We had just finished training about 70 high school seniors from Faith Christian Academy in Arvada (Denver, CO area) on a late September Friday afternoon in 2006. The students would join us for the Exhibit at Colorado State University (CSU) in Fort Collins during the next week.
As our training team drove north on I-25 toward Fort Collins at about 3:30 PM, I turned my cell phone on to listen to voice mail. The very first one spelled immediate disaster—a CSU administrator informed me that we would not be able to have the Exhibit at CSU on Monday because the student club paperwork was not in proper order.
We made a quick exit off the freeway and found a hotel that graciously let us to use their wireless internet in the lobby. After 90 minutes of intense prayer, phone calls, tracking down students and information, the crisis was resolved and the CSU reservation again secured.
Relief was followed by starvation. Most had missed lunch. A few had also skipped breakfast. Tammy and Paul remembered that we had stopped at that very exit to eat on an earlier mission to Denver with less than enjoyable results. Votes were cast. We would eat at a different restaurant nearby.
A fatigued training team of 8 JFA staff and volunteers sat down to “destress” and have dinner and thoroughly enjoyed the energetic service that a waitress named Cecilia (named changed for privacy) provided.
Near the end of the meal, I complimented Cecilia on her excellent work and asked how long she had been a waitress. “Six months”, she replied, adding that she was also a student at Metro State (Denver).
“In that case you may have seen our ugly abortion display called the Justice For All Exhibit there last fall,” I responded.
“I did! And I thought that it was needed and very well done.” Then more softly Cecilia continued, “My mother had an abortion a long time ago, and she still has problems with it – she’s recently been having dreams about it.”
“Could I give you a brochure that covers that experience that you could share with her?” I asked.
“Most certainly I would. Thank you.” She replied leaving the table to process my credit card payment for our bill.
She had barely left the table when Paul jumped up to retrieve a Focus on the Family abortion recovery brochure from the truck to give to Cecilia when she returned with the credit card receipt.
Upon my offer of the brochure, Cecilia said, “My mom only speaks Spanish. Do you have anything that I could give her that’s written in Spanish?”
I promised to find an abortion recovery brochure in Spanish for her to review and give to her mom, and we traded email addresses.
Cecilia then added, “I have a good friend who wanted to get an abortion, so I went with her to Planned Parenthood. I was appalled by what they did not tell her, so I showed her the Justice For All Exhibit in order to show her what really happens in an abortion. She now has a beautiful baby girl!” (text in bold was Cecilia’s emphasis)
Cecilia went on to tell us that she is a pre-med student, and that the Justice For All Exhibit offers an extremely valuable service to students since they don’t learn about abortion anywhere else. She made us promise to let her know when we would be back so that she could volunteer at our next Colorado Exhibit!
And we have! Pray that she will join us for at least part of a day in 2008!
--As told by David W. Lee, Executive Director, Justice For All