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Devotional for Day 16, October 10, 2013

Rev. John Ensor, President, PassionLife

Intention:

Pray for the mothers going into pregnancy

help centers. The personal care,

the free ultrasound, the ongoing practical

help is designed to deliver them

from those who profit in shedding innocent

blood.

Scripture:

Come to me, all who labor and are

heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

—Matthew 11:28

Reflection:

“You have twins. That will be another $350.” She did not speak English. But she finally understood that they were telling her to go get more money and return for her abortion. She had already given them her rent money. But they were not about to give her a two-for-one deal. They told her to get dressed and return with more cash. A couple, who was praying outside, comforted her. They brought her to their local pregnancy help center. The staff quickly saw that her personal circumstances were so desperate, and immediate, that they would need direct and ongoing help from local Christians and churches. They started making calls.

Then they did the ultrasound. It showed there was only one baby, not two. This abandoned, immigrant, powerless mother was being exploited. She would do whatever she was told. Who would know? Who would care? God calls us to “Rescue the weak and the needy; and deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (Psalm 82:4). When you provide an alternative to abortion you are not only rescuing innocent babies, you are delivering mothers from the wicked: those who profit in the shedding of innocent blood. Pray for those who rescue and deliver daily at your local pregnancy help center.

Prayer:

Father, hear our prayer!

Snatch desperate mothers from the

fire. Bring them out of our abortion

businesses and into our pregnancy

help centers. Deliver them from evil.

Use us to help them chose life and see

your hand of provision.

Devotional for Day 17, October 11, 2013

Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director, Priests for Life

Intention:

May all understand more deeply that

the pro-life message is rooted in two

basic truths of life:

1) There is a God

2) He isn’t me

Scripture:

And the Lord God formed man of the

dust of the ground, and breathed into

his nostrils the breath of life; and man

became a living being.

—Genesis 2:7

Reflection:

From the beginning of the Bible until the end, the theme is echoed that God alone has dominion over human life. He made it; shared it; died to save it; will raise it up forever. The act of creation described in Genesis 2:7, and earlier in Genesis 1:26-27, is a sovereign act. God did not have to do it, and would have been happy forever without us. Yet without our asking for it or earning it, God brought us out of nothingness and into life, and sustains our existence at every moment. And He does so in Christ: “For by Him all things were created…in Him all things exist” (Colossians 1:16-17). “You are not your own,” Paul declares in 1 Corinthians 6. God alone owns us.

While He entrusts us to the care of one another, He does not allow any human being to own another. A Southern California abortionist, James McMahon, once explained how he justified killing children after 20 weeks gestation by the process known as partial-birth abortion. He did not deny that this was a child, but rather asked, “Who owns the child? It’s got to be the mother.”

The struggle over abortion is really a struggle over the dominion of God. The Christian individual, and the Christian Church, cannot sit idly by when others declare that God is not God.

Prayer:

Lord, we are yours. Thank you for

breathing into us the breath of life.

Thank you for claiming us as your own.

May our words and actions in defense

of human life proclaim to all the world

that you alone are Lord of life and

death, Lord of our freedom and of our

choices.

We pray in Jesus’ name, amen.