Sanctity of Human Life Week
January 21-28, 2001

Focus on the Family has church bulletin inserts and an updated Sanctity of Human Life Quick Reference Guide for 2001, filled with a wealth of information on the value of life. Does your pastor need a last minute sermon outline? We have one! And it's ready to print or download right now. (We have copied it below for you)

Sanctity of Human Life 2001
Sermon Outline

(Focus on the Family, not Nevada LIFE)

The first to be killed in Nazi Germany were the infirm, the senile and mentally retarded, the aged and defective children. Eventually, as World War II approached, the doomed undesirables included epileptics, children with badly modeled ears and even bed-wetters. Transportation of patients to killing centers was carried out by "The Charitable Transport Company for the Sick." The plan then was to kill all Jews and Poles and to cut down the Russian Population by 30,000,000.

We're all struck by this great Holocaust and wonder how it ever could have happened. Leo Alexander, who was consultant to the Secretary of War and on duty with the office of Chief Counselor for War Crimes in Nuremberg, says that what happened in in Nazi Germany "all started with the acceptance of the attitude that there is such a thing as life not worthy to be lived."

An elderly German man who lived through the Holocaust tells the following story:

I always considered myself a Christian. I attended a church since I was a small boy. We had heard the stories of what was happening to the Jews; but like most people in America today, we tried to distance ourselves from the reality of what was really taking place. What could anyone do to stop it?

A railroad track ran behind our small church, and each Sunday morning we would hear the whistle from a distance and then the clacking of the wheels moving over the track. We became disturbed when one Sunday we heard cries coming from the train as it passed by. We grimly realized that the train was carrying Jews.

Week after week that train whistle would blow. We would dread to hear the sound of those old wheels because we knew that the Jews would begin to cry out to us as they passed our church. It was so terribly disturbing! We could do nothing to help these poor people, yet their screams tormented us. We knew exactly at what time that whistle would blow, and we decided the only way to keep from being so disturbed by the cries was to start singing our hymns. It some of the screams reached our ears, we'd just sing a little louder until we could hear them no more.

Years have passed, and no one talks about it much any more; but I still hear that train whistle in my sleep. I can still hear them crying out for help. God forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians, yet did nothing to intervene.

Does this sound like the United States in 2001 — are we tempted to just "sing a little louder"?

Notice, it all began with "the attitude that there is such a thing as a life not worthy to be lived." That sounds a lot like today's statistic. Ninty percent of expectant parents who receive a prenatal diagnosis of down syndrome will abort their baby. A life not worthy to be lived?

What that's really saying is that God goofed, He must've been distracted or tired when He created that particular life, maybe not paying real close attention. Is that the way God views the people He creates? Let's look into Scripture.

Created to Bear His Image

In this context, the question is often asked, "What if the mother's life is in danger? Shouldn't she have an abortion then?" Dr. C. Everett Koop, former Surgeon General of the United States says that during his more than 35 years of medical practice in obstetrics, "Never once did a case come across my practice where abortion was necessary to save a mother's life."

And at the other end of life, when, loved ones have illnesses diagnosed as terminal and are perhaps in great pain, Christian physicians who view God as the giver and taker of life can become very skilled in pain management to alleviate that suffering. Even though the circumstances may not make sense from our perspectives, we are never "authorized" to "play God," to usurp the position that is rightfully His (Psalm 23:4, Corinthians 12:9).

Developed According to His Plan-

It is declared in His Word:

It is validated by medical science:

Protected to Fulfill His Purpose-

In his book Sanctity of Life, Chuck Swindoll tells the story of a couple who married during the Great Depression when he was middle-aged and she was in her twenties. Exactly 10 months after their wedding day, their first child was born — a baby boy. Times were tough, but they managed fairly well. Before their second anniversary, along came a second child, this time a girl. Their hands were certainly full with this addition!

And then lo and behold, in January long before their fourth anniversary the following October, the mother conceived her third child, even though they were using contraceptives. The other two children were, obviously, still in diapers. Finances were very challenging. The mother's health was not good, and understandably she was tired all the time. She didn't especially enjoy young children to begin with; she was depressed. The pressures were so great that it would've been easy to consider seeking out someone, who could perform an abortion, even though they were illegal. However, this couple was convinced that they should accept whatever God had sovereignty planned for them. In spite of the circumstances, they chose to trust God and have that baby in October of 1934.

That baby was Charles R. Swindoll, president of Dallas Theological Seminary, pastor for many years and pre-eminent teacher of the Word. He was his parents' last child. All three of those children are today in vocational Christian service.

No one, certainly not his parents, knew at that time what God's plan for him, or his siblings, would be. But they knew God, and they fully believed that He was greater than their rights, their plans or their inconveniences.

That God has not changed. Whether at the beginning of life, at the end or any point in between, His timing is perfect, His plan is detailed and His provision unmatched.

The question is, will we trust Him?