As I was contemplating Psalm 94 this morning, my heart was grieved for the unborn. Specifically, I am saddened by President Biden’s executive order on January 28th rescinding the “Mexico City Policy” which prohibits foreign aid to non-governmental organizations which provide or support abortions. Further, that executive order directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services to review Title X, which prohibits federal funding of abortions, with a view towards rescinding that prohibition. In short, President Biden is starting to take steps towards a culture of increasing abortions.
The writer of Psalm 94 begins his lament with the question: How long will the wicked succeed? How long will He allow injustice against the poor and powerless to prevail? Later he states:
20 Can wicked rulers be allied with you, those who frame injustice by statute? 21 They band together against the life of the righteous and condemn the innocent to death.
That is precisely what is happening. However, in light of this utterly wicked state of affairs, let me offer three words of hope.
First, the psalmist assures us that judgment is sure. He denominates God the “God of vengeance,” and assures us that God is not blind to infanticide, nor is he deaf to the cries of the blood of the unborn, and that he will avenge those little ones. He will “[bring] back their wickedness upon them And will destroy them in their evil; The LORD our God will destroy them.” In fact, he calls the powerful people who allow/support/perform such acts “senseless” and “stupid” (His words, not mine).
Second, the psalmist also proffers God’s grace. He urges the unrighteous to “pay heed,” and to “understand.” In other words, all is not (yet) lost for these people. They still have a chance to repent, and find forgiveness and righteousness in Jesus Christ. There are none who cannot find healing and forgiveness in Christ. Jesus did not just die for us, he became sin for us. When he died on the cross, Jesus was the legislator who voted to legalize abortion; he was the woman who sought and received an abortion; he was the abortionist who performed the abortion. And because Jesus became these things, those people can, through faith in him, find forgiveness and grace and peace.
Third, from a more worldly view, according to the CDC and the Guttmacher Institute, abortions have fallen fairly consistently since 1980, whether measured as an absolute number of abortions, an abortion rate, or an abortion ratio. There are a couple of small blips in there, but generally speaking the number of babies killed in the womb has consistently declined nearly every year. There were roughly half the number of abortions in 2018 as there were in 1980. This is obviously not driven primarily by politics, or even the courts, since we have experienced several Republican and Democratic presidential administrations, a Congress controlled at various times by both parties, and a SCOTUS which has leaned both left and right. Obviously God’s agenda is not driven by or through politics.
Nevertheless, as Calvin said in his Institutes, “Let princes hear and be afraid” (Instit. 4.20.31.).
