To a Woman Considering Abortion
“Why do you want to do this?” I asked, with urgency and a heavy heart.
“Because I don’t wanna get fat or have to tell my parents,” she responded. Her voice was calm and full of indifference, as if my question made reference to the weather rather than the abortion she was about to undergo.
Two hours later, the unwanted baby inside the womb of my 17-year-old mentee was gone. I will never forget that day and how it felt. Holding the phone, pleading with her to let her baby live. To consider God’s sovereignty and how involved he was with the new life she sought to rid herself of. The scenario was weighty at its core because I was conversing with a teenage girl on the brink of committing murder.
Unexpected Inconvenience
Perhaps that’s you, right now. You’ve found out that you are pregnant and you’re considering an abortion. After all, this wasn’t a part of your plan — the baby, that is.
“It” seems to be an unexpected inconvenience. Your freedom is at stake, your body under siege, and your life potentially under the authority of another, or so you think. The temporal pleasures of sex weren’t supposed to lead to a lifetime of parenthood. Now the only option up for consideration is to call the nearest Planned Parenthood and schedule the appointment you believe will maintain the autonomy you enjoy.
I do not presume to know you, your circumstances, or the complete array of thoughts at home in your heart, but I do know that if you are considering abortion, it is because your mind and heart have been led to believe lies. These lies come from a dark place, where light and truth don’t reign, only pride. The same pride that caused Eve to assume true freedom and happiness could only be experienced apart from the will of God. Now, due to sin’s influence on your logic, you are following in her footsteps.
I beg you to walk another way. By faith, take another route — the path that leads to life, not death.
Unforeseen Responsibilities
I got pregnant with my daughter on my honeymoon. Initially, I did not look on my pregnancy with joy, but rather the recognition of another life inside of me felt burdensome. I had plans for me and my husband to spend the beginning of our marriage alone. No children. No unexpected responsibilities. Just the freedom that I believed children would hinder.
Though I did not consider abortion, I still had the heart of an abortionist. I saw the life inside of me as a stumbling block to my joy. I looked at this baby not as a gift from God but as a mistake. And from that perspective, I can understand your anxiety.
I know how it feels to be caught off guard by Providence and desperately want your will to be done instead of God’s. Yet there is still a choice to be made. Either let your actions be governed by lies or believe the truth.
The truth is this:
1) Murder Will Not Make You Happy
You were born convinced that true joy is discovered apart from God. That sin is much more pleasurable to you than Christ. Your heart is inclined to choose everything other than God for its satisfaction, and this disposition has led you to this point — to the idea that the murder of your unborn child is the most rational way to preserve your joy.
But, to the contrary, the one true joy available to us all can be found only in Christ. To know God is to know authentic joy. Fight to believe that the sin of abortion will not satisfy you. Allow the recognition of such to lead you into the arms of the only Savior sufficient to save you. There, you will find forgiveness and freedom from the penalty and power of sin. Then you will know joy and happiness in God, and God alone, under whom this can be said of you: “Blessed [Happy] are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6).
2) Children Are Gifts from God
If we had a discussion on why we look forward to birthdays and Christmas, the common denominator in our love for both events might rest on their emphasis on gifts. Gifts not only make us feel appreciated and loved, but they often reveal the heart that the giver of the gift has for us.
“Abortion will not satisfy you.”
Tragically, in our society, the same doesn’t ring true in our hearts towards children. We view them as “mistakes” when they are conceived without our permission, rather than as gifts from the providential hand of a loving God. Psalm 127:3 says, “Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.” Pay attention to the word from in that Scripture. Your child was not conceived by happenstance; your child was conceived because God created that child, in his image, with purpose, and placed him or her in your womb for God’s glory and your joy. Fight to reorient your thinking to believe this as fact.
Don’t let society’s ideology about children influence you, and lead you to abort the human being growing inside of you. He or she is a gift.
3) You Were Made for More
This world is bursting with self-centeredness. If there is one thing we are all skilled at, it is being selfish. We reckon that living for someone other than self seems foolish at best.
I am sensitive to your predicament, but I must be frank with you about its root. The root of your desire to abort your child is selfishness. I don’t say that to condemn, but to reveal in love. Understanding this will bring your struggle to light so that it can be replaced with the truth that you were made for more.
Living a life that revolves around you is not to live at all. It’s the paradox of what it means to be blessed: “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). And truly great: “Whoever would be great among you must be your servant” (Matthew 20:26). And ultimately, like Jesus: “Even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).
“Living a life that revolves around you is not to live at all.”
Jesus, the exalted king, worthy of eternal praise and adoration, became a servant. How much more should we through the avenue of parenthood. We were not created to be self-serving creatures, but instead we were made to love God and love people.
Look into the Future
Before I got off the phone with my friend just two hours before she aborted her child, there was one major thing I begged her to see — the future. I wanted her to let go of all of the negative thoughts she believed her future to be, and instead consider the great positives and wonderful things that could come from her choosing to be a mother over a murderer. To imagine the joy her child would bring to her life. To imagine the purpose God has in store for her child. To imagine the amazing opportunity of raising someone with the potential to impact the world around us in ways unseen.
And I implore you to do the same. Just for a moment, I want you to step outside of yourself and imagine all of the beauty that could be if only you’d choose life over death, motherhood over murder, sacrifice over selfishness, and true joy over empty lies.