But medical ethics involves more than the issue of abortion. Stem cell research, euthanasia, organ donation, and when to terminate treatment are some of the many areas where people struggle to find answers.Many people struggle for answers because they begin with wrong assumptions and principles. For example, if the question of when human life begins could be satisfactorily answered for everyone, then questions of when human life should legally be protected are easier to answer.
Two Biblical principles give insight and clarity to these issues. First, human life is unique, deserving dignity and respect because all humans are descendants of Adam. Genesis 1:26-27 teach that man was created in the image of God. We may not know all the details of what that phrase "image of G
od" means, but one truth is clear: Only man has the image of God; animals do not. And since all people are descended from Adam, then all people bear the image of God, even if that image is marred and deformed through sin, disease, or accident.Second, human life begins at conception. The Bible does not tell us everything, but the Bible does tell us enough. Psalm 139:13-16 and Jeremiah 1:5 are two texts which reveal the working of God in the unborn. The only position that is consistent with the Bible and with what we are learning about the life of a baby before birth is that human life begins at conception. Otherwise, all we have left is ethical chaos and pragmatic & convenient demagoguery (which even a casual look at bioethics journals will show).
Does believing that human life begins at conception solve all the ethical problems? No. In fact, it will create a few problems. But it is the only position that fits the evidence, Biblical and scientific.
What is so revealing is that many people will never accept that human life begins at conception, no matter what evidence is presented. Many have a personal agenda of "Me First" and no amount of Bible, logic, or science will change their mind. What principles they have are based on convenience and comfort, not what is right or true.
A person’s attitudes about the weak, the disabled, the sick, the dying, and the unborn are a picture window into his soul and what he really believes about God. Babies who are born with severe deformities and elderly patients with painful, terminal illnesses are situations which test and refine our thinking about God.
The Bible explicitly states (many times) that God is sovereign over life and death, health and sickness, the good and the bad (Deut. 32:39; 1 Sam. 2:6; Isaiah 45:6-7). Once a person rejects the sovereignty of God in these areas, ethical confusion dominates the thinking. For example, what degree of abnormality justifies abortion and who will decide? What is "quality of life" and what criteria will we use to decide? How does a person really know his heart? Does he wish to terminate life because of compassion for the one suffering or does he have other motives? How can we sure what our motives are?
Although those who support abortion, embryonic stem cell research, and euthanasia believe they are honoring human life by their actions, in reality they are dishonoring human life by sacrificing the most helpless and weak for the strong. One day, the strong will bec
ome the weak and will themselves be used for the benefit of those stronger.Bioethics without a Biblical basis is essentially ethics without boundaries (or boundaries which regularly change) and a confusing and empty quest for answers. In today’s pluralistic America, those who believe the Bible have a duty and right to speak out in support of life and oppose a culture of death.
