In the broad landscape of biblical theology, the church often distinguishes between sins of commission and sins of omission. Sins of commission are easily identified as the active violation of God’s negative commands, such as the injunctions not to steal, lie, or commit adultery. However, the sins of omission—those things we are called to do but actively avoid—often serve as a more insidious stumbling point for believers. Today, we must address the ramifications of ignoring the biblical injunctions to perform the good that God has explicitly commanded. To understand the gravity of these omissions, one must first recognize that all of God’s commandments are rooted in the pursuit of human happiness. As our designer and creator, God knows what produces our greatest fulfillment; therefore, every act of disobedience, whether it is an act of commission or the neglect of a neighbor, results in a reduction of human happiness and a damaging of the soul. When we reject God’s commands, we mischaracterize the work of grace in our lives as something cold and neutral rather than as a force that breeds compassion and generosity.

The Theological Framework of Omission

The fundamental theology of sin suggests that rejecting God’s mandates is inherently self-damaging. For example, God commands us not to steal because He desires for us to discover Him as our daily bread and provider through faith; to steal is to deprive ourselves of that discovery while simultaneously harming the livelihood of our neighbor. This principle applies equally to the positive commands of Scripture. James 4:17 explicitly states that he who knows the good he ought to do and does not do it, sins. This sin of omission perverts the human soul and offends the image of God within us because it fails to represent His character to a hurting world.

While the church often categorizes certain moral issues as chronic—such as the ongoing biblical injunction to feed and care for the poor—there is a distinction between these chronic issues and what we must identify as a preeminent moral crisis. A chronic issue like poverty requires a constant, good response to prevent suffering, but a preeminent crisis involving the intentional slaughter of the innocent requires an immediate and decisive intervention. In the case of ignoring the call to rescue the innocent from slaughter, as commanded in Proverbs 24, the result is not merely the continuation of a lamentable state like poverty; the result is that a human soul perishes.

The Parable of the Passive Observer

The danger of intellectualizing moral responsibility is most famously deconstructed in the Parable of the Good Samaritan. In this narrative, the priest and the Levite serve as the primary “bad guys,” not because they attacked the man on the side of the road, but because they acknowledged the crisis and made peace with death as they hurried on their way. They likely gave intellectual lip service to the evil of the situation; one can imagine them intending to deliver a message in their synagogue regarding the tragedy of those beaten in the gutter, yet refusing to assist the victim because they did not want to show up to preach with blood and dirt on their robes.

This reflects a modern phenomenon where many believers and church leaders claim to be “pro-life” or “against abortion” and consider that intellectual assent to be the end of their moral responsibility. They check the box of opposition and move on to the next issue, failing to recognize that love demands much more than the mere acknowledgment of evil. Love calls us to put a stop to it. The failure to intervene to stop a slaughter is an act of disobedience that destroys our own happiness and the well-being of the neighbor targeted for death.

The Exceeding Sinfulness of Sin

To understand the weight of this omission, we can look to the Puritan perspective, specifically the work of Jeremiah Burroughs, who wrote on the “exceeding sinfulness of sin“. This phrase, derived from Romans 7, suggests that sin is sinful beyond measure. Burroughs argued that even the least sin is more destructive and evil than the greatest physical affliction a human can suffer. While affliction is a part of the Christian life that must be endured, sin is a destructive force that must be rejected at all costs.

The sin of ignoring the command to rescue those determined for slaughter carries a weight that exceeds many other omissions because of its finality. If one fails to clothe the poor, they may become cold; however, if one fails to act for those tagged for slaughter, they will certainly die. The Puritans, acting as “doctors of the soul,” would trace such a sin from the outward inaction back to the heart’s motive, the damage caused to others, and the ultimate offense it brings to the glory of God.

A powerful way to frame this is to consider the moral difference between actively lynching an innocent man and passively watching that lynching take place. While most people would assume a significant moral difference exists, the Scriptures suggest that killing an innocent person and watching passively while they are killed are equally condemned. Both actions bring the observer into what the Bible defines as the guilt of shedding innocent blood. This is a poignant “aha moment” that reveals the exceeding sinfulness of silence.

The Revelation of Leviticus 20

The biblical mandate regarding the shedding of innocent blood is explicitly detailed in Leviticus 20, which provides God’s moral instruction on child sacrifice. The text states that anyone who gives their child to Molech must be put to death, but it also addresses the community: “If the people of the land do at all close their eyes to that man… then I will set my face against that man and against his clan“. This teaching demonstrates that God does not only judge the one who commits the murder; He also judges those who close their eyes to it.

Closing one’s eyes to evil is a way of saying “it is not my business” to avoid the consequences and costs of intervention. This passiveness is, in many ways, even more abhorrent than the act itself. When we teach the Four Questions—a curriculum designed to provide a blueprint for understanding the sanctity of life and the application of the Gospel—this revelation from Leviticus 20 often causes the scales to fall from the eyes of participants. We have witnessed significant pastors and ministry leaders in places like Medellin, Colombia, weep as they realize they have only been looking at “half the apple”. They had agreed that the act of abortion was offensive to God, but they had ignored the command to not close their eyes to it.

From Silence to Repentance

Many pastors assume that because they do not perform abortions and are intellectually opposed to them, they have fulfilled their duty. They may assume that abortion is not happening in their congregations or that it is merely a political or social justice issue unrelated to their ministry. However, when the sin of omission is revealed, it becomes clear that silence on the topic of abortion is itself a sinful omission. By refusing to address the shedding of innocent blood, they have allowed evil to fester and people in their own pews to suffer without the guidance and rescue the church is mandated to provide.

In our global training sessions, we have seen church leaders stand up and weep, repenting before their peers because they realized their silence was revealed as sinful. This repentance is a God-honoring and redemptive moment that shifts the church from a posture of passive opposition to active rescue. We must move beyond simply being “against it” to asking the critical question found in the fourth stage of our training: “What do we do?”.

A Call to Rescue

The reality is that the United States accounts for only 3% of the abortions that occur globally each year, leaving 97% of the crisis as a primary world missions challenge. This necessitates serving where the need is greatest and the innocent are most vulnerable. To aid in this effort, we utilize tools like the medically accurate fetal model of a tiny baby at nine weeks after conception to help the world visualize the humanity of the victim.

The transition from a “check-the-box” pro-lifer to a rescuer involves a commitment to not keep one’s mouth shut when people are being led to the slaughter. It involves doing something in our own neighborhoods and communities to stop the shedding of innocent blood. We must reject the sin of doing nothing, recognizing that the failure to rescue is a transgression of the law of love. By refusing to close our eyes to the preeminent moral crisis of our time, we honor the glory of God and secure the happiness that He intends for all His children. We invite everyone to move past the sin of omission, to download the resources of the Four Questions, and to join in the active work of rescuing the innocent.

This article is adapted from the episode transcript.