We Value Sanctity of Life

by Timothy Teuscher

“We value life as a gift of God to be cherished, nurtured, and protected from conception to natural death.” That is the fifth value statement as to what walking together as pastors, deacons, and congregations in our synodical family means and involves.

In our country today, however, matters pertaining to the sanctity of life are increasingly and blatantly challenged and rejected by governments, schools, the entertainment and advertising industries, mainstream media, and, sadly, even by some church bodies. The list is legion: abortion on demand, medical assistance in dying (MAID), critical race theory, cancel culture, gender identity, same-sex marriage, and on.

While we don’t have the space here to go into the specifics of these moral and ethical issues, notice how the Small Catechism provides us a framework to explore what God’s Word says about the beginning and ending of life; about marriage and family as the place where God gives and guards life; and about our responsibility in our various vocations to show mercy to others in all stages of life.

What gives life its worth and value? Who determines the worth and value of your life and the life of others? No, not us, but God who “has made me and all creatures, given me my body and soul, eyes, ears and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them” (SC II.2). How does He do that? The catechism explains: “He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life” (SC II.2).

God also wants us to use properly these gifts through which He sustains our physical lives and the lives of others. The second table of the Ten Commandments addresses this. For instance, what are we to do and not do with God’s gift of life itself according to the Fifth Commandment? “Do not hurt or harm our neighbour in his body, but help and support him in every physical need” (SC I.10). According to the Sixth Commandment, what are we to do with the gift of marriage and the means whereby new life is created by God? “Lead a sexually pure and decent life in what we say and do, and husband and wife love and honour each other” (SC I.12). What, according to the Seventh Commandment, are we to do and not do with the gift of material things by which God sustains our lives? “Do not take our neighbour’s money or possessions, or get them in any dishonest way, but help him to improve and protect his possessions and income” (SC I.14).

The explanation of the First Article of the Creed concludes: “All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me” (SC II.2). Notice that the worth and merit of life are not determined by anything in us—not physical appearance, mental capacity, bodily abilities, occupation, gender, ethnicity, age, or quality of life. Instead, God’s fatherly, divine goodness and mercy alone give human life its worth and value.

How different this is from our society in which the unborn are not afforded the protection of the law, since it is asserted that they do not yet possess the characteristics of being a ‘person.’ Some maintain that unless the unborn are wanted by their mothers, they have no inherent right to life. We hear similar claims at the end of life regarding the severely disabled or terminally ill.

We Christians, however, value human beings and care for them in every season of life, not because they possess certain acceptable physical or mental traits and capabilities, but because they are created by God and endowed with His gift of life. In short, the worth and value of every single human being, whether in the womb or near the tomb, is not based on what we have or who we are or what we do, but instead on whose we are. Human beings have not only been created by God but, as the explanation of the Second Article of the Creed explains, we sinful human beings have been “purchased and won from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil” (SC II.4) through the holy precious blood of Jesus, in order “that I may be His own and live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness” (SC II.4).

Each of us are called to live under Christ in this earthly kingdom called Canada—to serve not myself but the One who has created and redeemed me, and to serve Him by serving others who have also received His gift of life. Human life is never a mistake that needs to be eradicated; it is a gift to be cherished because it comes from the gracious hands of God our Father who made us and preserves our lives... of God the Son who took upon Himself our flesh in the womb of the virgin Mary and suffered in His body on the cross the just punishment for our sins to redeem us from sin and death... and of God the Holy Spirit who “enlightens me with His gifts, sanctifies, and keeps me in the one true faith” (SC II.6).

We therefore pray, in the Seventh Petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “that our Father in heaven would rescue us from every evil of body and soul, possessions and reputation, and finally, when our last hour comes, give us a blessed end, and graciously take us from this valley of sorrow to Himself in heaven” (SC III.20). We do so because God Himself values the life He has created and redeemed.

Rev. Dr. Timothy Teuscher is President of Lutheran Church–Canada (LCC).

Additional resources on the issues mentioned above can be found from Lutherans for Life (lutheransforlife.org) and the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (evangelicalfellowship.ca).