Opinion

October 30, 2012 (Bound4Life.com) – Your passion not only effects you, it affects others around you.

Until late July of this year, I was pro-choice when it came to abortion. I know it seems hard to believe that someone like me could even say that. I mean, I love Jesus. I had been in church my entire life. I was raised by parents who taught me great morals. I even went to ministry school at the Ramp. I’d heard the 22-word Life prayer for abortion to end. I had quoted it; I had even sung the song. I witnessed Lou Engle cry out for it and I’d seen pictures of red Life Tape across the mouths of people standing outside of Planned Parenthood, and I even admired their boldness for taking a stand. I thought what they were doing was awesome, but it just wasn’t for me. And I had absolutely no idea that I was in the wrong. I believed abortion was bad, and I would have never stood for it in a normal situation.

However, in my head, the exceptions for abortion made so much sense. I mean you have the common argument about when someone is raped they should have the choice to abort. I agreed with that, I mean… rape is a crime right? It seemed logical. There was also the fact that sometimes it was safer for women to abort than to go to term. It seemed to make more sense to save a woman’s life than to save a baby who wasn’t even born yet. But the biggest part of my argument was that yes, abortion was wrong… but women should have the right to choose what to do with their own bodies. But at the end of the day, no matter what my stand on it was I knew that I would never have an abortion, so it didn’t really matter to me. And I was content with that.

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This summer I met someone who is absolutely 100% pro-life. When I first met her, her desire to see abortion end kind of shook me up a little bit. She not only just believed abortion was wrong, but it was evident that she was passionate about seeing abortion ended completely. This girl hated abortion so much, she didn’t even support companies that funded Planned Parenthood. To be honest, I thought it was a little odd at first. Yet the more I got to know her, the more I really saw her heart for the unborn. She wasn’t one of those people that would yell at someone and tell them that they were going to hell for murdering their unborn child. She was different… she genuinely cared. When she would talk about it, I would see the actual hurt it caused her to know that innocent lives were being taken every day. Tears would stream down her face as she would talk about the love that she wished she could show the women who had already had abortions. I saw her heart break over people she had never even met. I saw how much she loved them, and I knew that her heart was pure.

When I would notice how broken she got over abortion I couldn’t help but question my own stand on the subject. I re-evaluated the way I thought about life vs. choice and for the first time, I actually understood that life begins at conception. I understood that a baby that is in the womb is still a baby and not just “tissue.” Because of my friend’s passion, something that I had chosen to ignore became real to me. I would even wake up from dreams about abortion. I would see a baby in a store somewhere and it would be very hard for me not to cry. It was quite a change for me.

The life that my friend lives and the passion that she has for babies was too much for me to ignore. And she won’t know until she reads this blog how deeply her stand for life affected me.

Don’t lose your passion. Whether you are passionate about abortion, orphans, the nations, sex trafficking, or seeing celebrities saved… it all matters. And you have no idea who you will influence by just being you and burning what God has put in your heart to burn for.

Danica Keeton attended Ramp School of Ministry in Hamilton, AL last year and is now pursuing a degree in nursing. She is a gifted artist and paints for paintings on purpose to raise money and create awareness for missions. She enjoys reading, writing, and ministry. Follow her on twitter at @DanicaKeeton .

Reprinted with permission from Bound4Life.com