Prayer from Mark Baumgartner, Executive Director of A Moment of Hope
Mark Baumgartner, founder and Executive Director of A Moment of Hope, prayed the following prayer on Saturday, September 26, 2020, on the South Carolina State House steps as part of a prayer gathering of national repentance.
Great God and Gracious Heavenly Father,
I come to you as a man of unclean lips, amidst a nation of unclean lips. Thank you for atoning for my sin, not with a burning coal from your altar (as in Isaiah chapter 6), but by pouring out your burning wrath on your beloved Son Jesus, the Lamb of God, in my place on the cross. I come boldly before you now because of His righteousness and shed blood.
I bring before you the evil of abortion—the killing of the most defenseless, innocent, and helpless of your image bearers, in what should be the safest place on earth, the mother’s womb.
Every day between two and three thousand precious little ones are killed in abortion clinics in this country alone. More than sixty million have died since 1973. Just yesterday1 27 more babies died on our doorstep—at the Planned Parenthood abortion facility off Forest Drive—less than three miles from where we stand.
Your Word says, “Thou shalt not kill.” Your Word also says if we ask anything according to your will, you hear us. Hear us Lord. Bring an end to this wickedness. Keep this nation from storing up more wrath for the Day of Judgment. How long, O Lord, will you let this evil continue?
I turn now to the purveyors of this evil, the many abortion workers in this city, state, and nation. They’re blinded by the devil and held captive to do his will. Open their eyes, Lord. Grant them repentance and give them faith to turn to you as Lord and serve you in God-honoring employment.
We pray for mothers who might be considering abortion. Give them the courage and resolve to love, nurture, and protect their babies.
We pray for the Christians and ministries laboring to bring an end to this holocaust. Bless their work. Give them perseverance and endurance to love their enemies well, until the day when abortion is not only unthinkable, but outlawed.
To this end, we pray for the speedy confirmation of a God-fearing and life-affirming Supreme Court Justice and for Roe v. Wade to be overturned. Thank you for the strong advocacy our elected officials, including Governor McMaster and President Trump. Bless them in their service to this state and nation.
Finally, I pray for those who have had abortions. Some may be sitting here among us. Help them find the forgiveness and healing that only Jesus offers. As the well-known hymn2 goes:
What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
O precious is the flow that makes me white as snow;
no other fount I know;
nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Thank you, precious Savior, for who you are, for what you have done, and what you will do, for us, your people. In your exalted and glorious name we pray. Amen.
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Mark Baumgartner serves as an elder at First Presbyterian Church in Columbia, SC and is the founder and executive director of A Moment of Hope, a Christian outreach to the local Planned Parenthood abortion facility.
1 Friday, September 25, 2020
2 Nothing but the blood of Jesus by Robert Lowry (1876)