Tag: Dabney Hedegard

When Does Life Start?

January 31, 2021

Photo by Andreas Wohlfahrt on Pexels.com

January has been the month of celebrating the importance of human life.

Various articles, memes, posts, and videos have shown that life matters. We’ve heard it from every angle. The over-arching theme is that human lives are significant.

All life should be equally important.

This is what the Bible says about life in Psalm 139:

“For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
    when I was made in the secret place,
    when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.”

Given that, perhaps you can understand my passion when I read this article quoting our new president about life and abortion and detailing the censoring of said articles. (You can read it for yourself here.)

And when I saw the following quote by Rep. James E. Clyburn (D – S.C. I decided I had to speak out. It was time to tell part of my story.

“Today marks the 48th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which gave women the right to control their own bodies.”

Rep. James E. Clyburn

Right to control? How about the responsibility to control our bodies?

“…each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable…” I Thes. 4:4

Women, including myself, have the responsibility to control our bodies. Once we’ve made a choice (that’s the part of “pro-choice” I agree with) to engage in sexual relations, we have now relinquished our rights if that union has created a child. At that point, we have the responsibility to protect that child. Because that child has the right to be born and live the life ordained by their Creator.

  • As soon as an egg is fertilized by sperm, the gender of the child is decided.
  • Within three weeks, a baby’s heartbeat can be heard.
  • At six weeks, fingers and toes are developing.
  • After only two months, a baby’s form can be clearly seen – head, eyes, legs, arms, fingers, toes and internal organs are visible.
  • You can see photos for yourself here.

Some proponents of abortion argue that rape is a reason for choosing abortion, but even if the woman had no choice in the creation of the child, that fact does not remove the rights of that child to life.

Believe me, I understand the challenges unplanned pregnancy brings.

At twenty-five, I was going through a messy divorce because my husband decided he couldn’t give up an adulterous relationship. As a mother of two very young children, I chose, in that season of heartache and poor judgment, to become sexually involved with a dear friend. In spite of using necessary precautions, I found myself pregnant.

It wasn’t the first time.

I had married my husband five years earlier because I became pregnant after a night during which I was unable to prevent his advances. We married in spite of my miscarrying the baby. (I saw that baby who was only a few weeks old.) So when my friend insisted we marry when my divorce was final, I panicked. I wouldn’t be forced into another marriage. He was a kind man, but in a bad place both in his budding career and in his emotional state. My mindset wasn’t any better.

I didn’t see any way that as a single parent with no current source of income, I could carry and raise a new baby along with my two and four-year-old. But I had made a choice to become involved sexually, and that meant I had a responsibility to this child.

I prayed. God could take this little one home to heaven and “spare” me the challenge of carrying and raising him. Or, I could carry him despite the ramifications of what it would mean to my life, my future career, and my reputation. I could give him up. Somewhere was a family longing for a child who would be blessed by this baby.

In the end, I kept my baby boy. It’s a longer story than I have space for here, but I will never regret my decision to carry and keep my child. He is a grown, married man with two children of his own now. How much I could have missed!

I, as well as people I know, were told that the life carried was nothing more than a blob of tissue. I can imagine their heartache. Whether they knew what they were doing or didn’t, God as grace, forgiveness, comfort, and healing for all of us.

I know from my own experience as well as research that the “blob” statement isn’t true. It’s a lie that believing in live means we don’t have choices. We make a choice when we partner in creating a life by our sexual action. We can also choose to protect a life, rescue a life, or adopt a life.

But, we can’t make a true choice if we don’t have all the facts first.

Like these facts about trafficking, another “lives matter” issue:

  • 300,000 – Children in the U.S., at least, prostituted annually (ndaa.org)
  • 12 – The average age that a trafficked victim is first used for commercial sex (DHS)
  • 2,700 – Child sex-trafficking victims rescued by the FBI in the U.S. the past 10 years (FBI Innocence Lost Initiative)
  • 3 – Florida’s rank in the number of calls received by the national human trafficking hotline (Polaris Project)
  • 83% – Of sex trafficking victims identified in the United States were U.S. citizens according to a study of U.S. Department of Justice human trafficking task force cases. (Office of the Attorney General of Florida)
  • 52 – Approximate number of local child sex-trafficking victims rescued in 2015 (FBI Innocence Lost Initiative)
  • Less than 250 – Shelter beds for commercially sexually exploited children in the U.S. (ECPAT-USA)

Are you as shocked as I was when I read those statistics?

How can we be appalled at this and accept that 2,363 children die by abortion (2016 statistics) each day?

That is, if life matters.

Maybe we should think about what that means.

I believe all life matters. I believe what God says, that it begins at conception—for that is the way he planned it. And I also believe that we are spiritual as well at physical beings so as Dabney Hedegard states:

“…life doesn’t really begin until I meet my Maker.”

In the end, Jesus is the way, truth, and life. It is with him that we will spend eternity if we choose to believe him. Every sacrificed baby will be there in heaven with Jesus. Every rescued life has a chance to live now and forever. Our true life will begin when we meet Jesus in heaven.

God puts it this way:

“This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life…” Deuteronomy 30:19-20

On this last day of January, the life awareness month, will you choose life?

Today is also the last day to get my novel, Dangerous Ground, which deals with sex trafficking, for FREE as the Kindle version. But every copy, whether digital or print, that is purchased will be supporting organizations like A21 and Bridging Freedom that are fighting to end sex trafficking and give aid to victims. All the proceeds of the book will be donated so you can know that you are contributing to saving a life by buying a book for you and/or a friend. While today is the last day for FREE, the annual proceeds from Dangerous Ground will always be donated no matter when you purchase it. Please pass the word.

HEALING: To Be or Not to Be?

November 1, 2013

That is a good question.

Anyone who’s ever been sick thinks of getting well. And as Christians who follow a Savior known as the Healer, we pray for it, claim it andDSC_0128 stake our faith on it.

But what happens when healing doesn’t come?

Or at least, not healing as we’d like it.

It’s been almost a year since I began feeling consistently unwell. This is the second year since my husband, Brendan, and I have been married. Two yearlong illnesses in less than five years. Not quite how I envisioned our newlywed life.

I can point at all the underlying issues: mold, stress, a driven way of life; but I also still believe God holds my health as well as my life in his hands.

He can heal instantly.

I’ve experienced him healing me a few times pretty much within minutes of someone praying for me. But I’ve also struggled with illness for more than a few weeks. He has healed my emotional wounds both in the moment I realized them and asked, and in decades of slow motion. I’ve known people who have been healed from debilitating diseases like cancer, and those who have died from them. All those folks believe God is sovereign and holds their life as precious and valued.

So what gives?

Here are my current conclusions:

  1. God cares most about our relationship with him. We are spiritual beings living in a physical world—someday purposed to spend eternity with him. While he cares immensely about our illness, wounds and brokenness, he most cares how it will draw us and others closer to him, and show him to those who haven’t yet met him. Is my illness bringing me closer to the Lord? Absolutely. I have a friend who suffers from a life-long illness. He claims he is a different person as a result, and while he would love to feel well all the time, he is grateful for the way God has used his illness to change him. I’m grateful too. For both of us.
  2. God wants to heal us. And he will. Whether today, in two months or in heaven, we will all be whole and with new bodies someday. The question isn’t whether God can or will, it’s what will I do with my illness in the meantime? Continue to ask for healing, while asking what I can learn in the process. Look to the Lord for what is most important today. Thank him for whatever he is using my illness to accomplish. I must keep focused on the good, the positive, the hopeful, all the way to the grave whenever that day comes. I can easily get discouraged from day to day based on whether I feel well or not if I don’t keep my eyes and heart on Jesus.
  3. Sometimes well-meaning people don’t see the big picture. Remember Job’s friends? I have to be willing to listen to advice, but ultimately God is my leader. I have to keep asking him what he wants for me in each given day, or hour or sometimes moment. I can’t do something because I’m concerned about what other people will think.                                                                                                      Last night I planned on attending an event at our church. I wanted to be there to serve, support my family, see my children and grandchildren, and interact with my church family; but midway through the day, I knew I shouldn’t go. I prayed, hoping the little nudge I felt to stay home and rest was imagined. But the more I wrestled over it with the Lord, the more I knew the answer. I kissed my husband and children goodbye and curled up with a bowl of veggie soup, praying for the event to make people feel safe and welcomed by the Holy Spirit on a night filled with evil. I worried briefly about what others might say about my not being there. I felt a little sad to not partake of the creative way our church campus was transformed into an adventure in space. But I knew I was where God wanted me. Resting and praying.
  4. I want my time of being ill to glorify God. My faith has been so strengthened and encouraged by people who have battled or continue to battle in the face of terrible illness or heartbreak—most far worse than mine. When I see the way those people carry on, loving Jesus with abandon, trusting him with each moment of each day even in the pain and tears, I feel empowered. I feel the spirit of God. Thank you Jo, Jeff, Margaret, Ashli, Dabney, Bill, Brian, Jen, Pamela, Ariana, Sharon, and so many others. Your lives testify of God’s goodness in the midst of a broken world.

I don’t have all the answers. I haven’t been fully healed—yet. But God is good and is teaching me to be more like him. Isn’t that the point?

 
If you disagree with me, or have some of your own conclusions, I’d love to hear about them.