In recent years in our nation, wider and more liberal allowances have been made for women to serve alongside men in virtually every role and capacity in the military than in years past. While the normal personnel base for the military comes from volunteerism, our nation still reserves the right to a draft young men in times of emergency and requires registration in the Selective Service for men ages 18-25. We have observed a national conversation taking place surrounding the possibility of including women in the Selective Service and becoming included in the draft.

In light of these novel and reprehensible ideas, we have found need to provide a clarifying statement.  

The doctrinal conviction of Bayview Bible Church regarding the conscription of women into military service and all acts of “bearing the sword” is that such practices are wicked and against the teaching of the Bible and of nature. While we find the forced conscription of any person into military service against their conscience or religious principles to be a grave matter, we especially find the registration for forced conscription of women to military combat an unequivocal violation of Holy Scripture, the Church’s millennia of tradition, and of universal Natural Law. It is our carefully reasoned determination, as those whose duty and Office it is to be stewards of the mysteries of God, that compelling women into military service or combat is a pernicious and odious evil, undermining the Order of Creation which God established in the beginning, and abdicating the solemn duty of fathers, brothers, and sons to protect and serve their mothers, sisters, and daughters.

We will by all means resist any ideology regarding America’s daughters being forcibly taken away to battle and war.

The members of Bayview Bible Church stand within the two-thousand-year Christian tradition. We are committed to the doctrinal standards of our church constitution and the supremacy of the Holy Scriptures. Because of this, we affirm our religion’s principles of liberty of conscience as expressed in our confession of faith, which is the Second London Confession of 1689 (see chapter 21, paragraph 2).

We are committed to honoring and preserving human life from conception to natural death and teach that individuals and families bear full responsibility for making medical and healthcare decisions in the fear of the Lord. We also affirm that an individual’s conscience is a gift from God and is answerable to Him alone who is Lord of the conscience.
Therefore, Scripture teaches that any act a person believes to be sin is in fact sin for that person, whether it is intrinsically sinful or not. “For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Rom. 14:23). “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb. 11:6). Furthermore, our church confession states that, “subjection, in all things lawful commanded by them ought to be yielded by us to them, in the Lord.” (2nd London Confession of 1689, Chapter 24, paragraph 3). Mandatory medical procedures do not conform to that which is lawful, i.e. that which conforms to the eternal law of God.

These mandates fall outside the jurisdiction of the divinely instituted authority of the state or employer. Therefore, individuals are under no moral obligation to comply with such mandates. Furthermore, these mandates fall outside the jurisdiction of the government according to the first amendment of our own constitution.

Therefore, we state our unequivocal support for the right to refuse, on the basis of religious conviction, mandatory medical procedures (including vaccinations), whether ordered by a branch of civil government, an employer, or any other institution to which an individual is subject or dependent. In addition, the Holy Scriptures teach Christians that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit. “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Stewardship of our bodies before God necessitates being free to make decisions about health and medical treatments according to Scriptural principles, the light of nature, and the dictates of individual conscience. Therefore, the refusal to obey mandatory medical procedures may also be based on an individual’s sincere belief that his or her (or his or her child’s) life, health, welfare, or ethical integrity is potentially endangered by such procedures.

We affirm that our Christian religion protects the liberty of individuals and families to refuse any medical procedure or product on the basis of sincerely held concerns for known or unknown side effects, experimental or emergency uses, potential involvement in fetal cell lines whether in development or testing, or medical and/or political corruption or coercion. The sixth commandment—“You shall not murder”— makes every person responsible “to preserve our own life, and the life of others” and prohibits “the taking away of our own life, or the life of our neighbor, unjustly, or whatsoever tendeth thereunto.” (The Baptist Catechism, Q72-73.) Many Christians believe, in good faith, that involvement in such medical procedures violates this commandment.

Therefore, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we uphold the rights and responsibilities of the members of Bayview Bible Church to make responsible medical decisions for themselves and their families, including their right to refuse vaccinations or gene therapies on religious grounds. And we hereby call upon all authorities: political, governmental, organizational, or otherwise, to respect these deeply held religious convictions by upholding this religious liberty and/or providing religious exemptions as requested.

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