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Monday, January 23, 2017

Sanctity of Human Life . . .

. . . from God's perspective and our testimonies . . . 
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
We are so thankful that God has revealed in His word,
 that He is the creator and sustainer of life.

"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know this full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body.  All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be."
Psalm 139:13-16

"This is what the Lord says--he who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it, who gives breath to its people, and life the those who walk on it."
Isaiah 42:5


The Bible is full of such verses!
And we are so thankful, that we had this foundation when we were faced with "a choice" nearly 21 years ago. 

When at 7 weeks pregnant, we saw four little hearts beating on an ultrasound screen, we knew that God had created these little hearts, and that He would sustain them (and me) if it be His will. Thankfully, knowing this, we had the confidence to stand firm when given much advice from medical professionals to "reduce" two of the 7 week old babies.  We trusted that our Almighty God would take care of all of us.  And He did!

This is a testimony from one of these babies!
 Victoria just shared this on her facebook page:

"I am a quadruplet. It's been an amazing experience! Those 3 siblings are my best friends. They've always been there for me and my life has been blessed immensely by them. I can't imagine life without them! Right after my parents counted 4 little hearts beating on the monitor screen at a pregnancy clinic, the doctor handed them a business card to a nearby abortion clinic and told them not to worry, "he'll take care of it". They were advised to "eliminate" at least two of us.... I often wonder who of us 4 wouldn't be here. By God's grace, my parents decided to keep all 4 of us because they believe that life begins at conception and knew that every life is a precious gift from God. Yesterday was Sanctity of Human Life Sunday. My heart goes out to the little lives of the unborn who will never get to experience life here on earth. I could have easily been just a part of the abortion count statistics but I wasn't. Life is precious, friends! Lets do what we can to be a voice for the unborn!"

Another one of these now 20 year-old babies : -), Caroline,
has taken on leading the Centralia 40 Days for Life campaign this year! 
She is doing what she can to protect the unborn! 
You can join her at: 
Centralia 40 Days for Life




Then, again, when I was several months pregnant with Joseph, we had another medical professional advise us to abort him, because of it being too risky of a pregnancy.   We had the same convictions then, that God created his life, and would sustain it and take care of me, if it be His will.
And He did!
We cannot imagine life without three of our beautiful children.
So, let's do everything we can to share the truth of God's word with others . . .
that God is the creator of life from conception, and that He will provide a way to care for this life,
no matter what the circumstances!

Recently, we were challenged again when some dear pro-life, pro-adoption friends shared their conviction that since an IVF infertility procedure was violating God's design for natural conception, that they would not have a peace from God about embryo adoption.  But this begged the question of do we really believe life starts at the moment the egg from a woman and the sperm from a man are united (at conception, even if this is outside of a womb?) If we believe that, then even if the embryo is in a temporary location and environment for a time, it still is human life, needing protection and a chance to live!!
This excerpt from a letter to our dear friends explains our convictions on embryo adoption . . . .

"As you know, Robyn and I had our own journey in regards to infertility.  We had to carefully consider what we were willing to do in treating a medical condition . . . and what would be “crossing the line” of tampering with things that belong to the Lord.  Our general principle was to do what we could to restore the natural reproductive function God had designed, similar to a person using eyeglasses to restore the vision God had designed.  We concluded that as Christians we could not do in-vitro fertilization (the process that results in frozen embryos) for two reasons.  It violated God’s design for conception and, more importantly, it created babies (just very tiny ones) many of which would likely go “unused” or discarded.  If we believe life begins at conception, those embryos are babies and destroying them is abortion.

This is why we believe wholeheartedly in embryo (tiny baby) adoption.  In adopting these “unwanted” babies, a couple does not take the place of God in creation . . . they glorify God in reflecting His love for human life at every stage and every age.  The babies are already created because the sperm has fertilized the egg . . . and life has begun.  The couple willing to adopt one of these tiny babies is not condoning the method of their conception, nor their being frozen, just stepping in to lovingly care for a modern orphan.  We see no difference in this than what you did for your precious children.  You weren’t condoning the actions that resulted in them being orphaned, but lovingly stepping in to care for the innocent victims . . . all the while modeling God’s heart of compassion for orphans.  This is a beautiful thing!

We also see an inescapable connection between being “Pro-Life” and “Pro-Embryo-Adoption”.  For all of us who believe abortion to be the killing of a pre-born child, the big question is always “when does life begin?”  The reason we believe abortion is killing is because we believe pre-born babies are alive human beings, created in the image of God.  So based upon scriptures like Psalm 139 we conclude that once a child is conceived, it is life, and must be protected even before birth (egg + sperm = life).  If we don’t believe this, we have to come up with some arbitrary definition of when life begins, which is what abortionists do to justify their killing of pre-born babies.  So if we’re consistent in our belief that abortion at any gestational age is killing, we are saying that once a child is conceived it is alive . . . created in the image of God . . . and should be protected.  So to be consistent, we have to believe these frozen embryos are living babies that are no less valuable in God’s sight than the 10-year-old child also waiting to be adopted.  Couples may have a variety of reasons to adopt one child rather than another (and no-one can adopt them all!), but if we say that any are more valuable or deserving of adoption than another . . . then we are playing God."

Our most recent testimony of the Lord's leading our family
 in valuing life at its earliest stage . . .  :-)
Richie and Lydia ~ parents of an adopted itty bitty preborn baby girl : -)
A good way to look at these tiny little babies is summarized in the SLED test,
first written by Stephen Schwarz, in his book, "The Moral Question of Abortion."
He addresses how Size, Level of Development, Environment, and Degree of Dependency are not determining factors in whether a human being is a human being and valuable in all circumstances. 
It can be found on the internet in various paraphrases by other pro-life authors. 
Here is one version:

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