Found

Throughout the Scripture, we can see God portrayed as the giver of life - including the first chapters of the Bible in the book of Genesis, where we see God as the Creator and the life-breather and the activity of a baby who leaped in the womb when his mother heard about the coming of the Messiah. God called the prophet Jeremiah in the first chapter of the book that bears his name, where we can read:
4 Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying:
5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations."
6 Then said I: "Ah, Lord God! Behold, I cannot speak, for I am a youth."
7 But the Lord said to me: "Do not say, 'I am a youth,' For you shall go to all to whom I send you, And whatever I command you, you shall speak.

This Scripture passage points to a God who knows us - who knew us even before we were created, endowed with a purpose before we were born.  Our days have been ordained by Him.  This can remind us of the sanctity of human life and give us an impetus to protect life in the womb.  It can also cause us to think about what God has in store for each of us; there is a meaning for our lives, and God empowers us to follow and fulfill His intent for us.

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This passage in the 139th Psalm can remind us that each life, including our lives, is a precious gift of God. We can read these words:
13 For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother's womb.
14 I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them.

A while back, I interviewed Arkansas Judge Joseph Wood. He shared the story of how, as an infant, he was "found" after having been left by his mother. He was placed in an orphanage and eventually adopted.

Well, there is more to his story now.  According to FoxNews.com, the judge "commemorated National Adoption Month in November by taking his lengthy search for his biological parents public."  This was over a year after my conversation with him aired in October of 2020.  The Fox story said that Wood had been "left swaddled in a shoebox in front of an apartment building March 20, 1965." 

The declaration of his story yielded fruit: the story relates: "CeCe Moore, a prominent genetic genealogist who specializes in cold cases, reached out to Wood on Thanksgiving after his story garnered media attention from Fox News and other outlets."  The article continued:

Moore said after Wood agreed to accept her help, she and her team of volunteer detectives worked around the clock to build his family tree with the information they uncovered from his DNA, hoping to get him the answers he wanted before Christmas.

This past December 23, Moore called Wood to say a "match" had been found.  The article reports:

Moore's firm discovered that Wood's mother died in 1978 at age 36. His father died in 2007 at 68, one of his brothers died in 2013 at 48 and his maternal grandfather died in 2020 at 98.

There are a remaining brother and sister, and as of March of this year, when the FoxNews.com story ran, there had been no response.

The story said that, "Moore, who often works with law enforcement to determine the origin of abandoned babies, told Fox News that Wood's story is an example of the importance of the safe-haven laws that have been implemented nationwide since the 1990s."  It states:

Safe-haven laws, also known as "Baby Moses laws," are U.S. statutes that have decriminalized leaving unharmed infants at police stations, fire stations and hospitals.

You may also remember my conversation from last September with Linda Znachko, who has He Knows Your Name Ministries, and has been involved with "Safe Haven Baby Boxes."  A story from early July at the KKTV.com website out of Colorado said, " A healthy baby was recently surrendered in a Safe Haven Baby Box in Indiana, making it the sixth baby surrendered in a Baby Box this year." The story stated:

Firefighters at the Mooresville Fire Department immediately tended to the infant when it was placed into the temperature-controlled box.

The story said that 6 states now allow have these boxes.  It stated:

The Mooresville location was the 39th Baby Box installed and offers a safe and anonymous way for new mothers to surrender their newborn babies they are unable to care for.

Monica Kelsey, who founded the Safe Haven Baby Box program, said, "We know this mother loves her infant immensely and we are proud of this selfless act. A loving family will soon adopt this baby and we are so grateful to be part of changing the narrative for this infant and the birth mother..."

A young man from Texas is involved in an effort to adopt a baby that had been found in less-than-ideal circumstances: a trash can in Haiti.  A CBN.com story said that back in 2017, Jimmy Amisial, who is 22, was "on his way to an orphanage in Gonaïves, Haiti when he heard a large crowd of people making a commotion around a trash can." He said, "When I got to the place where the people were making noise I saw a baby," adding, "It was in a pile of trash crying, and there wasn't a single soul who wanted to do anything about it."

Amisial took the baby, who was three months old, to his mother's house, then proceeded to report the child missing.  When police came up empty-handed, a judge asked him if he wanted custody of the child. 

The CBN article relates:

After a few nights of thinking it over, Amisial decided to become the boy's legal guardian.

"You know, in life, if you want to be great you have to learn how to face your challenges. And so, I took a leap of faith by saying yes to God, because when I looked into his eyes, I'm like, I cannot say no to that," Amisial told Austin-American Statesman.

Emilio Enjole Jeremiah is now 5 years of age, and lives happily with Amisial's mother in Haiti.

"He is certainly a blessing and a gift that God has entrusted me to show his love," Amisal wrote on Instagram.

Amisial has raised over $145,000 in order to make the adoption official.

As Kristan Hawkins of Students for Life of America reminded us last week on The Meeting House, every life has value.  We have developed an attitude that the lives of unborn children can somehow be thrown away - discarded in a cruel manner.  Unfortunately, this is a mindset that has permeated our culture and affects our view of one another.  Life is a gift, life is precious, and we should always find ourselves upholding the sanctity of life. We should take the right measures, make the extra step to preserve life.

That sense of value can continue to keep us motivated to serve God wholeheartedly - if we are breathing, God has a purpose for us. We can rejoice in the one who has breathed the breath of life into us and seek to please Him; that includes speaking up for those who are vulnerable and endangered in the womb.