Prolife Kitchen Table

Episode 26 - Bloodwork - Baby Chris Week 25

• Season 1 • Episode 26

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A favorite tactic of pro-abortion activists is to claim that, "the Bible doesn't say anything about abortion" - this is not the flex they think it is.  Another avenue of attack is to claim that in Numbers 5:11-31 God prescribes abortion as the penalty for adultery.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Stick with us today as we work to refute these two assertions using proper exegesis.



Scripture References in this episode include:

Leviticus 17:13-14             Genesis 9:6              Psalm 72:14

Exodus 20:13                    Genesis 3:7, 21        Genesis 22:8

Leviticus 17:6-11               Exodus 29:21            Exodus 12:23

Genesis 15                        Jeremiah 31:31-34   Luke 22:19-20

I Corinthians 11:24-25     I Peter 3:18                I John 2:2

Isaiah 59:2                        Hebrews 9:15          Ephesians 2:14-16

John 3:16                          Romans 6:23           Romans 10:13

Revelation 22:17              2 Corinthians 9:15  Numbers 5:11-31

https://www.ppl.org/baby-chris

Abortion is never medically necessary

Abortion Pill Reversal https://abortionpillreversal.com 24/7 Helpline at 877.558.0333 Email: help@apr.life or Chat at the weblink above

Post abortion recovery for both women and men at https://www.rachelsvineyard.org

Life Training Institute https://www.prolifetraining.com

Charlotte Lozier Institute https://lozierinstitute.org

Guttmacher Institute https://guttmacher.org


Compelled by the gospel, PPL equips Presbyterians to champion human life at every stage. PPL.org


Host:

Welcome back to the table, where we share resources from the almost 50 years worth of archived pro-life material created by Presbyterians protecting life. I'm Deborah Hollifield, a former PPL board member and past executive director, and your host for these podcasts. PPL's intention for these podcasts is to equip Presbyterians and really all pro-life Christians of all denominations to be able to have intelligent conversations about life issues from fertilization to natural death with an emphasis on making abortion unthinkable. A key strategy in being able to respond to the objections of pro-abortion activists is to keep our responses focused in the same category as their objections. By that I mean if their argument is coming from the point of view of medical science and biology, then keep your response in the focus of medical science and biology. Don't divert to religion or ethics. If their argument is coming from the point of view of humanity and personhood, don't immediately appeal to the Bible, especially if you are having a conversation with a secular atheist.  I once participated in a survey of national pro-life leaders where one of the questions involved how often pro-life leaders invoked religion and scripture. The result was nearly unanimous that Christian pro-life leaders never invoke God's scripture or even religion in general in most pro-life conversations and debate. But it was also true that the secular or atheist pro-abortion activists were the ones who were the first to bring up God, scripture, and religion in pro-life exchanges with Christians. So today I want to cover a resource that addresses some of the supposed ammunition in the pro-abortion gotcha arsenal.

Host:

The first one they like to go to is the Bible says nothing about abortion. And the second one is that God prescribes an abortifacient as a penalty for adultery in the book of Numbers, chapter five.

Host:

First, what about the claim that the Bible doesn't say anything about abortion? The Bible has stories about, and get ready for a long list, romance, prostitution, rape, incest, cohabitation, marriage, divorce, polyamory, polygamy, adultery, infertility, teenage pregnancy, unwed mothers, illegitimacy, surrogacy, childbirth, death during childbirth, birth anomalies, homicide, suicide, patricide, fratricide, depression, economic deprivation, bodily autonomy, women's rights, racial discrimination, spousal abandonment, and every other reason that we hear about every day as a reason for abortion. And yet, in this comprehensive 1,500-year record of human sexual relationships and social and economic oppression, there is no story about abortion.

Host:

Now this is not the flex that pro-abortion lobbyists think it is. It's that abortion is never considered to be a solution to any of these issues. Because to God, abortion is unthinkable. No murder is God's law against abortion in the sixth of the Ten Commandments. Scripture is very clear that God is the author of life and sovereign over it. God creates life, God creates destinies, God protects, rescues, delivers, provides for women and children, fights for the voiceless, and lifts up the oppressed. In Matthew chapter 22, verses thirty six through forty, Jesus teaches that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind, and the second greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. Certainly women and children, both born and preborn, are our neighbors. God hates hands that shed innocent blood. Those being led to slaughter are to be delivered to safety. The innocent, weak, oppressed, and especially children are deserving a special protection. The idea of abortion is completely incompatible with what we know of the attributes of God. The thread that runs throughout Scripture is life. In the call stories of the prophets and Paul, in the destiny stories of Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Samson, John, and Jesus. In Genesis chapter 1, verse 28, God commands human beings to be fruitful and multiply. It's childbearing, not abortion or infanti that is considered women's God given right. And being childless is sometimes considered a fate worse than death.

Host:

But wait, exclaims the eager pro abortionist. What about Numbers chapter 5, verses eleven through 31? Well, if you are familiar with this Old Testament text, I'm going to read it first, but you will want to read it on your own later as well. I'll be reading from the ESV version.

Host:

"Hear the word of the Lord, beginning at verse eleven. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, if any man's wife goes astray and breaks faith with him, if a man lies with her sexually and it is hidden from the eyes of her husband, and she is undetected, though she has defiled herself, and there is no witness against her, since she was not taken in the act. And if the spirit of jealousy comes over him and he is jealous of his wife who has defiled herself, or if the spirit of jealousy comes over him, and he is jealous of his wife, though she has not defiled herself, then the man shall bring his wife to the priest and bring the offering required of her, a tenth of an epha of barley flour. He shall pour no oil on it and put no frankincense in it, for it is a grain offering of jealousy, a grain offering of remembrance, bringing iniquity to remembremembrance. And the priest shall bring her near and set her before the Lord. And the priest shall take holy water in an earthenware vessel, and take some of the dust that is on the floor of the tabernacle, and put it into the water. And the priest shall set the woman before the Lord, and unbind her hair, and place her hands in the grain offering of remembrance, which is the grain offering of jealousy, and in his hand the priest shall have the water of bitterness that brings the curse. Then the priest shall make her take an oath, saying, If no man has lain with you, and if you have not turned aside to uncleanness while you were under your husband's authority, be free of this water of bitterness that brings the curse. But if you have gone astray, though you are under your husband's authority, and if you have defiled yourself and some man other than your husband has lain with you, then let the plea priest make the woman take the oath of the curse and say to the woman, The Lord make you a curse and an oath among your people, when the Lord makes your thigh fall away and your body swell, may this water that brings the curse pass into your bowels and make your womb swell and your thigh fall away. And the woman shall say, Amen, amen.

Host:

Then the priest shall write these curses in a book and wash them off into the water of bitterness, and he shall make the woman drink the water of bitterness that brings the curse, and the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain. And the priest shall take the grain offering of jealousy out of the woman's hand and shall wave the grain offering before the Lord and bring it to the altar, and the priest shall take a handful of the grain offering as its memorial portion, and burn it on the altar, and afterward shall make the woman drink the water. And when he has made her drink the water, then if she has defiled herself and has broken faith with her husband, the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain, and her womb shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away, and the woman shall become a curse among her people.

Host:

But if the woman has not defiled herself and is clean, then she shall be free and shall conceive children. This is the law in cases of jealousy, when a wife, though under her husband's authority, goes astray and defiles herself, or when the spirit of jealousy comes over a man and he is jealous of his wife, then he shall set the woman before the Lord and the priest shall carry out for her all this law. The man shall be free from iniquity, but the woman shall bear her iniquity." Thanks be to God.

Host:

Pro abortion activists will try to tell you that God here is prescribing abortion as a penalty for adultery. At first reading, even most Christians think this text is problematic. Well, I have good news for you. Once you know how to read the Bible in context, it's not difficult to understand. Sadly, this common confusion has been exacerbated by mistranslation and misunderstanding of this isolated text outlined above.

Host:

Part of the correction to this is to remember what we already learned about abortion being incompatible with what we know about the character of God. In context, this Old Testament account describes something known as the jealousy offering or the trial by ordeal. When a husband suspected that his wife had been unfaithful, but when there were no witnesses to the act except the accused couple, the husband of the accused woman could bring her to a priest who would mix up some unpleasant ingredients. Those ingredients are believed not to be poison or an abortifacient, but just ordinary water mixed with the dust from the temple floor. The wife would drink it, and if the wife was guilty of adultery, it was believed she would get sick and her belly would swallow. If the wife was innocent, God would protect her. There is nothing magical about the concoction.

Host:

Regardless of the outcome, God was the woman's righteous judge, affirming the truth that be sure your sin will find you out. Some suggest that the judgment of adultery involved causing the woman to abort as her punishment. A particular mistranslation in the 2011 edition of the New International Version Bible mistakenly states that the drink will cause miscarriage. However, this is not what the passage is talking about. Pregnancy is nowhere mentioned or even hinted at in the text. The only thing that even sounds like pregnancy is the guilty wife's stomach becoming bloated. But even in that instance, it has nothing to do with pregnancy, because as I said before, pregnancy is not mentioned in the text, and further the passage doesn't say that drinking the concoction would cause an abortion or a miscarriage. Because wait for it, pregnancy is not mentioned in this text.

Host:

Leviticus chapter twenty verse ten states that if a woman was found guilty of adultery, her punishment would be death. But in Deuteronomy 17, verse 6, we also read that the death penalty requires the testimony of two witnesses. As we read earlier in this circumstance in Numbers, there are not two human witnesses, only the accused woman. If the accused woman was found to be innocent, verse 28 says she would be clear cleared of guilt and able to have children. But without two witnesses, the guilty woman could not be killed by human judges, but rather would be rendered barren by a holy God instead. In this case, God himself is the only witness against the woman, and God, not a husband, is the only one against whom the woman has sinned.

Host:

One of the reasons we know this is that in 2 Samuel chapter twelve, when the prophet Nathan confronted King David about his adultery with Uriah's wife Bathsheba, King David exclaimed, "I have sinned against the Lord." And then he goes on to write to the Lord in Psalm 51, that "against you and you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge."

Host:

So in Numbers five, the woman has a completely truthful witness and a completely righteous judge in God. If she is innocent, her husband cannot carry his suspicions into their future relationship. Because God has judged her rightly, her reputation as a faithful wife will be maintained. But if she is guilty, that same completely truthful witness and completely righteous judge will not violate his own law and sentence her to death without a second witness, but will instead render her barren, childless, and she will know that her childlessness will be the judgment of God and a fate worse than death for a woman in that time and culture.

Host:

So I hope that this explanation wasn't too complicated and that it made sense to you. And if it's not, I encourage you to listen a second time or go to the show notes and read the transcript for the podcast. But whatever, it's important to understand that when we are interpreting scripture passages, we must always keep in mind both the cultural context, the attributes of God, and the whole canon of scripture, and not just interpret texts in isolation and come to misunderstandings and misrepresentations about God.

Host:

And now it's a good time for a break. Or maybe a short minute to pray and thank God for both who He is and for giving us guidance for life in His written word.

Announcer:

Until she experiences the healing, renewing, and restorative love of Jesus Christ in a most unexpected and unusual way. Presented by a five-member ensemble cast, Viable leads the audience through a journey of healing and restoration for post-abortive women and men through the love of Jesus Christ. Viable is endorsed by the National Right to Life Committee. You can find out how to present Viable to your church or pro-life group at ViablePlay.org.

Host:

Hear the word of the Lord. "For the life of all flesh, its blood is its life. Therefore, I say to the Israelite people, you shall not partake of the blood of any flesh, for the life of all flesh is in its blood." Leviticus chapter 17, verses thirteen and fourteen. At twenty-five weeks, baby Chris's nostrils open. He moves freely in the womb and frequently changes position. His skin is pinker because capillaries are forming. These are the smallest blood vessels, only one cell thick, and they are transferring oxygen and other nutrients throughout the body and collect waste material to return to the veins. The capillary is the site of cellular respiration, helping tissue use oxygen and returning carbon dioxide to the lungs for expiration. Here's a note to those who claim the Bible teaches that life doesn't begin until first breath. Our cells are the site of respiration long before birth.

Host:

The human body contains more than a billion capillaries with a thousand square miles of surface area for exchange of gases, waste, and nutrients between blood and tissue fluid. Interestingly, a mother and her child in the womb do not share the same blood type. The baby's blood type is determined by the genes of both parents. The mother's blood carries oxygen and nutrients to the placenta, which then filters the mother's blood for nutrients and oxygen for the baby, but does not mingle their blood. At the same time, the baby's blood travels up the umbilical cord to the placenta and carries the nutrients and oxygen back to the baby.

Host:

That is amazing. All of this proves by design what we know to be true by experience. Human beings can't live without air, water, and food in the blood that carries it all to our organs and tissues. Life is indeed in the blood.

Host:

As the author of life, our blood is precious to God. Life is to be protected, so we are instructed not to commit murder. Because humans are made in the image of God, there is a death penalty for those who murder. Blood purifies and atones. When Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, they tried to hide from God and cover their shame using fig leaves. In God's economy, though, the shedding of blood, death, is the penalty required for humans' sins against God. But in loving faithfulness God rescued them with a sacrifice by taking the life of an innocent creature, animals who do not know sin and which do not bear God's image, in substitution for their lives. God clothed Adam and Eve in its skin as evidence that righteousness had been fulfilled on their behalf. Throughout the time of the old covenant, the blood of the animals sacrificed as sin offerings continued to expiate the sins of God's people, purifying them from the corruption of their sin. The priest sprinkled blood on his own robe before serving in the temple as part of his purification rite, and the blood was splashed on the four corners of the altar. Blood protects. The blood of the sacrifice protected God's people from the wrath of God. The blood on the doorposts of the Hebrew homes protected God's people from the destroyer sent by God to punish Egypt. Blood testifies to God's faithfulness. God made a covenant with Abram, promising him a son and a land to call his own, the child of the promise and the promised land. God sealed this covenant promise with the lifeblood of five of his creatures, and required no blood from Abram, for the fulfillment of the promise would be by God alone.

Host:

On the night he was betrayed, Jesus ate with his disciples and announced to them that there would soon be a new covenant which would be sealed in his shed blood. He offered them the common cup of wine and explained that it represented the new covenant in his blood, which would forever after serve as a reminder to them of God's faithfulness in providing Christ's blood on their behalf. Jesus is our substitute. Once again, God provided the sacrifice for our sin when Jesus, the God man who knew no sin, offered his lifeblood in an all-sufficient atonement for the sins of the whole world, once for all and for all time, removing forever the barrier between God and human beings.

Host:

This forgiveness of sin and reconciliation with God is offered as a free gift to anyone willing to receive it. The precious blood of our Savior was stored up for us while he was in his mother's womb. The blood shed for the sins of the whole world was unmingled with the blood of any other. It remained his alone pure and undefiled. Now all people who claim the name of Christ as their Savior have their doorposts of their hearts marked with the same blood that circulated in the capillaries and veins of the pre-born Jesus. Their shame is covered. They are protected from the wrath of God and purified with the blood of the child of the promise. The resurrected life in his blood restores us to eternal life. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!

Announcer:

We hope you enjoyed this week's reflection. We encourage you to share it and join us next time on Pro Life Kitchen Table. May God bless you.

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Deborah Hollifield

Host