All the women in your life have to be 80 years old or more to have gone through their child-bearing years during a time when abortion was not legal and accessible. Among the rest, 42% of American women have had one abortion by the age of 45 (abandoned or pressured, by and large, by men). There are 50 million abortions every year worldwide. The USA represents less than 3% of this. Where we gather college students and young professionals together to challenge them with the gospel, close to half of them are struggling secretly with this one particular form of guilt.

Addressing the Blood-Guilt of Abortion
Our generation needs a gospel presentation that address the blood-guilt of abortion specifically and openly as a gospel issue. To view abortion as a secondary, or worse, a political issue is to fundamentally misunderstand the defining experience of our times. Imagine preaching the gospel in the town of Dacau in the 40’s and intentionally avoiding, rather than pressing head-on, as to how the gospel addresses the sin of shedding innocent blood. Our silence would be interpreted to mean that it is outside the reach of what the gospel offers. Imagine sharing Christ in a hospital full of soldiers, some missing eyes, others arms, and never mentioning the part of the gospel that promises new bodies. Imagine preaching Christ at a funeral and never mentioning the hope of resurrection.

Called Out, Confessed, and Brought Under the Gospel
If you care about the primacy of the gospel and have a passion for missions, I beg you to stop seeing abortion as a secondary issue. Understand that it is the primary mark of this generation. And understand the anguish it causes. It is a megaphone of endless Satanic accusation. It snaps the tendons of spiritual effort and risk. The blood-guilt of abortion festers under the surface of all Christian endeavor. It needs lancing. It needs to be outed. It needs to be called out by name, confessed by name, and brought under a gospel that declares that there is no forgiveness for the shedding of innocent blood except by the shedding of innocent blood. Our generation needs to hear explicitly that the blood of Christ cleanses us from acts that lead to death, even and explicitly, abortion, “that we might serve the living God” (Heb 9:11).

John Ensor is VP of Heartbeat International and author of several books, including, The Great Work of the Gospel (Crossway).

http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/the-mission-field-created-by-abortion

What Is God Doing...Making Sense of Life

Have you ever stopped for a few hours to ponder one simple question...what is God doing in my life? I did...here are my reflections. Enjoy...but take time to answer this question for yourself! Write down your answers. I'd love to see them. Simply e-mail them to: trey@northwestfellowship.com - Can't wait to see them!


1. God is challenging me to the utmost so that I am only capable of persevering through His power! That's the way He likes it.

2. God is forcing to do that which is most important...pray!

3. God is encouraging me with just enough answers to prayer to refresh my faith!

4. God is calling me to look giants in the face with the same courage that a young shepherd named David did!

5. God is reminding me constantly that He is Almighty God and I'm His boy. That's a great thing!

6. God is leading me beyond my comfort zone with opportunities galore!

7. God is humbling me daily by showing me my weak pursuit of Him!

What an amazing life...what an indescribable God!!!

Quotes

"The key to prayer is simply praying." AW Tozer

"When we rely upon organization, we get what organization can do; when we rely upon education, we get what education can do; when we rely upon eloquence, we get what eloquence can do. But when we rely upon prayer, we get what God can do." - A. C. Dixon


"What if we are getting the very things we asked for...or not getting the very things we haven't asked for?"


"Why do we love rememdies for America's ills that avoid God's clear remedy: "If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways--I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin and heal their land."


In all things God is working a divine conspiracy for my good!


The most important thing I do is pray!


"Better a hundred times to have less and have God than to have more and cloud the face of God." AW Tozer


"I am more and more convined that God is desiring to answer the fervent prayers of righteous people like you to bring healing and revival."


"Is it any wonder that when the flames of missionary zeal and success sank away, it was because the fires of prayer had died low on the altars of devotion?"
- Robert E. Speer


"If added power attends the united prayer of two or three, what mighty triumphs there will be when hundreds of thousands of consistent members of the Church are with one accord day by day making intercession for the extension of Christ's Kingdom."
- John R. Mott


"Will you unite with fellow Christians around you in prayer? The greatest gift that we can give to others is our prayers..."

- David Bryant



"There has never been a spiritual awakening... that did not begin in united prayer."
- A.T. Pierson



"Revivals begin with God's own people; the Holy Spirit touches their heart anew, and gives them new fervor and compassion, and zeal, new light and life, and when He has thus come to you, He next goes forth to the valley of dry bones...Oh, what responsibility this lays on the Church of God! If you grieve Him away from yourselves, or hinder His visit, then the poor perishing world suffers sorely!"
- Andrew A. Bonar