The streetfighter’s lethal weapon and the surgeon’s abortion instruments.

As London-based newspapers noted with horror that the new year had been marred by yet more fatal stabbings, it was another statistic that really shocked me. And it’s one that points to what lies behind the eruption of violence on our capital city’s streets.

While we remain obsessed with focusing on the symptoms, rather than the causes, of our problems, we will get no closer to a solution.

Knife crime has risen to frightening levels which have left London’s streets apparently now more dangerous than those of New York, long notorious for its gang warfare. But this shocking dilemma is met only with cries for more police, and more funding for law enforcement generally.

And yet in the midst of this comes news that abortion remains the biggest cause of death by far in our blood-soaked world. Whereas 8.2 million people died from cancer in 2018, almost 42 million abortions were recorded. In other words, for every 33 live births, ten infants were aborted.¹

Violence Breeds Violence

The connection is obvious: violence breeds violence. We slaughter babies in the womb by the million – legally in most cases – and wonder why violence on an unprecedented scale has erupted on our streets. And I am aware that there are other, often related, factors such as broken homes causing lost and unloved young men to seek ‘family’ elsewhere.

At a time when there is a major focus on research into killer diseases – and there has undoubtedly been much success with discovering new cures for cancer – anti-abortion fundraisers would more likely be harangued or beaten up than receive open public support.

And yet the Bible says: “Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter. If you say, ‘But we knew nothing about this,’ does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who guards your life know it?” (Prov 24:11-12).

We slaughter babies in the womb by the million and wonder why violence on an unprecedented scale has erupted on our streets.

While every victim of senseless knife crime is a tragic statistic, the mass slaughter of innocents that goes by the euphemistic name of ‘choice’ for women whose lifestyle is unsuited to raising children, is a blot on Western civilisation in general, and British society in particular.

Abortion was the leading cause of death worldwide last year.After all, there was a time when we led the way with missionary zeal in proclaiming the efficacy of a Judeo-Christian culture based on the Ten Commandments, one of which states with the utmost clarity: “You shall not murder.” (Ex 20:13).

But as soon as we jettisoned our commitment to those values, many of the nations we have influenced followed suit.

Our only hope as a nation is in returning to the God-given laws Moses was given on Mt Sinai – laws that Christ subsequently enabled us to follow through his Spirit in our hearts.

Attempt to Thwart God’s Plans

The slaughter of innocents is essentially a mark of rebellion against God – and the devil himself is behind it.

In anticipation of the birth of Moses, the Egyptian Pharaoh tried to prevent God’s will from being fulfilled by murdering every male Jewish infant (Ex 1:22). Moses was a ‘type’ of the Messiah to come, in that he led God’s people out of slavery towards new life in the Promised Land. Jesus went further by redeeming all who trust him from slavery to sin.

But when Christ arrived on the scene some 1,500 years after Moses, King Herod ordered the slaughter in Bethlehem of every child under the age of two (Matt 2:16).

In both cases, God was about to usher in a wonderful new era – and Satan tried to stop it.

The slaughter of innocents is a mark of rebellion against God – and the devil himself is behind it.

In more recent times, when six million Jews were mercilessly slaughtered in the concentration camps of Germany and Poland, one-and-a-half million children were among them.

Once again, God was about to introduce a glorious new epoch for Israel, with Jews back in their ancient land and many recognising Jesus as Messiah. satan tried to stop it in an unspeakably monstrous way. Yet, even so, he failed in his ultimate objective, but at a terrible cost of precious lives because so few who were in a position to do so lifted a finger to help.

Devil Doomed to Defeat

It’s interesting that the legalisation of abortion in Britain in 1967 happened to coincide with a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the old established churches. Whenever God wants to do something special in revealing his presence and power to sinful humanity, satan seeks to spoil his plan.

Ultimately, however, the devil is doomed to defeat and will take all his allies with him into the pit of everlasting fire known as hell (see Rev 20:7-10).

St Paul writes: “The God of peace will soon crush satan under your feet” (Rom 16:20).

My new year message to abortionists, and all who support them, is: Stop this satanic slaughter!

References

1 Jerusalem News Network, 4 January 2019, quoting Life News. The estimate of 42 million abortions is conservative; the real number is likely to be higher - perhaps 56 million or more, according to WHO data gathered by Snopes.