Prolife Kitchen Table

Episode 33 - Impossible! - Baby Chris Week 33

• Presbyterians Protecting Life • Season 1 • Episode 33

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This week's episode begins with a mini lesson on pro-life apologetics, before we dive into Marie Bowen's book Pregnant With Promise, to examine the chaotic family of Jacob and his wives, Leah and Rachel.  Their story helps to remind us that God is present when we are unloved and miserable, when we struggle with our sisters, and when we live with trouble.

Scripture references in this episode include:

Genesis 27-30                     Luke 1:37                           Luke 2:52    

Genesis 2:7                         Job 10:8-9; 33:6                Isaiah 64:8

Romans 9:20-21                 2 Timothy 2:20                 Philippians 2:13

Ephesians 2:10                    Romans 8:18

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 ProLife Kitchen Table. I'm Deborah Hollifield, and this podcast is sponsored by Presbyterians Protecting Life, a national pro-life parachurch organization. PPL has been educating and equipping Presbyterians about all things pro-life, from fertilization to natural death, for more than 40 years.

Host:

If you are just beginning your pro-life apologetics journey, you will find that the more you talk about it, the more you will internalize the information and the easier it will become. By way of a mini-lesson, one of the first things that I would recommend is that you keep in mind that there are many different ways to approach the pro-life conversations and arguments and objections with abortion advocates, and keeping those categories straight will help you think as you speak.

Host:

Sometimes abortion advocates will bring up medical science as a way to try to stump you. Or they may come back in and try to use philosophy to talk about personhood. And they often believe their final shot is their best one when they try to use religion to use scripture against you. PPL can provide you with good information to respond in each of these categories.

Host:

But my mini lesson that I mentioned earlier is that it's really important to give an answer in the same category that you are being grilled about. By that I mean, if an abortion advocate brings up something in medical science, for example, the age of viability, don't try to respond with an answer from scripture. Instead, respond with an answer from medical science about the progress that has been made in saving the lives of premature babies.

Host:

As far as scripture is concerned, most pro-lifers don't lead with that, and that's probably why it's a favorite of the pro-abortion crowd. They think they can beat us over the head with our own Bibles. But if they want to go there, a true pro-life advocate will be able to easily bring clarity to their confused understanding of the attributes of God as sovereign over life, protector of the innocent, rescuer of the oppressed, and protector of women and children.

Host:

You can go to ppl.org and under the abortion tab in the menu, you can access different papers that list the most commonly used scriptures and responses to pro-abortion arguments in other categories. Just don't confuse your categories. Discuss science with science, religion with religion, and philosophy and ethics with philosophy and ethics, and it will be a lot easier for you to keep things straight in your head when there is a lot to know and share.

Host:

Now we're going to return to Marie Bowen's great book, Pregnant with Promise. We've been learning the attributes of God by following the lives of the pregnant women in Scripture. We've already met Eve, Hagar, Sarah, and Rebecca, and this week we are going to meet Jacob's wives, Leah and Rachel, and learn about how God is present when we are unloved and miserable, when we struggle with our sisters, and when we live with trouble.

Host:

The story of Jacob's life with Leah and Rachel is told in Genesis chapters twenty seven through thirty. It's important to understand their husband Jacob, who has received God's blessing and is the one through whom God continues to build a people set apart for himself. Jacob's story is epic and it could feel a really long novel. He is a turbulent character, impulsive and deceitful, but he's also devoted to God.

Host:

In Jacob's story we find two wives, two concubines, barrenness, jealousy, conflict, deceit, and blessing. In the middle of this chaotic family, God shows himself to be faithful to his promises, and reveals more than that, that he is the God who brings order from chaos, fruitfulness where there was barrenness, sees our places of deepest hurt and longing, and blesses us even when punishment is deserved. Jacob's mother Rebecca helped him flee to his uncle Laban's home to save Jacob's life after he stole his twin brother Esau's blessing and inheritance.

Host:

Along the way to his uncle's house, Jacob stopped for the night and dreamed of the stairway reaching to heaven and of angels ascending and descending upon it. The next morning Jacob vowed that if God would give him safe journey, the Lord would be his God and he would give a tenth of all that he owned as an offering to God. And this is where the story of Leah and Rachel begins.

Host:

When Jacob arrives at a well and discovered shepherds there, he asks if they know his uncle. They do, and they point out Rachel, Laban's daughter who is there with them. When Jacob sees Rachel he rolls the stone from the mouth of the well and waters his uncle's sheep for her. Rachel is beautiful and he falls in love at first sight. Jacob stays with his uncle as a guest for a whole month, and during that time he gets to know both of his uncle Laban's daughters, Leah the oldest and Rachel the younger. Laban offers Jacob the opportunity to marry Rachel. So Jacob tells his uncle that he will serve him for seven years in order to marry Rachel. Laban agrees, and Jacob works for those seven years, and Scripture tells us that they seem like just a few days to him because of his deep love for her.

Host:

Well, you may know the rest of the story. Uncle Laban plans the wedding feast, but when the evening comes, he gives his daughter Leah to Jacob instead of Rachel. We don't know why Jacob didn't realize the deception immediately. He might have had too much wine to drink during the celebration, it might have been dark. Leah was probably wearing a traditional heavy veil, but whatever the reason, Jacob didn't know he had been deceived until the next morning. Jacob confronts his uncle and asks him why he had deceived him. Uncle Laban comes up with a new plan, and Jacob finishes his bridal week with Leah, and then he marries Rachel.

Host:

This gives us some idea about what Jacob thought about the concept of marriage, that mostly it was all about him and for his benefit. This crisis sets up a polygamous marriage in a turbulent and conflicted course for Jacob's family life. A lot of times you will hear people say that God approves of polygamy as a way of demeaning God's character. But God never prescribes polygamy as an acceptable way of marriage. Many of the pagan cultures that Abraham and his family lived among practiced polygamy. But every time polygamy is recorded in Scripture, it's recorded in a negative light of chaos and turmoil in families.

Host:

Verse thirty begins to tell the source of the conflict in Jacob's family, where it says, And he loved Rachel more than he loved Leah. In verse thirty one through verse thirty five, God saw that Leah was unloved. It says that when the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb. Leah then goes on to conceive four more times and birth four sons.

Host:

The names she gives her children and her exclamations at their births tell us much about her feelings, her character, and her relationships. She names her firstborn Reuben, which means

Host:

"See, a son!" and says, "Because the Lord has looked upon my affliction, for now my husband will love me."

Host:

She names her second son Simeon, which means "heard," and states, "Because the Lord has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son too."

Host:

Her third son, Levi, which means "attached," is born, and she proclaims, "Now this time my husband will be attached to me because I have borne him three sons."

Host:

And when her fourth son Judah is born, whose name means "praise," Leah simply says, "This time I will praise the Lord."

Host:

Genesis chapter 30 records how Rachel reacts in jealousy because of her own pain at her inability to bear Jacob a child. She looks to Jacob and pleads, "Give me children or I shall die!" Jacob, of course, is helpless to fulfill her request and rightly points her to God, but in doing so he does it in anger, and he gives her this response, "Am I in the place of God who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?"

Host:

This is a good place to pause a minute and think back on our lesson from last week with Rebecca. When Rebecca was found barren, what was Isaac's response to her? In Genesis 25, it tells us that Isaac prayed to the Lord for her.

Host:

If you've been following this podcast from the beginning, the next part of the story will make you shake your head and wonder how anyone could make the same mistake twice. Remember how Sarah responded to her barrenness by giving her maidservant Hagar to Abraham so he could have a son through her instead of waiting for God to fulfill his promise that she would bear a son herself? That story is in Genesis 16.

Host:

Well, almost unbelievably, even though certainly she had heard the story, Rachel makes the same response rather than trusting God. She gives her servant Bilhah to Jacob, and Bilhah bears him two sons, Dan and Naphtali. Dan means "judged," and when he is born, Rachel says, "God has judged me and has also heard my voice and given me a son." And Naphtali means "wrestling." And when he is born, Rachel says, "With mighty wrestling I have wrestled with my sister and I have prevailed."

Host:

Nothing like a revenge birth to patch up things with her sister.

Host:

Like the names given by Leah to her children, these names revealed that Rachel understood children to be a blessing from God, but they also showed her jealousy towards Leah overrode everything in her life. If only that were the end of the matter.

Host:

But Leah is not to be outdone. Leah follows Rachel's example and gives her maidservant Zilpah to Jacob as a wife. Zilpah bears two sons to Jacob, Gad meaning "good fortune," and Asher meaning "happy". Again, the statements of Leah are recorded. Of Gad she says "Good fortune has come," and of Asher's birth, she states "Happy am I, for women have called me happy."

Host:

So what has Jacob been doing besides making children with his wives' servants and forgetting God's promises to him? Well, Jacob is treated by both women as a weapon with which to wound the other. Rachel bargains away a night with her husband for some of Leah's son's mandrakes, and Leah exclaims, "Is it a small matter that you have taken away my "husband?" It's open warfare inside their home.

Host:

Like men often do when they want to avoid conflict with women, Jacob has abdicated any leadership role in this chaotic family. He complies with Rachel's bargain and sleeps with Leah again. She conceives three more times and bears him two sons named Isakar and Zebulon, and a daughter named Dinah, which means "female judge." With each new son, Leah expresses her expectation that Jacob will finally love her and show her honor.

Host:

At last Rachel conceives. When her son is born, she names him Joseph, which means "He will add," and declares, "God has taken away my reproach. May the Lord add to me another son."

Host:

Something about the birth of this son through the woman that Jacob loves seems to wake him up, and he goes to his uncle with a request to leave with his family and start a new life for himself and his family with his growing livestock.

Host:

God renews his covenant with Jacob and calls him by a new name, Israel, which means "He struggles with God." God commands Jacob to be fruitful and multiply and reiterates the promise given to Abraham and Isaac, that nations and kings will come from him, and his heir will receive the land of promise.

Host:

They set out on their journey, and Rachel becomes pregnant for a second time and then goes into labor. The delivery is difficult, and when labor is at its peak, the midwife says to Rachel, "Do not fear for you have another son." As Rachel is dying, though, on the road to Bethlehem, her son is born, and she names him Benani, which means "son of my sorrow." But Jacob will have none of that and calls him instead Benjamin, which means "son of my right hand."

Host:

So what is our response to God in this troubling story of marital discord? When spouses are unloved, it would be naive to think that there are no marriages today where women and men are not loved. Perhaps you yourself are in that situation. And most of us can point to a time in our lives when we have felt unloved. This story shows us that God very definitely sees us when we feel unloved and that his love for us does not change according to what it is that we do to subvert his will for us. And when we believe we are unloved, we can respond positively by turning to God and praying in faith to bear up until we are rescued by God.

Host:

But what about jealousy? Like many people who exhibit jealousy, the jealousy was a response to Rachel's pain. But that jealousy drove a wedge between her and her sister and between her and her husband. Think how differently things might have been if she had brought her feelings of pain and jealousy to God in prayer. If there are roots of jealousy in your own life, take them to God and let Him resolve those issues in your heart and show you a positive way to respond.

Host:

Many women will be familiar with men who abandon spiritual leadership like Jacob did. One of the frequent reasons that pregnant women give for choosing abortion is the unwillingness of the father of the child to support her through her pregnancy and parenting. While Jacob was present with his two wives, and because of God's blessing and by his hard work, he was a good provider. It seems apparent though that at some point Jacob abandoned his role as the spiritual head of the home.

Host:

In Colossians 3:18-19, Paul writes about the unique roles of men and women in marriage. He says, "Wives, submit to your husband as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands love your wives and do not be harsh with them." Paul sees the man as a loving servant leader, no more willing to damage his own wife than he would be to harm his own body. Jacob could have done much more to fulfill this role of spiritual leadership in his conflicted home by exhibiting loving service and prayer covering to his wives.

Host:

There are many men like Jacob in church families. How might the church fill the gap for women when a man is not willing to be the provider or the spiritual leader in the home? There are older men who can come alongside a reluctant or clueless husband and encourage him with their own examples and support. The church can offer classes for men on the attributes of God and the duties and responsibilities of a husband and father.

Host:

And then sadly, women will face death as Rachel did. Women rarely face death today in childbirth in America. Still, though, even the life of the mother has often been used as a reason to support abortion, although there are almost no medical situations in the United States, when physicians are unable to save the lives of both baby and mother. When a mother does die of a medical cause, it is almost always near the time of delivery, sudden and not predictable earlier in pregnancy, when most abortion decisions are made.

Host:

It is never easy to face our own death. It is the final letting go, the final act of trusting God. The time to think about our own death and the deaths of our loved ones is before the crisis arrives. Do you fear your own death? The death of your loved ones? If you're comfortable doing so, you might want to broach the topic of your own attitude toward death with the group of sisters in Christ.

Host:

I think I may have exhausted us during these last few minutes. There is so much to think about in these chapters of decisions that led to deceitfulness and jealousy, barrenness and even death, and much is obvious about how different life would be if those decisions have been made in faith instead of desperation.

Host:

So I promise that when you come back after the break, the week 33 Baby Chris Devotional will be encouraging and uplifting, for nothing is impossible with God.

Announcer:

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:

This Baby Chris Week 33 devotional is titled Impossible.

Host:

Hear the word of the Lord. "Nothing is Impossible With God." Luke chapter 1, verse 37. Thanks be to God.

Host:

At 33 weeks, Baby Chris will add about half a pound a week until birth. The amniotic fluid is being digested in the amount of about a pint a day now. His fingernails are now long enough to reach to the tip of his fingers or beyond and might need trimming once he's born. His pliable skull bones aren't yet fused together.

Host:

Every mother has wondered how that big baby's head is going to come out of that small exit. But a combination of hormonal changes and mechanical adjustments between the mother's pelvis and the baby's skull makes it all possible. A hormone called relaxin loosens the ligaments around the pelvis. The pubus joint at the front of the pelvis is made up of fibrocartilage flexible enough to allow movement for more space for the baby's head and shoulders.

Host:

A baby's head is made up of seven bones held together with cranial sutures that come together in a soft spot at the top of the skull. There is also a soft spot in front and another in rear. As the baby's head moves down through the dilated cervix, the unfused bones in his skull will shift and overlap slightly to allow the head to fit through. These soft spots allow the head to be flexible during birth and allow for more brain development after birth. The bones won't fuse until the baby is around two years old.

Host:

But the indoor pool of the womb, things are quite literally inside out. Even though a baby's lungs are full of amniotic fluid, the baby doesn't drown because oxygen is being delivered from the placenta via the umbilical cord.

Host:

The process of human growth and development that begins in the womb is evident and continues throughout our lives. Sentience, the capacity to feel and relate, is something that also increases with maturity and has no connection to one's humanity or personhood. In males, the human brain is not fully developed until at least the age of twenty-five. And some researchers believe that emotional maturity isn't reached until the age of forty three. Dr. Luke noted that even Jesus, whose incarnation was human perfection from the moment of conception, grew in wisdom and stature. Contrary to the assertions of pro abortion philosophers, philosophy is not a science. There is no degree of physical or sensory development that serves as a line of demarcation between non human and human, or between nonperson and person.

Host:

Scripture repeats the theme of God's intentional hand in creation and lifelong human development. God formed Adam from dust. Job referred to himself as God's clay. The prophet Isaiah likened humans to clay on a wheel being worked by God as a potter. And Paul reminds us that God retains sovereign power over the use of the clay. Our flexible, soft forms, minds and spirits gradually take the shape he intends. Some of his work in us is allowed to cure, to harden over time, while other work will be fired to hardness in a hot kiln of the tests and trials of life.

Host:

We have a God infused flexibility of body, mind, and spirit that enables us to accomplish whatever it is that God intends, no matter how impossible the task appears. Throughout our lives, it is God who is at work in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure, molding us into who we need to be to perform the good works prepared for us in advance. If the stretch is painful or the fire is hot, we can be certain that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us.

Host:

Hear the word of the Lord, "For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." Ephesians chapter 2:10. Thanks be to God.

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