A hard day

Yesterday was a hard day.

Work has been stressful. I strive on success and I've somehow found myself in an industry where, "no one hates it," seems to be the highest possible praise. Even though I'm part of something meaningful, I know I'm as out of place as a bull in a china shop. If I ever hand in my resignation, my boss will probably celebrate for weeks. Mostly, though, I've had too much on my plate for a while and it doesn't seem like that will end any time soon.

My body has been stressful. My bad shoulder has been extra bad lately - probably because of my bad habit of laying in bed wasting time on my Kindle. What is rarely more than a general sense of pressure and tightness now includes a sharp pain in the joint. Add a little PMS and you have a good risk of general crabbiness.

The general state of the world has been stressful. Ebola and Enterovirus keep popping up on the morning, noon, evening and nighttime news. ISIS/ISIL keep beheading Your people. Political leaders keep doing stupid and immoral things and none of their would-be-replacements seems much better. Furthermore, plenty of otherwise sane seeming people keep rooting and voting for the status quo.

Still, yesterday could have been an easy day. I was very nearly caught up on my work, however unsatisfying it is, by noon and I took half the day off. The sun was shining and the trees were lovely. I decided to sign up for an hour at the 40 Days for Life vigil and then go home and enjoy a nap.

This isn't my first vigil, but because of my work schedule I'd never been there on abortion day before. Right now, I'd make almost any excuse to never be there on abortion day again. It may have been the most horrible hour of my life. I can never unsee the faces of women walking into that building, knowing that within 24 hours they would flush their sons and daughters down a toilet somewhere.

Abortion has never been faceless to me. I've known since my teens specific people who I know were, in one way or another, survivors of abortion. The girl with spina bifida. The girl whose mother was turned away from the clinic because she was too far along. The babies of my friends who had the courage to "ruin their lives" by giving birth in high school, despite pressure from boyfriends and relatives to just "get rid of the problem". When people talk about "the fetus" I know their really talking about Amy* and Leslie* and Brittany*.

Still, I've never been there in the moment it happened. Never had to watch women unload their toddler from the car so they could kill it's brother or sister. Never saw young women chatting on the phone as they walked into the abortuary as if it was the nail salon. I knew statistically, that the women who have abortions aren't all scared teens, but it still shocked me when a woman walked through those doors with two tweens in toe. She could have been my age.

I've never before felt like screaming, begging a stranger to change their mind. I felt almost complicit for not doing that very thing. I did all I was supposed to do. We walked up and down the sidewalk praying. I prayed for the place. I prayed for the employees. I prayed for the whole country. I prayed for each person who walked through those doors. I prayed for the souls that they were there to dispose of. And when I couldn't think of more words to send to God, I read scripture. And the words of Job condemned us. He curses, not just the day he was born, but the night he was conceived. Even all those thousands of years ago they knew that life doesn't begin at birth, but somehow we've forgotten. At the end of my hour, I left as quickly as I could.

When you stand out on a cold, wet windy day, you leave feeling cold to your bones. If you don't take a long hot shower, no amount of layers will warm you up for hours. Yesterday was sunny and warm, but I am still cold now. Not to the bones, but to the soul. It's like the first time watching The Silent Scream all over again. I have witnessed a tragedy and there is no judge on Earth to hear my testimony. I stood thirty feet away while lives were violated and I cannot wash away that knowledge. I am tainted by it.

Yesterday was a hard day.

Today, life is threatened. Today, you can make a difference.

Today a girl in our community woke up feeling nauseous and cried when she counted the days since her last period. Today a nurse placed an advanced care directive in front of a relatively healthy senior citizen and encouraged him to sign away his right to certain basic care. Today a couple who was happily pregnant was told that their baby has Down syndrome and that it would be irresponsible to let it be born. Today a woman is abusing drugs and alcohol because she can’t deal with the pain of knowing she had an abortion and hasn’t found God’s forgiveness.  Today a young man is telling his girlfriend that she’s ruining his life by having his baby and she’ll do anything not to lose him because she doesn’t feel like anyone else really loves her. Today a young man is in tears after finding out why he’s not going to be a father after all.

Today, God is giving you the chance to save a life. Maybe not single-handedly, but as part of a world-wide movement called 40 Days For Life. We are answering God’s call to be there for those in need through prayer, fasting and a seven-days-a-week physical presence outside the Planned Parenthood office in Cedar Falls. This isn’t an angry mob of protestors that you may envision. Groups of two or three, often families, commit to peaceful sidewalk prayer and only talk to the clinic’s clients if approached.

We don’t need people who know everything about abortion or other life issues. We don’t need people who are looking for confrontation. We don’t need people who are ‘without sin’ to cast stones. We just need people who care.

We’ve made a commitment to be there at least twelve hours each of the 40 days between September 24 and November 2. We’ve made a commitment to provide an experienced buddy for anyone who is new to sidewalk prayer. We’ve made a commitment to connect those in need to resources that will allow them to choose life.

Now it’s your turn to make a commitment. Could you be the one who tells that scared girl about Alternatives Crisis Pregnancy Center? Could you be the one who helps that girlfriend discover that she is loved today and always by our Savior? Could yours be the words that save a woman from a lifetime of regret and heartbreak and her child from an untimely death?  Can you spend just one hour a week for six weeks defending life in the Cedar Valley? Can you commend life issues to God in your daily prayers? It’s really not much, when you think about it, but to the tiny passengers those women carry into that clinic it could be, literally, everything. 

Please go to www.40DaysForLife.com to find your local 40 Days for Life group. If you're in the Cedar Valley, you can connect with our local group at 40-Days-For-Life-Cedar-Falls on Facebook.