Thursdays are exciting days at Community
Pregnancy Center! Throughout the week, our client advocates counsel every young
woman seeking a pregnancy test, listening to the details of her situation. If
the client is vulnerable to the abortion choice, our advocates schedule them
for a free, limited ultrasound to see the growing baby in the uterus, give an
accurate due date, and allow that confused girl to hear the sound of her baby’s
heartbeat! Donated equipment and a large flat-screen television reveal the life
that our loving King has been knitting together for weeks. Miracles happen in
that ultrasound room. God changes hearts in that ultrasound room, and it all
happens on Thursdays.
This past Thursday welcomed a
young woman, celebrating her twenty-fourth birthday. Our sonographer, Mikelle,
reviewed her file before calling her to the back of the office: abortion-vulnerable.
When she came for her pregnancy test just a week previous, she explained her
sorted story. This was not her first pregnancy. She chose abortion years
earlier, and, after that decision, she mothered beautiful sons. Her youngest
boy is just five months old. Her boyfriend has already left her. She’s
unemployed, she’s alone, and now-for the fourth time-her pregnancy test read
positive.
She convinced herself that she could
not parent this child. How could she? No money. No boyfriend. No support. She
then saw only two options: adoption or abortion. She considered both, fully
knowing the grief and regret of abortion. However, she saw adoption as giving
her baby away. She would experience the full pregnancy, the pain of delivery,
and then she must watch as another woman walks out of the hospital with the baby
in her
arms? Surely that’s not proper motherhood. Surely a decent mother would care
for her own child. If she did not have the will or the means to do this, then
abortion must be the only option. She told herself that if she couldn’t keep
the baby, then it would be better to stop the pregnancy before the baby grows
any further.
Mikelle read this commonly heard
mindset within this young woman’s file, and prepared for the ultrasound
appointment. She called the girl forward, but the client asked if the
appointment could please wait. “My relative’s coming!” she explained. “Can we
please wait for my relative to get here?” Mikelle graciously agreed. This was
the last appointment for the day, so a small delay was not a problem.
Finally the relative walked
through the door. Identifying the woman as her older cousin, our young client
followed Mikelle to our sonogram room to see her baby. The cousin walked behind
the pair seemingly distant. Hesitation appeared to hang over her. The
television screen soon lit up with a perfect 14 week old baby boy! The sound
waves from the ultrasound machine stirred the life into excited motions! He
flipped. He turned. He nodded. He touched his face. He moved every second with
animation and exhilaration!
The client smiled and looked up
at her guest: “Do you see how active he is?” she asked her cousin. “I could
never handle that in my life right now!” Confused at the reaction, Mikelle
continued to explain the baby’s growth. After a few minutes of routine pictures
and measurements, she activated the sound capabilities of the machine. The sound
of a fast-paced heartbeat filled the room. This was a healthy, beautiful baby
boy due just two days before the 5 month old son’s first birthday.
Following the appointment,
Mikelle asked the client to pick a baby blanket before they continued to the
post-sonogram counseling. The client looked over to her cousin, saying, “I want
you to pick out his blanket!” The cousin, still somewhat hesitant as if she was processing, chose a cozy
blue blanket. Mikelle led the client to one of our counseling rooms, and the
cousin, clutching tightly onto the blanket with a warm smile on her face for
the first time, walked to the waiting room. The distance, the hesitation melted
away!
Mikelle asked the client how she
was feeling after seeing the ultrasound. The woman beamed with joy and
explained her excitement, her relief, and her cousin’s role in the entire
story. She confirmed her report. She was planning on an abortion. She was terrified
to have one again, but she just couldn’t parent this child. Thanks only to the God of the universe intervening,
this young woman remembered her cousin. After many miscarriages, this beautiful
relative recently carried a baby to the third trimester. However, due to violent
and detrimental complications, her pregnancy-at 7 months-was terminated for the
health of the mother. Thursday, however, changed the ending to this cousin’s
dark story to have a family with her husband, because on Thursday, she saw her
new son.
This client,
overwhelmed at the thought of parenting another child,
is giving the healthy
baby boy to her cousin through adoption!
Merriam-Webster defines adoption as the
following: “to take by choice into a relationship; especially: to take voluntarily
(a child of other parents) as one's own child”. Using the pen of the apostle
Paul, Jesus Christ Himself defines adoption in Ephesians 1:4: “even
as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be
holy and blameless before Him”. This young woman
chose the baby to be hers, even before he was born! She was to be his mother,
through the body of her pregnant cousin. God,
the Sovereign, loving Creator and King of the cosmos, chose us to
be His, even before the foundation
of the world. He was to be our Father, through the broken body of His only
Son. Thursday, we saw firsthand a
beautiful yet earthly imitation of God’s perfect love for mankind!
Pray
for these two women as they move forward with their adoption plan. Pray for
absolute peace. Pray for opened eyes to see the love of their Creator and the
adoption plan He has crafted for them.
