I Know God Has My Back: From a Mama Who Chose Life Over Abortion

The mama I conducted a baby shower for Friday was one of the most grateful people I have yet encountered in my work persuading abortion-minded mamas to choose life. She is surpassed in gratitude however by this person...

her own mother...the grandmother of the baby who was almost aborted. Sometimes we forget that it is not only the baby and her parents affected by abortion. This is the grandmom's expression when she saw all the baby shower gifts covering her living room.

I arrived in my van which was full-laden with gifts collected and beautifully bagged and organized by Cities4Life volunteers. The grandmom met me on the driveway, with a friend to help me unload. Neither spoke English fluently. As I opened the back hatch, the grandmom looked at me.

"What do we need to unload?" she asked in halting English.
"All of it."
Her mouth fell open.
"All of this? For my daughter??"
I nodded.
Tears flooded her eyes, and she threw her arms around my ribs. My broken ribs, I might add. I yelped, but I think she thought it was for joy, and she hugged harder. She (thankfully) stepped back and nodded to the man beside her.
"Todo!" she said in Spanish.
"Todo???" he asked, incredulously.
"Todo," I said, smiling.

As he brought package after package into their small living room, the grandmom clutched my hands, still crying. "She went to that place....[the abortion center]...and my heart!!! The poor baby! I love you! I love you! Thank you. Thank you!" More kisses, more rib crunching hugs.

One didn't need great English skills to convey that this grandmother had not wanted her grandchild to die, but had not known how to stop her daughter. I may never have encountered someone more effusive in her gratitude for the Cities4Life volunteers on the sidewalk of the abortion center.

She hugged me a few more painful times, before I had her daughter 'C' explain to her that I had broken ribs and she could only hug gently. She remembered to refrain from hugs for almost the entire visit after that warning, but each time she passed me, she laid her hands on my cheeks, and kissed me.

Later, C told me that when she went to the abortion center, she prayed that God would show her a sign whether she should do this. Before she left, she finally confided to her mother that she was pregnant, and intended to abort. Her mother told her she would not interfere with what her daughter was determined to do, but if C chose life, her mother promised she would help her. C paused as she related this part of her story to me. She and her mother had been at odds, and this statement was a turning point in their relationship. "I realized, maybe for the first time, that my mother would be there for me, no matter what. I think it was the first time she realized that too."

"Your baby was already working a miracle," I said.
"Yes," C said, nodding vigorously.

 She continued her story of that day. She left her grieving mother, and continued on to the abortion center, where my team and I were on the sidewalks, begging women to reconsider. C drove past us, wishing we were not there, as she was already feeling guilty.

She entered the clinic, and asked the technician if the baby's heart was beating yet.
"I was already feeling bad, but I thought I could convince myself it was okay if the heart was not beating yet."

She was 4-6 weeks pregnant. The heart beats at 18 days from conception.
"Oh no!" the technician assured her, "The heart isn't beating."

C had driven to the abortion center with a friend. Now, they both stood on the porch of the center as I was speaking over the microphone, imploring her not to abort. I reminded all the abortion-minded women there that the little human inside them had a heart that beats as early as 17 days from conception, long before most women know they are pregnant.

"Why doesn't she stop?" C told her friend, "Doesn't she know she is breaking my heart? Doesn't she know she is making me feel worse?"
"Maybe you should feel worse," her friend said. "What you are doing is wrong. Let's go talk to that lady."

The remarkable friend then led C to me, and I brought them both on-board the HELP Crisis Pregnancy Center Mobile Sonogram RV.  The ultrasound showed C her baby, and the baby's beating heart.

C chose life, and both she and her friend chose salvation in Jesus. From that day, they began attending church, though C says the church is far from them, and she doesn't go as often as she would like. She reaffirmed she will make stronger efforts now, as she recognizes that it was God who rescued her from "making the biggest mistake of my life." She wants her children to grow up with a sustaining faith that will keep them away from decisions like the one she almost made in defiance of God.

I didn't know till yesterday at the shower that the friend who accompanied her that day to the clinic was not the one C had originally asked to drive with her. Her first choice had been another friend who had had an abortion herself, and approved of C's decision to abort. Inexplicably, C changed her mind at the last minute, and asked the other friend to accompany her, the one who urged her in the end to reconsider.

"God granted you a second miracle," I said.
"Yes," C agreed. "I don't know what would have happened if I had gone with my first friend who thought I should abort. I felt so hopeless that day. But now...I feel so strong. I know I am worth so much more than I realized. No man can destroy my happiness. No one can. I know God has my back."

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To be a part of this remarkable ministry, please visit http://charlotte.cities4life.org/
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Isaiah 41:10 

Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Psalm 54:4

Behold, God is my helper; the Lord is the upholder of my life.