Ask Sam – The Sanctity of Human Life Episode 78

Host: Dr. Isaac Crockett

Co-host: Hon. Sam Rohrer

Note: This transcript is taken from a Stand in the Gap Today program aired on 1/16/26. To listen to the podcast, click HERE.

Disclaimer: While reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate transcription, the following is a representation of a mechanical transcription and as such, may not be a word for word transcript. Please listen to the audio version for any questions concerning the following dialogue.

Isaac Crockett:

Well, hello. Have you ever thought about this question? What is the most valuable resource on earth? If we look back historically, the Western hemisphere, North and South America, they were trying to find a shorter trade route for spices and things like that in the East Indies in India. And they ended up finding the new world and they ended up finding valuable metals, gold and silver and things like that. And they found that a valuable resource. Right now, there’s a lot of talk about what’s going on in Venezuela with oil and silver and valuable resources. There’s a lot of talk about Greenland, Greenland, Greenland, Greenland. We hear that a lot from our president, President Trump and others. And there’s a lot of valuable rare earth minerals there in Greenland, a lot of valuable location there compared to where it sits in the Arctic. But what is the most valuable resource on earth?

Well, hello. With that, I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett. And joining me today is the Honorable Sam Rohrer, the president of the American Pastors Network and the regular host of this Stand in the Gap Today program on this Friday edition. We’re going to do another Ask Sam because there’s so much going on. But this week we think about the sanctity of human life. On Sunday, many pastors will be talking. This is the Sanctity of Human Life Sunday about the sanctity of human life. And I think you can see where I’m going with that question. The most valuable resource is the human soul. It’s the human beings that are created in God’s image that are here on earth. And so with all that’s going on, Sam, I just want to talk with you about what the Bible teaches. And I want to look at maybe some different angles to the sanctity of human life that maybe sometimes gets brought up.

But what are some of the things that the Bible teaches us about human life being even more valuable, even more strategic than minerals or locations of land masses or islands or nations?

Sam Rohrer:

Well, Isaac, you’ve already kind of referred to it. I mean, to me, when even you phrasing this and setting up the program in this fashion by comparing and asking the question, what’s the most valuable asset? And comparing to minerals and land and continents or islands, whatever, and then people. I think it puts it in a right perspective because I think what ultimately happens there is that most of what governs our lives that impacts it more than anything else, I’m going to say is government and governmental policy, the laws that govern where we can go and what we can do and how we work and that kind of thing. So I think that’s obvious that that’s probably the one area. So when we look into that area called government, the question is, and what I have always believed is that we should measure government the way God measures that which is of importance.

Well, we know what God says is most important. It is the souls of man. How do we know that? Well, because God so loved the world. It wasn’t just the world. It was people who were in the world, the souls of men. And because of that, he sent his only son and that’s why Jesus Christ came and died on the cross and so that we could as fallen human beings could be reconciled back to our creator, God. So the Bible is all about that which God says is of greatest value. It’s not this earth, it’s not the stars above. It is human beings with a soul created in the image of God. So when government comes along, and which God established that, we can measure government and its relationship to whether or not God will bless them or not bless that nation based on do they reflect the priorities of God or do they worship as Romans one talks, worship the creation more than the creator.

So when I look at these things, Isaac, I look and I evaluate governmental policy, laws and all of that, the words that come out of a politician’s mouth based on, is what they are saying and are the actions that they’re taking measure up and are commensurate with the priorities that God has established in his word. If they do, then I say, “Amen, because I can expect God’s blessing.” When it’s not that way and it’s inverted, then I know that God’s blessing will turn into judgment. So I’m going to say that in a general sense about the way you said, but souls are valuable because they are eternal. Everything else will go away, but eternal, a soul will live everywhere somewhere. On Wednesday, Dr. Carl Broggi and I talked about the reality of hell is hell forever. And we talked about that aspect, but yes, the soul of man will live forever, literally live forever.

It’s either going to be with God in heaven or it’s going to be with the devil and hell created for the devil and his angels. That’s it. That’s why the value of the souls of man are number one and we can measure all things by that.

Isaac Crockett:

The worth of a soul so much there. And I love where you went with the government because that is a God-given authority, but it’s authority of what? It’s authority over nations, but it’s not just authority over landmasses. It’s the people that live in those lands. And you’re bringing up some really good points here, Sam. And I think opening up, I think we need to have some more Ask Sams on some of these things and looking at some global discussions on what’s going on and national sovereignty and government rights and where does one stop and another begin the right to protect others, even if it’s not those in our nation. If we can do good to help other people, we talk a lot about the persecuted church. There are many Christians in the Middle East being taken advantage of, being put in prison, even being killed.

So a lot of things that that brings up when we realize the worth of a soul, when we realize the eternity of a soul and that Jesus Christ can save a soul so that we don’t spend eternity and punishment, but have everlasting life in Jesus Christ. So a lot of things, but going all the way back to the beginning of the Bible, the book that means the beginning, Genesis chapter one, it tells us, we have in verses 26 to 27, we see that we’re declared uniquely created in the image of God. God said, let us, the triune God, God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit let us make man in our own image. Man, kind, human beings have been created something special, something inherently different. And we have a lot of questions on this, Sam. We’ll get into a lot of this, but as the world chases power and resources and victory and other things, what biblical principles remind us that really the security we’re seeking after the value, if you want to put it that way, that we’re looking for comes from God, from honoring him and ultimately everything, our lives, our souls and our eternal being where we’re going to spend eternity come from God.

I guess what does the Bible say about that, Sam, that should cause us to pause and to realize how important our lives are for the lives of others, including our friends and family and even our enemies, how important human life. That’s what sanctity of human life is all about. What are maybe some of these biblical principles that help us to focus on that today?

Sam Rohrer:

Well, we’re at our break, Isaac. How about if we deal with that when we come back into the next segment, okay?

Isaac Crockett:

There we go. All right, when we come back, we want to look at that. The worth of a soul, we talk a lot about abortion. When you hear sanctity of human life, I think we usually think about the abortion issue pro- life, but what are some of the other issues that go with that, that go along with these questions we’re talking to Sam about what about euthanasia? What about self-defense? What about war time? A lot of what abouts? And we’re going to try to get to some of these tough questions and see what Sam says when we come back right after this timeout. Welcome back to the program. I’m Isaac Crockett, and today we’re asking Sam questions, particularly about the sanctity of human life. And Sam, back to the question I ran out of time on our last segment, but how does a biblical worldview of truly honoring God and understanding his word, how does that help us have the right view of human life and what we call sanctity of human life?

Sam Rohrer:

I would answer that question, Isaac, because it applies if we’re straight on life, okay, we’re going to be straight on everything else, but there is something that actually precedes that in our thinking. At the end of the book, and I like to go here, at the end of the book of Ecclesiastes, King Solomon was making this and he wrote the book and he was looking back over his entire life and he was summing up everything and God had done so much for him. It was the heyday. It was the high day of the nation of Israel. The temple had been built. People from around the world were coming. God had made them so wealthy. The silver and gold in the nation was abundant and scripture talks about that. It was really something to behold. But at the end of the day, at the end of his life, King Solomon said, “Now, let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter.” The whole matter of what?

The whole matter of how you walk through life, the decisions that you make. And he could speak to that as a king of a nation. He could speak to that as someone who presided over the building of the temple where God came down and he actually, and his glory actually was in that temple. So he was speaking from a very, very lofty position, but he said, “Let’s hear at the conclusion of the whole matter.” Simply this, fear God and keep his commandments for this is the whole, the entire duty of man. Reason, for God will bring all things into account with every secret thought and sin and all will be reviewed before God. Now, the point there being is that in all the way through scripture, this is the point. Fear God leads to obedience, keep his commandments, his word.

Isaac, when that is done, all matters of life are kept in right priority, not just the matter of life, because we find out the value of life where from scripture, because of God’s attitude toward it. But we also find there about how to treat our neighbor, how to govern if we’re in a position of a political position in a nation. We find out how we are to raise up our children and what the attitude towards children are. It should be by fathers and mothers and everything, everything because the scripture speaks to all issues of life. So fearing God and committing to obedience to what he says is the single greatest way to keep priorities right, no matter who the person is or the position they may occupy. But from that, then we get why God feels life is so important.

Isaac Crockett:

I love that. It starts with the fear of God and knowledge of God, true wisdom creates a love for life and for human life. And when we think of sanctity of human life, I think the kind of the go- to topic is pro- life versus so- called pro- choice or pro- killing babies in the womb. And I do want to cover that, and then I want to go into some other areas that maybe don’t get discussed as much in regards to sanctity of human life. But Sam, I saw an alarming statistic recently, and that is that one of our youngest generations, generation Z, so there’s generation Z would basically be those people born from about 1997 until about 2015. So a lot of your college age and high school age young people, and the generation that’s even younger than that would be generation alpha. But the generation Z, I read that one third of that generation, over one third of that generation has already died.

And I think, okay, these are people on their teens and twenties, how could over one third of them already be dead? And it happened because of abortion. When we look at scripture, why do we see that abortion is, I guess you could say, it’s an assault on God’s creation, on his creativity, taking a life in the womb. How do we see that from the biblical worldview as really against what God has made?

Sam Rohrer:

Well, again, we’re back to the concept that life is a gift from God, all life. All life is a gift from God. And yes, I know you can combine in the Petri dish and unite a sperm and an egg and come up with something. And even that is getting into a realm that becomes a very difficult one. If that’s not really life, God has done it, but it’s the point being that life is a gift from God. Life is after the nature of God and because of the soul being connected to the life, it has great value. And scripture talks about, well, I go all the way back where we find God’s response to the taking of life wrongly was when Cain killed Abel and he was angry and God came to him and said, “Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the earth.” And why was that?

It was because it was innocent blood. Somebody took the life. Cain took the life of his brother and because God saw it and that blood called out to the God of heaven, we know that ultimately, as we find through scripture, God himself will hold people, nations, that he will hold them accountable. As the great judge of the universe, when human government does not protect and bring justice to those who take innocent blood, God himself will step in into nations and will bring them to collapse in judgment where they are allowing the taking of innocent blood. And that is the whole point. So whether it is a baby in a womb that’s innocent, represents a life, a soul, and they’re killed, which they were done all through the Old Testament, sacrificed babies to bail, or in modern Bail worship where people say, “Well, I have a choice.” And they take this life through some aspect of abortion, could be a pill or it could be a physical thing.

I mean, what happens is that when that happens, we are stepping into God’s domain and we are saying that what God says is valuable is not. And when we justify what God says that that is always called murder, the taking of innocent life, God says, “You don’t deal with that, I will deal with that. ” Long-term consequences, short-term. So when you talk about a generation coming up that has so thin and small, because we’ve killed them all through abortion in this country, 60 million, that’s a consequence economically, that’s a consequence to the nation, but there’s a consequence from God’s perspective because of the sin that that represents. So I mean, there’s so many things involved in it, but it starts with God’s action and what he says is important and he’s made very clear that taking of innocent blood will bring judgment from him.

Isaac Crockett:

Okay. So God values life, the taking of innocent life. Now you’ve used a word there, not just the taking of human life, but of innocent. And so that takes me to another question that sometimes gets brought up, some things that try to muddy the water sometimes. And that is in Romans 13, I think it’s verse four that Paul says that authorities are called to wield the sword for justice, which would sounds like capital punishment. It also, going back to Exodus 22 and other places throughout old, and I would say we could probably argue from the New Testament as well, we see self-defense. And so now you’re not talking about innocent life, you’re talking about defending oneself and possibly taking the life of somebody else. There are certain instances where that is permitted is what it would appear from the Bible. So could you maybe talk about that same because sometimes people will bring this up and say, “We should never fight.

There should be no war. There should be no capital punishment. There’s no right even to defend yourself with lethal force.” Could you talk about how that should be, but at the same time, the attitude that we should have, we shouldn’t be bloodthirsty cheering for the death of somebody. I can.

Sam Rohrer:

I’ll try to do as quickly as possible because see, this understanding of this is the understanding of that which comprises our law in this nation. There’s a difference between murder, premeditated murder, taking of innocent life and manslaughter as an example where a life is taken, but it wasn’t for accidents. It was a car accident or something of that type where it was not intentional. And scripture makes it very, very clear. The 10 commandments gives the guidance for a moral law and the underpinning of what constitutes justice, six command, thou shalt not murder. That is premeditated murder. It says thou shalt not kill, but the Hebrews thou shalt not murder. It’s a premeditated because in the expansion on that law, in the book of Exodus and elsewhere, God made it very, very clear that the state, the government, Romans 13, that carries the sword, can take life that is capital punishment, but it’s in the context always of enacting justice.

Justice according to what? Well, as God laid it out. Well, how did God lay it out? God made it very clear in the Old Testament that when a life is taken, blood is shed, an innocent person, premeditated murder, that government has the responsibility to take the life of the murderer. That’s where capital punishment came from. That was always the basis for our law in this country and because it’s on the basis that God’s justice, blood for blood, you take the blood of an innocent person, government operating under the justice of God says, “No, your life must be taken.” That was capital punishment. It all fits with the justice of God when we understand it, God’s way.

Isaac Crockett:

So Sam, thank you for that clarification. This goes back to the justice of God. This goes back to fearing God, knowing God through his word, fearing him, and then having a love for human life, a sanctity of human life. A lot of good points you’re making there. I think we could spend a lot more time on every one of these areas, but when we come back, we want to look at loving our neighbors and loving our enemies. What does that have to do? All right. Well, welcome back to Stand in the Gap today. If you’re just joining us, I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett. Today is a Friday edition and Ask Sam Friday edition, and we’ve been talking about sanctity of human life, looking at some angles that maybe don’t always get brought into play with sanctity of human life. Of course, we hear a lot about abortion or euthanasia, but looking at even the right to defend ourselves, even with lethal force or the right for the government to take somebody’s life.

And Sam, you brought us back to this idea of innocent life versus the government’s duty to take the life, for example, of a murderer or something like that. Before we get back in to more on sanctity of human life, I don’t know if I talked to you about this ahead, Sam, but we do have a special Sunday we focus on a return to God Sunday. Sam, I don’t know if you would want to say anything about that right now or not, because then after that, we’ll jump right back into our topic of the day with more questions for you.

Sam Rohrer:

Well, I can just briefly. Yes, we every year, actually for several years now, Isaac, we have been emphasizing as a part of APN and emphasizing and encouraging pastors in particular, our people listening to encourage their pastors to take a day, February, coming up in February, the first Sunday of February is when we’re doing it this year, emphasizing. It doesn’t have to be done that Sunday, but we’re looking towards that, is to emphasize the important aspect for us as a nation and as people. And that is our need to return to God. And that’s how we’ve call it. Return to God Sunday. We have materials on the website, on the American Pastors Network website that people can access and use and help. And it’s actually a guide that’s there. Dr. Jamie Mitchell, one of our co-hosts has actually produced kind of like a guide, day by day guide that people can follow through for the week prior.

But even what we’re talking about here, Isaac, the fact that as a nation, we’ve taken so much innocent blood. The fact that we have a generation coming up that’s been effectively depleted because we’ve killed over 65 million babies. I mean, just to say that is just unbelievable, but there are consequences short term and long term to not following God’s words. So as we’ve talked about, what is the most important that people fear God? Look to God and say, “I want to know more.” That choice to pursue truth will end up taking any person. Scripture of Proverbs says, “You choose truth, respond to the light that you have before us. It will lead you to the light, the truth, and the way who is, of course, Jesus Christ, the way the life and the truth.” And so returning to God, the emphasis of return to God is to say, “Get our eyes off ourself, get our eyes off of Washington, get our eyes off of Moscow, get our eyes off of Belgium, Brussels, the European Union.

Get our eyes off of these things which cannot deliver what they promise other than misery, but focus on the Lord Jesus Christ, the word of God, return to God.” That is why we’re emphasizing it and that’s coming up and we’d encourage people to check into that.

Isaac Crockett:

Sam, thank you for that. And I want to go back now to the Ecclesiastes passage that you cited. I think that was last segment. I didn’t know you were going to go there, but I’m really glad you did. At the end of Ecclesiastes, I believe it’s chapter 12, I think it’s like the last or second to last verse that you were quoting that the end of the matter, once everything has been heard, he boils it all down. What is life all about? And he says, “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man, to fear God and keep his commandments.” And then so we say, “Well, what is God commanding me? What does the Lord that God require of that? ” Well, in Matthew chapter five on Jesus’ famous sermon on the mount, verse 44, he gives us a commandment.

He says, “I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you. ” Sam, I want to have just a discussion here on some things that again, I think this ties into the sanctity of human life. I think this ties into fearing God and obeying his commandment, and that is loving our neighbors as ourselves, but going beyond, as Jesus taught more than just our neighbors, loving those that hate us, loving our enemies, as well as, and this is throughout the Old Testament and New Testament, but strangers and sojourners in the land. And we could think about refugees and immigration. How do we think biblically on that? Because I think every one of these points, Sam, are kind of like walking through a landmine almost with the political correctness and with people taking sides, “I’m pro this or I’m anti this or anti this.

” And to try to walk biblically, Sam is getting harder and harder it seems. So let’s talk here with loving our neighbors, Matthew 22, but then taking Matthew five, loving our enemies even. How does this really call us to value and show sanctity of human life, compassion on people, even people that we strongly oppose what they’re standing for?

Sam Rohrer:

Isaac, what Jesus is laying out there and the sermon on the mound took what the Jews at that point that were under the law, which we know the law, no one was able to keep the law and the purpose of the law was to bring them to Christ because they said, “Well, we can’t do it. Even if we try to, we can’t keep all of the laws, so therefore we need a savior.” That’s what Jesus coming was all about. But Jesus took that sermon on the mountain. He took every one of those 10 commandments and he even took and went beyond what they said, which made it further impossible, but ultimately he was holding it up so that the pattern becomes him, Jesus Christ. He becomes the model. What should a Christian be like? We should be Christ like. That is not just the law, but we think like an act like Christ.

God who loved the world sent his son. Jesus came, God of heaven, king of heaven voluntarily submitted himself. That’s our attitude should be. And he came and he walked among the people that he made. Unbelievable. So what should that tell us about our attitude? There isn’t anybody around us that we’re better than them. No, we should be the servant all. Well, Jesus talked about that. And when he said, “Love those your neighbor, it was because he loved us and he is our pattern.” Loving our enemies goes even further because if it’s somebody’s really your enemy and has threatened to kill you, how can you love them? Well, if you cut their soul out and took away that which was them, that part that God so loved the world for that he sent his son. If we cut that part out, well then who cares? But I care and Jesus cares because even that enemy needs a savior and that enemy has a soul of great value.

That’s in part why we should pray for those who are in authority, even if they’re not good people. We pray for them, and if nothing else, that they would submit themselves to the God of heaven, that they would come and be reconciled to the God of heaven through Jesus Christ. We ought to pray for that. And when in this world, when it’s filled with nothing but hate and division, we see that all around us. I mean, the entire political world is nothing but hate and cutting down and all of that. How remarkably a difference it is when someone speaks in terms of, “I know I don’t agree with you, but I love your soul.” Man, you talk about changing the discussion in politics today, if that were the case. It’s powerful in what it does, but it follows the model of God loving the world in Jesus Christ, coming as a servant to man.

All

Isaac Crockett:

Right, Sam, you’ve hinted a little bit on this, but we get people who are pro- abortion and pro euthanasia and things like that, but then all of a sudden they say, “Well, look at you Christians. You are not loving the sojourner and you should allow open borders and immigration, just free immigration anywhere. And if you don’t, then you’re not really pro- life.” That’s kind of one of the arguments we hear. What right does a nation like the United States or other nations have to restrict people from coming in? And we’ve seen this in Democratic … I mean, President Obama, President Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Democratic Senators, as well as Republican presidents and senators have enforced immigration laws when they were in control, but is there any biblical backing to that that we can say, “Hey, I love life, human life, but yes, I have the right as a government to limit who comes into our nation.”

Sam Rohrer:

Isaac, Absolutely. And how can a country get so far off? When we understand that from the scripture, any nation has a common border, a common religion, and in a common language. That’s the definition of a nation. And when it comes to Israel, Israel is our pattern. Did God instruct Israel as a nation who was to fear God, keep my commandments and I will bless you. They started that way. They walked away. Did God instruct them about the stranger and immigrant? He absolutely did. Second Chronicles talks about it. Isaiah talks about it. Two types of strangers in the scripture, two different Hebrew words. One is a person, not a citizen, who comes into your country with the intent to create harm. You don’t let them in. You qualify those who come in. We used to qualify those who came in. That is appropriate. It doesn’t say open the door.

It says, no, you don’t. Because if they come in with the intent to harm, you are facilitating and enabling perhaps a murderer, a destroyer of property, which the government is supposed to punish them so that they don’t harm the lawbreaker or the lawkeeper. But the other stranger is that God designed Israel to be, that our founders understood. When you become a light on the hill, William Penn prayed for that, that we become a shining city on a hill. The point was when you have a light, just like at light at night, the math is flawed to it. When you have a nation that lifts up the light and is blessed of God, people from around the world will want to come. They will be attracted. And God told Israel, if they come and they want to become a part of the blessings there, and they want to know who the God is that made it possible, then you point them to the God of heaven.

You let them come in because they will be good citizens.

Isaac Crockett:

This is great, Sam. So good. We’re going to take a quick time out and we’re going to come back and talk about that our real hope is in Jesus Christ and it’s in his return. He has promised that he could return to any day. Our hope is in heaven. Our hope is in Jesus Christ and even in his return, we’re going to get into this as we wrap this program up when we come back after this. In a fallen world of death and suffering, a world that seems to be obsessed with death and violence, a world that does not value human life, as we have been taught, a world that does not fear God and keep his commandments. It is so important that we don’t get caught up in that. It’s so important if you know Jesus Christ as Savior, if you have a biblical worldview that you don’t get discouraged and despair, but rather that you look forward to seeing Jesus Christ face to face.

With that, I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett. I’m talking to the honorable Sam Rohrer. We are wrapping up our program today on the sanctity of human life. And we’re going a little bit off of where maybe you normally hear the conversation go when it goes to sanctity of human life. And we have talked about what that means. And it means fearing God. It means loving God and loving what God has created. And therefore loving even, and this is so hard to talk about, but even loving our enemies and even praying for those who despise us and persecute us. And Sam, I just want to read real quickly here before I turn it over to you as we wrap things up. But from one Thessalonians chapter four, Paul is describing to the churches, he says that, “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so will we always be with the Lord.

Therefore, encourage one another with these words.” In fact, I’m sorry, I forgot the first before that, that the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry, the voice of the archangel with the sound of the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first. He’s describing what we often refer to as the rapture. And he says, the purpose of all of that, after we meet the Lord in the air, the reason he’s telling them that is so that we can encourage one another with these words. Sam, you’re talking about things. There’s threats against human life that we’ve talked about, but let’s talk about our ultimate hope that scripture gives us and how this passage and others like it give us hope even with the death that’s all around us, even with the lack of value for human life around us. Can you just talk to us a little bit about that hope we have in Jesus Christ and in his return?

Sam Rohrer:

Absolutely. Be glad to do that, Isaac. And you already said a lot in what you just said when you opened this segment, that one of the great things for every true believer, what they will say when you ask them about their testimony as what we would say it, they will talk about that day. They moved from death to life, from being a dead man, a scripture calls. We are dead in our trespasses and sins. We have no mechanism. We are not reaching out for God and the Lord quickens. The Holy Spirit will quicken us and there’s a whole lot we can’t explain and all that, but he gives a desire there. And when we put our faith and trust and agree with God, that salvation is only through Jesus Christ, his son. Salvation is really more agreement with God than anything. We put our faith, we trust in what God says and says, “All right, I may not understand it, but I believe it.

Yes, I put my children.” All right, we move from death to life, life eternal. Now, in reality, that life eternal is life with Jesus Christ forever in heaven so that when we die and when that rapture occurs and if we may be alive, we will go at that point that wherever Jesus is, we will be. That’s what it means. Wherever Jesus is, we will be. Now, that’s life eternal, but the hard thing to understand is why we should be so concerned and pray for our neighbors and even our enemies who have souls for which Jesus died is that they also have life in a different way. It is forever life in hell, totally forever separated from God. And scripture talks about that where they go to a place where their worm dieth not and there is pain and suffering forever and ever and ever and ever.

Why? Because the soul lives forever and ever and ever. Our desire for those of us who know life through Jesus Christ, he is the life and the way that our concern is as we talk about sermon on amount, we pray for those who are our neighbors. We reach out to them and say, “Do you know about life eternal? Let me tell you my experience.” So even witnessing is not a hard thing to do. We don’t have to know every aspect of theology. We just need to say, “Do you know what? I found food. I found life, Jesus Christ.” Can I just share with you that? That’s all one needs to do and the Holy Spirit will do the rest of the work in that. But that is the basis for it. That’s the basis for why we value life. That’s for why, because that life has that soul had enough great importance to God, that government and then others respects that life and brings justice to those who takes that life.

Ultimately, who is the taker of life? It is Satan himself. He’s the one who says, “No, I want to be God.” And so what’s the mission that he’s been on since he tempted Adam and even the garden right to this very day and will increase in the days ahead is that he wants to bring death and destruction to all humankind. If he could, he would prevent every living soul, every person, he would take them with him to hell and does not want them to know the gospel, which is why we have to be so careful that we are not deceived and distracted by all those things that are happening. And we who do know the truth, who are true believers, that we don’t get distracted and get caught up on other things and move away from that which is most important. And that is really the sharing of the gospel, living our lives as light and salt so that those around us will come and say, “Wow, how can you have peace in the middle of the storm?” “Oh, wow.

How can you be calm when everything is just falling apart? “Well, let me tell you about it because my faith is in Jesus Christ, he’s in charge of all things and he’s coming back soon and I know where I’m going to be. That kind of hope really is an amazing thing, but that’s what we ought to do. That’s why we’re here.

Isaac Crockett:

That’s why God created us. And in the last book of the Bible, the revelation of God to Jesus Christ to John who wrote it down then, it says in chapter 21, it says,” Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will be with them as their God. “This is talking about the new heaven and earth. And in verse four, it says,” He will wipe away every tear from their eyes and death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore for the former things have passed away. “And it says that he who says on the throne says,” Behold, I’m making all things new. “Same when we look at that, how does that give us the real perspective? Real life is looking forward to eternity. It’s not seeing what I can get here and now, how I can step on others to work my way up the ladder.

And then when I die, it’s all over. Real life is planning for eternity with God himself. How do we prepare for that? How do we live faithfully today so that we can be prepared for forever?

Sam Rohrer:

Well, it brings back to what we started with at the beginning, Isaac. Our priority starts with fearing God and committing to holy living, keeping his commandments. And it’s what Jesus said in that same passage in Matthew,” Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven. Get your priorities right, and then all of these things will be added unto you. “The idea of laying up not treasure on earth with where moths and rust gets away, but laying up treasure in heaven, because that’s where we’re going to be. This life here, we think I’m 70 years old, a little bit over. I mean, seems like a long time. It’s nothing. It is absolutely nothing compared to eternity. Yet we oftentimes think that this life, waking up tomorrow is the end all. No, it’s not. Waking up in glory is the end all. And I know that if I don’t wake up tonight, I’m going to be with the Lord.

So I’m not disturbed when I go to sleep. And in the fear of all those things that are happening, people who don’t know the Lord, they ought to fear dying, but they don’t have to fear death if they trust in Jesus Christ. So it’s that. The Bible just gives us the answers to everything we need. We just need to do it.

Isaac Crockett:

That is so good. Well, thank you, Sam. Thank you for listening today. And if you know Jesus Christ, if you have put your faith in Jesus, you have believed on him as your Lord and Savior, then do not be discouraged. Do not be afraid. Put your faith in him every day. If you haven’t, please put your faith in Jesus Christ even now. Until next time, I hope you’ll stand in the gap for truth wherever you are.