We are gathered here today to worship our Creator. God made each of us in his image. Psalm 139 describes him knitting us together in our mothers' wombs. That same psalm teaches that God knew us, and had a relationship with us, even before we were born.
On January 22, 1973, our nation's Supreme Court legalized the killing of the child in the womb for any reason the woman deems sufficient. Now almost 50 years later, 60 million children have had their lives ended before they could take their first breath. This is a great abomination before the Lord. It is the taking of innocent life, the most vulnerable form of life.
As God's people we lament this sin in our land and any role we have played in it. We lament all the other sins connected to the sin of abortion -- sins of sexual immorality, sins of deceit, sins of family disintegration, sins of selfishness. We long to live in a culture where God's design for sex is honored, where marriage as God intended it is honored, where children in the womb are protected. We long to live in culture where abortion is not just illegal but unthinkable and unnecessary. We do not merely pray God would stop the shedding of innocent blood in the womb. We pray for people to save sex for marriage; for people to marry and then stay married, even through hard times; for children to be received as priceless gifts from the Lord; for mothers to embrace the glory of true femininity, as homemakers for their families; and for fathers to embrace the masculine glory of protecting and providing for a household. We are not just pro-life. We are pro-family, pro-marriage, pro-children, pro-womanhood, and pro-manhood. We lament the many ways our culture has fallen short of God's will, Word, and wisdom.
But we not only lament these sins, we rejoice in their forgiveness. We rejoice in proclaiming God's forgiveness of any and all sins. We are not just pro-life; we are also pro-forgiveness. We are not just pro-life; we are pro-new life, the new life we have in Christ. The blood of Christ was shed so every other sinful shedding of blood can be forgiven. Christ's blood covers all our sins -- sexual sins, violent sins, selfish sins, greedy sins, idolatrous sins -- every kind of sin we have ever committed. Today, we are gathered here because we need that forgiveness. We are gathered to hear that forgiveness announced, to receive that forgiveness, to sing about that forgiveness, to celebrate that forgiveness, to enjoy the fruits of that forgiveness, especially as we come to the Lord's table.
Let us keep these truths in our minds and hearts as we come before the Lord today.