5 Reasons To Rejoice For The Overturning Of Roe
Protests outside the Supreme Court after the overturning of Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022. Creative Commons photo.
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(OPINION) As pro-life believers across America are shouting for joy and giving thanks for the overturning of Roe, others are saying, “Look, we don’t like abortion either. But so many women in America are terrified right now, as if others can dictate what they do with their own bodies. So, let’s be a little more muted in our celebration. This is certainly not the time to gloat.”
How should we respond?
I certainly agree that 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, doing so with 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 day and night prayer for Roe to be reversed for years. Prayer meetings have been held for decades. Large rallies have been organized for supplication to the Lord. Millions and billions of prayers have reached the throne of God asking Him to have mercy on the unborn. People have fasted and 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 downright ungrateful, not to mention irreverent, if we failed to praise Him and worship 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.
That’s why a former Planned Parenthood worker wept on my radio show 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 — little hands and legs and eyes. (Never forget “Baby Malachi!”)
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 fewer 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. It can permit a behavior. Or it can 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. Women and their mothers and even grandmothers grew up with it as normative. Reversing it is a massive good.
Remember this principle as you read through the Old Testament. God hated unjust laws. It was important in His sight that they were 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, fewer abortions will mean fewer 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” women 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. But you must put 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 national, 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 choices.
This is now a fresh topic for discussion, giving us an opportunity to dismantle the pro-abortion rights 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 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. How we need God’s ongoing intervention in our land!
This column is republished with permission from Ask Dr. Brown.
Michael L. Brown, who has a doctorate from New York University, is founder and president of AskDrBrown Ministries and host of the nationally syndicated daily talk radio show “The Line of Fire,” and has served as a visiting or adjunct professor at seven leading seminaries. He is the author of more than 40 books and is devoted to helping spark revival in the church and a gospel-based moral and cultural revolution in society. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is a recognized leader in Jewish apologetics. His Twitter handle is @drmichaellbrown.