This article contains a lot of links. Before you go any further please bookmark this page so you can find your way back in order to access the other content! Alternatively, all links should open in a new tab, so you can always come back to this tab.
On Tuesday, November 7, 2023, the NC Baptist Convention will vote on a critical resolution – The Resolution on Equal Protection for the Preborn. The intent of this resolution is not only to provoke one another to love and good works in the midst of our ongoing half-century holocaust but to submit how we love and work to God.
A digital link to the resolution can be found on Page 18 of the 2023 Annual Meeting Book of Reports.
Pastor Matthew Tarpley and Pastor Jessie Watkins authored and initially put forward the resolution. The Board, upon receiving the resolution, made a few small changes. On the paper literature you received from us you will note that we marked two areas on the resolution in white and suggested messengers put forward a couple of amendments before voting on the resolution.
The first proposed amendment is in Paragraph 4: WHEREAS North Carolina Baptists have fought for the value of the preborn through the funding and placement of five ultrasound machines in pregnancy resource centers throughout NC just since 2022, and NC Baptist Executive Leaders and the Christian Life and Public Affairs Committee of the NC Baptist Board of Directors advocated for the strongest legislation possible in North Carolina to protect the preborn; and North Carolina Baptists and Baptist churches and have been engaged in the fight for preborn life through support of pregnancy resource centers, engagement in adoption and foster care initiatives, involvement in legal advocacy at the local, state, and national level, and investment in varieties of local ministries engaged with valuing all life from the womb to tomb; now therefore, be it (Deut 30:19, Ps 119:73, Ps. 139:13-16, Is. 44:24)
We believe the line in red should be stricken. It’s definitely a good and wonderful work to advocate for the preborn and we love and celebrate the work NC Baptists are doing, but we believe this particular line is not inline with the rest of the resolution. In the context of civil law, to date, only one righteous bill in NC has treated the murder of the preborn the same as the murder of any other human being. It received little to no support and never even made it out of committee. The lion’s share of churches are backing pro-life legislators and regulatory pro-life laws that seek to regulate and restrict murder but do not provide equal justice and protection. For 50 years now many Christians have supported civil legislation that defines how, when, and where the murder of innocent children may “legally” take place.
We love your heart and intent and we understand that your intent is to have less murder. We also want to make it abundantly clear that we know some of you have poured your lives and your resources into speaking and acting for the preborn… and we love that about you. But we also believe that good intent alone does not justify supporting laws that allow some people to be murdered “legally” so that others are not murdered. We shouldn’t support laws that exhibit partiality toward older people, moms, or other people who are of different ages or at different levels of human development and we must not support or applaud civil legislation that allows for some murder. If we could end a war by bombing a children’s hospital of civilians, we should not do that because it’s evil, even if our intent is righteous. It would be evil to advise an adulterer to only commit adultery on Mondays and Thursdays – even if the intent is less adultery. Ever heard of the movie The Hunger Games? Even Holly-weird knows it’s wrong to offer up 2 innocent people from each district to die in order to prevent a great civil war and further bloodshed. How does the church not recognize this? We’ve been deceived! We must repent!
Abortion is not only a civil crime, but it is sin – individual and collective sin – and the answer to sin is the Gospel. If Satan can deceive the church to disciple North Carolina by preaching “sin less!” or “thou shall not murder – unless the victim is less than 12 weeks old!” then he has robbed us of our only weapon in this spiritual battle – God’s Law and Gospel. God says “You shall not murder”. Period. We are not allowed to say, advocate, or even consider anything else in our hearts. We are not to say, “Did God really say…?” We are commanded to baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and to disciple the nations to obey whatsoever things Jesus commands. To abortive parents like us, we say, “You have committed murder, we know a God who redeems murderers! Repent and believe on Jesus and be made new in Christ!” To civil magistrates we say, “Senator So-And-So our Lord says “woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees” – defining how some people may be murdered in our laws is evil because God says “You shall not murder” – repent and believe on Jesus for the remission of your sins and if you continue in this we will no longer support your endeavors!”
If we give up God’s Law then we give up the good news of a gracious God who forgives and redeems lawbreakers. Our words and actions must be informed by our Lord and Savior. We should not be advocating for some sin in order to sin less. We should not advocate for some transgression of the law for less transgression of the law. If we have to become like Satan in order to defeat the works of Satan – then what’s the point? We will wind up in the same pit with him.
Some have argued that if we aren’t restricting and regulating abortion in our laws then we “aren’t doing anything” and are “allowing babies to die” because we “demand perfection or nothing”. That’s simply a falsehood and it’s a category error. First of all, the number one cause of death in North Carolina is parents legally murdering their own children in accordance with our pro-life regulatory laws. The murder death count of our own children dwarfs cancer and heart disease. So even based on the intent to “save some” these laws fail. But secondly, if your neighbor robs a bank can you and your cousin hold a trial for him in your backyard? Of course not. God ordains the civil magistrate to wield the sword of justice. Rendering justice is outside of our jurisdiction. The home can’t wield it. The church can’t wield it. God’s civil deacon must wield it. And they must wield it justly and not pervert justice or judgment. Our demand to the civil magistrate is that they wield the sword justly. Period. That they don’t write laws that make the fatherless into prey. And the standard is “thus says the living GOD” not what we think might work based on our limited sensibilities. We are to walk by faith, not by sight. Children are not chess pieces to be given up in some sick game. So demanding that the God-ordained sword-wielder wields the sword justly and demanding that they obey whatsoever things Jesus commands… is good and righteous work.
BUT there is still the issue of doing nothing. If all we do is demand that the civil magistrate justly wields the sword and then we sit on our collective hands until it becomes time to vote, then we have done next to nothing. If you were slated to be legally (yet unjustly) executed tomorrow, what would you want others to do for you? A major part of the problem is that we all want to have some civil magistrate do our work – the work of the home and of the church. And when we do this we pervert their work – rendering justice. It’s easy to lay the life-saving on some man in Raleigh while we live our lives as if we aren’t in a holocaust. But we are in a holocaust. Where is everyone? Everyone has a tendency to outsource their love and good works. For example, CPC’s can do good and crisis pregnancy services are needed, but many of the women who go to a CPC weren’t abortion minded in the first place. Meanwhile, if you go to an abortion clinic on almost any day of the week you might find 3 people out front preaching Jesus and pleading with the never-ending stream of abortive parents. Usually you will see more people praying the rosary or huddling around a statue of Mary than those who profess to be proclaimers of the life-changing culture-shaking true Gospel of Jesus Christ. And if our abortion regulations continue to “succeed” the majority of abortions are going to happen by ordering pills online in the privacy of one’s home. Soon there won’t even be a physical place for this tiny minority of Christians to preach and plead Jesus on the final lines of this holocaust. We must repent and think rightly about this great collective sin. We must love our neighbors as ourselves. We must save those stumbling toward death. We must act. And we must demand our civil magistrates believe on and obey Jesus and render righteous judgment while we believe on and obey Jesus, love Him and love our neighbors as ourselves. If we were writing this article in the chattel slavery era we would say, “we run the underground railroad and we save as many as possible while we seek abolition and justice in the civil realm”. Sounds a lot like Micah 6:8, huh?
God in His providence uses His Church and normal people like each of us… ask yourself what it should look like to be a Christian in a culture where the number one cause of death is parents murdering their own children. How are you bringing the Gospel into conflict with this great evil? Have you been apathetic and indifferent? Repent with us!
The second proposed amendment is in Paragraph 5: RESOLVED that we as the messengers of the BSCNC meeting November 6-7, 2023 in Greensboro, NC, will continue to advocate for the equal protection of the preborn and justice under our laws, that we will not stop in our legal efforts until the day when abortion is both illegal and unthinkable; and be it further…
We believe the line in red should be stricken and replaced with “will solely advocate for the equal justice and protection of the preborn under our laws…”
Primarily this should change because we should not ever advocate for injustice or partial justice – in any circumstance – for any motive, intent or reason – even for those best and purest motives and intents. And though most of us have advocated for laws that allow some to be “legally” murdered we should no longer do that. We should repent and solely seek equal and impartial justice and protection for all image-bearers of God from this day forward.
+++We have so much more we would like to share with you, and we are so grateful for your stand. For more information please see the following links:Open Letter to North Carolina Pastors. Please watch this 3 minute video from NC Pastors to NC Pastors. If you are interested in learning more about the Coalition of Abolitionist Churches here in North Carolina please email [email protected]
+++Sign the PETITION to abolish abortion in North Carolina – share with everyone you know and sign up for newsletters and breaking efforts since social media shadowbans this organization.
+++Read and sign the NORMAN STATEMENT. Be a Berean and study the tenets of abolition in light of scripture and judge for yourself if they are true and Biblical. Make sure to check out the rest of the information on the Abolitionists Rising website and watch the hundreds of hours of education and street activism on their youtube channel.
+++Learn more about the efforts of Equal Justice and Protection happening at the national Southern Baptist Convention HERE.
+++For anyone who has preached Jesus and plead with abortive parents in front of abortion clinics, you quickly realize the “second victim” narrative is absolutely false. And if we say a murderer is a victim then we deprive them of the Gospel – the very thing that can redeem them and release them from wrath and condemnation. If you have never been on the final lines you should go watch and read the thousands of hours of videos and testimony HERE (Not a Victim).
+++Rescue Those is one of the best educational websites for Christians in context of the abortion holocaust and the Christian response and obligation. Hundreds of hours of sermons. They even have an app. Excellent resource.
+++End Abortion Now is also a decent resource. Check it out when you have time.
+++THIS is a 45 minute talk on abolition given at the NC Constitution Party State Convention. It’s a very succinct primer that has been very well received due to its simplicity and plain speech.
Author: Wayne Groover – Director of Education for Abolish Abortion NC