As pro-life believers across America are shouting for joy and giving thanks for the overturning of Roe, many women in America are terrified right now, causing them to be more muted in their celebration. It’s as if they still believe others can dictate what they do with their own bodies.
How should we respond?
Indeed, this is not the time to gloat. And with all my heart, I believe we must do our best to reach out to those who are angry and fearful, and demonstrate love, longsuffering, and grace. This is not the time to win a debate as much as the time to change hearts and minds.
But without any question whatsoever, this is also a time to rejoice, with everything within us. This is a time to give God praise!
Here are five reasons why.
1. The overturning of Roe is a massive answer to prayer.
Think about it for a moment. There has been prayer all day and night for Roe to be reversed for years. Prayer meetings have been held for decades. Large rallies were organized for supplication to the Lord. Countless prayers have reached the throne of God asking Him to have mercy on the unborn. People have fasted, cried out and made all kinds of sacrifices for this moment.
How can we not rejoice and give thanks? God has acted! The Sovereign Lord has responded to the cries of His people! It would be ungrateful, not to mention irreverent, if we failed to worship Him, praise Him and celebrate.
This is a constant theme of the Bible: God’s people cry out, He answers from heaven, and we give Him praise.
In this case, we are looking at what might be the most dramatic answer to prayer on a corporate level that we have seen in our lifetimes. In the words of Jesus in another context, if we do not lift our voices in praise, the rocks will cry out instead (Luke 19:40).
2. The lives of innocent babies will be saved.
Abortion on demand is a monstrous evil. The shedding of innocent blood is one of the most grievous sins in God’s sight. And the more we understand about the development of the baby in the womb – with scientists largely agreeing that life begins at conception and with the child receiving its DNA coding at that moment – the more we realize that there is a little human being in there.
A former Planned Parenthood worker wept on my radio show for that very reason, as she talked about the “products of conception.” She was referring to the jars kept in one of the rooms of the clinic filled with the severed parts of tiny humans.
And while the Court’s decision does not outlaw abortion throughout the country, it is already saving lives. That’s because clinics are shutting down in different states, which means that more women will think again before they abort, which will result in less abortions.
How can we not give thanks — loudly and publicly — for this?
3. A massive injustice was reversed.
The Roe decision of 1973, followed by the Casey decision of 1992, was not just bad law. It was massively unjust. It claimed that there was a constitutional right to abortion, thereby turning justice and righteousness on their heads.
Not only so, but the legalizing of abortion on demand (potentially, for any reason, right until the moment of delivery), normalized the idea of abortion in America. As my friend Dr. Frank Turek has often pointed out, the law can do one of three things. It can prohibit a behavior, permit a behavior, or promote a behavior.
In the case of abortion, just as in the case of the redefining of marriage, the Court’s 1973 decision helped to promote something aberrant in our land. The new ruling — the correct ruling — goes a long way to set that right.
Abortion has been a way of life for tens of millions of Americans for almost 50 years. We’ve grown up with it as normative. Reversing it is a massive return toward goodness.
Remember this principle, which is still applicable, as you read through the Old Testament. God hates unjust laws. It is important in His sight that they are removed and replaced.
For this we give Him thanks.
4. Many women’s lives will be saved.
The fact is that mothers are also deeply wounded by abortion. Many carry scars for years. And so, in the end, less abortions will mean less women who are damaged and hurt.
I’ve heard these stories on my radio show as well, as these women (and even men) sobbed as they recounted abortions they had decades ago — and these were Christian women who knew they were forgiven. Some of them told me that they were strongly pro-choice when they aborted their babies, and they remained pro-choice for years afterwards. But all the while, they suffered from guilt and pain, especially around the time their babies would have been born. It was only when they came to faith that they experienced mercy and relief.
Now is the time to reach out to today’s “pro-choice” supporters with the love of God. Now is the time for us to say, “We know you’re angry and afraid, and we know you blame us. But there is a God who really cares about you and has only good intentions for you. Consider putting down your defenses. Acknowledge your sins, and surrender your life to Him.”
This too, even in advance, is a cause for thanksgiving.
5. We can now make the argument for life on a national level.
Although critics claim that the Court’s decision was a threat to our democracy, the reality is that abortion now becomes a matter of legal debate from state to state. I do not mean that states have a moral right to kill babies. But I recognize that, under our democratic republic, the states will make the ultimate decisions.
This is now a fresh topic for discussion, giving us an opportunity to dismantle the pro-abortion talking points (see here and here) and to make the case for life (see here).
This is also a great time to discuss Justice Alito’s decision, asking those who differ, “Where did he get things wrong?”
The fact is that Roe was bad law from the start. Removing it is cause for celebration, not just for these five reasons, but, looking ahead, for millions of reasons, each with a beating heart.
It’s also a time to remember all the lives that have been lost. We need God’s ongoing intervention in our land!
Dr. Michael Brown (www.askdrbrown.org) is the host of the nationally syndicated Line of Fire radio program. He holds a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from New York University and has served as a professor at a number of seminaries and is the author of 40 books. Connect with him on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube.
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.