From the beginning of time, God has always been straightforward in His communication with mankind — particularly when it comes to what is right and what is wrong. We see God’s first example of this simplicity when He created Adam and Eve. In the Garden of Eden God did not set up a complicated code of laws, or even a set of 10 commandments. He had just one law:

Don’t eat the apple!

While God’s law was simple and unambiguous, it was quickly complicated by the first couple. When Satan came slithering up to Eve in the form of a serpent to tempt her, Eve embellished God’s law. Eve complicated God’s simplicity by adding her own new requirement and interpretation:

Don’t eat the apple … or touch it!

From that day to this present one, man has continued to add to, embellish, interpret, and complicate God’s laws. We have attempted to “perfect” what cannot be perfected. By doing so, we have complicated what is simple. And we have altered what God established.

In our day, there is perhaps no greater example of man’s altering and complicating God’s simple and perfect law than in the battle for life.

The second major sin ever recorded by God in the Bible was the taking of an innocent life. We read in Genesis 4 that Cain killed Abel, his righteous brother. Since that day, man has been prematurely ending the most precious gift ever given to man: life.

God was so displeased with man’s evil actions that He “complicated” His original law and established 10 commandments. Amongst that list of 10 laws is this one simple command:

Thou shalt not kill!

Simple. Unambiguous. Direct.

Yet man has debated, argued, defined, redefined, and will continue to complicate a simple standard.

What is life? When does it begin? When does it end? Under what scenario is it right to end life?

While man confuses, Jesus, the Son of God, simplifies and uncomplicates. Man muddies. Jesus clarifies.

When Jesus walked the earth, He regularly confronted the leaders of His day, both political and religious. As He did, Jesus would dismantle the complicated systems that these leaders had built up. And when it came to life, Jesus could not have been more clear about the standard God established.

One day Jesus was confronted with the opportunity to heal a man. But doing so would have violated the complicated requirements that the Jewish leaders had established. These leaders had taken one of the original 10 commandments, “Keep the sabbath holy,” and they had built around that simple standard an entire laundry list of codes and requirements. By doing so, the elite “interpreted” what man could and couldn’t do.

But Jesus, the very Author of life, obliterated the complicated reasoning of the elite when He had this to say:

“Then he (Jesus) turned to his critics and asked, ‘Does the law permit good deeds on the Sabbath, or is it a day for doing evil? Is this a day to save life or to destroy it?’ But they wouldn’t answer him.” —Mark 3:4

In one sentence, Jesus destroyed every argument, debate, and discussion about the worthiness of every child in the womb. And this is the question every politician, judge, activist, and expectant mommy and daddy in America should ask themselves:

“Is this a day to save life or destroy it?”

Simple. Uncomplicated. Clear. Unambiguous.

When a heart is beating, we have two options:

Save life: Allow the heart to continue to beat.

Destroy life: End the beating of that little heart.

Last week I wrote about Annie, a little girl whose life was destroyed because her mother allowed politicians, laws, peers, and her own personal desires to complicate God’s simple standard. Since the writing of my story last week (An Aborted Life: The Thoughts and Dreams of Baby Annie), 30,000 little Annies and Johnnys have been lost in America — their lives destroyed because the hearts of 30,000 mothers and fathers were confused. They were deceived into believing that taking a life in the womb is okay because man’s law allows them to do so.

But there is only one righteous standard for life. It is God’s, not man’s. So when God established the standard, “Thou shalt not kill,” there is a very clear and uncomplicated way for knowing if we have violated His law, as it applies to little Annie in the womb:

Do we save life or destroy life?

Regardless of whether you believe you have a right to control what goes on inside your body, if you end your pregnancy, are you saving life or destroying life? Is the heart beating? Will your “pro-choice” belief stop the beating of that little heart?

If you are a mommy with a little heart beating inside your womb, I pray you will call out to God for His strength to save life and reject the temptation to destroy life.  If you will call upon God, He will offer you the grace to help in your time of need.