Imagine a Friday night at a high school football game somewhere in the Missouri. A little girl in the bleachers suddenly begins choking. Her face turns blue. Her father struggles to help her breathe while someone screams for a nurse. A stranger calls 911. Within seconds, the score of the game means absolutely nothing. Every person watching understands that a little girl’s life hangs in the balance.
Just beyond the stadium fence, a dead sparrow lies beside the sidewalk. Hundreds of people have walked past it without a second thought. Why does one life stir such urgency while the other barely receives a glance?
Deep within the human conscience is the recognition that a little girl possesses something the sparrow never could. Scripture tells us why. She was made in the image of God.
We recognize it too. Yet when the conversation turns toward abortion, we often struggle to explain why human life carries such extraordinary worth. Missouri’s Amendment 3 has brought that question before us again.
On November 3, Missourians will vote on an amendment bearing the same number as the one approved in 2024, though it would move the law in the opposite direction. The 2024 amendment placed reproductive-health rights, including abortion through fetal viability in our state constitution. A yes vote this year would repeal that provision and permit restrictions limiting abortion to specified exceptions. A no vote would leave the 2024 provision in place.
The proposal allows abortions in medical emergencies, for certain fetal anomalies, and in cases of rape or incest before twelve weeks. It also provides for parental or judicial consent for minors, protects care for miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies, and would constitutionally prohibit specified gender-transition procedures for minors. The Secretary of State’s ballot language deserves careful reading.
I served on the Missouri Baptist Convention’s Resolutions Committee as we helped prepare language for the messengers’ consideration. This week, the convention adopted a resolution urging a yes vote on Amendment 3 and calling for care for women, children and families. A resolution expresses the judgment of the messengers. Every Christian should examine the proposal carefully.
For me, the biblical question begins in Genesis, long before any constitution was written. God made man in His own image, male and female. He is the Maker of every material thing. He alone is infinite, eternal and unchangeable. We live in time, occupy one place at a time and change as the years pass.
Yet God made us in His likeness. He is wise and we are capable of wisdom. He is just and even fallen people have a sense of justice. When we are wronged, we know it. When someone suffers, our conscience recognizes the injury. We are creatures who can think about truth and error, right and wrong and the God who made us.
Sin has terribly defaced that image, but it has never destroyed it. The elderly man whose strength has faded, the child whose life has barely begun, and every person between them still bears the image of God, utterly unique among the living things of this earth. We may disagree sharply about what government ought to do, but the Christian understanding of human dignity begins here.
After the flood, God told Noah, “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed; for in the image of God He made man” (Genesis 9:6). Scripture places great weight upon human life. The prohibition against murder rests on the value of the person whose life is taken. You can’t play fast and loose with human life. It is a sacred thing.
That concern extends beyond the moment someone dies. The biblical law speaks about the man who knows his ox is dangerous and still allows it to harm a neighbor. It recognizes a moral difference between an accident and danger knowingly ignored. The owner who understands that his vehicle has faulty brakes cannot simply hope that nothing will happen. A neighbor’s life requires active concern.
And Scripture speaks about life in the womb. When Mary visited Elizabeth, the unborn Jesus was already called “my Lord” (Luke 1:43). The child was still hidden from sight, yet His humanity was never in question. The protection of life reaches every age and state of health.
I also acknowledge the terrible difficulty of a pregnancy in which a mother’s life and her child’s life may both be in danger. Both lives are sacred. We should be cautious with easy answers when others must make decisions under such circumstances.
Whatever happens in the voting booth, our concern for life must be visible in our churches. A mother facing a frightening diagnosis needs more than our opinion. Families need help with food, shelter and the daily burdens of raising children. The injured neighbor requires attention. Human life is sacred and Scripture calls us to protect, sustain, and cherish it wherever we find it.
Jesus said that life is more than the body. Our bodies will die, yet the soul’s existence does not end at the grave. The most urgent work of the church is therefore bound up with the everlasting soul and the message of salvation.
The Son of God entered our humanity in Mary’s womb. He lived without sin, bore the judgment sinners deserve, died upon a cross and rose from the grave. Everyone who turns to Him in repentance and faith receives forgiveness and everlasting life.
The God who made us in His image has opened the way for fallen people to be reconciled to Him. The concern for life must reach beyond an election and the years a person spends on earth.
After prayerfully considering the Scriptures and the language of the amendment, I have decided to vote yes on Amendment 3.