Tony Evans - God and Life (11/04/2022)
Since government is divinely ordained to protect human life, which bears God's image from conception to death, kingdom voting must prioritize the sacredness of life in all stages. Drawing from Genesis 1:26-28, Psalm 139:13-16, James 3:9 and other passages, the preacher urges believers to vote for comprehensive protection—opposing abortion while also fighting injustice and any degradation of dignity.
Kingdom Voting and the Issue of Life
We are talking about kingdom voting, and so when we talk about voting, we have to deal with the issue of life, because that is the role of government—to protect life. That is its divinely ordained responsibility. When you consider your vote, you have to raise the question, “What is life?” since that is its divinely ordained responsibility.
Most discussions about the issue of life do not start at the right place, because they unfortunately do not start enough with Scripture. God is the Creator of life, therefore we start with God. When God created mankind in Genesis chapter 1, verses 26 to 28, He said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”
The Imago Dei: The Starting Point
So the discussion of life, in any human form it finds itself, starts with the Imago Dei—that is, the image of God. When you do not start with the image of God, then you make life what you want it to be, not what God has created it and stamped it to be.
The psalmist says in Psalm chapter 8, verses 4 to 6, “What is man that you are mindful of him?” And You have crowned him with glory and majesty. This means that every human being has a divine design. This means that every human being is sacred because they have the stamp of God on them.
That means every person created was created for community, since God is a triune being—one God composed of three co-equal persons who are one in essence while distinct in personality—so we were created for one another. It means that every person matters, is significant from womb to tomb.
Insulting the Creator by Devaluing Life
When God created man, He created him with a mind to reflect Him in history. And that means that when we fail to give dignity to humanity, in whatever way we fail to do it—we will talk about that in a moment—we have insulted not only the person, we have insulted the Creator of the person.
Whenever life is destroyed illegitimately, whenever life is downgraded illegitimately, we have said to the Creator, “You are a bad manufacturer. You do not know how to produce human products, and Your image is not worth protecting, and Your image is not worth emulating. And to show You, God, how we feel about You—since we cannot get to You—we are going to get to them, and what we do to them will show how we feel about You.” Because every time life is illegitimately removed or downgraded, you have insulted and attacked God.
The Biblical Command Against Taking Life
So over and over again the Bible is clear: “You shall not kill.” Whether it is homicide, suicide, patricide, matricide, genocide, whether it is infanticide or fratricide—no matter what kind of -cide it is—it becomes an attack on God. Which is why God says in Genesis chapter 9, when you take a person’s life, you have forfeited your own life because you have attacked the image of God.
See, God views it as a personal insult when life is not given the value He gives to it, because what you have said is, “What God did is not worth protecting.” So any discussion of life has to start there. Any discussion of life has to start with a divine mark.
And the job of government, the Bible says, is to protect that life. That is why safety is often called by a government the first responsibility—that it has to deal with enemies within and without—because life is worth living. Why? Because the Manufacturer’s reputation is worth protecting.
The Consequences of Removing God from Government
You leave God out of government and life, and its value gets downgraded, reduced, dishonored, and attacked. And so when you think about kingdom voting, you must think about the question of life. What do we mean by life? What are we including in this thing called life?
Well, let me give you the big perspective. It includes pre-born life and post-born life—abortion before birth and abortion after birth.
God’s Intimate Involvement in the Womb
Let me show you what I mean in Psalm 139, verses 13 to 16. Let me read it to you: “For You formed my inward parts. You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You when I was made in secret and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth. Your eyes have seen my unformed substance, and in Your book were written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them.”
You had my life in the womb, but You had some stuff planned for me to the tomb. And to get rid of either side—either the existence or cutting short the extension—is an attack on the Creator. And unless you understand that on both sides of the maternity ward, on both sides of the created genius of God, you will not have a biblical view of the role of government. You will just have a partisan view or a personal view, but you will not be dealing with life as God deals with it.
Scriptural Evidence for Life in the Womb
Let me say a word about life in the womb. In Job chapter 10, verses 8 to 12, and in Job chapter 31, verse 15, Job says that You made me in the womb and that I have the qualities of God in my unborn state. Psalm 22, verses 9 and 10, says God brings the child out of the womb. So He gets it started because He stitches it together, and He brings it out.
Matthew chapter 1, verse 20—when Mary the virgin was pregnant with our Lord Jesus Christ—the angel told Joseph that Mary is carrying a child. The Bible is clear that in the womb is life.
In fact, it is bigger than that. God is so committed to life in the womb that He prescribes its value before it ever gets into the womb. That is right. Isaiah says in Isaiah chapter 49, verses 1 to 5, “Before I ever entered the womb, You had a plan for me.”
Jeremiah 1, verses 4 and 5, says You had a purpose for me prior to my entering in. Paul says in Galatians 1:15 to 16, there is a plan. In other words, when God allows the baby to be in the womb, that is because He had a plan before it got to the womb, so that when it entered the womb, it began the process of experiencing its destiny outside of the womb.
So whenever you cut that short, you have interfered with the program and purposes of Almighty God. And in Matthew chapter 1, verse 20, He says it began when it was conceived. So there is life in conception—after all, that is why it grows, because it is alive.
Government, Abortion, and Attacking God
So when the government says it is okay to abort, it is saying it is okay to attack God. And when you attack Him in the womb, you have come against Him, and He does not like it. That is why He said in Genesis 9, “You attack My life, I am going to attack you.”
So you want the government to keep you safe? Well, they better keep you safe by keeping God happy, and it keeps God happy by not legislating or legalizing death in the womb.
Addressing the “My Body” Argument
Now, I know one of the arguments is, “Well, this is the lady’s body.” Well, first of all, if you are carrying a boy, there are parts in your body that do not belong to you, okay? You cannot equate that with you.
Secondly, we have established that it is the creation of God. Just because it is your body does not mean you get to do whatever you want with it. See, that is the problem.
In fact, the government makes laws all the time that just because it is your body does not mean you can do what you want with it. You drive drunk—okay, you are going to be in trouble. It is your body. You can drink what you want to drink, but they are going to create boundaries on your freedom, and you cannot argue, “Well, it is my body.”
You cannot argue, “It is my body,” so I am going to abuse somebody else, I am going to rape somebody else, I am going to do something—no, no, no.
Secondly, we are talking about a different genetic code. We are not talking about your genetic code. We are talking about a brand-new genetic code.
So it is not just about you. But the selfishness of our world has reduced and dumbed down the dignity of life because it has dumbed down the Imago Dei—the image of God that is involved in the process of birth.
Limits on Freedom and the Chaos of Removing God
And so you do not give people freedom to do wrong, even if they are doing wrong with their own bodies. No, you have laws that structure good and bad. And remember, God says, “I am the author of what is good and what is bad, what is right and what is wrong. You do not get to choose that—that is, if you want Me involved. Now, if you want to get Me out of the picture and see how chaotic your culture becomes, remove Me and then let us watch what happens.”
So now you have all manner of chaos because of the attack on God.
Protecting Dignity After Birth
The government is to protect life, and it is to protect it because it wants God on its side. But leave God out, and then it is my body, it is how I feel, it is what I think. And then we have people who say, “Well, I would not do it, but I do not think that I should tell other people what to do.”
That is a very interesting compromise, particularly when it is done by Christians. There are a lot of things you would not do that you would tell other people they should not do either. There are a lot of things you would not be a part of, and you would tell them quickly, “Well, you should not be a part of that evil either, because God has spoken on the subject.”
You do not run away; you do not just say, “Because you would not do it.” No, you find out what God says about the issue, and that becomes your standard.
We want to talk about saving the life in the womb, but often times disregarding it to the tomb—removing its longevity through murder, removing its dignity through how people are treated.
Laws Must Protect Both Existence and Dignity
There are not only to be laws to protect the existence of life. There also must be laws to protect the dignity of life. American slavery was a loss of dignity. Jim Crow was a loss of dignity. Racism in any form is a loss of dignity, whether it is individual, or familial, or structural.
It is canceling out the dignity. It is removing the crown that exists on every man and every woman born into the world. Putting your knee on the neck of a helpless victim is not only to destroy their life; it is to attack their dignity.
That is why the Bible says in James chapter 3, verse 9, “How dare you reduce the dignity by cursing?”—not cussing, cursing, that is, removing the dignity of a person. “Why can you not take away the dignity of a person?” He says in James 3:9, because they have been created in the likeness of God.
So we are back to the Imago Dei. When you take a person’s dignity away from them—when you tell them by the color of their skin they cannot go here, do that, participate as an equal created person; when you take away their uniqueness by their race, their face, or their place, their station in life; when you treat the homeless as though they have no dignity; when we treat the poor as though they are the leftovers or the refuse of society; when we take the down-and-outers and we oppress them, or when we create structures in society that reduce them, whether it is gerrymandering of districts and redlining of districts so that there is not equal access; when we allow the poor to have worse education than others because they do not have the same dollar bill; when we do not care about the health and wellbeing of people who do not have access to adequate healthcare—when we reduce their dignity, we have attacked God.
And when we reduce it by law or by practice, then that is called post-life abortion, because you are aborting either the length of their existence or the wellbeing of their existence.
Righteousness and Justice: Inseparable
So it just depends on which abortion you are talking about, because all of it is to reject God. Psalm 89:14—God says from His throne comes righteousness and justice. You cannot have one without the other. These are twin towers; they operate simultaneously.
We have one group calling for righteousness. We have another group calling for justice, as though God can be divided. He says from His throne you have to deal with both. So do not just talk to me about moral laws—talk to me about it, but do not put a period there. Talk to me also about the just application of the law without discrimination.
Talk to me not only about what you are going to do with the poor, but how you are going to handle the rich who are breaking My standard but because they have money they can bypass it or buy their way out of it.
No, there are two kinds of abortions. There is abortion in the womb, but there is abortion on your way to the tomb, so that people do not get to live out their divinely ordained destiny.
Calling for Comprehensive Protection of Life
Yes, we should protest abortion in the womb, but that same number of people or more are to righteously and peacefully protest abortion outside of the womb—so that we have the same group protesting for life, the right to all of life, not term life, not limited life.
A lot of people in our world now have been crumpled up by sin, circumstances, oppression, but what we need to do is remind them of the image that has been put on their lives. They have been stamped by God, and because they have been stamped by God, they have the image of God.
They have been trampled on and reduced by others, made to feel like nothing, called outside of their names. They have not been included where they should legitimately have been included.
We need some folk to come along—particularly led by Christians across racial and cultural and denominational lines who are kingdom disciples. This thing of life is so important that God says in Matthew chapter 5, verses 21 and 22, if you call somebody by a hateful name—if you call them “fool,” meaning their life is not worth living—He says you are in jeopardy of hell’s fire. He says, “I will send you to hell,” that is what Jesus said, for reducing a person’s humanity.
Kingdom Voting: Standing for Whole Life
So you see, this is about God. So government, you better jump in here. And yes, I know we have got sides—somebody emphasizing life in the womb, somebody emphasizing justice to the tomb. Well, you Christians better come out here and say, “Okay, well you know, I know I have got to vote here or there, but where I am going to take my stand is on whole life, comprehensive life. I am going to take my stand with God. I am going to take my stand and fight for all of life.”
So what do we do? You are going to be a kingdom voter. That means you have to vote for life. And life starts at conception—because Jesus was conceived as a child—and it goes to death, but between the two should be dignity. Between the two should be protection so that they can maximize their freedom.
Now, they may not do anything with their dignity. They may not do anything with their lifespan, but that should not be because you set up structures, systems, attitudes, or perspectives that got in the way. It should be because they chose to eat the fruit, not because you forced fruit down their throat.
No. It is time for Christians to adopt a whole life agenda and vote for government to protect a whole life agenda. And if your government party only is going to protect one side of it, then you hold them accountable and responsible to not ignore the other side of it, and you do it in a righteous way—because if you try to do it in an unrighteous way, God is not going to be with you there either.
Partnership in Kingdom Voting
Remember, kingdom voting is a partnership. So yeah, God is going to make the final decision, but He still wants your participation. So you do not get to stay home. You get to evaluate the candidates; you get to say which reflects the best view that you can come up with by the leading of God.
You have been called to the kingdom. There is chaos in our culture; there is chaos in the world, and you are supposed to be a kingdom Christian and a kingdom disciple casting a kingdom vote.
Well, let us be kingdom voters. Get up out of your chair and go vote.
The Hope of Transformation in Christ
But I have good news, because the good news of Scripture in 2 Corinthians chapter 3, verses 17 and 18, is Jesus Christ is available today to conform you to His image. Yeah, that is right. You know He can change your image—your self-image, your image of other people. He can turn a racist into a non-racist. He can turn prejudice into acceptance. He can remove discrimination. He can give you dignity that you do not have to bend over and have other people ride your back. He can give you significance.
And for the lady who has had the abortion, He can forgive you; He can let you begin again because you are still in His image.
So the beautiful thing about coming to Christ is that He can take whatever is messed up, and He is the fixer-upper.
So I invite you now, if you have never come to Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, if you have never recognized He died on the cross for you in your place for your sins, He rose from the dead to give you eternal life, and that if you will simply trust Him alone as your sin-bearer—if you will go to Him right now and say:
Lord Jesus, I am a sinner. I recognize You want to be my Savior, and I trust You now to come into my life. Forgive me of my sin and give me the eternal life that You promised to give if I came to You for it. I receive it now by faith.
He will forgive your past no matter how bad that past is, and He will restore your image because that is why you were created.
Life begins with God because it starts with the Imago Dei—that is, the image of God. Life begins in the womb and it is to be protected and valued to the tomb. God makes it clear in Psalm 139, verses 13 to 16, that He is involved in the creation of life in the womb. So to attack the unborn is to attack God Himself since they are being created in His image. But it also relates to the dignity of people once they are born. James 3:9 makes it clear that people are not to be cursed because of the Imago Dei, the image of God. So from womb to tomb, cradle to grave, life must be valued, treasured, impacted and improved, and treated with the high honor God gives it, because life is related to God first—we are the beneficiaries.