WWUTT 1325 Q&A Responding to The Holy Post Abortion Video (Part 2)

WWUTT Podcast

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:01

Philippians 2 .3 says do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

00:10

And we should follow this instruction even when we vote, when we understand the text. This is

00:25

When We Understand The Text, a daily study in the Word of God that we may be conformed to the image of Christ.

00:31

Visit our website at www .utt .com and don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

00:38

Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky, who is not in studio with me today.

00:43

She's not sitting next to me here. I had to record this earlier in the week. In fact, if everything went according to plan, then by the time you're hearing this,

00:54

God willing, we are in Texas. The plan was for us to leave Kansas and move to Texas on Thursday.

01:00

So by the time this episode posts, that is where we are. Now I've had to tear down my studio.

01:06

It's still packed. I don't know when I'm going to be able to get it back out again. So there's not going to be any devotionals for next week.

01:12

I know on Wednesday as we were finishing up Romans 11, I said that next week we were going to get into Romans 12.

01:19

Well, that's probably not going to happen. So give me a little bit of time. Let me get situated.

01:26

I about said help me get situated. Hey, if you can do that, that would be great, too. Let me get all the equipment back out again and set up, and then

01:34

I'll resume recording devotionals as soon as I can. So this might be the last episode for at least a week.

01:42

I don't know for how long. Hopefully it will only be a week. Pray for us is, hey, we've still got to get settled in and all that stuff.

01:49

We're not moving into the house. We're purchasing for another couple of months. We're staying in a in a borrowed place right now and very grateful to the folks that have given us this place to be able to live until we can move into our house.

02:02

Our house in Kansas has to sell, and then we're using that money to buy the house in Texas that we want.

02:09

Anyway, yeah, it's a whole whirlwind of stuff. Needless to say, I hate the moving process.

02:15

Can't stand it. I can't imagine that anybody really thinks, hey, moving is a lot of fun. We should move.

02:21

That would be great. This has been terrible. I've hated it. If we are indeed in Texas right now,

02:27

I am so grateful to God that we are no longer packing up a house and moving it from one state to the next.

02:36

Thank you, though, to all of our friends who came and helped us with that move. We would not have been able to do this without you.

02:43

It was exhausting enough. We would be the first ones up. We're already cleaning things or packing up things from the time we get up to the time we go to bed at night.

02:54

So we're up. We're working. Friends would show up, and then friends would go home, and we're still working until it's time for us to go to bed.

03:01

So I'm just done. I'm spent. I'm tired of putting stuff in boxes, deciding what box goes where, cleaning the house, getting repairs done, painting the house.

03:12

I'm over it. I'm over moving. We are staying in Texas for a long time, but again, of course,

03:21

God willing. Hey, we got quite a few emails in the past week about last week's episode responding to the

03:29

Holy Post video entitled What About Abortion? And some of those emails that we got were saying there were a lot of points that I teased because they were coming up in the video.

03:40

But since we only did like the first half, I didn't ever get to those points. So a couple of those emails were like, hey, what were you going to say about this?

03:47

Because you said that was coming up, but then you never actually finished critiquing the video. So that's what I'm going to do today.

03:53

I figured this would be the easiest thing to throw together since I already had the notes on it from last week. So we're going to continue what we were reviewing last week that was shared by Phil Vischer and Sky Jitani, part of the

04:08

Holy Post podcast. In case you're not familiar with him, if you didn't listen to part one, Phil Vischer is the creator of VeggieTales.

04:15

Sky Jitani is one of his co -hosts, but he's been a writer for the Huffington Post.

04:21

He has been a pastor. He's been a motivational speaker and an author. These are just some of the things that are listed on his website.

04:28

He's the main guy that's talking here in this particular video. Phil Vischer opens it up, Sky Jitani takes over.

04:35

So we're going to continue to critique this video today and some of the terrible arguments he makes regarding why it's not really important for Christians to vote for pro -life candidates.

04:47

That's basically the gist of the argument, that your vote for a pro -life candidate actually doesn't have anything to do with reducing abortions.

04:56

Some of the information that he gives, particularly in the latter half of the video, which we're getting to today, is data that has been mined, polished up a certain way, and handed to you to craft a particular narrative.

05:09

Now, my two biggest critiques of this video are these. Number one, that neither

05:14

Phil Vischer nor Sky Jitani say what abortion is, and that's the murder of an unborn child.

05:21

They never say that, but that's what abortion is. That's what an abortion is. An abortion is the murder of a child.

05:29

When you're talking about abortion collectively, you're talking about one of the worst holocausts, if not the worst holocaust in the history of mankind.

05:36

3 ,000 babies per day in the U .S. alone, a million children per year.

05:43

When you're talking about abortion on a global scale, since 1980, over one and a half billion unborn children in the world have been murdered by abortion in the last 40 years.

06:00

That's incredible. This is a bloodbath that we're talking about here.

06:06

Of course, the way that this is crafted for you in this particular video is for you to think of abortion as a political issue, not the murder of unborn children.

06:16

Otherwise, this narrative that Vischer and Jitani are crafting, whether they're deliberately trying to be manipulative or they're just ignorant of these things,

06:27

I can't pretend to know what their motivations are. But if they were to actually define abortion as the murder of an unborn child, then this crafted narrative for you to think of abortion as a political issue would not work.

06:43

That's number one. That's my first critique. They don't even define what abortion is. Number two, there is no gospel in this video.

06:53

There's no presentation of the gospel. There's no mention of Christ, except that the word Christ appears in the word

06:58

Christian when they use the word Christian. There's no reference to scripture. There's no mention of God.

07:04

This is not even being presented from a Christian worldview. I wouldn't even call it a conservative worldview.

07:11

It is at best a moderate worldview. But as I said last week, when

07:16

Becky was joining me in this critique, the argument clearly leans

07:21

Democrat. You would not get to the end of this video and be convinced to vote Republican.

07:27

It is more on the side of convincing you as a Christian, it would be okay for you to vote

07:34

Democrat and under no circumstance should any Christian ever vote for the party of death that is on the side of abortion.

07:44

And we're not just talking about abortion at any stage of development, although that's what all

07:49

Democrats want. That is the official democratic platform of the party, that abortion should be available at any stage of development in pregnancy.

08:00

They're even for infanticide, the murder of children outside the womb.

08:06

That's exactly what Virginia Governor Ralph Northam was advocating for at the beginning of 2019.

08:12

President Donald Trump mentioned it in the state of the union address Northam's comments and that this is what the

08:18

Democratic Party would do. They would even advocate for the murder of children already born. If you were watching the vice presidential debate a couple of weeks ago between Mike Pence and Kamala Harris, Pence mentioned it there.

08:32

He said that the Democratic Party wants abortion all the way up to the very minute of birth.

08:38

Thankfully, we have all these little fact check organizations out there that that fact checked Pence's comment and rated it wrong.

08:45

Nope, he's absolutely right. That's exactly what the Democratic Party wants. And even after a child is born, there's still some wiggle room there.

08:53

You can still kill your child. This is this is the Democratic Party. You cannot close your eyes and ears to this.

09:01

A Christian has no good reason to vote Democrat. If we were to just even put aside the subject of abortion, look at the other things that the

09:12

Democratic Party stands for. They want to pass LGBTQ discrimination laws that would force

09:18

Christians, Christian organizations, Christians working even in secular jobs. All Christians would have to comply.

09:26

Eventually, they're going to come after churches as well. It's only a matter of time. The Democratic Party is in favor of pumping kids with hormone blocking chemicals if a boy wants to be a girl.

09:36

We just heard Joe Biden talk about it regarding eight and 10 year olds in the in the last presidential debate.

09:43

Well, it was two debates ago. It was the two town halls, which should have been the second debate. Anyway, Biden answered a question regarding transgender children and said that they should be allowed to pick what they want to be.

09:58

That means mom and dad, if you have a boy attending a public school and someone in that school is convinced your son that he should be a girl and then he buys into it and he wants to be a girl.

10:10

And you, as mom and dad say, no, Johnny, you cannot be Jenny. The government's going to come after you and say it's not your choice.

10:18

Your son gets to pick what he wants to be. And the Democratic Party is in favor of that kind of autonomy.

10:26

Biden has called transgenderism the civil rights movement of our time. By the way, the

10:31

Democrats have encouraged the rioting and looting that's going on the burning down of cities. And these are perfectly fine activities in which you can partake during a pandemic as long as you're wearing a mask.

10:41

But singing in church will kill you. Can't do that. That's something else that the

10:47

Democrats have put a stop to. We we know that Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, has restricted singing in church.

10:56

We don't talk as much about New Mexico. New Mexico is not as on everybody's radar as California is.

11:03

But the same law has been enacted in New Mexico. Christians in churches there in New Mexico are not allowed to sing.

11:10

They're forbidden from singing. The couple of people that I've talked to from New Mexico, the couple of pastors there that I visited with about this, they've said we sing anyway.

11:20

Amen to that, brother. That's right. Whatever you see going on in California, that's what the

11:25

Democrats want to do to the rest of the country. You're seeing Democrat policies that they would enact everywhere.

11:32

Critical race theory and intersectionality pushing a narrative of racism, insisting that Trump is a racist who's never actually condemned white supremacy, no matter how many times he has.

11:45

You just keep getting fed the same narrative. I even encountered somebody the other day who said they're voting for Biden because Donald Trump couldn't condemn white supremacy.

11:55

That's total nonsense. That person was completely buying into this narrative that's been perpetuated by the

12:02

Democrat machine. Meanwhile, you have Joe Biden, who has said that all black people think the same way.

12:08

And if you don't vote for him, you ain't black. The comments that Biden has said are far more racist than anything

12:15

Trump has said. This is total projection. Biden's running running mate,

12:20

Kamala Harris, has the most liberal voting record in the Senate, even more liberal than Bernie Sanders.

12:29

The Democrats are the Communist Party. There is no justifiable reason to vote

12:37

Democrat abortion, the murder of children. That is the single most disqualifying reason.

12:44

We don't need to talk about any other reason. But if you do want to talk about some others, you would be hard pressed to find anything praiseworthy.

12:52

You definitely won't find any reason to give to a Christian as to why they should vote

12:57

Democrat. But Phil Fisher and Sky Jitani certainly try in this particular video.

13:03

Before we get there, though, let me read Romans 12. We're not going to get to do it next week.

13:09

Thank you for letting me have the time off. Get situated, get settled down in Texas. But let me read you here from Romans 12.

13:17

These instructions that we have for Christian living with one another, even in a wicked and evil age.

13:25

Romans 12, starting in verse one. I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.

13:40

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

13:54

For by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

14:07

For as in one body we have many members and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ and individually members one of another.

14:22

Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. If prophecy in proportion to our faith, if service in our serving, the one who teaches in his teaching, the one who exhorts in his exhortation, the one who contributes in his generosity, the one who leads with zeal, the one who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness, let love be genuine.

14:54

Abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is good, love one another with brotherly affection, outdo one another in showing honor.

15:07

Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the

15:13

Lord, rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer, contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.

15:27

Bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep, live in harmony with one another.

15:39

Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly, never be wise in your own sight.

15:46

Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.

15:53

If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

16:00

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, vengeance is mine,

16:07

I will repay, says the Lord. To the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him.

16:13

If he is thirsty, give him something to drink, for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.

16:22

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

16:28

There are some good things that we as Christians should be doing and can overcome the evils that are going on in this world, even an evil as monstrous as abortion.

16:40

We must love one another. We must care for single moms, those expectant mothers, providing help for local pregnancy centers, doing missions work through our churches, even in our local communities, doing evangelism, going out and sharing the gospel.

16:56

Nothing is going to make more of a difference, more of a change in our world than sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ.

17:04

People who turn from sin and believe in Jesus are forgiven their sins and are saved.

17:10

They are given new minds and hearts conforming no longer to the pattern of this world, but being transformed by a renewal of the mind that happens by the power of the

17:21

Holy Spirit and all of this through the preaching of the gospel. So let us go out and continue to proclaim the gospel.

17:29

We must confront those things that are evil and hold fast to those things that are good, as Paul said here, abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is good.

17:39

And there are times when we will even have to expose those evil things, as Paul talks about in Ephesians chapter five, have nothing to do with the fruitless works of darkness, but rather expose them.

17:50

Very unfortunately, this video that was produced by Phil Vischer's team, the guy who's the creator of VeggieTales, this video neither shines a light on something evil, nor does it present the gospel.

18:09

Let's come back. I'm going to pick up actually at a point that we left off at last week.

18:14

We did play this portion, but I'm going to play this again and then we'll carry on from here. So this is right after Sky Jatani has made the point that even if Roe v.

18:25

Wade, the Supreme Court decision back in 1973 that made abortion on demand available everywhere in the

18:32

United States and could not be restricted by any states. If we were to overturn

18:37

Roe v. Wade all these years later, according to the statistic that Sky presented, it would only reduce the number of abortions by 12 percent, which is a massive number of abortions.

18:50

You're talking about over one hundred thousand babies that would be saved with the overturning of Roe v.

18:57

Wade. This is an arbitrary figure, too, by the way. I mean, it's just a theory just to say at most overturning

19:05

Roe v. Wade would would reduce abortions by 12 percent. That's still a lot of abortions.

19:10

But that's the that's the statistic that Sky just put out there. That's where we're going to pick up.

19:17

And we'll continue on from here. Here's Sky Jatani from the Holy Post video entitled What About Abortion?

19:23

I know what you're thinking, but Sky, 12 percent is still a lot of abortions. That's a lot of babies.

19:29

If overturning Roe will save even one percent, isn't it worth it? Yes, of course it is.

19:35

The issue is not whether overturning Roe would help. It would. The issue is what will help the most?

19:42

I have a hard time believing that Vischer and Jatani's motivation here is what will help the most, because what will help the most is to make abortion illegal.

19:55

And anyone who commits abortion has murdered and they should be prosecuted as a murderer.

20:02

That's what would help the most. That's biblical. Exodus chapter 21, starting in verse 22, when men strive together and hit a pregnant woman so that her children come out.

20:14

But there is no harm. The one who hit her shall surely be fined as the woman's husband shall impose on him and he shall pay as the judges determine.

20:24

But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life.

20:29

Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

20:39

That's how the law of God considers the murder of an unborn child.

20:45

It's the same as if one were to murder an adult. Justice for the murder of an unborn child is the same justice that should be enacted against the murder of an adult.

20:59

And if we were to apply the same thing, that abortion is therefore murder, and anyone who has an abortion should be tried as a murderer, then that's what will help the most to reduce abortions in this country.

21:14

But that's not what Vischer and Jatani want. And nothing that they present is based in scripture, because as I said earlier, there's no

21:24

Bible in this presentation whatsoever. It's really just Vischer and Jatani's opinion against anyone else's who might differ.

21:35

Should Christians continue following the same path they've been on for the last 50 years of ignoring every other issue to elect a pro -life president, to appoint pro -life justices, to overturn one case, to maybe someday hopefully reduce abortions by 12 percent?

21:51

Or is there a better way to tackle this problem right now that has nothing to do with who's president?

21:57

And this is where we stopped last week. And as I mentioned last week, that's a total straw man. You're saying that Christians have voted only for pro -life candidates for the last 50 years at the exclusion of every other issue.

22:08

On the contrary, I would say that we haven't given the pro -life issue enough focus because even most pro -lifers speak of being pro -life as a political issue.

22:21

It's very rarely defined what we mean when we say pro -life. We don't talk about abortion as being the murder of unborn children.

22:30

Very few people talk about it that way. When you when you watch the news and you're even watching a conservative pundit on the news, you won't hear them define abortion as the slaughter of unborn children.

22:41

You never see on TV anybody showing pictures of what aborted children look like mutilated babies that were destroyed in the womb by this barbaric slaughter.

22:54

You never you never see anything like that. So I don't think we give it enough focus, especially considering that Sky is not even defining abortion here.

23:04

I am an abolitionist. What I want is for abortion to be illegal today. Right away, we prosecute every abortion doctor.

23:12

And we say that from this point on, anybody who tries to get an abortion is going to be tried as a murderer.

23:21

That's what I want to see happen. But since that's not our reality, then I'm going to rejoice whenever we have those small incremental victories like a state that declares abortion illegal or protects children in the womb after eight weeks or you have those fetal heartbeat bills and things like that.

23:39

That's not ideal. That's not exactly what I want, but I'm going to rejoice whenever we do accomplish those kinds of victories in order for abortion to be illegal, though.

23:49

Roe v. Wade is going to have to go and we've got to put political we've got to put candidates in those political offices that can help make that happen.

24:00

You cannot vote Democrat. That will never succeed. That will never come to pass. Roe v. Wade getting overturned will never happen as long as Democrats keep getting appointed to these offices.

24:10

Any offices, House of Representatives, Senate president doesn't matter. As R .C.

24:16

Sproul has said, a person who is in favor of abortion should not even be elected dog catcher.

24:23

It is absurd that any Christian think that they can just overlook that and vote Democrat because of any other issue that a

24:30

Democrat might speak favorably on. Romans 132 says, though, they know

24:35

God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die. They not only do them, but give approval to those who practice them.

24:45

And that's what you do whenever you vote Democrat. You give approval to a Democrat to kill children.

24:51

Yeah, I hate that you that you have that particular thing in your platform that the

24:57

Democrats love abortion. I wish you guys wouldn't do that. But you are giving these campaign promises on these other issues that I like so much.

25:05

So I'm going to go ahead and here I'm going to give you approval to go ahead and keep doing the slaughter of babies as long as you'll fulfill my political desires in these other issues over here.

25:15

That's just absolutely absurd. And as I mentioned earlier, there's really no other issue from the

25:21

Democratic Party that you can go, OK, well, I like that. So I'm going to vote for you on that one. Although what

25:26

I think that Vischer and Jitani are after here is socialized health care. And I will

25:31

I'll explain why coming up a little bit later on this statistic that that Jitani shares here.

25:39

This is crazy. I'll go ahead and let him say it and then and then address it at the end here. Let's look at two states, one red and one blue.

25:48

Between 2011 and 2014, Texas passed a number of laws restricting abortion.

25:53

As a result, abortions declined by 28 percent. That's more than double the reduction if Roe was overturned.

26:01

Delaware, a blue state, did even better. Between 2014 and 2017, Delaware improved access to health care for its poorest residents.

26:10

As a result, abortions in that state declined by an encouraging 37 percent, three times more than overturning

26:17

Roe alone would accomplish. That is such a bogus stat. And I don't know if Sky is being deliberately manipulative there or if he shared that statistic in ignorance.

26:31

Either way, there's no excuse for it. What he shared there was just wrong. First of all, the abortion rate in Delaware is still higher than in Texas, even with that reduction percentage that he gave there.

26:45

But secondly, and this this is kind of the most obvious thing of all. What is the difference between Texas and Delaware?

26:51

Let's take the red and blue out of it. What's the difference between Texas and Delaware? Texas is really big and Delaware is teeny tiny.

27:01

You're actually talking about the second largest state in the union versus the second smallest state in the union.

27:08

Texas is second largest after Alaska, and Delaware is second smallest, just slightly larger than Rhode Island.

27:17

Now, you wouldn't think that size should matter on this statistic at all. After all, what Sky presented there was a percentage.

27:24

It was a it was a reduction percentage, but it's still a manipulated stat because it doesn't tell the whole story.

27:32

Like I said in the beginning, these these statistics that are going to be given to you are carefully mined.

27:37

They're polished up and presented to you to go with the narrative that has been crafted here.

27:43

Delaware is small and there are not a lot of abortion clinics in Delaware. If if my search yielded the results that I was looking for, then there's three.

27:53

There's only three abortion clinics in Delaware. What's right around Delaware? Well, you have Washington, D .C.

27:59

You've got New Jersey. You've got Maryland all within just like a few minutes driving distance of living anywhere in Delaware.

28:08

Guess which states have the highest abortion rates in the country?

28:14

Washington, D .C., New York, New Jersey and Maryland. That's the top four.

28:20

And they're all right there with Delaware. So the abortion is probably not happening in Delaware.

28:29

It's probably happening in Washington, D .C., New Jersey or Maryland. So that's why that stat is so just way off base.

28:39

Again, first of all, the abortion rate in Delaware is still higher than Texas, even after that reduction percentage that Sky gave.

28:48

But after that, the abortions are probably not even being done in Delaware. They're probably being done in the states surrounding

28:56

Delaware. And even if that's the case, the abortion rate in Delaware is still higher than it is in Texas.

29:02

So that is a very manipulated stat. And very sadly, there are there were a lot of Christians I saw online, a lot of professing

29:12

Christians who just loved this video that was produced by The Holy Post. Beth Moore was one of them.

29:19

She was praising it. She thought it was absolutely fantastic. But that stat is it.

29:26

It may not be a deliberate lie, but it's not honest.

29:31

While the politicians have everyone on both sides focused on defending or reversing

29:36

Roe, we're missing the local and state policies that are actually impacting abortion right now.

29:42

Roe is a piece of the very complicated pro -life puzzle, but it's just a piece and not even a very big one.

29:50

Putting aside Roe and the Supreme Court for a minute, let's talk about the last assumption. Number three, the policies of Republican presidents reduce abortions and those of Democrats increase them.

30:02

Okay, this is where we need to separate rhetoric from reality. If you look at the two parties' platforms, they couldn't be more different on the issue of abortion.

30:11

The Republican Party is undeniably pro -life, and every Republican presidential candidate has advocated pro -life policies for 40 years.

30:20

The Republican platform calls for overturning Roe, no public funding of abortions, and defunding

30:26

Planned Parenthood. The Democratic Party platform is the opposite. It calls for supporting

30:31

Roe, taxpayer funding of abortions, and the expansion of Planned Parenthood. If you only look at these platforms, everything seems cut and dry, but the data actually shows something much more complicated.

30:44

No, it really is that cut and dry that the Republican Party presents itself as being for protecting the life in the womb, that when we read in the

30:54

Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal and are endowed with certain inalienable rights, that's hard to say, inalienable rights that among these are life and liberty in the pursuit of happiness.

31:08

When we read that, the Republican Party platform is that extends even to the unborn child.

31:13

They are a human being as well who is deserving of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

31:20

Whereas the Democratic Party is saying, no, we are against the first inalienable right as guaranteed by the

31:29

Declaration of Independence. That child does not deserve life. In the last presidential election back in 2016, you had

31:39

Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders going against one another for the Democratic ticket for president. And both of them said when they were running against each other, they both said that the child in the womb is a person who does not deserve rights.

31:57

That's the Democrat platform. And that's enough. That is enough to disqualify a

32:04

Democrat from ever holding any kind of office. And a Christian should know better.

32:10

If you're against life, I ain't voting for you. I don't care what any of your other policies are.

32:16

If you're defending the Auschwitz is that we call Planned Parenthood that are slaughtering babies, dozens of them per clinic per day, then

32:27

I don't care what it is that you have to offer. You don't care about people. So I'm not voting for you.

32:32

It is that simple. But then when Sky says the data presents something more complicated.

32:39

No, no, no, no. He's complicating it. The data doesn't complicate it. The fact is, abortions have fallen under every president, both

32:48

Republican and Democrat, for four decades. And today, the abortion rate is actually lower than before Roe became law.

32:57

In other words, electing a Democrat does not increase abortions. So if you were watching this video, then at this point, he's showing this graph where it shows the abortion rate drop steadily.

33:10

And at the very bottom, you may not notice this, but at the fine print at the bottom, it says that the source for this information is the

33:18

Guttmacher Institute. Anybody know where the Guttmacher Institute comes from?

33:24

It comes from Planned Parenthood. Yeah, that's right.

33:29

America's number one abortion provider. Do you think that they are going to be honest in the statistics that they present?

33:38

The Center for Disease Control has said that they can't keep track of the number of abortions that are performed because there are some places that don't report the number of abortions that are performed.

33:51

So the statistic that you get from the CDC is different than the statistic that you will get from the

33:57

Guttmacher Institute. The Guttmacher Institute claims they claim that their statistic comes from the abortion clinics that they contact.

34:05

They all report their numbers to Guttmacher and then Guttmacher publishes them. I don't believe that for a second.

34:12

I do not believe that this statistic that we've been tracking to see a decline in the number of abortions since 1973.

34:20

I don't believe it's honest for several reasons, first of all, because of the one that I just named, because Guttmacher is interested in presenting

34:30

Planned Parenthood as some sort of hero health clinic of the people. It makes

34:35

Planned Parenthood look good when abortions go down because Planned Parenthood will boast that they will say, hey, under these things that we're doing and and, you know, because of increased funding that has come to us, we've been able to do all of this stuff and reduce the number of abortions.

34:52

Their number one source of revenue, their highest source of revenue is abortions. But they're going to manipulate that data and make you think that they're doing something to actually help reduce the number of abortions, not that they are financially profiting in a big way off of abortion.

35:09

So there is a reason why the Guttmacher Institute would want to manipulate that data.

35:16

That's the first reason. The second reason why I don't believe that statistic is because the abortion pill is another reason why abortions have gone down.

35:27

The abortion pill does not get reported as an abortion. So therefore, the increase of the pill and the increased use of the pill has resulted in a lower number of people going into abortion clinics to get abortions.

35:41

That's one of the reasons for the decline. I had a friend who worked at a local

35:47

Walmart market in Junction City, Kansas, where I used to live again,

35:53

God willing, at this particular during this particular program. If you're listening to it, we should hopefully be in Texas by now.

36:00

But anyway, so where I lived earlier in the week in Junction City, Kansas, our local Walmart market has the abortion pill available.

36:08

Now, the market, in case you don't know the difference between a market and a super center, a super center is the big

36:14

Walmart. A market is just a Walmart grocery store. He worked in the Walmart market and he said that they would sell as many as 30 abortion pills a month.

36:24

That's that's like one a day. And that's just a small market in a small town, in a red state, selling 30 abortion pills a month.

36:37

There was there's also a local CVC in our community there. And then, of course, as I mentioned, there was a

36:44

Walmart super center. There are a couple of other pharmacies in town who can say how many abortion pills are being sold in our little red state conservative church going community.

36:58

Expand that out then and consider how many abortion pills are being sold nationwide.

37:04

I don't think that the abortion rate has gone down. Friends, I think it's gone up.

37:10

But but again, these are all manipulated stats that are being presented to us.

37:16

And we may not really know the truth of what the real actual number is because of the people who control these stats that were being presented.

37:25

Let's complicate things even more. The abortion rate in America actually fell the most under Barack Obama.

37:32

On the flip side, in 2019, while Donald Trump was president and the Republicans controlled the Senate, Planned Parenthood, the country's largest abortion provider, broke its record for taxpayer funding.

37:44

Yeah, and that does supremely bug me. I irritates me to no end that Donald Trump is president and the

37:52

Republicans control the Senate, but we're still seeing our tax dollars going and funding

37:57

Planned Parenthood. There was a tweet, I think it was that Trump made several weeks ago where he said something like, if you reelect me, then

38:08

I will end public funding to Planned Parenthood. We'll end it right now. Why does it have to be when you get reelected?

38:16

He signs these presidential executive orders all the time to do all these other things.

38:22

And the taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood do it right now.

38:27

So, yeah, it bugs me that the Republicans don't seem to have the spine to make even things like that happen.

38:35

But under no circumstance would that ever cause me to vote Democrat. The well, hey,

38:42

I'll just vote for the baby murderers. That would be better. It's ridiculous. That's absurd. But that's really the argument that Sky is presenting here, though he's not outright saying, but go vote

38:52

Democrat. That would be the alternative. You don't have to vote Republican because that doesn't reduce abortion anyway.

38:59

So go vote Democrat. That is just dumb. Pardon me for saying so, but that is ridiculous.

39:07

Even doing nothing would not be helpful. So say like, well, I'm frustrated with the Republicans. They're not reducing funding to Planned Parenthood.

39:14

So I'm not I'm just not going to vote at all. Well, then that gives that gives the power to the Democrats. It is better to vote for the party that has said that they are pro -life and hold that party's feet to the fire than to just abandon that party and not vote at all while the other one is throwing babies in the fire.

39:34

Now, to be clear, I don't think Obama was responsible for reducing abortions during his term.

39:40

And I don't think Trump was the reason Planned Parenthood broke its public funding record. Like so much about this issue, things are more complicated than that.

39:48

But this much is clear. The person sitting in the Oval Office is not what matters most when it comes to reducing abortions.

39:56

Their Supreme Court appointments haven't mattered. Their party platforms haven't mattered. And their rhetoric hasn't mattered.

40:04

So what has mattered? Why have abortions been declining steadily since the 1980s?

40:10

Again, it's complicated. But a big factor is that fewer women are facing unplanned pregnancies.

40:16

Sexual activity among teens is way down compared to 20 years ago. And more women have access to health care and long -lasting contraceptives.

40:25

Some states have also passed laws requiring a waiting period before an abortion. They've limited public funding and restricted late -term abortions.

40:33

Others have pushed to make adoption more affordable. All of these have contributed to reducing abortions.

40:40

None of them required Roe to be overturned. And none of them happened because of the president, the

40:45

Supreme Court or anyone else in Washington. Yeah, some of the information that he presents there is accurate.

40:52

And then, of course, he's got some of that manipulated data that's mixed in there as well. For example, where he says that sexual activity among teens is down.

41:02

That's not true. And I've been working with teenagers for a long time in ministry.

41:08

I've been doing ministry that has included teenagers since I was a teenager. Even when

41:13

I was 19 years old, I was still helping out in youth groups and and was still teaching teens up until covid happened back in March since covid -19 and schools getting shut down and stuff like that.

41:27

I haven't done any work with youth at all, but I was all the way up until the pandemic stuff beginning began shutting everything down.

41:36

I had consistently done ministry with high school students for that long. I have never seen a reduction in sexual activity among teens like just talking to teens and they talk about what they face in school and stuff like that.

41:48

It's gone up. It is way higher now than it was when I was in high school.

41:53

But here's one thing that has increased among teenagers over the last 20 years.

41:59

More of them are identifying as LGBTQ and you don't get pregnant when you have two guys who are having sexual activity with one another and two girls, of course, because that's a natural desire and it does not result in children.

42:19

Back in 2017, there was a statistic. I remember several news outlets publishing this, that 20 percent of millennials identified as LGBTQ.

42:31

That was just three years ago. That was in 2017. Now, in the year 2020, this stat was published again just a couple of weeks ago.

42:40

Guess what it is now? Well, here was the statistic, according to the American conservative, 30 percent of women under the age of 25 identify as LGBTQ.

42:54

30 percent, that has a lot to do with why there would perceptively be a reduction in the number of abortions.

43:03

And by the way, a reduction in the abortion rate and a reduction in the number of abortions, those are two different statistics.

43:10

There's also going to be a difference between the number of men who are sexually active versus the number of women who are sexually active.

43:16

And I want to say that the last time I saw this statistic, fewer men were having sex than women.

43:22

But that doesn't translate into like a reduction in abortions because one man could be sleeping around with ten women.

43:30

And some of those women would choose to get an abortion and others would be having children.

43:36

We as a culture, we see just a general reduction in the number of children that are being born.

43:43

We aren't having as many kids. People are waiting until later in life to get married. And therefore, when they do start having children, they're having fewer number of children.

43:53

So we're not seeing as many children born in the country. That also has contributed to a seeming reduction in the number of abortions.

44:03

When we have a culture that is like ours, where Darwinism is the prevailing worldview, you're just nothing but an accident.

44:10

You're just a collection of cells. Then, of course, they're going to look at children in the world, in the womb as being the same thing.

44:16

It was just a collection of cells. It's a life that doesn't matter because my life doesn't matter. And hence, we have this culture of death in which we live.

44:25

These are not things that that Sky and and Phil are willing to entertain in this particular video.

44:33

They're just crafting their narrative. And since there is no presentation of any real understanding of sin, an understanding of redemption in Christ Jesus, then we're just talking about issues here.

44:47

It's just a couple of guys sitting in a coffee shop, enjoying their lattes, talking philosophy and politics.

44:54

This is not being approached as a genuine life matter.

45:00

And since it's not being considered that way, we're not talking about sin. We're not talking about the wages of sin, which is death.

45:08

We're not talking about eternal punishment in hell. Redemption in Christ, living a new life in Christ, repenting of sin and following Jesus.

45:18

None of those things ever come up because, again, we're just sitting here talking issues.

45:24

This is as Becky and I talked about last week, referencing Second Timothy three, five, that there is an appearance of godliness, but denying its power.

45:34

So what have we learned? We've learned that despite 11 conservative Republican appointed justices on the

45:40

Supreme Court, for the last 50 years, the court has only upheld rather than reversed abortion rights.

45:47

And that's unlikely to change. And even if the court did overturn Roe, it would have very little impact because abortion was widely available before Roe and it would be after.

45:58

We've also seen that the president and his party have had no impact on abortion as the rate has steadily fallen under both

46:05

Republican and Democratic administrations due to local and state efforts that have nothing to do with Washington.

46:12

Finally, we've learned that there are things to be encouraged about too. Abortion rates have fallen dramatically and they're still going down.

46:19

And according to a 2020 Notre Dame study, 75 % of Americans say abortion should be illegal or only legal under certain circumstances.

46:28

In other words, there is wide support for common sense limits on abortion. Even more importantly, the

46:35

Notre Dame study found that most women, including most pro -choice women, do not want an abortion.

46:41

That may explain why local and state efforts to reduce abortions are so effective. Better adoption laws, waiting periods, crisis pregnancy centers, churches, and support groups who are actually on the ground helping women and walking with them through their pregnancies.

46:56

That's what's making a difference. Regarding the importance of local engagement, David French says this,

47:02

If you're pro -life, the encouraging reality is those things that matter most, your relationships and your local political community are the things over which you have the most influence.

47:13

The things that matter the least, the presidency and national politics are those things most removed from your daily life.

47:20

But I've been around the pro -life movement enough to know that we often get this exactly backwards. We're most passionate about the president, yet too many of us are less interested in the crisis pregnancy center down the street.

47:33

So a moment ago he said that there is widespread support for common sense restrictions on abortion, common sense restrictions on abortion.

47:45

Common sense is abortion is murder. That's common sense.

47:50

So no, there's not, there's not widespread support for common sense restrictions on abortion.

47:58

Restrictions on abortion can still be pro abortion to make abortion illegal is pro -life to eliminate abortion altogether, to make it to where that that is not an option and to do so would be to commit a crime.

48:16

That would be the pro -life position. That's the true pro -life position. And as I said, that would be the abolitionist position.

48:23

We want the elimination of abortion altogether, but that's, he's not even presenting that as a potential option here or something that we would even want.

48:34

And all of these, you know, summaries that he's been given here, again, all of that is based on the fraudulent information and manipulated data that he had presented earlier.

48:45

Now, where he talks about, you know, being boots on the ground in the community and, and helping out on a local level and, and, uh, and volunteering at the local crisis pregnancy center or giving money to them and, and helping out in your church and things of that nature.

49:00

Yes, we should do all of that. And I mentioned that last week, it should be a both. And it's not an either, or we should want the abolishing of Roe V.

49:09

Wade. We should want pro -life politicians to be filling our nation's offices.

49:15

And we should also be doing the local stuff, but Skye's plan of, of local action does not include sharing the gospel that never even comes up.

49:27

And after researching the ineffectiveness of the president and Supreme court, a professor of Catholic studies at DePaul university said this quote, the one strategy for reducing abortions that has been proven to work runs through love, not power support for women who may not feel able to carry a pregnancy to term.

49:46

This requires not blind allegiance to a political party, but the promotion of a culture of life.

49:53

End quote. He basically said there that we didn't say it directly, but voting is not loving.

49:59

I disagree. I think that you can vote with a desire to help people.

50:05

You can, you can certainly vote blindly. I mean, you can do anything without love, but you can vote with love too.

50:11

And out of love for unborn children who are being slaughtered in the womb by thousands every day in America, out of love for children, you can vote

50:21

Republican. It's not, it's not some sort of power trip that is therefore unloving to vote

50:27

Republican, but we should also be loving to people in our own community.

50:33

And the, uh, the things that we're doing in our community can likewise be saving lives.

50:40

Again, it is a both. And it is not an either or there may be good reasons to vote for a

50:47

Republican candidate for president, but overturning row or thinking the president will reduce abortions isn't one of them.

50:54

Likewise, there are things about the democratic party platform. I still strongly disagree with including abortion, but the data clearly shows that voting a

51:03

Democrat into the white house does not increase abortions. And again, this is why

51:08

I say earlier that the argument that sky is presenting here leans Democrat. You would get to the end of this believing,

51:15

Oh, as a Christian, I can go vote Democrat and voting Republican doesn't help anything because that's the approach that's being given here.

51:24

He doesn't say the democratic party's just downright wicked. A Christian should never ever vote

51:30

Democrat. I would have liked it better if the approach to this video would have been that our vote doesn't have as much of an effect on saving lives as you would like.

51:43

So therefore, as Christians, we should also be doing these other things. That would be a diff, a totally different approach to this issue than the approach that he took it here, which at the conclusion of it, basically leads one to believe, well,

51:58

I can go vote Democrat thinking I'm actually doing more good than if I were to vote

52:04

Republican, which doesn't seem to be doing any good at all. That's his approach to this and not talking about any of the other issues of the democratic party that are just downright wicked and godless.

52:16

If we really care about solving this problem, then we need to stop being manipulated by parties and candidates and get our focus off the presidential election.

52:25

Instead, we should focus on what's happening right in front of us in our States, our communities, and in our neighborhoods.

52:32

Now I want to say that right there was where I thought he was going to say, we need to get our focus off of the candidates.

52:39

I really was hoping he was about to say, we need to put our focus on Christ because I would have gone, yes, yes.

52:46

That's exactly it. Our focus on Christ and then sharing Christ with others. And that is going to be doing the most to promote a culture or, or a worldview of life.

52:58

The one who actually gives life, the one who is the way, the truth and the life.

53:04

John 14, six if we are sharing Christ with others, we focus on Christ. We share

53:09

Christ with others. That is going to do the most to save lives, to promote life and not just saving a person's life physically.

53:20

Like as far as our earthly existence goes, we can save all kinds of lives or, or make a person's life better on earth and not do anything for their eternal state.

53:32

Unless we're sharing the gospel by sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, that he died on the cross for our sins, rose again from the grave.

53:41

And whoever believes in him will not perish, but we'll have everlasting life. This is not just saving a life from doing something stupid that leads unto death, but it is saving someone from eternal destruction under the wrath of God.

53:58

We have to be sharing the gospel. None of these other things that we've talked about here are for any good.

54:04

If the gospel is not present in our witness, we must be sharing the good news of Jesus Christ.

54:13

And that is going to do more to promote life than anything else. And unfortunately that's not

54:19

Phil and Skye's interest here. So hence why Skye did not say we need to put our focus on Christ because throughout this narrative here, his focus has not been on Christ.

54:31

And whether abortion is legal or not, there will always be women who need our help. That means the ultimate answer is going to require compassion and not the

54:41

Supreme Court. So if you think which lever you pull in the voting booth every four years is what makes you pro -life, it might be time to think again.

54:49

I would agree that voting Republican does not make you pro -life, but voting

54:54

Democrat definitely doesn't make you pro -life. If you're voting Democrat, you are not pro -life.

55:01

As we conclude here, cause that's it, that's, that's the end of the video. Let me read to you from Philippians chapter two, starting in verse 12.

55:08

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed. So now not only as in my presence, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is

55:20

God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or disputing that you may be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life.

55:44

That word of the gospel that we have in Christ, Jesus, our Lord. Let me go back now in Philippians two,

55:52

I'm going to go back to the start of the chapter Paul writes here. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love being in full accord and of one mind.

56:13

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, including vote my friends, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

56:24

Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

56:31

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus who though he was in the form of God did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.

56:55

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

57:02

Therefore God is highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name so that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is

57:19

Lord to the glory of God, the father, heavenly father, forgive us of our sins and let us not look to just our interest or, or trying to advance ourselves or clinging to our own ideas and not considering how this might have an influence or an impact on other people.

57:41

I pray that we would be mindful of others and that we would reach out and love others in the name of Christ for you have shown love to us.

57:50

Let us love one another grant repentance to this nation.

57:55

Let there be sweeping revival that people would turn from their sin and turn to Christ and live.

58:01

And may there be preachers going out and sharing the gospel so that the people would know that they must turn from their sin before the judgment of God comes.

58:10

Lead us in paths of righteousness for your namesake and may the name of Christ be greatly extolled among your people.

58:20

Whatever happens with the election this coming Tuesday, may we be reminded that you are sovereign and you sit in throne above all and there is nothing happening outside of your will for from you and to you, and through you belong all things.

58:38

May your name be praised now and forever in Jesus name.

58:44

Amen. This is when we understand the text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. There are lots of great

58:50

Bible teaching programs on the web and we thank you for selecting ours, but this is no replacement for regular fellowship with a church family.

58:57

Find a good gospel teaching Christ center church to worship with this weekend and join us again