I am here today to share with you the healing that has taken place in my life the last couple of months.  Healing that I thought I had taken place 20 years ago, but I had really just buried it.

Even though I knew that Jesus had forgiven me of my sin, I still carried that sin because I buried it and kept it in the dark.  And until that darkness comes to Light, you can be forgiven, but you can never be truly healed.  And through the Bible Study that I am going to share with you today, I found true healing thru God’s Word.

The Bible Study is “Forgiven & Set Free: A Post-Abortion Bible Study for Women,” by Linda Cochrane

Here is how I came to take part in this study:

Some people here today have known me since I was a little girl. Some probably thought that I had everything a child could ever ask for. And I did, materially, but inside, I was totally LOST.

At 45, I feel I am FINALLY FREE to share my testimony. It all comes about in God’s time and I feel God has chosen this crucial time because our children’s future is at stake. More than anything, I want so much to share with you the MERCY, FORGIVENESS & MOST OF ALL, THE LOVE OF JESUS CHRIST. 

To tell you a little about my teenage years . . . At 12, I started drinking At 13, smoking pot, then at 16, I started doing cocaine and lost my virginity all in the same weekend. This guy that I had dated for two years, who I thought was the love of my life, was very good-looking and popular. Then, after that weekend, he turned around and dumped me a few months later. From being so crushed, and to get back at him (in my not-so-mature, 16-year-old mind), I decided I would go and sleep with his best friend. (Of course, we think we know it all at 16) First time-- I got pregnant. Not knowing what to do and scared to death to tell my parents (most especially my Mother, since we were Catholic at the time), a couple of friends drove me to Jacksonville and I had an abortion. From that time on, into my 20’s, I was looking for love in ALL the wrong places. 

When I was a senior in high school, I had another abortion.  I can remember my English teacher coming up to me, after I had the abortion, and saying, “Kathy, unless you make an “A+” on your term paper, you will NOT walk with your class.”  Well, I did my term paper on abortion, as I think I was crying out for help, and I did make that “A+” and I did walk with my class. Then, in my early 20’s, I had a third abortion.

And the reason I stand up here today to tell you this, is because for the first time in almost 30 years, I don’t feel like I have to bite my tongue anymore. Since I have been saved since I was 25, and have been healed by the Blood of Jesus, I have wanted to share my testimony so many times, but knew I would have to tell my mother before I ever went public.  God is so good and His timing is always just right, if we are patient and wait on Him. 

On September 23rd of this year, I had gone to my Christian counselor and when I left there I felt so FREE IN CHRIST and just knew that that day was the day I was to tell my mother. Before even telling my mother, just knowing I was going to tell her, already took 1,000 pounds of stress off of me. 

But I wanted to make sure that she was in a good place emotionally and spiritually, where she could hear it and not get too upset and that she was feeling really strong in the Lord. She said she was, so she came to my house and I told her.  God is so good! That morning, as she was driving in her car, God had already prepared her heart with a pastor on the radio giving a sermon on abortion and the effects it has on women.

I was facing such a HUGE issue at such a young age and had no idea where to turn; I thought there was no other option.  There was no one to talk to.  I think young girls at times can be too filled with SHAME to talk to their parents. And grown women feel they have no choice for various reasons and, honestly, I believe it is from fear and lack of knowledge. And most especially teenagers, like me, have no idea what they are actually doing. They think short term fix.

During the timeframe when I had my procedures, it had been approximately ten years since Roe vs. Wade had been passed, a time when the most abortions in history had been done. When I think of the heartache, sorrow and years of working through this, and the effects it has had on so many families, it just breaks my heart. What I have learned, through this Bible Study, is so healing and yet so sad and alarming, thinking of how many women and families abortion has touched.  Not only does it affect the woman that had the abortion or abortions, it affects her family and the father has just as many emotional issues.

What is hard to believe is that it is the middle-class woman in her 20’s and 30’s that is the most likely to have an abortion today. 

If someone had been there to take me by the hand and walk me through my situation, I know these pregnancies would have had a different outcome. Because of Roe vs. Wade, I didn’t need my parents consent to have these done and if I had, then my parents, MOST DEFINITELY, would never have allowed it.

And, most likely, if I had had my first child, I would never have gotten pregnant two more times. What a blessing it would have been to have someone who was grounded in the Lord to walk me through this crisis of telling my parents, etc. 

When I think back to walking into that abortion clinic, I don’t remember anyone really trying to talk me out of it. They may have asked, “Are you sure you want to do this?,” but nothing in a loving way to talk me out of it. I can even remember the second time I went, the nurse was so mean to me and I remember asking myself if she remembered me from before. It was awful.

We need to help women any way that we can and show them that if they end up with an unwanted pregnancy, that no matter what it takes, with the support of EPIC and your Christian sisters, the Lord will provide a way for that woman to keep her baby, whether she chooses to put it up for adoption or not.

Think of all the people you know that have had trouble conceiving a child and then think of all the people that have had an abortion. What a blessing God placed right in our laps to give life to couples that could not have children and we have taken it away so often. We have taken what God gave us freely as a joyful and precious gift and aborted it and then couples are charged thousands of dollars for the gift of a child that God gave freely.

I stand here today to reach out to any of you here that have been affected by abortion and to let you know that not only is God here for you, ready to take your pain away, but so am I.

I thank God that in my life, He has wiped that slate clean and my babies are in Heaven right now and I will rock them for eternity. And I want each and every woman, friend and family member to know the freedom and peace God has given me.

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is FREEDOM.”
2 Cor. 3:17

Let us together, take that darkness and bring it into the LIGHT.  In Jesus’ Name I pray.    AMEN