Amen. You may be seated. I can say so ends the third sermon this morning. Each one of these psalms and hymns are truly a sermon and the turn of phrase at times is really powerful. Isaac Watts in that next to the last hymn said that in him the tribes of Adam boast more blessings than their father lost." Do some contemplation on that this morning. Truly, more than what Adam lost, Christ has given to us. And we have reason to praise him, to glorify his great name today. We're setting aside the study of the book of Acts today and we're turning to the book of Jeremiah, to chapter two, the passage that we read earlier. And we're going to read two verses of this chapter and then ask the Lord's help in our study this morning. The two verses that we're going to look at are found here at the end of the chapter. They're verses 34 and 35. Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents. I have not found it by secret search, but upon all these. Yet thou sayest, because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned." The Word of God opened before us. Let's bow our hearts in prayer and ask for the help of God's Spirit this morning in our study of His Word. Father in Heaven, we come to Thee this morning asking for Your help and power, even as we study this book that Thou hast written. Lord, we live in a very evil generation. We live in a time in our own nation when things are going from bad to worse, where much apostasy abounds on every hand. Lord, truly, we have great prosperity, and often that prosperity has become an idol to the people. They're only concerned about whether they are wealthy, and if they're wealthy, everything else is all right. They can break Thy commands with both hands. They can run the way of sin and iniquity just as long as they are prospering in that sin. Lord, we would ask that you would forgive us our sins. And Lord, we would ask as your people to forgive us the times that we are caught up with the sins of our nation. And Lord, we ask that you would remind us that we're part of a heavenly kingdom, an eternal kingdom, the kingdom over which Jesus Christ himself rules. Lord, come and help us in our study of thy word this morning. Help us, set us apart, sanctify us, even as we would study this that thou hast written. For we ask these things in Jesus' name, and we ask them for His glory. Amen. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the January 22, 1973 Supreme Court decision called Roe v. Wade. The Supreme Court, decided by seven justices, to side with Roe, who was a plaintiff in a decision in Texas. And in siding with Roe, they struck down the laws in our country in almost every state of the union. I think there was only one state that had legalized abortion. And yet the Supreme Court struck down every law in our nation. Only Chief Justice, he would later be called Chief Justice William Rehnquist, and Justice Byron Wright stood against the other seven justices. The majority determined that pre-born children are not persons protected by the Constitution. They refused to determine when life begins, but stripped away the protection of the Constitution from a segment of our society by actually writing a law. Basically, they stated that as long as a child is in the womb, they are not protected by law, and that laws could not be written to protect the child in the womb. In arguing against the majority, William Rehnquist asserted that the 14th Amendment was written shortly after the Civil War in 1868, and that it had been in place for over 100 years. At the time of the amendment, there were 36 laws against abortion in the United States. None of those laws were struck down by the amendment. In 1973, there were still 21 of these same laws on the books, and never had the 14th amendment ever been used to strike them down. Never had the justices used the 14th amendment to strike down abortion laws throughout the United States. But now the majority of the justices were using the 14th Amendment, which helped to guarantee the freedom of slaves to allow innocent children to be put to death. Byron Wright called this misuse of the 14th Amendment an exercise of raw judicial power. Then he went on and he said it was an extravagant exercise of the power of judicial review. In short, they were really just writing law. Since striking down the laws throughout our land, over 50 million babies have died. I was trying to reason with one young man a few years ago, and he was justifying the practice of abortion by telling me that it was legal, and therefore it's right. The young man was born after it became legal. If you are not 40 years old this morning, you have always lived in a land that has allowed abortion. It's always been legal. And in people's minds, at least in many people's minds, it is therefore right. For those of us who are older, we can remember our land when it was illegal, when the Constitution was rightly interpreted and protected all of its citizens, including unborn children. In our text, we have before us a similar situation where wickedness was prevalent in society and people could say that sin was alright because it was legal. Think of that. In our nation today, almost all of the Ten Commandments, if not all of them, are being broken legally. Legally. You can have idols. You can desecrate the Lord's Day. You can commit murder, you can commit great immorality, you can steal, you can lie, you can covet, and it's all legal. In fact, oftentimes the government will lead you in the wickedness. And yet you and I live in a nation that makes these things legal, yet we know they're illegal. We know that God's command, the law of God does not change and therefore these ills that are in our society, these evils, these wickednesses in our society do not change either. Sad to say that many of these evils are found in the church. At least that which calls itself the church. And I say that in a very loose term because the church today truly is not a church that would be something the Apostle Paul would recognize. In the Church of Christ, abortion is prevalent. It's prevalent across our land, and it's prevalent among those who say they are believers, but truly are not. When we come to this passage of Scripture, we find that there were many things that were legal that God viewed as being evil. We mentioned earlier when we read through the latter part of chapter 2 that the princes were involved in the evil, the prophets, the priests, but so were the lay people. That is, the people in the pew, in the congregation of Israel. They were all a part of the evil and the wickedness. And when you come to verse 34, one of the evils that is mentioned is that in thy skirts, speaking now to the females as it were, in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents. Skirts had been stained by blood, bloodshed. What an awful indictment upon the women in the nation of Israel. Not just the priests, not just the prophet and the kings and the princes and the people. But here you have one of the most atrocious sins, being, as it were, accused of the women in Israel. On this 40th anniversary of Roe versus Wade, it's important that we remember what the scripture states on this issue of abortion, and that we actually live according to what the scripture says. We could preach on all the commands of God, which men legally break this morning, and we would be here all day long and into the next week. But today I want us to focus on this one issue. This issue that comes to our attention because at this time of the year, there are those who are actually going through our land and celebrating Roe versus Wade. Celebrating the legal right to put children to death. And some of those people would say, well, I'm a believer. I go to church. Well, in my church, the preacher agrees with me that this is legal. Well, it's not legal. And just as in the nation of Israel and Jeremiah had to stand alone against the sins of the people, there were the preachers, as it were, there were the leaders, there were the rulers, and they said, this is okay what you're doing. It's okay. And God said, no, it's not okay. And he dealt with the sins of the land, and this particular sin comes to our attention. First of all this morning, what is the blood of the souls of the poor innocents? What is it referring to? Well, we can just stay in the prophecy of Jeremiah and see how the blood of the children was indeed being shed in the nation. Turn, if you would, for a moment to Jeremiah chapter 19. Jeremiah 19. In verse 4, The Lord says, Because they have forsaken Me, and have estranged this place, and have burned incense in it to other gods, whom neither they nor their fathers have known, nor the kings of Judah, and have filled this place with the blood of innocents, They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire, for burnt offerings unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came into my mind." What God's saying here, you change gods. And when you change gods, you left the God of life and you went to the God of death. And now death is a part of your culture. It's a part of your environment. You are actually putting your offspring to death in your worship. In your worship. You're putting to death the children that I gave you as a heritage. Turn, if you would, to chapter 7. in verse 31. And they have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart. You changed gods and you changed your morality. Turn, if you would, to chapter 32 and verse 35. Chapter 32 and verse 35. It says in verse 35, And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech, which I commanded them not, neither came into my mind that they should do this abomination to cause Judah to sin. There's no question as to what he's talking about when he talks about the blood of the souls of the poor innocents. He's talking about children who have done no crime in society, therefore are not worthy to be punished, especially with capital punishment. And yet here they were being put to death wrongly and unjustly, and it was actually made a part of worship. They thought they would get great blessing to themselves in putting their children to death. Turn, if you would, to the Psalms. Psalm 106. Psalm 106, in verse 37. In verse 37 of Psalm 106, we read, Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils, to demons, to gods that were not gods. and shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan, and the land was polluted with blood. This is what is speaking of here in Jeremiah. And the women were a party to this. It wasn't merely that the king allowed it. It wasn't merely that the religious leaders were leading in this, but the fathers and the women were taking their children and putting them to death. And you have this imagery here, that in the skirts of the women were found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents. And when we come to America, we have a similar killing going on. It's similar in that it's children who are being put to death, children who have not done anything, not done a crime whereby they ought to be put to death. In that regard, the unborn child is not governed in a way by society whereby the child is being put to death. Even these young children, perhaps because they're out of the womb, had done something that was selfish, but they were not being held accountable for that. Certainly they hadn't done anything that was worthy of death. Why were they sacrificing their children in Jeremiah? They were sacrificing their children unto gods in order that they might receive blessing. When you ask the question, why are people sacrificing their children in America? And often it's the same reason. Wealth has become their god. This is going to interfere with my climbing the corporate ladder. Or the fear of man has become my god. And I've committed immorality. And to cover up that I've committed immorality, I'm going to kill a child. Or, you know, it's an inconvenience to have this child. Only that which is convenience. The great God of my life is I. It's me. And if anything breaks into that life and starts to stir me and make me, as it were, give to them, I'm going to discard them. And so here is a child coming along. I don't want that child. Therefore, I'm going to discard it. I'm going to put it to death. It's funny, we were told that Funny in a strange way, not in a laughing way. We were told that when abortion would be legal, that it would do away with child abuse. Every child then would be a wanted child. And what we have seen is that when abortion became legal, child abuse went off the charts. Once you could kill a child in the womb, then it's open season on all children. It doesn't take much logic to come to that conclusion. The unborn child is a person just as much as a child outside of the womb is a person. When you come to the scripture, it's very clear that that is the case. The Supreme Court, when they legalized abortion, they did not determine when life began. They wouldn't touch that issue. They said it openly. We'll leave that for the scientists and the religious teachers to determine. We don't care when life begins. What we're concerned about is that person in the womb. Is it a person protected by the Constitution, protected by the 14th Amendment? Henry Wade, the one who was actually arguing for the upholding of the Dallas Law, said, yes, the Constitution protects the child in the womb. The child in the womb is a person. And the seven justices said, no, it's not. The child in the womb is not a person protected by the Constitution. They just drew a circle around a segment of society and said that segment of society is no longer a person. Well, in our history, people did that with slavery. They drew a circle around a certain segment of society and said they're not persons protected by the Constitution. In Germany, that's what Hitler did. He drew a circle around a segment of society and said those people are not real people. They haven't arrived yet. We can put them to death. And so Jews and others were put to death because they didn't meet this prescribed race, this blessed race. That's all the Supreme Court has done. They've drawn a circle around those that are in the womb and said that the Constitution doesn't protect them. Now, I will give you a Constitution this morning, and I challenge you to show me where in the Constitution it says the child in the womb is not a person to be protected. Show me it. It's not there. The Supreme Court, in saying that, wrote law. That is, in itself, illegal. The only one who can write law in this nation are the legislators. They are only to interpret law. That is the Supreme Court. But rather than interpret law, they wrote law. And they said that the person in the womb is not a person protected by the 14th or any other amendments. Well, it's corrupt, what they did. and many babies have lost their life. When we come to scripture, does the scripture speak of the child in the womb as being a person? That's the only issue really before us. Is the child in the womb viewed as a person according to scripture? Well, when you come to 1 Peter 2 and verse 2, it speaks about the newborn babes desiring the sincere milk of the word, that they might grow thereby. The word newborn babe there, it's a special word. It's found as well in 2 Timothy 3 and verse 15, and it says concerning Timothy, that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith that is in Christ Jesus. In both passages, the term for the child is a newborn babe. But that same terminology is used for the child in the womb. When you come to Luke chapter 1 and verse 41, it says, It came to pass that when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb. The very same word that you find concerning a babe desiring milk or a babe learning the scriptures. Very same word. The Scripture doesn't make a distinction. It doesn't call the child in the womb a fetus and then the child out of the womb a child. It uses the same terminology because they are both the same child. Later on in verse 44, For lo, as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in my ears, the babe leaped in my womb with joy. You have descriptions of a child in the womb using the first person. You have that, for instance, in Psalm 139, in verse 13. David is writing, he says, "...for Thou hast possessed my reins, Thou hast covered me in my mother's womb." He's not speaking of himself as being an it, then he becomes a person after he's born. He's speaking of himself in the personal pronoun, first person personal pronoun. It's referring to David. He says in verse 14, "...I will praise Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are thy works, and my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, being yet unperfect, and in thy book all my members were written." David is speaking about how God fashioned him in the womb, and how that he was a person in the womb. Not a distinction, he was a person there. In Exodus chapter 21, turn there if you would. In Exodus 21, you have a case study. After giving us the Ten Commandments, the application of those commandments is worked out for the nation by different case studies. And this is one of those studies to help us understand what it means to murder someone. And when you come to verse 22 of Exodus 21, it says, If men strive, here they're fighting, and they hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her. Literally, she gives birth. and yet no mischief, no harm follow. He shall surely be punished according as the woman's husband will lay upon him, and he shall pay as the judge has determined." So two men are fighting, they're not careful about their fighting, and they strike a woman with child, the child comes out, there's no harm done to the child, but for the inconvenience of causing a premature birth, the husband gets together with the judge, and they find the individual that struck the woman. That's if no harm occurs. But what happens if harm does occur to the child in the womb? This is what we have that follows in verse 23. And if any mischief, any harm, that's what the Hebrew word is, any harm follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. If that child comes out harmed, then you do to the one who harmed the child the same thing that he did to the child. If the child comes out dead, you take the life of the man who struck the woman. Why is that? It's because God views the child in the womb as being a person. Just like you. Just like me. Oh, there are different stages of growth, but the child out of the womb has different stages of growth. If you want to say you can kill a child until it's fully grown, then let's say you can kill a child until they're 18. Because they're not fully grown until then. Or 12. Why not then? Or 2. Why not then? They're not fully grown. There are different stages of growth. And those different stages of growth begin at conception and continue on until someone becomes an adult. We say you can't kill a child that's a year old. And how can you kill a child before being a year old? Many of you know that my daughter was born premature. Now she had to go in and get her because if they hadn't, she would have bled to death. So they went in, what they told us was three or four weeks early. Thankfully, in our day and age, there is a way of taking care of a child early in the old country, the old days, she would have died and perhaps my wife would have died. This condition was remedied by them going in and taking our daughter and taking her and putting her on monitors and actually because infection came into her lungs and her lungs collapsed, they had to put her on a respirator and paralyze her. And all you saw for these days were just a chest moving as the air moved through her lungs. She couldn't open her eyes. She couldn't touch you. She couldn't respond to you. She was paralyzed head to toe. And yet, if I plunged a knife into her at that time, I would have been guilty of murder, and rightly so. And yet, during that time, she could have still been in the womb, and if I had done it in the womb, that would have been all right. The Supreme Court, when it legalized abortion and made it open season on that child in the womb, the only thing they did was make laws trying to help the mother's health and saying that you could do an abortion in a clinic for so many weeks. After that, it had to be done in a hospital. But as far as the child was concerned, you could take the child's life anytime. And that's where we're living now. 40 years later. According to the scriptures, though it's legal in this country to put a child to death just as it was legal to take a child and offer it in sacrifice. God still says it's murder. God still says it's wrong. God says, I can see the stain of the sin upon your skirts. No state, as we have said, has a right now to write a law prohibiting the killing of unborn children. There are states that are trying to whittle away at that law and trying to make it more hard for the premeditated murder of a child to take place. But having said that, in any state in the Union, abortion is legal. Lawyers, leaders, religious leaders, today and through this next week will be defending the murder of unborn children because according to the Constitution they are not protected. And yet you and I are following a different law. We're following the law given to us by our God. And that law given to us by God goes against the laws of this land when it comes to immorality. goes against the laws of this land when it comes to the Sabbath, goes against the laws of this land when it comes to idolatry, goes against the laws of this land when it comes to stealing, when it comes to covetousness. The law of God goes against the laws of this wicked land, just as they were going against the laws of Jeremiah. And the law of God is going against the laws in many a church today who is saying that this is okay. It's okay. Perhaps you have people who are friends and they come to you and say, well, it is OK to kill a child in the womb if the child was conceived because of sin. If the conception was due to rape or incest, then it's OK to kill the child in the womb. What they are saying is, again, the child in the womb is not a person. That's what they are arguing. The child in the womb is not a person. Because if you were to ask that person, can you kill a two-year-old that was conceived because of sin? Oh, no, you can't do that. Can you kill a 10-year-old and say, well, this 10-year-old was conceived out of a sinful relationship. Can I kill the child? You say, no, no, the child is a person protected by the amendment. Then why can you kill that child in the womb? The logic is the child is not a person. It's the only conclusion you can come to. Now, don't misunderstand me. I understand why pro-life legislators are trying to get laws passed that will outlaw abortion, except in the cases of rape and incest, because they know if they can get that through, they'll have wiped out almost all the abortion industry. Very few abortions are actually done due to rape and incest. There are some, but very few. And if you were a legislator and someone came to your desk and said, would you sign that? You would say, I'll sign that because I'll do anything to slow down and stop the murder of the innocent. And then once we stop that, we'll work on those that are there because of rape and incest. Think of that. A child is conceived because of sin. It's not the mother's sin and not the child's sin. Both of them are innocent. The one who is guilty oftentimes just gets a slap on the wrist and he goes out and does it again. Just a slap on the wrist. Here you're going to put to death one of the two that are innocent, who's committed no crime. And then you're going to put a slap on the wrist to the man who did the crime. I've actually asked some who've come to argue with me on this point. I said, are you in favor of capital punishment for the rapist? Don't come and talk to me about whether it is right or not right to kill a child in the womb concerning rape and incest if you're not going to kill the one doing the crime. Because a mother and child are innocents. They truly are. Just in USA Today this last week, we have brought to our attention that the backlog of those who want to adopt babies is way back into the months and years now because there aren't babies for them. Well, there would be babies there. People who didn't want their child gave them up for adoption and a loving home took the child and tried to nurture and raise the child in a manner that would please God. In Exodus 23 and verse 7 it says, Now we've spent all of our time this morning just basically talking about this sin. What is the stain? Where is the stain? You note that the stain is found upon the skirt. Because it's upon the skirt, it's something that can be seen. Our ladies here do a great deal of time and energy trying to make sure their clothes are clean. They're not coming to the house of God with stains on their clothes, especially a blood stain. God is saying, I see the stain. Others may not. I see the stain. This makes it a public crime. He said there's no need to hunt. You don't have to dig and search for this, for the evidence. Truly He says in verse 34, also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents. I have not found it by secret search. It's all out in the open. You're killing your children openly. And we find that the 50 million children who have been put to death in our country, that there are books recording their death. It's no mystery as to how many have died. Not anymore. The books are there. How many are 50 million children? It would be the population of Pennsylvania and then some. The population of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. And then, son, you start adding up the states around us where the whole population has been devastated. Now you're talking about 50 million people. It's a public crime. You don't need to hunt and look for it. Oh, it's legal. In Josiah's day, he put the child's sacrifice away. You had to do it in secret, but now Josiah is dead, and Jeremiah is crying out against the sin in Manasseh's day. The sin that was going on, the public approval was being granted to it, the king was taking part in it, and therefore the whole nation was given over to it. The question is, are you going to stand with Jeremiah or are you going to stand with the nation? Are you going to stand with Manasseh the king or are you going to stand with Jeremiah the prophet? Are you going to be with the false prophets of our day or are you going to be with the one true prophet, Jeremiah? It's a public crime. It's a personal crime. God saw the blood on the garments of the criminal. They may have had a desire to be free from it and to cover it and to somehow wash it clean and to prosper in spite of it, but God still saw the crime it was on the skirt. It's a perverse crime. A woman's attitude is not normally to kill her child. It's the exact opposite. She'll nurture that child, she'll protect that child, she'll die in the place of that child. Her desire is not to kill the child. We see then the perversion of this crime. Where is the stain? It's in the skirts of the women who killed their children. This showed a wrong attitude toward the children. We don't idolize our children, our heritage. We don't corrupt our children, our heritage. But we also do not murder our children and our heritage. We have a proper attitude toward our children. That attitude is given to us from scripture, and we will raise our children in a manner that is pleasing unto the Lord. How long does a stain last? Well, if man is doing the accusing, and that's all you're looking at, the stain may not last very long. Abortion was illegal until 1973. The Constitution made it illegal, and the laws of the land made it illegal. But man has changed his mind, and so now it's no longer illegal, now it's okay. So in man's eyes, there's no stain there at all. But what about God? God is the one who makes the law. God is the one who determines right and wrong. What does God say? Well, we've looked this morning. We have seen that God considers the child in the womb to be a person just like the child outside of the womb. And if you kill the child in the womb, the lex talionis, the law of retaliation, goes to that child just as it would an adult, like the woman who gave birth or the one, a man who might kill another man. Turn, if you would, please, to Numbers 35. In light of the killing of a person, this is one of the most sobering passages in all the Word of God. In Numbers 35 and verse 33, Verse 33 says, So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are. For blood, it defileth the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it. Is that not sobering? You remember when Cain slew Abel, the blood of Abel was crying unto God? God is saying, I see the blood that has been shed. I see it. It's in the skirts of the women. It's crying for judgment. And justice, if God is a just God, and He is, justice is such that He will require it at the hands of the one who did the murder. This would include the doctors, so-called. This would include the husbands who took their wives to have their child murdered. This would include especially the women who turned against their child. Yeah, but they say it's innocent. They haven't done anything wrong. Isn't that what we read in 2 Kings? Dealing with Manasseh, according to all that he did. And it says in verse 4, 2 Kings 24. And also for the innocent blood that he shed, for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, which the Lord would not pardon. God wouldn't pardon. He wouldn't overlook it. He wouldn't turn away. Now in this passage of Scripture, they're saying I'm innocent. Verse 35, Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely is anger sure turned from me. And God says, Behold, I will plead with thee. I'm going to argue with you. You're coming into my courtroom now, and it's by my terms and my law that the judgment will be made. I'm going to plead with you. Because you say I've not sinned. The Lord charges with sin and the Lord's charge cannot be overlooked. That stain cannot be washed away. The Lord cannot forget the stain. The Lord must punish the stain. And we read in Malachi chapter three in verse six, I am the Lord, I change not. We'll look at that passage more tonight as we think on the fact that he is immutable. That's a terror to those that are ungodly. He doesn't change. It's a blessing to you because in His not changing, He has found a way back into His presence. And there could be those here, those who are watching by way of internet, those who will hear the message later, and you're saying, I have committed this awful crime. I don't want the blood of a stain upon my skirt. I don't want the blood upon my hands. Is there any way to get rid of the stain? And there is. But it's not your doing. There's no soap that you can find that'll wash it away. There's no psychologist that you can go to who'll take it away, the stain of this sin. But there is indeed a way of having it cleansed. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin, including murder. Manasseh was the one who was guilty of this great sin, and yet at the end of Manasseh's life, he repented, and what did he find? Forgiveness. The Apostle Paul wasn't guilty of this sin, but he was guilty of consenting to the murder of Saul, and he was breathing out slaughters or murders. He was indeed injurious to the people of God. And as we saw last week, he found forgiveness. He found his sins cleansed, even the sin of murder. It's the only thing that washes away that sin. I have stood outside the abortion clinic, and as ladies have left the abortion clinic, and as they come to the road and have to stop to look at the traffic, I've whispered almost in the kindest way I know how to them and told them, this guilt won't go away any other way than through the blood of Christ. Come to Christ. You have done a perversion. That perversion stays in the heart and soul. It will corrupt the heart and soul all of your life. There's only one way of getting rid of this perversion in the heart, and that is through the blood of Christ. You say, but the scripture says the person must die. But that's where we come to the gospel, do we not? In 1 Peter 2, in verse 24, "...who his own self bare our sins, and his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness. By whose stripe ye are healed." He died, our sins were placed upon Him, that you might now live to righteousness. You said, I've committed this awful sin. God says this is an abomination. God says I can't have my sin cleansed but by the shedding of my blood. The good news is that your blood was shed on the cross when Christ died for you. You were punished in full for that sin. Later, Peter says, For Christ also has suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by His Spirit. He died the just. He was the just one for the unjust. That's us. We have committed all kinds of sins. and perhaps even the sin of murder. All we like sheep have gone astray, Isaiah wrote. We have turned everyone to his own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. It was laid on Christ. He received the punishment. That's the way that you and I can come back into good graces with God. It's through the blood of Christ. His blood was shed and you and I can come through that blood. What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow. No other fount I know, nothing but the blood of Jesus. In preaching this message, I don't want to give you the impression I'm looking down my nose on those who have committed this awful sin, because there go I but by the grace of God. And before I was saved, I consented to this sin by not speaking against it. And there were those who went to have an abortion, and I didn't say it was wrong to them. I didn't stand against them. I was in sin. This morning, that might be your sin. or maybe a host of other sins. We all come to God the same way. You say, I've never committed murder, but have you committed idolatry? Have you broken the Sabbath? Have you lied? Have you stolen? What is your sin? They're all guilty of great sin and great punishment. And then all those sins are washed away in the blood of Christ. If this morning You know that you have committed such a sin as we have been preaching against? Or you know others that have committed this sin? What is the answer to them? Is it possible for them to become righteous and live in righteousness? It is. But you must seek the Lord. You've sinned against Him. You've broken His law. You've struck out against someone who was made in His image. And God says you must die. You must seek the Lord. You must repent of your sin. As the Lord defines sin, You say, the nation doesn't define it as sin. Well, the nation doesn't define hardly anything as sin. And what it will define sooner or later is that we are sin. That the Christian, the Bible believer, the one who is following the scripture is sin and will try to push us out of society altogether. We've already been pushed out of the public school arena. We've already said, no Bible here, no prayer here. And they would like to push us out further and push us out further as we get the blame for the ills of society. No, it's the wickedness in our society that is causing the ills of our society. We must repent, we must ask forgiveness of the Lord, ask for cleansing, and we must proclaim the Lord to our generation. You proclaim him first in baptism, but you continue proclaiming him throughout the nation and the continual profession of faith. And to be sincere, you must speak out for those who cannot defend themselves. In that regard, what can you do? Well, you can vote. The one who has the power to change the legislation is silent in our nation. It's the legislator. It's Congress. Congress has the right to write a law that would indeed outlaw abortion. It would probably have to be a constitutional amendment, but that's where we begin. And our congressional leaders are silent. There are some there who indeed see this evil for what it is, but they're not in the large majority. And those that are there, many of them are too busy taking up with wealth. How we're losing it while the real wealth of the nation is being destroyed. You vote for the President and the Senate, they have the power to appoint and confirm interpreters of the law, that is the Supreme Court justices, and we have put in power Presidents and Senators who indeed agree that abortion is murder, and yet at this point they haven't acted on it. They haven't stopped it. But what else can you do? You can't write a law. You can't stop it physically from happening. You can vote for those in Congress to write legislation. You can vote for those in the presidency or in the Senate to indeed interpret this correctly or to put Supreme Court justices in place who will interpret the Constitution correctly on this issue. But if they refuse to act, you can pray. In the book of Ezekiel, a contemporary of Jeremiah, he was a younger man when Jeremiah was an old man. But before the nation fell and Jerusalem fell, you had someone who went through the Jerusalem and Judah and they marked the people who were sighing and groaning over the sins of the nation. An angel went through and put a mark on them. Sigh and groaning over the sins of the nation. This week, people will be celebrating the death of 50 million people. It ought to cause our hearts to sigh and groan, but especially it ought to cause our hearts to sigh and groan that this is being done in the so-called Church of Christ. Not so much evangelical, but the church at large. As I said, I use that in a broad term. And then we must proclaim God's word, like Jeremiah did to the congregation of the Lord. We must be willing to speak what we know. They may not listen. It's a very emotional issue, because in reality, if you convince someone that they have murdered their child, they view that as such, as convincing them that they have committed a murder. Nobody wants to be tagged with that. And so it becomes a very emotional argument. When you actually look at the facts, it's very easy to argue. To argue against abortion is not a hard thing, constitutionally or scripturally. It's very easy to argue, but it's such an emotional issue because people have murdered their child and they don't want to be tagged with that. Their emotions get very stirred up. There has been some success in the nation of changing the people's minds by speaking against it. Roe versus Wade, Jane Roe, was actually Norma McCorvey. Norma McCorvey now is against abortion, wants to see Roe versus Wade overturned. What you may not have known is that there was another case decided at the same time. Roe versus Wade was the case in Texas. Wade was the, District Attorney for the County of Dallas. But at the same time, there was a decision rendered in Georgia called Doe versus Bolton. Bolton was the Attorney General for Georgia. Georgia had new laws on the books. Texas had the old laws that go all the way back to the time of the 14th Amendment. So they were trying both types of cases. And in Doe versus Bolton, Sandra Cano, her name was Doe, Mary Doe. She was against it. She was lied to, she says, by her attorney. She didn't want abortion overturned. And when it was overturned, she was horrified by it. And ever since then, she has been trying to fight and get the case overturned. She even tried to get the Supreme Court justices to overturn it by looking at the fact that she was misled and lied to by her attorney. Now you don't hear about Doe versus Bolton. They were written at the same time as Roe versus Wade. Why? Because of the fact Doe has been trying to overturn the case ever since it was written. Norma McCovey in Roe versus Wade was trying to promote it for many years until God smote her heart. He smote her heart. And now she's pro-life. The man who was arguing this as a medical doctor before the Supreme Court was a man by the name of Bernard Nathanson. He was from New York. He started the pro-abortion movement, the organization that now takes its name, the National Organization for the Legalization of Abortion. That's not what it was called when it started, but it was started by Bernard Nathanson. He was the medical doctor there at the Supreme Court giving the evidence. He later says, we lied about all the abortions taking place in America. We just made up the numbers. Just made them up. After abortion was legalized, he began doing more study on the child in the womb and how that the child was dying. He would have called it a fetus in those days. He was a Jew and he was an atheist. Secular humanists, we call them. He had run an abortion clinic for a year when it was legal in New York. It was illegal everywhere else. Everybody came to his abortion clinic throughout the United States. He was doing abortions 365 days a week, 24 hours around the clock. And then when it became legal, His abortion clinic went out of business. His abortion clinic sprang up everywhere. And so he devoted himself to studying, and he was studying what goes on in the womb. And as he was studying what went on in the womb, he came to the horrifying conclusion, we're killing little people. He became pro-life. For 10 years he was still a Jewish atheist. But he became pro-life. He wrote a book called Aborting America, where he exposes the lies that they put before the Supreme Court, where he exposes what they did. He calls this a national holocaust. And he says, my hands are responsible for it. He later put forward a movie called The Silent Scream, showing that the child in the womb is indeed a person and is screaming for its life when it's being put to death oftentimes. Roe, she's against it. Doe, she's against it. Bernard Nathanson, he's against it. What's keeping the rest of the nation? They're bound and locked up in their depravity and their sin. They're worshiping idols because God speaks so clearly on this issue. They don't want to hear His voice. And yet there are many who have heard His voice and come to Christ Those here today, you've heard his voice, you've come to Christ. Others that we have known at, I protested at an abortion clinic for years, and inside the clinic, two of the workers hearing scripture being read outside the clinic, two workers in the clinic got saved. Became pro-life. Oh, it's a long, hard battle, but this is the battle. This is where we're living. We're living in a kingdom inside of a kingdom, and the kingdom that we're living inside of is a perverse and wicked kingdom right now. We're living in Christ's kingdom, and we're to be the salt of the earth. To be the salt of the earth. You say, I've committed sin. God will forgive that, but you have to come and lay hold of Christ. His blood will cleanse your sin. You come to someone and they argue with you, an abortion will do what I have done on many occasions. Tell them that God will change their heart and give them a love for their baby. Tell them God will forgive their sin and cleanse their sin. And once their sin is cleansed, then they can have honesty to actually look at Scripture and look at what they have done. And oftentimes, it becomes more horrible to them as it did to Bernard Nathanson. The blood is able to cleanse from sin. On this 40th anniversary, it's not a day of rejoicing, it's a day of shame and sorrow. Fifty million. Those that people are counting on now to fill the ranks of the working class in order that they might, in the working class, produce taxes and produce Social Security, they're not there. Fifty million workers are gone. They're not there. We are judging ourself. We are killing ourself. And God has already allowed the judgment to begin on the land. We have people with reprobate minds defending this in every arena of society. They're defending it. But it doesn't surprise us. They're defending immorality, sodomy, pedophilia. It's all being defended today. And we are the ones who are wrong. No, my brethren, we are in Christ's kingdom. His law is truth, and we will govern our lives and seek to help others govern their life according to the truth of God's word. That starts with forgiveness through the blood of Christ, but it continues on all of our life, being sanctified and set apart by the word of God. Let's bow our hearts in prayer. If this morning you're outside of Christ, Perhaps you're dealing with this guilt that we have talked about. There's only one way to get rid of guilt, and that's through the blood of Christ, to see that He died for sinners. And when you come to Him, He'll wash away your sin. I am your servant for Christ's sake. I have been very hard on this sin because God is very hard on it this morning. But my heart is tender to those who are sinners. I am a sinner saved by grace. If I can be of help to you in coming to Christ, speak a word with me. But what you need today is really Christ. What you need is to know that His blood has washed you clean. Come and lay hold of Him. Come and lay hold of that blood. It will wash you clean from every stain. Every stain. Come and lay hold of Christ. If you are one of God's people, you are out of step with the world. And I know that that at times can be intimidating when so-called scholars disagree with you. But the three people that were mainline pro-abortion here now agree with you. That will encourage your heart that you're on the right track. What God has said in His word is truth. Follow that truth with all of your heart. Be the salt of the earth in our generation. Father in heaven, we ask this morning that you would help us to stand like Jeremiah. If we have to stand alone and give us such grace, Lord, we are thankful that there are more than 7,000 who haven't bowed the knee to Baal, even on this particular sin. Lord, we are thankful that there are many who are standing against this sin who even when it comes to salvation, are still bound by darkness. But Lord, we are not bound by that darkness. You've set us free. You've given us understanding. And Lord, we would ask that you would help us to regulate our life and to encourage others to stand against this great evil. Let the children not be put to death. Let innocent souls not be snuffed out by the wickedness and the selfishness of those in this generation. would help us indeed to see the child as the heritage of the Lord and to raise the child to bring honor and praise and glory to thy great name. Lord, be with those this morning who are wrestling with the guilt of this sin. Be with them, we ask, and through the blood of Christ, grant them that cleansing. Grant their conscience that cleansing. Grant that the guilt would be removed by the cleansing of the blood. And Lord, then give them grace to speak against this evil in our generation. Lord, put it to a stop. Smite hip and thigh those that would promote it. Lord, allow it not to go on. Lord, we are tired of the great wickedness and the bloodshed in our land. Lord, we see these moral perversions everywhere. And then we see them in the so-called Church of Christ. Lord, it's not your church. Lord, arise in your church and purify your church and come and grant that your people again would believe and walk according to the paths of Scripture. Lord, come and help. Come and get glory to thine own great name. For we ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen. music music music music Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! you