Fight on Babcock Road

Not all battles are obvious.  Not every fight is visible from the outside.  One morning my stomach went topsy-turvy, and I didn’t think too much of it.  Then I remembered the story of Job, where Satan afflicted him with physical sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.  Job's pain was so severe that he picked up a pottery shard to try and scrape away the agony (Job 2:7-8).  That was Satan's tactic then, and he might still attack physically today.  In fact, the more I pondered the idea, the more my topsy-turvy stomach served to motivate me.  I didn’t like the idea of Satan deterring me from anything.  I continued visiting patients at the hospital and recognized the Lord giving a particularly tender conversation, which Satan would have loved to hinder.  I drove to the abortion center to pray, as planned.  Interestingly the somersaults in my stomach ceased.  No more queasiness, and what an amazing joy that came for praying in a place so dark with death.  My joy deepened all the more for realizing the Lord’s power to thwart any of Satan’s antics.  All the more vibrant was my prayer.  I asked the Lord to bring life to that whole area, to shower love upon this property on Babcock Road to dispel and replace all that had been destructive in the past.  May those who enter that parking lot, those who walk or drive by, those who work inside the building, those who live in the neighborhood, and those who pray on the sidewalk know the depth of love and forgiveness that Jesus offers.  That’s a big prayer.  Yet we have a big God.