Observing Sanctity of Life

by Tom Strode                                                                                               Vol. VI, No. 1, January 1993

[Tom Strode serves on the Washington, DC, staff of the SBC Christian Life Commission. This article was done for Baptist Press.]

The pain of one woman's abortion pierced the hearts of at least one Southern Baptist congregation on last January's Sanctity of Human Life Sunday.

Sharon Yeats, the pastor's wife, did a dramatic reading of a poem called "The Unmother" during the morning service of South Park Baptist Church in Grand Prairie, Texas. The poem, written by a church member after interviewing a woman who had undergone an abortion, included the following excerpt:

There was no funeral for this being who was not born; An unwed unmom is my chosen plight. There is no place to go and mourn. No plot to put flowers for this quiet sin. Only an aching deep inside to know what might have been.

John Yeats, Southpark's pastor, said, "The worst preacher in the world could have preached after that. I'll tell you what, it broke people's hearts."

The dramatic reading was just one of many ways Southern Baptist churches observed Sanctity of Human Life Sunday in 1992. When the 1993 observance is held Jan. 17, it can be expected churches again will find creative methods of communicating the message that God values all life, born and unborn, young and old, healthy and infirm.

Sanctity of Human Life Sunday has been observed the third Sunday in January on the denominational calendar since 1986. The Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, which was announced on Jan. 22, will reach its 20th anniversary in 1993.

South Park Baptist Church also portrayed the sanctity of life message in ways other than the dramatic reading. Yeats preached a sanctity of life sermon based on Psalm 94. He recalled telling the congregation after the message, "We can sound real authoritarian and calloused about this abortion issue, but we've got to understand we've got to love people, even women who have had abortions. We were real careful to sit them down and say there are some practical things we can do," Yeats said. "I think there's a balance we need to have ... we need to be people of compassion."

The church's young people also established a "cemetery of the innocents" on the front lawn of the property. It contained 100 small crosses, one for each child aborted daily in Dallas County. It served as a profound symbol to the 300 to 400 students who walk across the front lawn daily to South Park's neighbor institutions, the largest junior high school in the district. "As a church, we're making the statement that a child is a child no matter what stage of development he is in," Yeats said, "and we believe that abortion is not the appropriate response."

Covenant Church of Columbia, MD, used the same concept to express the message to the community. Covenant's Project TLC (Tiny Little Crosses) consisted of 700 crosses planted on the front lawn of the church property for 30 days. The total represented the number of abortions done in Maryland each week, said Covenant Pastor Walter Collett.

In the morning service Collett preached on the sanctity of life. He also interviewed the director of Project Rescue, a state activist pro-life group. Covenant's Interceding for Life Ministry led a "very meaningful" evening service. It presented a video of its pro-life efforts during the past year and distributed information on how Christians could be involved in helping women in crisis pregnancies and in saving unborn babies.

Tusculum Baptist Church in Greenville, TN, led a community-wide effort. Tusculum's pastor, David Carr, called 15 to 20 pastors of like-minded churches and organized the community's first life chain. Local and national life chains have become popular pro-life activities in recent years. A life chain involves adults and children lining a major thoroughfare while holding signs saying "Abortion Kills Children" and "Jesus Forgives and Heals." The life chain was organized in about one week, and the local newspaper estimated 150 people participated, Carr said.

The conditions were not ideal. The temperature was barely above 30 degrees. Carr recalled one of the children who participated said, "You know, I hope it is really cold today, because that will show the people that we're really interested." I said afterward, "I think he got his wish." The life chain was a "positive, non-confrontational" method to say "there are alternatives to abortion and that abortion kills children," Carr said. Southern Baptist agencies provide resources for Southern Baptist churches to use in presenting the sanctity of life message. The Christian Life Commission offers sermon outlines for pastors as well as literature for churches. The CLC also has a new video, "The Sanctity of Human Life," which examines such issues as abortion and euthanasia and shares what Southern Baptists are doing to affirm life.

The Baptist Sunday School Board produces a curriculum for youth through adults for Sanctity of Human life Sunday. The Home Mission Board provides resources and training for the establishment of evangelistic crisis pregnancy centers through its Alternatives to Abortion Ministries.