, go to their

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YouTube channel, watch their docu -series. And it has all this wonderful information and even more about the reality of what's really going on and what

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God would have us to be doing. Our churches can add a resolution just like we did years ago with the

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Marriage Act. We can add a resolution to our church constitution, our church bylaws to say that we are for equal protection.

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And if you are a Southern Baptist church, the Southern Baptist Convention has already done that.

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And we can officially, if we so desire in our churches, adopt what they've already passed at the

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Southern Baptist Convention, just make our church public about it.

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And then once we do that, once we pass and make it formal, an equal protection resolution in our church, we can fulfill the duties in that resolution.

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Be obedient, fulfill those resolution duties. The next thing that we can do is contact our legislators.

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Let them know that we should be pushing equal protection legislation.

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And there's two slides that go along with this. Our friends, our brothers and sisters at OSA, I saw that they put this one out and I agree with it.

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When it comes to contacting your legislators, if they say no abolition of abortion, we say no votes, no money, no kidding.

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And they want us to make a pledge. That's taking a stand. That goes against the voting for lesser of two evils sometimes.

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It's taking a stand. The only thought that I had on this was we can do this.

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However, they will just say, okay, that's fine because they still have many pro -life organizations that are lobbyists that fully support them.

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And so to our next slide, what we can say to them, if you find a pro -life organization that says we are not for equal protection laws, we can also say to them, no money, no donations, no volunteers.

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That would drive the money of the lobbyists to the legislators who would then say, okay, maybe

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I'll lend my ear to the abolitionists now. But it's not about political strategy ultimately.

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It's about being obedient to Christ, about being obedient to his word.

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It's about the gospel. So I want to thank you for your attention.

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Thank you for enjoying this presentation. I hope that it was informative. Let me pray.

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If you have any questions, John Rice Cameron, he's going to come up here and help me answer those questions.

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So let's pray. Father, we thank you for what you're doing in your church. We do want to repent for our apathy for the state of child sacrifice in America.

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Work in us obedience, we ask. Work in us courage to fully trust in your sovereignty.

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In your plan, because it's good. Pray this in Jesus name, amen. So who has the first question?

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Yes, sir. Yeah, so we're working on that right now.

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We've had equal protection bills filed in about 19 states. So next session, we're looking at probably around that number.

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We'll see. But definitely like Texas is going to have one. South Carolina is going to have a big one. Maybe Tennessee.

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It's a state we haven't had before. And I'm working on North Carolina right now. So basically, the first step is finding one legislator who's willing to file it.

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I was actually at an event last night in Gaston County, where I live. And I talked to like two state senators and a state rep, talked to him about equal protection.

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But North Carolina is a tough state because it's not really a red state.

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It's a lot closer. And understandably, and unfortunately,

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Republicans are, oh, if we push this, we'll lose the election. But really, once you find that one legislator, that gives you the opportunity to start the conversation.

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Because until we have a bill, it's hard to even have a conversation. Because if it's not in legislation being debated and considered, then it's not really a part of that political dialogue.

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So the first step is finding a legislator to file the bill. And once you have a bill filed, then you want to sort of rally support across the churches, across grassroots organizations, and say,

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OK, this is the bill to end abortion in North Carolina. We need everyone to call their legislator to support it.

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And so then a call would go out. Hey, contact your legislator. Tell them to support this

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House bill or the Senate bill. But I think in the long run, the vision for North Carolina is first getting that bill, getting your foot in the door.

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But there's also a lot of work to be done at the local party level. So each county in the state has its own

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Republican Party. And so ultimately, we would want to get abolition of abortion in the

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North Carolina Republican Party platform. And you'd kind of be surprised. Not a whole lot of people show up to these

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Republican Party meetings when they're voting on resolutions and stuff. So if we got more Christians involved in the process, then we could have a lot of sway, a lot of authority.

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It was funny. I was talking to a legislator last night. He's actually my legislator down in Gaston County.

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He said if the Christians would just show up, we would control everything. So pushing the party in a positive direction on this would be an important step.

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Simultaneously advancing legislation, sort of consolidating the

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Christian church behind this vision of equal protection. And I think once you see that, legislators will increasingly get behind it.

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And then because you've started the conversation, that gives you the opportunity to change the culture.

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And another, that's a long answer, but the last thing I'd say is that when you think about changing the culture,

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I was talking to a candidate last night who's running for an office in education. And I kind of asked her, hey, how would you feel about introducing curriculum into the government schools in North Carolina to basically say, hey, we're going to teach kids that life begins at conception.

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We're going to educate students about the humanity of the pre -born, like all that stuff.

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It's not a substitute for equal protection. It's not a substitute for having a bill to just abolish it.

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But we can do those things simultaneously to help kind of move the culture in the right direction.

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And I would just say that there's a draft being written so that when we speak to these legislators, we can say, here's the bill.

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And then also I would include two other things. Educate, educate, educate.

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So that's the encouragement to you as far as the practical application. When a bill is introduced, we do find that champion, that champion legislator, we are already working on and have been working on educating our friends and family and other churches so that they know that there's support behind them.

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And then the other thing too is not sure the exact state of this situation, but I showed you these two pieces of information.

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We can do big things and we can do little things. Here's the open letter with all the pro -life organizations that signed do not support equal protection bill.

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Here's the resolution from the Southern Baptist Convention. If you take a real close look, there's some inconsistencies between the two.

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A convention that passes an equal protection resolution and part of our convention that signed an open letter discouraging someone not to vote for equal protection legislation.

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So one of the little things that we can do is look for inconsistencies and try to correct those inconsistencies where we find them.

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Any other questions? Yes, ma 'am.

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So, I mean, in North Carolina, abortion is legal up to 12 weeks.

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It's really for mothers, it's legal at any point in the pregnancy because the law explicitly says that a mother cannot be prosecuted for abortion, even if it's after 12 weeks.

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And that's what we're trying to change. Unfortunately, North Carolina has become a destination state because other states surrounding it, like Tennessee, South Carolina, Georgia, have stricter laws in North Carolina.

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They either sort of regulate abortion around six weeks or in the case of Tennessee, it's at conception.

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And so what that does, it means there's a massive influx of people from those states into North Carolina, primarily

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Charlotte, to get abortions. There's the abortion mill on Latrobe Drive in Charlotte where Love Life has a big presence.

42:18

I've been there a couple times to pray with them once in their prayer walks and stuff. But that's like the epicenter for abortion in the

42:28

Southeast. And so, yeah, if we had a law of equal protection, it would certainly shut that place down.

42:36

And it would also just make it a crime to assist in an abortion and also to procure one. I think in other states like Texas, Texas has probably, it's not equal protection, but it has the strictest abortion law in the

42:52

Western world probably. I believe that if an abortionist is caught performing an abortion, like a doctor, not a woman, but it's a doctor, he or she could be thrown in jail for 100 years, which is great.

43:06

We want that to be the law. But the problem is that that does not, equal protection is not applied.

43:14

And therefore, there's still a loophole that allows mothers to legally do those abortions, right?

43:19

And that's why you're seeing the pills flooding into Texas, women taking the pills. Like, yeah,

43:25

I understand. So these pro -life laws, they've written into the penal codes of these states, right?

43:32

Saying that no mother on whom an abortion is attempted or performed can be prosecuted under any circumstances, prosecuted or convicted, right?

43:44

And so what that does is it essentially creates in the law, like special murder rights for mothers.

43:50

And that's what's allowing the proliferation of abortion and of death in these states.

43:58

And that's kind of the sex, like if we look at all of our equal protection bills, like pretty much all these states have a provision like that in their penal code, no woman can be, it forbids the prosecution of a pregnant woman on whom an abortion is intended to perform.

44:14

And so usually like an equal protection bill, it's pretty simple. All it does is it repeals that section.

44:20

So to answer your question, I'm not aware of any cases in which a mother or a doctor has been prosecuted.

44:30

And that doesn't mean that the abortionists are not necessarily following the law. They have to think about it like the abortion industry, it has an ideological purpose for its existence and that it wants to promote abortion.

44:42

And they have this very perverse view of like a woman's choice and all that, but they also exist to make money, right?

44:49

And so they don't want to break the law and subject themselves to legal criminal or civil liability, right?

45:00

Cause their first and foremost concern is self -preservation, right?

45:05

So usually you don't see, you know, abortionists violating these laws, but I think oftentimes it's partly because they feel like they don't have to, like abortion is still available in Texas and all these other states for basically anybody who wants it.

45:19

I will say, cause when I was talking, I did remember a case. So a couple of months ago, there was a case in Texas down in the

45:28

Rio Grande Valley where a woman in her twenties had taken abortion pills.

45:37

And obviously these abortion pills are incredibly dangerous for women, you know, in addition to murdering children.

45:44

And so she'd had complications with those pills. And so she went to an emergency room down in South Texas and they asked her what was going on.

45:56

And she said that she had taken abortion pills to, you know, abort her child.

46:03

And the sheriff in, I think, Star County didn't actually understand the abortion law in Texas.

46:11

And so he arrested her thinking that, you know, hey, he thought that abortion, that Texas was supposed to be abortion free, right?

46:19

And so there's someone who's come and they've said that they've confessed, right?

46:25

To committing what he thought was a crime. And so he's like, yeah, well, let's arrest her. So she ended up spending like two days in prison but she was let out.

46:34

And now she's suing the, you know, the county and the police department there. And unfortunately she'll probably win because the reality is, is that what she did in Texas was legal.

46:47

And so like, that's a case where you're seeing like the confusion that these pro -life laws cause, right?

46:55

It's like an inconsistency in the run. On the one hand, you have legislators going out there, beating their chest saying, hey, like we've ended abortion in Texas.

47:02

This legislation makes abortion illegal. And then law enforcement tries to enforce it.

47:08

And, you know, people say, oh, no, no, no. Actually this law was written to acquit murderers, not to put them in jail.

47:15

So that's, you know, equal protection would simplify all that. It would make it, it would actually make enforcement a lot easier,

47:23

I would say, and a lot more simple and straightforward for law enforcement because basically, hey, abortion is a crime.

47:29

We believe that it should be illegal for everyone to murder anybody. So, yeah.

47:53

Okay. Yeah, I know Seth. Very bright young fellow.

47:59

Yeah. His table, the way I understand it, is the education showing the ideology of what plants are created to be and it has become now.

48:18

And is what we're doing here tonight is part of that education.

48:26

But I think a step farther, is there any way that the fathers of the

48:35

Spaniards have any rights at all in any state in this country to stop an abortion?

48:43

Yeah, that's a great question. And the answer, the answer is no, right? So thinking biblically, right?

48:50

There's, and I know Robert mentioned, you know, this several times in his message, is that, you know, we're to pursue justice for the fatherless, right?

48:59

And legally speaking, the preborn child in America is the fatherless, like in the most literal sense of the word, because, you know, his or her mother wants to end their life.

49:12

And the father has no legal right to intercede in any of these states to protect the child's life.

49:20

So in some states, you know, there's like parental consent laws, right, around abortion.

49:27

The left is trying to undo even that. But really, yeah, no, fathers have no legal authority to interpose and to stop the murder of their children.

49:39

You know, if you had a case where a mother, you know, the mother wanted the abortion and the father did not.

49:46

But the thing about equal protection is you think, you know, a lot of the common objections you get is you think, okay, what about women who, you know, might be coerced into having an abortion, where it's really not their fault?

49:58

Or what about, you know, there's like there's a huge problem in our country with human trafficking, right?

50:03

And that sort of, you know, underground human trafficking industry probably creates a lot of abortion, right?

50:13

And so you think about those cases, right? Or what about, you know, it probably would be very, very rare, but what about a case where a woman genuinely didn't know what she was doing, right?

50:22

And so in our equal protection laws, it's, you know, they're written to protect mothers in those cases, but also, right, like it also holds, you know, abusers accountable in a way that they're not held accountable right now under the law.

50:38

So right now, let's say you live in any state where it's still legal, which is all of them, or it's still legal for mothers to abort their children, right?

50:47

But even in a state with a lot stricter laws, right? You know, say it's a state that has like one of those trigger law states, right?

50:54

Because it's not legal, because it is still legal for a mother to order pills and intentionally cause the death of her own preborn child, it's therefore not illegal for a abuser, a trafficker, a boyfriend, you know, whoever it is to put pressure on her, as long as he's not, you know, using direct force, right?

51:22

As long as it doesn't cross that line into duress. But if he's making threats, saying, hey, I'm going to,

51:28

I'm going to kick you out of the house. I'm, you know, going to, you know, pursue some other kind of retribution, right?

51:36

He can still legally do that. He can still legally apply pressure upon her to get the abortion because what he's pressuring her to do is not illegal for her to do, right?

51:49

And so really, these equal protection laws would go a long way,

51:55

I think, in protecting women in some of these really tough situations, right?

52:01

Because then it would be, you know, because then you go to like the abuser, it would be illegal for the abuser to put pressure on somebody to do something that's illegal, right?

52:12

That it's illegal to incite or to, you know, pressure, coerce someone to do something that's illegal.

52:18

So I think that, you know, equal protection laws, right? Like we're writing them because we want to protect babies, right?

52:25

That's where the genocide is happening. But it would just have a lot of other downstream effects in our culture that I think would be very positive.

52:33

Yeah. So that's a great question.

52:50

And so it has to do with personhood laws, right? So it's funny. A lot of states, a lot of states actually treat preborn children as persons under the law, right?

53:03

Which is good. I support that. You know, Louisiana is one of those states. I believe even Texas is.

53:08

It's like South. Right. So and so basically what, you know, oftentimes you'll find, right, is that somebody is, say, if you if you cause the death, like, say, a car accident, right?

53:19

And you get a car accident and, you know, a pregnant mother and her preborn child are killed in the car accident, then somebody could have like a double manslaughter charge.

53:29

Or, you know, say that someone, you know, murders a pregnant woman. That could be that could be a double homicide.

53:34

Right. And so what you're seeing is that a lot of these with these states are basically saying with their laws, and this is why there's still a problem, even when you have recognition of personhood, is you're basically saying, well, hey, you know, this class of people, we're going to treat them like persons.

53:51

We're going to recognize them as persons and we're going to treat them as persons in every other category, except for homicide by their own mother.

54:02

And so and so basically, that's why I think that like, you know, personhood, it's it's necessary, but not sufficient in that, you know, a state can still say, yes, you know, these people are persons, but we're just going to treat them differently.

54:16

Right. The same way, like with, you know, you think about like slavery or stuff like that. It's like, yeah, persons, but we're treating them differently.

54:26

Yeah. Yeah. Anything that I need to add there? March for Life, maybe?

55:59

Yeah. They make you feel very good about it.

56:14

Yeah. So what?

56:45

Yeah, no, no. They were everyone I talked to is very receptive to the idea. I mean, I mean, you're right.

56:50

It's like the first step, right, is having the first conversation. But the real test is, are they willing to introduce a bill or once a bill has already been introduced by somebody else, are they willing to co -author it, like sign their name onto it?

57:06

Right. Which, you know, how you basically get bills passed, right, is, you know, it's introduced, you know, basically the way you kind of build momentum behind it is you've got to have people sign on to the bill.

57:17

So the more legislators sign on to a bill, the more kind of legislative momentum it has, you know, the more likely it is to get a hearing and committee and then to pass the committee and then get to the floor.

57:29

So I do see that a lot. Like I've done a lot of lobbying in Texas and I've talked to a lot of people who will say things like, well,

57:39

I really support that bill. I really like it. You know, I agree with it. But what about like,

57:47

I'm worried about, you know, we just can't do it this year because there's an election next year and, you know, we're going to lose all of our pro -life progress, right, if we do that.

57:57

But the thing is, like, that's every session. There's always an election next year, right? So it's never the right time.

58:02

Like they say, they say, oh, yeah, we can. I'd love to do that. Just, you know, just call me back when it's the right time, you know?

58:09

And so you see that a lot. I think the solution to that is, well, it's two things, right, is that I think that, you know, as Christians, we have to be thinking about raising up, you know, godly men to go and run for political office, men who fear the

58:26

Lord first, who are not afraid of special interests, afraid of, you know, being, you know, scorned and derided by their colleagues, right?

58:36

And so we're seeing that, like we're seeing in Texas, for example, there were a number of legislators who got elected who

58:43

I have a lot of confidence in, you know, who have, I would say, like a spine of steel and who are going to be pushing this equal protection stuff very aggressively.

58:53

Like in Oklahoma, there's a state senator who's actually very active in the SBC, Dusty Devers, but he's been pushing equal protection legislation and he's actually been able to rally people sort of behind it in a way that, you know, that hasn't really been done before.

59:12

And so, you know, part of the solution is, you know, supporting candidates, like identifying candidates while they're still running, talking to them about equal protection, helping out with their campaigns if they're willing to consider this.

59:25

And then the second piece is like, you know, you can get, you know, part one of the solution, right, is to elect better people.

59:35

And then sometimes you can't do that. So part two is you apply pressure on the people who are already there. And that goes to some of the things that you were talking about in your presentation, where it's like people, like most people don't think to reach out to their state legislators, right?

59:51

So, you know, most people don't think to give their state legislator's office a phone call or to even like, like,

59:58

I don't know what district you're in, but if you were able to, I'm almost certain that if you were able to call your legislator's office on the phone, you could probably get a meeting set up, like in person with your legislator, you know, either they'll meet you at like a coffee shop or something, or they'll meet you at their, if they have like an office in their district, they'll meet you there, they'll invite you there.

01:00:20

And you'll have like 30 minutes to, you know, talk to them about this type of legislation and talk to them why it's, you know, talk to them about why it's important to you.

01:00:30

And, you know, what God's word says about establishing justice and what their role is as the civil magistrate that's been given the sword, you know, by God and how, you know, all authority in heaven on earth belongs to God and they're under God's authority.

01:00:45

So there's definitely, I mean, you know, the access that you have to your state legislators, it's an access that you're not going to have to a federal office holder.

01:00:56

And I just encourage you to take advantage of that. And so, yeah, but once we have a bill set, we'll start, you know, mailing us, we'll start putting together an email list and, you know, sort of solicit interest and then kind of push that out.

01:01:11

And we'll put alerts out saying, hey, you know, call your legislator to coauthor this or that.

01:01:17

But yeah, first step is getting a bill. But you're right, I have been seeing a lot of that. And I would just add this too.

01:01:26

My first and initial reaction, and I've spoken to legislators before, but it, you know, if I was to speak to them is to jump in with both feet and say, why aren't you doing this?

01:01:38

Why aren't you doing that? But I really think in stepping back,

01:01:44

I believe that legislators, especially professing Christian legislators will begin to behave consistently principled when the church and believers begin to act consistently principled.

01:02:01

And so that sounds good, but it can be discouraging because ultimately we're not somebody else's

01:02:09

Holy Spirit. We're only accountable to God for ourselves and being obedient to the Spirit.

01:02:15

And I was listening to another Psalm on the way to church this evening and I was hearing David cry out, why do all my enemies rise up against me?

01:02:24

And so oftentimes he felt alone and we can feel alone, but we're accountable to God for ourselves.

01:02:32

But there's encouragement and there's strength in the Lord for obeying him because his plan is ultimately good.

01:02:44

And whether we see something positive happening around us or not, the

01:02:51

Lord may bless us and allow us to see some positive moving forward. But ultimately ending abortion or abolishing any sin, think about 1

01:03:04

Corinthians 15 and Psalm 110. It says that Jesus is actively destroying his enemies and that last enemy will be death.

01:03:17

That's our victory and he is working actively towards that. So the abolition of abortion or the abolition of any sin,

01:03:28

Christ is working on it. We wanna be on his side and that's an encouragement for us.

01:03:34

When we feel alone, we're not alone because we're with Christ. Yeah.

01:03:39

One more thing to kind of add on that as I was thinking your question. So the most powerful tool that you have when you're talking to, especially like,

01:03:50

I mean, you'd be surprised like how many of your legislators are professing Christians. And I think a lot of them really are walking with the

01:03:57

Lord, right? They have their shortcomings in a lot of different ways, but so do we all, right?

01:04:04

But the most powerful weapon that you have in this type of spiritual warfare is

01:04:09

God's word. And so I've noticed that like, we had a legislator in Texas, we were trying to get a Senate bill.

01:04:14

We've had a house bill for quite a while. We're trying to get a Senate bill last session. And the guy we've been talking to was a professing believer, been in the

01:04:26

Senate for quite some time. And so we just went to his office and we started just expositing from the scriptures what

01:04:35

God says about justice, how he can love his pre -born neighbor given the authority that God has given him.

01:04:44

And we were in his office for like 40 minutes just talking about the Bible, just talking about what

01:04:51

God says about establishing justice. And then we finished up in prayer and he said, let me take the weekend to just pray about this and think about it and I'll get back to you.

01:05:03

And then the following week, right on the deadline to file legislation for the session, he put forward what was the first equal protection bill ever filed in the

01:05:13

Texas State Senate. So you really take advantage of the access you have, but also it's like don't underestimate the power of going into a legislator's office, who is a professing

01:05:27

Christian and just opening up the scriptures and talking about it with them and just speaking that scripture and then just trusting

01:05:34

God to do the work, do the Holy Spirit, do the work in that legislator's heart.

01:05:40

And praise the Lord, we've seen people change their mind because of that. Any last questions?

01:05:52

Rob, do you want to close us in song? Yes, I did have one more slide here where we're going to pray for the nation, but I don't know that we talked about that.

01:06:00

So do you want to do a prayer for the nation before we sing our last song? Did you want to pray for us,

01:06:06

Pastor Chris? Thank you,

01:06:19

Pastor Chris. Thank you. I just want to say thank you to Robert.

01:06:27

Brother, I did get you, I missed your name. John and John for coming all this way and speaking to us tonight.

01:06:35

Can we give them a hand to say thank you? We appreciate it very much.

01:06:42

Let's pray. Our Father, we pray,

01:06:48

Lord, that you would work in our land, that we would be more now like the kingdom than we are now.

01:07:01

That we would want to see justice done. Lord, I know every person here wants that.

01:07:08

I know every person here wants abortion to be illegal in our state.

01:07:15

Help us, Lord, to understand things we've heard tonight and steps we can take to support that and help that come true.

01:07:24

We pray, Lord, that you would work in our land as we work, that you would bless these efforts, that you would be honored, you would be praised, and the unborn would be protected.

01:07:37

Lord, we know that you allowed slavery, but then in places like England and here in America, you allowed it to be abolished.

01:07:48

And we pray that you would do the same for abortion in our nation, Lord. And we pray it for the president and the

01:07:56

Congress and our governor and our legislature, Lord, that you would work in all these bodies, that abolition would be a desire of our nation and that it would come to fruition,