Join us as we discuss the crucial issues of life, death, and morality from a faith-based perspective. From the implications of partial birth abortion to the contentious Schiavo case, we examine the roles of law and personal belief in determining ethical outcomes. This episode challenges listeners to reflect on the underlying values society embraces and the potential consequences of relying solely on human-centric moral standards. Discover how historical context and scriptural insights provide a framework for understanding these debates.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
SPEAKER 03 :
Why do they send mothers to jail for killing newborn babies? It happens all the time. Babies are left in toilets or thrown in the dumpster or otherwise disposed of. And if they can prove who the mother was, she’s prosecuted for infanticide. Now, why do we do this? And what right does society have telling parents how to treat their kids? Don’t the kids belong to the parents? Can’t the parents do as they please with their own children? Well, no, of course not. Children are persons under the law, and they’re entitled to all the protection of the law. Children don’t belong to their parents. They are in the care and the custody of parents, and society commonly makes these children a ward of the state when the parents won’t do their job. And so, consequently, we can take care of them. Children are persons, they’re not property, and the law rightly protects children. So then comes the next question. At what point does a newborn become a person and entitled to all the protection of the law? At what point does it become murder to kill a child? Now, you would think this is a simple question, a slam dunk, as a basketball fan would say. It turns out not to be quite that simple. Not long ago, the Michigan State Legislature drew a bright line to answer this in law. They said the moment any part of the baby’s anatomy emerges outside the mother’s body, the baby shall be considered a person under the law. Then, to deliberately kill this child in some medical procedure would be deemed murder. That is to say, it would have been if the governor of Michigan, Jennifer Granholm, had not vetoed the bill. Now, mind you, what we’re talking about is a woman’s labor issue. The baby, let’s say, a foot comes out, a hand comes out, some portion of the baby comes out. Can you at that point, let’s say the foot has come out or the legs have come out, insert an instrument into the woman’s body and kill the baby? Fetus, if you’d prefer. Can you do that? They call this, you know, basically I think it’s partial birth abortion is the term often applied to it. Is it legal? Well, it would not have been if the Michigan law had stood. But the governor of Michigan vetoed the bill. Now, the whole question may be rendered moot because the president is, by now, I think, has long last signed a federal bill prohibiting partial birth abortion. But that doesn’t mean it’s going to stay law because the Supreme Court will eventually have to hear this case and they may well toss the law out so we can’t be sure what the outcome will be. World Magazine wrote up the story and the governor’s complex reasons for vetoing the bill. They explored them all. But I can’t help feeling there’s something going on here that defies rational explanation. Jennifer Granholm, the governor of Michigan, is a Roman Catholic. And she says that she is personally opposed to abortion. She objected to the bill because of some vague fault in the wording and said she wanted to work with the legislature to find other ways to reduce abortions. Now, the governor’s problem is easy to understand. She accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from the abortion lobby for her political campaign for governor. And now she’s got to deliver. She has, to use an overused metaphor, sold her soul to the devil. It’s not an unfamiliar thing where politics are concerned. Now, I don’t know if the governor is a serious Catholic or not, but I would think a serious Catholic would be sweating bullets over this. The reason I say this is that a serious Catholic in office can say he is bound to follow the law. This was an issue when we elected President Kennedy as President of the United States. We can accept the fact that he can be a Roman Catholic with Roman Catholic convictions, but that he was bound to follow the law. But in this case, Governor Granholm is vetoing the law. She has, in effect, become the law. And so it is that it’s not so much at Governor Granholm that we must look, though. We have to consider those shadowy forces that bought her veto. And while we are looking, there’s a parallel case that we have to consider at the same time. Why are these same forces hell-bent on killing Terry Schiavo? Terry is brain damaged. Doctors say she is in a vegetative state, but her family and other doctors say, no, she is not in a vegetative state. Now, I can easily believe that Terry is brain damaged to such a degree that she can never recover. But here’s my problem. She is plainly still alive. World Magazine quoted Carla Sauer. She’s a nurse that used to care for Terry. And she said that they could feed her with a spoon and she could swallow back in about 1995 when they were caring for her. Back in those days, they would be able to work with her every day. She had physical therapy. She had contact with people. There was a lot of stuff going on around her and a lot of stimulation. The nurse who now demonstrates outside the clinic where Terry Chauvel lies said, quote, she’s not a vegetable. She knows voices. She responds. She can follow commands. And she tries to communicate by blinking her eyes yes and no. Of course, this might have been back when she was receiving regular therapy. But all that ended a long time ago because of, well, because of money. Now there’s a battle between the forces that want to maintain her life and those who want to end it. No, this is not simply a matter of letting a dying person die. Tereshavel is not dying. She could live another 50 years like she is today. What some are proposing is that she be starved to death. Here’s my question. If you really believe her life should be terminated, why not give her enough morphine or some other drug to kill her painlessly? Why on earth are you going to starve her to death? There’s a fundamental flaw here that needs to be explored. Our society does not allow euthanasia, but we will allow the removal of feeding systems, and we will allow the starving to death of helpless people. Now, it’s one thing to do when a person is dying. But in these cases, we’re talking about terminating a life that could go on with minimal help. A feeding tube is not a heroic method of maintaining life. It’s just normal treatment. Terry is not in any pain. Her parents are willing to assume all the responsibility for her care. Why put the parents through the agony of seeing their daughter starved to death? Do the parents not matter at all? What’s going on here? What’s the real conflict taking place in the partial birth debate and in the battle over Terry Schiavo’s life? Exactly what are the real issues and who are the real antagonists in this debate? I want you to listen to this short message, and when I come back, I’ll tell you.
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Can you imagine the combined population of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida wiped out since the Supreme Court decision allowing abortion more than 58 million lives have been destroyed? Can we engage in such destruction and not pay for it? For a free program titled The Class That Never Was, write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll free 1-888-BIBLE-44. In both of the cases I just mentioned,
SPEAKER 03 :
The battle is a battle between two faiths. One is a faith in God. The other is a faith in man. The one says we should look to God for our moral standards to tell us the difference between right and wrong. The other says we should look to man for our moral standards to tell us the difference between right and wrong. For a very long time now, our kids have been taught in school that there is no creator. And even though many people still believe in God, you do a poll across this country, the vast majority of the people still believe in God. They may even attend church. But they no longer in their heart of hearts believe in a creator. The founding document of this country claims that our rights come to us from a creator. We do hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men were created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. There is a strong element in our society that no longer believes that. And when that foundation is gone, it has to be replaced by something else. So instead of any kind of theism, that is belief in God to direct us in matters of right and wrong and to undergird our rights, we are left with utilitarianism. Big word, yeah. Utilitarianism is a kind of secular religion, if I may put it that way. Because like religion, it tries to define right and wrong, but it defines right and wrong by human standards, not by divine standards. It defines right and wrong in terms of what produces the greatest happiness and the greatest good. In other words, what works and what doesn’t. And it looks exclusively to man to decide what that means. Utilitarianism is the word. Is something utilitarian or not? Keeping Tereshavel alive is not useful. It does not produce happiness. So kill her. Keeping a handicapped baby alive is not useful. Kill it. And even keeping a healthy baby alive might not make the mother happy, so since it doesn’t produce the greatest happiness, kill it. Oh, sure, it goes on all the time. Old people had better watch their step and maintain their usefulness. For the time may come when utilitarianism sees you as a useless old woman who can be disposed of. No, we’re not there yet, because society as a whole still retains too much faith in God. But that’s changing as fast as the schools can change it. And even a Roman Catholic governor can veto a law that protects the life of a child that is in the process of being born. Something’s happened somewhere in our faith, in our minds, in our hearts, in the standards of what we think is useful and what’s not. And the courts may ultimately decide that you are no longer useful and you can be terminated. Now, if you want to make a living will, you want to leave documents, sign documents, and make that decision for yourself, you are fully entitled to do that. Do you really want the courts to do it? Medical science is making so much progress that they are going to present us with ethical dilemmas we never imagined were possible. In fact, you don’t have to go back very far to realize that we could not even imagine we would face the ethical dilemma that cloning a human being presents to us. And there is no obstacle today other than the legal and the moral ones. to cloning human beings. And we are headed into this brave new world with no roadmap except what works, what’s useful, what’s utilitarian, you know, what feels good, what creates happiness, perhaps the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. But what if you are in the other side of that equation and you’re not among the greatest number of people? What about your good and about your happiness? This is not to say there’s not a better way. There is a better way. But there’s a growing element in our society that no longer wants to hear it. The better way is the revelation to man of the Creator and of His law. But even the Christian churches have, by and law, abandoned the law of God as their guide, and they are looking to society to tell them, well, I don’t know what they’re looking to society for, I guess, to find out what God wants them to do. That’s the only thing I can figure on it. Because Christian churches no longer look to the law of God as a guide. This is nowhere more clearly presented than in the ordination of a gay bishop, actively gay bishop, in the Episcopal Church. The law of God, written clearly in the Bible, prohibits sex between certain persons. Can we still say that? It prohibits sex with persons near of kin. It prohibits sex with animals. And it prohibits sex between persons of the same gender. I have simply read these scriptures on the air in previous programs and have made some radio station managers downright uneasy. If I were in Canada, I could have probably had been fined or had my program banned for saying or reading those scriptures on the air. Even the New Testament presents us with the same laws. The great apostle Paul, in spite of all he said about the law, declared sex with a person of the same gender was a shameful lust. Quoting the NIV, the King James Version says it’s vile affection. I wonder if I were in Canada, if I could cite Paul’s prejudice without prejudice to myself. Now, here’s the dilemma. If I said that the candidate for bishop had left his wife and children and shacked up with a woman and therefore was not eligible for the bishopric, would I be wrong? Certainly not. I think everyone in the Episcopal Church would agree. No, no, he shouldn’t be a bishop. Well, then why is it okay for him to leave his wife and children and shack up with a man? Mind you, we’re not asking whether or not we should accept him as a Christian brother, say. We’re asking whether or not he should serve in holy order as a high-ranking minister in the church when he is in violation of both Old Testament and New Testament laws and principles. That’s all. Now, why am I bringing the rogue bishop into this discussion? I’m bringing him in as an illustration of my point that even Christians no longer educate their conscience by means of the law of God. To be sure, there are laws in the Bible we cannot obey. There are laws that are no longer relevant in our age. But every one of those laws was given to man by a righteous God, and they are there for our instruction. People are not discussing how these laws might or might not be applicable. They are just dismissing them out of hand as a whole without a second thought. They are not even bothering to learn from them. And they are leaving themselves with no guide to morality, no guide of right and wrong. There was another time when it was like this. And there was a prophet that God sent down to the gate of the city to speak to the people and tell them what was going on and what was coming and why it was coming. The prophet’s name was Jeremiah. And in his 23rd chapter, he says this, verse 9. My heart within me is broken because of the prophets. My bones are starting to shake. I’m like a drunk, like a man that wine has overcome because of what God has said about all of this, because of the words of His holiness. For the land is full of adulterers. For because of swearing, the land mourns, the pleasant places are dried up, their course is evil, the force is not right. Everything is going screwy in our whole society, he says. Because the whole land is just full of people who pay absolutely no attention to any word that God has said. Can I tell people that adultery is a sin? Can I proclaim the fact that by sleeping around on your husband and sleeping around on your wife that you are offending God and offending society and you’re doing wrong? I’m not sure how much longer we can say that. He says, for the prophet and the priest are profane. In my house I have found their wickedness. Now, we’re not talking about secular people here. We’re talking about religious people. who have become profane, religious leaders who no longer lead the people in right paths. What’s going to happen? He says, Wherefore their way shall be unto them as slippery ways in the dark. They shall be driven on and fall in it, for I will bring evil upon them, saith the Lord. Their way, he said, will be unto them as slippery ways in the dark. And that’s just exactly where we are. We are walking down a slippery road in the dark, and we haven’t got a clue where it’s taking us. You know, our Constitution, which one of the founding fathers said was only fit for a people who believed in God and was utterly useless for any other, It said simply, Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. The founders made a mistake, made a tragic mistake, because they failed to tell the Supreme Court that they could not prohibit the free exercise of religion either. Because that’s where we are. Congress has made no law regarding the establishment of religion. Congress has never passed a law to prohibit the free exercise of religion. But the Supreme Court commonly, decision by decision, day after day, does make decisions that prohibit the free exercise of religion. It happens. Somehow, forces who are opposed not merely to joining church and state together, but who are opposed to any idea of God intruding into public life, have gained sway in this country, and the majority seem content to have it that way. If they were not, they would do something about it, for this is, after all, a government of the people and by the people and for the people. Abraham Lincoln hoped that this kind of a government would not perish from the earth. I’m beginning to wonder if it already has. Stay with me.
SPEAKER 02 :
I have more to say after this short message. For a free CD of this radio program that you can share with friends and others, write or call this week only. And request the program titled, No Longer Useful. Write to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560, White House, Texas 75791. Or call toll free 1-888-BIBLE-44. And tell us the call letters of this station.
SPEAKER 03 :
Whose fault is it that we find ourselves in this sorry state that we’re in? Well, Jeremiah, the prophet I just quoted, lays it really at the feet of the leaders. He starts with the preachers and goes on to the priests, which really in a way is like our senators, our congressmen. Now, of course, I’ll have to acknowledge, quick as anybody, that these guys, the preachers included, and the senators and the congressmen, are all telling us what we want to hear. The preachers will lose their job if they don’t tell the congregation what they want to hear. And the senators and the congressmen run poll after poll after poll to find out what we want to hear, and then they tell us what we want to hear. The fact of the matter is that leaders are expected to exercise courage. They’re supposed to lead, not follow. And follow is precisely what they’re doing. And all I’ve got to do is say to the preachers and to any other leaders who should happen to hear my voice, we are going to need in the months and the years ahead of us uncommon courage if we’re going to provide any leadership for this people at all. We’re going to have to tell them the truth, whether it hurts, whether it hurts or not, and whether it gets us in office, whether it gets us out of a job, whether it gets us voted off into oblivion. We’re going to have to start telling people the truth. After he warned that when people turn their back on God and his law, their ways will be like slippery ways in the darkness, Jeremiah went on to say this in verse 16 of chapter 23. This is what the Lord of hosts says. Don’t listen to the words of the prophets that prophesy to you. They make you vain. They speak a vision of their own heart. They’re not telling you what comes from the mouth of God. They say to those who despise me, well, the Lord said you’ll have peace. And they say to everyone that walks after the imagination of his own heart, no evil will come upon you. Do you realize what he’s telling you here? He is saying that there are people who sit in a pew or a congregation of a church who actually despise God, and a preacher stands before them and says, you’re going to have peace. He’ll stand up in front of a group of people who are walking, every one of them, after the imagination of his own heart, what they think is right, what they think is wrong. And he tells them this, and he says, no evil is going to come upon you. And so that you can, as a church, Vote into office a man who stands in opposition to clearly stated passages in Scripture. You can put him right in there, and the preachers will say, no evil will come upon you. For who has stood in the counsel of the Lord, Jeremiah asked? Who listens to God’s advice? Who has perceived and heard what God has to say? Who has marked His Word and listened to it? You’d better listen, he says. A whirlwind of the Lord has gone forth in fury, a grievous whirlwind, and it’s going to fall grievously upon the head of the wicked. The anger of the Lord shall not return until he has executed, until he has performed the thoughts of his heart. In the latter days, you will understand this perfectly. Hmm. That sort of seems like where we are, doesn’t it? God says of these prophets, I didn’t send them, but they went. I haven’t spoken to them, but they preached. But even so, if they had stood in my counsel, my advice, if they had caused my people to hear my words, then even they could have turned them from their evil ways and from the evil of their doings. You see, even a man that God didn’t send, if he’d just be faithful to the Bible, he can have a positive effect on society. But you see, even the preachers these days don’t pay very much attention to the Bible. Am I not a God at hand, saith the Lord, and not a God afar off? Can anybody hide him in the secret places and think that I’m not going to see him there? I fill heaven and earth, says God. I have heard what the prophets say, that prophesy lies in my name, saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed. He goes on to say, the prophet has a dream, let him tell his dream. He that has my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? All these dreams you people talk about are chaff. My word is wheat, and my word is like a fire and like a hammer that breaks in pieces the rock. Yes, it is. God’s word is pretty tough when it comes to describing a people who have no other basis than utility for what they think is right and what they think is wrong, who would just as soon kill a useless baby much sooner than to go to the trouble of rearing the child and taking care of a handicapped child through whatever is left of his life. Behold, says God, I am against them that prophesy false dreams, and tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies and by their lightness, when I didn’t even send them. I didn’t command them. I wouldn’t even talk to these people. They are not going to profit these people at all. And when this people… or the prophet, or the priest, shall come to you, Jeremiah, saying, What is the message from God? And you shall say to them, What message? I will even forsake you, saith the Lord. Wow. There comes a point in time when you’ve left off God, you won’t listen to his word, won’t follow his law, won’t even think about his law as a guide to conduct. that one of these days you’re going to ask of him and he’s going to say, my message to you is, I will forsake you. And as for the prophet and the priest and the people that shall say the burden of the Lord, I will punish that man in his house. You’d better learn to shut up about that kind of things. What I fear… is that God is going to say to us as a people is that since we have decided that utilitarianism is our guide, that whatever works, whatever is useful, that’s what we’re going to consider is right, and if it’s not, we’ll consider it wrong, that God is going to decide that we are no longer useful.
SPEAKER 02 :
Until next time, I’m Ronald Dart. In the U.S. and Canada, call toll-free 1-888-BIBLE-44
SPEAKER 01 :
Stay in touch with the new Born to Win with Ronald L. Dart app. This app has all of your favorite Ronald L. Dart radio messages, sermons, articles, and it even has a digital Bible. Simply search on the iOS or Android app store to download it for free today.
