This is going to be a very off the cuff response to the article I am going to share below (I read it just a few moments ago); but this article is very timely and connected to a discussion I had with a friend today.
I was out for coffee and my friend asked me, "when did you start having a heart for the unborn?" After I thought about it a few seconds I said when I was really young. I remember having the desire to adopt as young as 5.
I remember having an understanding that abortion was wrong when I was in grade 8. I had heard about abortion before then, it made me unsettled, even all the talk about it being the woman's choice. Then in grade 8 I had a friend who asked me to go to the Planned Parenthood office with her. I didn't know then that they helped perform abortions. I knew she was pregnant and I thought she would go there to get support. So, I went with her, I had no idea how she would care for the baby and I didn't know how I could be of any help, but I knew she needed someone to be with her and I wanted to help her even if it just meant being company to her appointments. After talking with a lady there, she made another appointment for a different day; when that date came she said she didn't want me to come with her, that she wanted this other girl to go with her. I remember later, finding her in the school bathroom huddled against the wall crying really hard. I tried calming her. I asked her what happened, I asked if her baby was OK. She just said "There is no baby," and cried harder. After she could calm down a bit, she left school for the rest of the day. Even though she never said directly what happened I knew what she had done. When she came back to school she never wanted to talk about it again and tried to act as if nothing had happened. It took a long time for her to become convincing.
I remember in high school doing a play in drama class about abortion. The setting was a woman's ward in a hospital where there were 3 different women who had just gone through an abortion. Each of the characters responded differently. From extreme remorse and guilt to not being phased by the decision at all. I was chosen by our teacher to play the cold, detached, emotionless ward nurse who "didn't pass judgment on anyone", but was definitely strongly annoyed with the character who felt guilt.
I hated that character, I tried to get out of it, but it was part of my grade and the reason my teach had chose me to play that character was because it was so different from who I really was and how I really felt about the issue. She hoped I would feel some empathy for people who really are in that nurse's position. Instead I felt pity.
Anyway, as I was talking with my friend, I said that my views on the issue of LIFE have changed over the last few years. I have come to a place where as I pray a simple prayer each week at our House of Prayer that it is not just about standing up for a cause, it is not just about getting up on a soapbox and having your opinion heard. It is not just about being a part of a big movement. Though there is nothing wrong with those things.
For me though, I am coming to a place where I realize that things like praying for the ending of abortion, praying for people in the church to have a heart for adoption and actually go through with it or if they can't that they at least support those who can. Or for families to join the foster care system and love those kids hard, for as long as they have them; it is all about partnering with God's heart. It is about valuing life because He values it. It is about valuing not just the unborn, but the kids around us that are slipping through the cracks, the women who have gone through abortion and are now dealing with the aftermath (we really need to stop looking at them like they are monsters and outcasts, but look at them as broken, sinful humans in need of Jesus - we are no better or worse then they are), about caring for those women who though about abortion and didn't go through with it, but still don't have resources to care for their child or don't want the child. It is about loving and supporting the single mom's and single dad's in our neighbourhoods. The issue of LIFE isn't really an issue or cause, it is living life how Father and Jesus calls us to, it is high and hard standard but He will give us the grace to do it. LIFE is about making a lifestyle of pouring your life out for another and seeking God's righteous and perfect justice.
I will stop my rant here. I will post the article right after this last comment. In the article, all the stats and examples are American. But the need and the question poised in the article are the same for here in Canada. Are we ready for what happens when God answers our prayers. At the House of Prayer here in Winnipeg, we pray each week that abortion would end in Canada, that heart's of the fathers would turn to the children, that God would have mercy on our nation and change the attitudes of doctors, nurses, government leaders, men and women. That God would cause laws to be changed in order to protect the unborn. If we are praying within the will of God and with the right heart, I believe He will answer our prayers. Are we ready for when He does. Are we ready for the increase of children who will be spared from death, but may very will still be unwanted or unable to be cared for by their families. As the church in Canada, are we ready to open our hearts, our homes, our wallets and lives to love these children as Father has loved us. Are we willing to pour it all out to break the lie that they are unwanted or a burden? To show them that their Father in heaven loves them very much and that they can have everlasting life through His son, Jesus?
So, after all of that, here is the article, it is a very good read: Is the church ready for the abortion law to change?
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