The Prodigal at an Abortion Center

I often get calls from abortion minded moms as a Cities4Life counselor. Our teams are on the sidewalks of the Charlotte abortion centers every day they are open. Contrary to what many people think, many of those moms are conflicted and even praying God would place someone in their path to stop them!  I put my name and phone number on the literature we hand out. Sometimes, moms call me months later. Yesterday, one such call came through. It was  God-ordained on so many levels.

I had spent the morning watching a YouTube video about rationally presenting the case for protecting the unborn. Much of the material was familiar to me, and I use many of the suggested arguments already in my work as a prolife counselor. Nonetheless, when the video showed aborted fetuses, I crumpled in a mass of ugly tears and gulping sobs, remembering my own abortion forty years ago. I was consumed with sorrow. I had done that to my own child. How could I have been so foolish, so evil?

Shortly after the video ended, I received a text message. It was from a mom I had apparently counseled many months ago. She had stopped communicating to us and we assumed she had aborted. Now, she told me that she had miscarried, and was so distraught and depressed that she stopped texting all of us who were trying to help her. She was pregnant once more, but determined she would never consider abortion again. However, she needed help.

I told her of course we could offer help and asked her if she wanted me to call her. She did. I was in the middle of a boatload of work, but I felt God whisper, “Talk to her. Now.” I called her immediately.

One of the instantly apparent issues was that this poor woman, L, was feeling immense sorrow and guilt over the miscarriage. She wondered if she was being punished for considering abortion. I told her that no matter what, we would connect her with people who could help with her current pregnancy, but would she allow me to talk with her about God? I felt she carried an enormous burden of grief, and I believed I could help her. (Not really I, but God could...)

She agreed. 

I shared my own history of abortion and atheism. Then I told her that very day, I had been crying about what I had done to my child. I said the consequence of abortion may not be removed, but that healing was possible with God. Then I shared my journey of faith, and the Gospel. She interrupted several times with excellent questions.

“How could a merciful God take my child’s life after I decided NOT to abort??”

“Was my sin the cause of my child’s death in miscarriage?”

“Why would God bring so much suffering when I had tried to turn back to Him?”

Over the next two hours, I shared the truth of the Gospel. I talked about Job, and his questions that mirrored her own. I shared the suffering that Jesus endured to pay the penalty that we deserved. I told her about how we all sin, how God is a God of justice and has no choice but to demand a penalty for sin, and how justice kisses mercy at the cross. I explained how we all have a choice to accept or deny God’s incredible merciful offer to pay the penalty for sin we owe.

“But how could God want me back?”she said, crying. I knew how she felt. I had felt it myself.

So then, I shared the story of the prodigal son. I told her how Jesus tells a parable of a father who lets his profligate son leave home with his inheritance. I described the wayward, rebellious boy wasting his father’s money on women, food, and wine. And when the son had nothing left, he realized with abject despair that he had no hope. His only hope at survival was to return to his father. So he headed back home. The father saw him from afar, and ignoring the dignity of his position and the custom of his people, he RAN to greet his son. (By now I was crying, as I pictured the father running to his son...) He called his servants to prepare a feast. His son who was lost now was found. And the father ran as fast as he could to embrace the son who had returned to him.

“That is how God welcomes you back,” I said. 

Both of us were sobbing now. She said she was ready. She wanted to give her life to her Heavenly Father.  As she prayed out loud to receive Jesus as her Lord, I don’t know which of us was more joyful.

“I have wanted to do this for such a long time,” she said, while weeping.

******

Luke 15:32
“But we had to celebrate and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live, 

and was lost and has been found.'"

Sadness and Killing Averted

An old man stopped his car to talk to me as I was pacing up the street from the Abortion center. Our Cities4Life team was spread out along the street, offering hope and help to abortion minded women.  I often stand on the side of the road offering our help and information to women on the way to the abortion center. I sometimes have great discussions with passerby’s who want to chat about why we do what we do. Sometimes those discussions are confrontational. Often they are from people who support what we are doing, speaking for the unborn at that last-ditch place.

The man rolled down his window and told me he was against abortion. However, he worried very much for our safety in this terrible world. He feared there were people who would oppose us in harmful ways.

“Thank you so much for your concern,” I told him, “However, I trust that since God has called me here, He will protect me. And if He doesn’t, He has a reason and purpose in that as well.”

“May I ask you something?”he asked.

“Sure.”

“When God doesn’t answer your prayers, when you can’t hear Him, what does that mean?”

“That is a great question,” I said, “And one that I suspect most people ask. Here is what I believe. I think God is always speaking but sometimes we miss it. For example, the Bible says all creation declares the glory of God. Just looking out the window when you wake up and seeing the beautiful colors, and taking a breath...I think all those are reminders that God is declaring His glory to you. But if you open your Bible, He is speaking very clearly on many things. Sometimes you can find your answer there. 

“Or maybe His answer is one you are not ready to understand. Like in the book of Job, Job asks God why he is suffering so terribly and the wicked prosper. God doesn’t answer why. Not directly. Instead, He reveals Himself to Job and describes many things God can do that Job cannot. In the end, Job says I had heard of you but now I see you. Your ways are too marvelous for me to understand, and I repent in dust and ashes. Sometimes we have to just trust that God is working and He knows best. He created the universe and loves us deeply. His ways are not our ways, but they are always best.”

His eyes were red. He seemed to hang on my every word.

“I suspect there is a heavy burden you carry,” I said, “And your prayer is going seemingly unanswered.”

“Well see...now can I ask you something else? No one loves me except my wife. I have a hard time trusting that God would love me.”

“Do you know Jesus as your Lord?” I asked.

“Oh yes.”

“Well, I don’t know about all the others in your life... whether they love you or not. But I do know God loves you immeasurably. The Bible says that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. That means before you ever submitted your life to Jesus, He was willing to die a gruesome death on the cross to pay the penalty for sin you deserved. He saw you completely. Unlike all the people in your life, He saw every ugly thought, every sin. He knows everything about you. And He was still willing to die for you. THAT is love...unfathomable love.”

He grew teary-eyed as I spoke. Then he grasped my hand tightly. 

“May I make one more request? Will you pray for me this week?”

I told him I would pray for him for this week and beyond. “But please understand that you can do nothing to earn God’s love. He already loves you, from the moment of creation.  The Bible says: It is by faith not works that we are saved, lest any man should boast.” There is nothing you can do to lose His love either. The Bible says you are engraved on the very hands of God and that nothing can separate you from the love of God!

“You are made in the image of  our Holy God and even now, at your age, He has a divine plan and purpose for your life. He will help you to understand and know what that is. If you have truly repented of your sins, submitted your life to Jesus, believed He died to pay the penalty for sin that you deserved, you have the Holy Spirit in you. The Holy Spirit will guide and lead you. He will help you understand all you need to know. Mostly, He will help you to believe you are loved, absolutely loved by God.”

Then I asked if I could pray for him right now. He nodded and closed his eyes. I prayed mostly that God would truly reveal to this poor man how deeply loved he is. When I finished, the man squeezed my hand and thanked me. “This was a divine meeting,” he said softly.

Right after he drove away, a young couple stopped their car beside me. They were on their way to abort. I talked with them a long time. Much of our discussion centered on the Gospel, who God is and what He would have them do. Finally, they said they would leave and think over what I had said. To my surprise, they did. And they did not return. 

The abortionist arrived and the deadly slaughter began. I stayed long enough to be certain the young couple had truly had a change of heart and missed their appointment with death. The baby was safe, at least for today.

The full parking lot slowly disgorged women with sad faces. They averted their eyes as we tried to hand them healing literature for post-abortive women.

One would think my heart would be filled with angst, but it wasn’t. It was filled with hope and worship for the Lord that had allowed me to comfort a hurting old man with the Gospel, and one young couple who recognized that killing their baby was not what He would have them do.