Lou Engle: The Greatest Prayer Movement I’ve Ever Been Part Of
As one who serves on staff at a pregnancy resource center, I feel like I’ve seen it all.
I’ve met women contemplating abortion because their boyfriends won’t help them. I’ve seen girls who fear revealing their pregnancy to their parents will get them kicked out. I’ve seen women who desire to carry their child and place them for adoption. I’ve heard ladies talk about abortion as casually as discussing a hair appointment.
I’ve watched women weep over past abortions and describe it as the most traumatic thing they’ve been through. I’ve witnessed ultrasounds change a mother’s mind. I’ve seen women look at their beautiful baby on the ultrasound screen and then still choose abortion.
Every single morning, I start the day at our pregnancy center with prayer. I gather with my volunteers to pray for the women we’ll encounter who are facing a crisis pregnancy. We pray for the ones who will walk in looking for options counseling and a listening ear. We ask our Heavenly Father to help the conflicted and hurting ones find us.
This week a woman called who said, “My mother hasn’t talked to me since I told her I was pregnant. I guess I’ll have to do this alone.” We told her she wasn’t alone and we would support her through this. Her finding us when she needed someone is an answered prayer.
Prayer can change any circumstance. That is why I love the ministry of Bound4LIFE, a prayer-focused grassroots organization founded by Lou Engle and led by Matt Lockett. Engle happens to be the man who taught me how to pray! I spent years as an intercessory missionary before I started working at our pregnancy care center.
Ten years have passed since I first heard Lou talk about praying to end abortion, but he is still teaching a generation how to contend with God. In a new video, he shares the importance of united prayer and how God is using Bound4LIFE to save lives through intercession.
“Prayer is the greatest force for releasing justice in the earth!” says Engle in the video, his Life Band faded but “still working,” he notes. “Praying for the ending of abortion, for the releasing of justice for the unborn and the pregnant mother, I believe Bound4LIFE is the greatest prayer movement that I’ve ever been part of.”
When we pray, God moves on our behalf. While working at our pregnancy care center, I’ve faced moments where I feel totally powerless. I don’t have all the answers and I’m limited in my ability to help others. I wish I had more money, time and resources to erase the needs of the mothers I love.
I imagine Bound4LIFE prayer teams must feel the same way as they stand before the Supreme Court, a busy abortion clinic or their state’s capitol building. The abortion industry, politicians and governmental leaders have so many resources at their fingertips. At times, it can seem like we are the ones struggling to fight in the battle of life. When we feel discouraged, we can remember what God’s Word says:
“For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers; but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil” (1 Peter 3:12)
Countless prayers have been offered up by Bound4LIFE prayer teams and many others in the pro-life movement. Who knows when God will tip those prayer-filled bowls in Heaven and send our answers crashing to earth? Maybe those answered prayers will come in the form of a saved baby, a post-abortive woman receiving healing or an abortion provider coming to know Christ.
Regardless of what is going on politically in our nation, I know the thousands upon thousands of prayers offered before the Supreme Court are changing the hearts of our governmental leaders. Even when we cannot see the answers with our eyes, we can know in our hearts that by faith they are coming.
We all play unique roles in the fight to end abortion, but intercessors have one of the most valuable jobs. They are the ones who lift up our nation and stand in the gap before a holy and just God.
As the Body of Christ and the pro-life movement, we must do all we can to ensure that when God looks for a man to stand in the gap on behalf of the land—He will find one.
Christina Marie Bennett, who writes at ChrisMarie.com and for Bound4LIFE, believes conversations can change culture. After graduating college with a degree in Business Communications, she served with Justice House of Prayer DC and later led the Bound4LIFE Atlanta chapter while serving at International House of Prayer-Atlanta. Since then, she married the love of her life and became a stepmother. She currently works for a non-profit in New England that serves pregnant women in crisis and their families.
Reprinted with permission from Bound4LIFE.
