Can There Be Good Without God? Part 2

by: Gary L. Hutchens

​   As pointed out in the first article in this series there is no way to define goodness objectively without God.  Any attempt to find a reliable standard of goodness without God fails.  All human standards that might be suggested are subjective, based upon personal feelings at a given point in time.  Feelings are different from person to person, and they change from point in time to point in time.  True goodness is a constant truth that does not change, based upon our eternal God being the standard.  The inability to define goodness without God is powerful proof of His existence.

​   But society continues to strip God from the picture as it fumbles around trying to design good laws and regulations for its people.  Another case in point is the recent new law passed by the New York state legislature regarding abortion.
   The new law in essence allows abortion until the moment of delivery, supposedly conditioned upon the health of the prospective mother.  But that condition would seem to be a convenient loop hole in the vast majority of cases.  Have you ever heard of a prospective mother being denied an abortion, it having been determined that her health would not be threatened by delivering her baby?
   A further feature of that law is that abortions do not have to be performed by a medical doctor.  They can be performed by a midwife or a practitioner certified as qualified to perform abortions.  Remember the old protests that abortion needed to be legalized so doctors could perform them safely, protecting women from having to seek back-alley abortions that could put their lives in danger.  Apparently at least part of that line of reasoning has been laid aside.
   It has been at least speculated that a child that survives an abortion procedure, which does happen from time to time, could be left to die without care, based on New York’s new law.  That would be reminiscent of an ancient cultural practice of leaving unwanted newborns to be exposed to the elements to let them die.  Does that sound civilized or barbaric?
   At the announcement of passage of the new law, applause and cheering broke out spontaneously in the New York legislature.  In addition, the governor ordered various state structures to be lit up in pink, by way of symbolizing victory.  How ironic when you think about all of those aborted babies that will never get to wear pink.
   When a people remove God from their thought processes in attempting to determine the right way to go, they open the door to disaster, because without God there is no real moral compass.  The scriptures repeatedly speak of God planning a life of service for an individual from his mother’s womb: Gen. 25:23; Jgs. 13:5; Ps. 22:9-10; Isa. 49:5; Jer. 1:5; Lk. 1:15; Gal. 1:15, just to name a few.
   And how does a society reconcile abortion, based upon a prospective mother’s choice, while condemning as a murderer a person who kills a pregnant mother along with her unborn child?  How can killing a baby in the womb be legally sanctioned on the one hand while being legally condemned on the other?  Is it only a child if the prospective mother declares it to be a child?  An obviously glaring inconsistency and outright contradiction.
   But such is the product of a society that continues to develop a culture more and more devoid of God’s influence.  History should remind us of the brutal, inhuman barbarity that resulted from most of mankind not knowing God.  We are, at great speed, moving backward into repeating that history, and people are cheering.  A nation that turns away from God will cease to be a good nation, for without God there is no goodness…