FREE PRESBYTERIANS STILL REJECT SAME SEX MARRIAGE

The Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster views the introduction of same sex marriage in Northern Ireland on January 13th with deep concern. In keeping with the teaching of Scripture and consistent with our position as a Christian denomination we will only recognise marriages between biological male and female. 
Therefore, in exercising their freedom of thought, conscience and religion we wish to make it absolutely plain that we anticipate that ministers in our denomination will not be conducting same sex marriages in any of our churches.

Marriage is a holy institution given by God for the monogamous, lifelong, marital union of men and women.

As apostasy from God and His Word deepens in our nation, all kinds of immorality abound throughout society. The consequence of this increasing immorality is that God’s institution of marriage is constantly treated with scorn as a sinful people give vent to their corrupt lusts. 

Sadly, in a relatively short period of time, there has been an alarming abandonment of the teaching of Scripture on marriage as ordained by God. This contempt for Biblical marriage includes, not only the abandonment of it as a divine institution, but also direct attack upon it in the promotion and acceptance of so-called same-sex marriage. 

The legislation of same sex marriage violates the law of God as Creator and offends God as the Judge of all. We would remind the powers that be of the Scriptural warning that God is not mocked and that legislators of evil will be called to give account at the Great Judgment Day.

“…for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.” Revelation 1:9

Day of Defiance

Monday the 21^st October is a notable date in the calendar of Northern Ireland for all the wrong reasons. It has been termed by many the “darkest day”. A day when the abortion law that has saved the lives of over 100,000 babies was liberalised, a day when marriage is to be redefined to include that which is contrary to God’s law.

These changes are not being implemented as a result of a decision by the citizens of Northern Ireland nor by the majority of their elected representatives but have been forced on the people following decisions at Westminster and the fact that the Northern Ireland assembly is not functioning.

We commend those MLA’s who signed a petition to trigger a recall of the Assembly on Monday and who sought to introduce the “Defence of the Unborn Child Bill 2019”. Sadly, other parties did not have the same interest or desire to preserve the life of the unborn child despite all their talk of equality and tolerance.

The moral landscape of Northern Ireland has changed overnight and not for the better.

We now have a society where there is the potential to have the most liberal abortion laws in Europe.

Instead of the mother’s womb being a place of safety it could now be the place of death. There is now the very real possibility that a child conceived through an act of sexual crime will be put to death for the crimes of the father. Likewise, a child thought to have abnormalities instead of receiving dedicated care and affection, may be unwanted and discarded by abortion. The little one who has offended no one could be aborted and put to death if viewed as an inconvenience.

God’s institution of marriage, an illustration of Christ’s relationship with His Church (Eph 5:25) is to be changed to include that which is corrupt and sinful, that which is condemned in the Word of God.

In both of these cases, no consideration has been given to those who may object or have a differing point of view. 

We hear much about Human Rights, tolerance, equality but does it exist for the medical professionals who have devoted their lives to the preservation of human life and oppose abortion?

Does it exist for those who hold to the Biblical definition of marriage?

What has happened is the mark of a secular, sinful, selfish world. 

Paul writes in-

2 Timothy 3:1-5 This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. 

² For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 

³ Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,

⁴ Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; 

⁵ Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

The well-known verse in John 3:16 tells us that “God so loved the world that he gave”. This is the essence of the Gospel. A God that loves and One that gave, what a contrast with the world we live in. The Lord Jesus Christ in giving His life for fallen man was selfless but what we have seen taken place in Northern Ireland reveals the sinful selfish heart of mankind.

Despite the darkness, there is hope for fallen man. In love and grace, God has provided salvation for the repentant sinner and that applies to those involved in abortion and homosexuality.

In such a time we are reminded that God is sovereign, that Christians have a duty to pray and to witness. Regardless of what society is doing, we are still to “preach Christ crucified”!

Presbytery Statement on impending Abortion Legislation.

TIME TO BE A VOICE FOR THE VOICELESS

Our nation is counting down the days – until the 31st October.  Will our Parliament finally deliver on the expressed will of its people, or will it trigger yet another mechanism by which to invoke another delay to, if not revoke the result of, the referendum?

Of greater concern to us in Northern Ireland than any Brexit deadline is the fact that we can see the whites of the eyes of another cut-off point and can hear the clock ticking on a much more sinister countdown.  One that threatens to put out eyes before they can open; to close the ears of that child whose sensory faculties are rapidly developing inside the womb of its mother; to mechanically – and monstrously – revoke that child’s right ever to live, or learn to speak, or cheer, or vote. 

Exhilaration

While for some – the kind of people who recently celebrated with air punches and cheers in New South Wales, Australia, after they overturned an 119-year-old law against abortion and replaced it with a most radically permissive regime; and those who in May 2018 when the barriers to abortion fell in the Republic of Ireland threatened “The North is next!” – 21st October 2019 cannot come quickly enough; yet for many in Northern Ireland this is a date to be dreaded.

Extremity

It is horrendous to think that our province has been railroaded to such a degree that from being the safest place in the British Isles for an unborn baby she will accommodate one of the most extreme abortion regimes in the world, with little to no protections for anyone, including our health workers, but especially the most defenceless, the unborn child.

As one Australian MP recently depicted it, this is “the slavery debate of our time” and laws imposed upon Northern Ireland without local consultation gives the green light to our own version of the notoriously wicked Holocaust.  

Euphemisms

Naturally this is disputed by those in our society who perversely portray abortion as a   “progressive” measure.  It does not seem to register with them that the murder of the most defenceless of our society should never be couched in terms of advancement.

The euphemisms employed to deliberately mask and minimise the crude, cruel dismemberment of a living child in its mothers’ womb are not only threadbare but terrifying.  In a calculated effort to diminish the horror, terms are pulled into play such as, “a woman’s right to choose,” the deceptive, “a compassionate response to crisis pregnancy,” or the ridiculous description, “healthcare.”  Since when did we take pleasure in healthcare that is locked into only one outcome – death?  Abortion is neither health care nor a woman’s right:  it is murder; the unjustifiable, unconscionable, sinful slaughter of the innocent.  It is a completely bewildering sight to witness some political parties vigorously campaign to outlaw smacking a child, yet at the same time support the violent killing of a child in the womb.

Education

When we permit God’s Word to be our educator, we discover that the weight of Biblical evidence indicates that the Lord considers the unborn child to be a person – therefore that child’s life should be protected as other people’s lives are protected.  The Scriptures plainly teach:

• As a basic commandment (number 6), “Thou shalt not kill.”

• In many passages in the Bible the child in the womb is described as a person:  “The children struggled within her” (Rebekah, Genesis 25:22); Elizabeth “conceived a son in her old age” (Luke 1:36&57); “the babe leaped in her womb” (Luke 1:41).

• God’s judgment always falls on those who slay the unborn (2 Kings 8:11-12; 15:16; Amos 1:13).

• God requires the same punishment for killing a child in the womb as He does for killing a man (Exodus 21:22-23).

Earnestness

With these facts in mind and the deadline quickly approaching, I appeal to Julian Smith MP, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, to recognise the mobilisation of local public sentiment on this issue, to remember the previous votes of the Stormont Assembly not to relax our abortion law, to redress the ambush on our democracy launched and facilitated by the unwarranted interventions of Stella Creasy and John Bercow respectively, and recall the Stormont Assembly before 21 October so that our own elected representatives can take the necessary action both to prevent this law coming into effect and so stop this Death March before it is allowed to begin.  Only by this means will we raise a necessary voice for the voiceless and reverse one of the most wicked impositions of our times:  “Open thy mouth for the dumb in the cause of all such as are appointed to destruction” (Proverbs 31:8).

Rev. Ian Brown

Minister, Martyrs Memorial Free Presbyterian Church,

on behalf of the General Presbytery of the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster.