In this Impact Report, we feature highlights from Justice For All (JFA) events that took place from March to September. Each highlighted event illustrates the way smaller training teams can help us make a bigger impact. We’ve found that empowering our trainers to do events on their own helps our team to be nimble and ready to meet the great need all over the country for good dialogue training—training that includes outreach whenever possible.
This month we report on a different kind of impact that God has created through JFA, specifically through the work of our office manager, Eva Heath. This is the story of the impact God produces through human beings many have written off because of their circumstances or disabilities. It’s also the story of one woman’s testimony that even if we can’t see the good that God is bringing from difficulties right now, we must hope in Him, loving every human being precisely because each person is made in the image of God. We bid a fond farewell to you this month, Eva, and we trust God will care for you in the new chapter of your retirement!
We just updated JFA’s elementary lesson plan, ”The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine” with a stethoscope model on which we have gotten good reviews from kids who have tested it for use with the lesson plan:
JFA recommends this kid-tested and kid-approved stethoscope: “Ever Ready First Aid Dual Head Stethoscope, Black” available for about $5 from Amazon. (Note: You can choose Justice For All, Inc. as your charity through www.smile.amazon.com to help JFA through your purchase.)”
Two links in our recent letter were just redirected to the correct pages. If you ended up at our 404 page, we apologize! The links work now:
July 2019 Impact Report (including List of Spring 2019 Events)
JFA has been known for using very large exhibits to train Christians to become leaders in their communities, creating dialogue that changes hearts and minds on abortion. While we are still willing to use any of our three large exhibits when training large groups, we now also have many small-scale signs in our tool kit that allow us to divide into smaller teams and visit more regions and campuses, and sometimes we even have events happening in different cities on the same day. (See our “JFA Events at a Glance: Spring 2019” list for a complete list of events.) In this Impact Report, we show just a sampling of some of these smaller-scale events and the leaders they allowed us to train and encourage. Some of our volunteers even joined us multiple times in one semester!
Our smaller outreach signs enhance indoor events like the one at South Dakota State University.
In Louisiana, JFA Fellow Amy Grace (yellow scarf) engages a passerby while two other conversations happen near the poll table. Amy Grace also just completed a week intensive in Wichita in July.
Thomas (left) is a high school student in Georgia. He was electrified by the “Three Essential Skills” presentation he attended in March in a JFA supporter’s home and decided to make it a priority to attend the JFA seminar and outreach events at Kennesaw State during the next week.
Julia (front left), Rebekah (front center), Kaitlyn (blue), and Moriah (right) joined JFA for outreach at UNM in Albuquerque. Moriah interned with JFA in 2017, and Julia shared some of her story in our February Impact Report (www.jfaweb.org/feb-2019). Kaitlyn is now raising support to work for JFA from Michigan, and Rebekah is raising support to travel to JFA events.
Esther (left) joined a small JFA team as we partnered with Master Plan Ministries for outreach at Fort Lewis College in beautiful Durango, CO.
At Johns Hopkins in Maryland in April, Steve Wagner (not pictured) helped Elisabeth (center) and her club create conversations with fellow students.
Susanna (right) also participated in two outreach events at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. An intern with JFA in 2017-2018, Susanna is now raising support to work as a JFA trainer in Washington, D.C.!
Peyton (left) joined us for outreach at UCLA to learn to come alongside those who are tolerant of abortion and help them love unborn children and their mothers.
For the first time that I’m aware of, EHD has recently made a 6-minute version of their rare embryoscopy footage available for download. And, it’s free.
We’re excited about this because it’s a beautiful window on the womb, but it also will fill very nicely the video component of our lesson plan, “The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine.” Note, the video is also available in multiple languages!
Use the comments section of this post to share your ideas and feedback about JFA’s elementary lesson plan, “The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine.”
Access, Download, Share, and Use the Lesson Plan here: www.jfaweb.org/heart-beats-like-mine
See the latest updates to the lesson by accessing our “Heart Beats Like Mine” blog tag and scrolling through the latest posts.
Five years ago, JFA released a working paper to respond to the strongest versions of bodily rights arguments for abortion. Equal Rights Institute (ERI) recently released a video featuring one of the contributors to that paper, Timothy Brahm (former staff member of both JFA and ERI), in which he takes a different approach than our paper, one that we think is an even more helpful response to bodily rights. It’s called, “Blood Donation and Bodily Rights Arguments.” Some of our staff think it’s even better than our paper. In 12 minutes, Tim deftly responds to the most common challenges and gives you a framework that you can apply to the most common and most difficult bodily rights arguments. (Indeed, he also shares some reasons why our original paper may not be the most persuasive — helpful critique that we welcome!) JFA’s “It’s Her Body” series last year set the appropriate context for any discussion of bodily rights. Pairing ERI’s video with “It’s Her Body”, will give you a great primer on bodily rights, as well as a great conversation starter.
Impact Report, June 2019
In this Impact Report, we share a story that’s been passed down from the early days of Justice For All. The lead character is a four-year-old we’ll call “Rachel” (name changed for privacy). If Rachel was able to help save an unborn child’s life, can’t we do the same?
In the story, Rachel makes use of video footage captured using a technique called embryoscopy. At the time when the story took place, embryoscopy footage was rare and rarely seen. But now the Endowment for Human Development (EHD) has made embryoscopy footage free and readily available through a stunning website, EHD’s amazing apps, and through a new short film (see video below).
JFA recently released a K-4 lesson plan for free on the web (sign-up for updates required). The lesson plan features the video footage from EHD with the hope that we can enable thousands of churches, schools, and families to teach their children (and adults!) to do what Rachel did so naturally: speak up for those who can’t speak for themselves. - Steve Wagner, Executive Director
When “Rachel” went to preschool, she just had to tell her teacher what she had seen.
Rachel had recently climbed into her daddy’s lap as he was preparing the next day’s lesson for his ninth grade biology class. Together, they watched rare footage of very young unborn children, captured using a technique called embryoscopy. Unlike the sonography of the time, these video images were crystal clear. They watched the heart beating through the semi-transparent skin of the embryo. They saw the young fetus move her hands and legs. They watched unborn children open and close their mouths. Rachel was electrified.
As JFA’s founder, David Lee, paraphrased the story years later, here’s what happened next:
Soon after seeing the video with her father, Rachel told her preschool teacher that she had seen babies in their mother’s tummies. She described them in detail. Of course, her preschool teacher knew that wasn’t possible and gently scolded Rachel: “While that is a fun story, it is not really a good thing to make up stories.”
When Rachel’s mother came to pick her up, the teacher felt it necessary to inform Rachel’s mother that she had scolded Rachel for not being entirely truthful. Rachel’s mother replied, “On the contrary, she did see that, sitting in her father’s lap, because he was going to be showing it to his biology class.”
Of course the preschool teacher felt awful. But what might have been the end of a slightly embarrassing story was only the beginning. Not long after, the teacher was entering her apartment, unlocking the door, when she was tapped on the shoulder by her neighbor in the apartment building who was holding a pregnancy test. The neighbor said, “Can you help me read this? I’ve never done this before.”
The teacher was a little embarrassed by the situation, but as a Christian, she decided she must help. She welcomed the young woman into her apartment. Together, they read the test. Her neighbor was pregnant.
The neighbor could only say, “Would you help me go to get an abortion?”
The preschool teacher was shocked and said, “I could never help you do that. I couldn’t help you kill your baby.”
Then it was time for the neighbor to be shocked as she said, “What do you mean, a baby? I’m just four or five weeks pregnant. How could it be a baby?”
““What do you mean, a baby? I’m just four or five weeks pregnant. How could it be a baby?”
The light went on in the preschool teacher’s head: This young woman needed to see the very same footage that Rachel had been talking about at the preschool.
The teacher talked to Rachel’s mother and shared the story about the neighbor who was pregnant and intending to get an abortion. “May I borrow the video to show my neighbor?”
To make a long story short, she did show her neighbor and the boyfriend that video. And there’s a baby whose life was saved, in part because a four-year-old saw video of unborn children and shared it with her friends and her teacher.
If a four-year-old can learn about unborn children and speak up for them so naturally, we think elementary school students (and the rest of us) certainly can watch similar video footage and share what they’ve learned. We think we’ll see lives saved as a result. That’s why JFA has just released our first elementary school lesson plan for widespread use: “The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine.” Please click here to access it, download it, share it, and teach it!
Although the lesson can be fun for any age, it’s intended for use with students in kindergarten through fourth grade. As for older students, why not encourage them to help you teach the lesson to your younger students?
In this lesson, K-4 students identify with unborn babies through a series of experiences, including feeling their own heartbeats, seeing the unborn baby in the womb, naming similarities they share with unborn babies, making a bracelet that reminds them of when the heart begins to beat, and narrating what they learned to their parents. The goal is to help them value all human beings including the smallest ones and to get conversations about unborn babies started in churches, schools, and the broader culture.
This K-4 Lesson Plan is well-suited for one-to-many instruction in religious elementary schools, Sunday school environments, and homeschool co-ops, and it's also well-suited for use by parents and grandparents in teaching their kids and grandkids one-to-one.
Justice For All makes this copyrighted Lesson Plan available to anyone to use. To share it with anyone anywhere in the world, use the address www.jfaweb.org/heart-beats-like-mine. You’ll be directed to sign up as a "JFA Content Subscriber." That's free. It's just our way of making sure we can keep in contact with folks using the lesson plan. (Or, you can share this lesson plan summary and letter using the link www.jfaweb.org/june-2019.)
Here are a few of our projects and needs for which you can pray specifically this month:
Outreach Events: UCLA (May 20-22) & Wichita State University (June 26)
Upcoming Workshops in MI, KS, TX, & PA: Find more event information on JFA’s Calendar page.
New Staff: Kaitlyn Donihue and Susanna Buckley recently accepted positions to work for JFA (in Michigan and the Washington, D.C. region respectively). Pray that God would quickly bring in the monthly support they need. Go to our Donate Page if you would like to help.
JFA Trainers Raising Support: All of JFA’s trainers are working to raise additional support during the summer. Pray that we can successfully connect with many people.
25 Churches & 50 Families: We’ve recently released a lesson plan that can help you and your friends to teach K-4 students to identify with and love unborn children. Pray with us for 25 churches and 50 families to download and teach the lesson plan this summer. Pray they would give us feedback as we work to expand the reach of the lesson to thousands more soon. Click here for more information.
Kaitlyn Donihue (left) recently accepted a position to work for JFA in Michigan.
Susanna Buckley (middle) recently accepted a position to work for JFA in Washington D.C.
Whether you teach kids at home, in a church Sunday School, or in a traditional school environment, be one of the first to download and teach “The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine” lesson plan to students in kindergarten through fourth grade. Then give us feedback. During the lesson, K-4 students identify with unborn babies through a series of experiences, including feeling their own heartbeats, seeing the unborn baby in the womb, naming similarities they share with unborn babies, making a bracelet that reminds them of when the heart begins to beat, and narrating what they learned to their parents. (“Sign Up” to access this “Member Only” content. That’s free!)
JFA developed our new K-4 Lesson Plan (click here to read a brief description) partly to “drive interest” in discussions about unborn children within churches and other communities. Here’s how we envision that working: You download the lesson plan and teach any group of K-4 kids (or you can teach just one!). During the lesson, students practice sharing what they’ve learned with their parents, and then take home a bracelet and a “Student and Parent Handout” to facilitate those conversations about the unborn child. We anticipate this will not only create conversations among parents and students but also among parents and teachers and others in the community! Help us test this idea to see if it will work.
“These numbers were debunked in 1969 — 50 years ago — by a statistician celebrated by Planned Parenthood. There’s no reason to use them today.”
ICYMI --> Planned Parenthood’s false stat: ‘Thousands’ of women died every year before Roe https://t.co/eiDrxIucox
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) May 29, 2019
The claim that “thousands of women died every year” from illegal, botched abortions prior to Roe v. Wade is widely repeated by such prominent voices as the Los Angeles Times’ executive editor Norman Pearlstine in this recent op ed and even by the President of Planned Parenthood. But is it true?
Thanks to the fact checkers at the Washington Post, we now have a clear answer.
May 2019 Impact Report
Kaitlyn Donihue shares the brochure in a conversation at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado in March 2019. (Photos shared in this story courtesy of Master Plan Ministries)
Our team was conducting outreach at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado in March 2019. A young man came up and signed the poll table. I asked him whether he thought abortion should be legal throughout all nine months of pregnancy, or just for a window of time in pregnancy.
“Definitely all nine months,” he said.
“Ok. I am really curious. Women get abortions for a lot of different reasons. How do you feel about a circumstance in which a woman wants a boy, but realizes that she is pregnant with a girl—should she be allowed to get an abortion for that reason?”
“Yes,” he said emphatically. “Women should have choices.”
“So you think that abortion should be legal through all nine months of pregnancy for any reason at all? Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
JFA volunteers dialogue with students at Fort Lewis College in March 2019. (Photo courtesy of Master Plan Ministries)
At this point, I wanted to go talk to someone else. I did not want to talk to someone who was that staunchly pro-choice, but instead I said,
“I agree with what you said a minute ago. Women should have the freedom to make choices. Freedom is so important. I am so glad that I live in a country where I have rights and freedom. There are many countries around the world where I, as a woman, would not have rights.”
JFA volunteers dialogue with students at Fort Lewis College in March 2019. (Photo courtesy of Master Plan Ministries)
“Now, this is going to sound strange,” I said, “But I am also glad that I do not have some rights. For example, I do not have the right to walk onto this campus with a gun and start shooting people. My rights end where your rights begin. So I think the question we have to ask with the issue of abortion is, ‘What is the unborn?’ If the unborn is not a human being and abortion does not kill a human being, then I think you are right. If that were the case, then abortion should be legal through all nine months for any reason. But if the unborn is a human being and abortion actually takes the life of a human being, then even though there are really difficult situations in which women find themselves, I don't think those situations can justify taking the life of a human being. What do you think? Do you think the unborn is a human being?”
I pulled out the JFA brochure and showed him pictures of development.
“Yes. Yes, I think it is a human being. You’re right. This is wrong. We can’t kill human beings,” he said thoughtfully.
“Do you think that abortion should not be legal?”
“Yes. I don’t think it should be legal.” He was staring at the pictures of development.
One conversation during the recent outreach at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado (Photo courtesy of Master Plan Ministries)
“The next page of this brochure contains some graphic pictures of what abortion does. Would you mind if I showed them to you?”
“No. That would be okay.”
I opened the brochure, and we stood there in silence for a couple of moments. He was very thoughtful.
“This should never be legal,” he said.
Through this conversation, I was reminded that I cannot really know another person or his beliefs until I take the time to ask questions and hear him out. I never know what God might do, even in the heart of a student that seems closed off.
UCLA - May 21, 2019
See more photos from last week’s JFA events at UCLA, below.
I was in the plane last week traveling to our recent events in Los Angeles. The man sitting next to me, on his own without any provocation from me, brought up the recent Alabama law that banned abortion outright. He saw it as unconscionably “extreme.” This law in Alabama and similar laws in Georgia and other states are getting the conversation about abortion and unborn children started all around us. Let’s pray for JFA’s training events as we prepare Christians to be ready for these opportunities. Let’s pray God will use our outreach events to strengthen courage in all of us to speak up. - Steve Wagner, Executive Director
Mar. 17-19 (Durango, CO): Seminar & Outreach Events with Master Plan Ministries
Mar. 23-26 (Albuquerque, NM): Seminars & Outreach Events near/at University of New Mexico (UNM)
Mar. 31-April 2 (Lawrence, KS): Seminar & Outreach Events at/near University of Kansas (KU)
April 15, 24 (Fairfax, VA): Outreach Events at George Mason University (GMU)
April 23-25 (OK and TX): Outreach Events at Oklahoma State University (OSU) & University of North Texas (UNT)
May 18-22 (Los Angeles Area, CA): Seminars & Outreach Events near/at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
UCLA - May 2019
(Pictured - right: Kaitlyn Donihue, JFA Intern)
UCLA - May 2019
(Pictured - middle: Steve Wagner, Executive Director)
UCLA - May 2019
(Pictured - right: Tammy Cook, JFA Trainer)
UCLA - May 2019
(Pictured - left: Rebekah Dyer, JFA Fellow)
This month, when Jeremy Gorr showed up in Phoenix to teach a seminar, he was met with a surprise: Rylei, a high school student he helped train in 2017 and 2018 in Colorado, was now a student at Arizona State University and eager to become active changing hearts and minds at ASU. Jeremy’s letter, “Growing Up with Justice For All” tells Rylei’s story. Please pray for Rylei’s conversations at ASU, and pray that God would continue to help Rylei, JFA alumni like her, and JFA’s training team, as all of us speak up this month for forgotten women and children.
We’ve recently conducted outreach events at Univ. of Kansas (4/1-2), Univ. of Northern Colorado (4/8-9), George Mason Univ. in Fairfax, VA (4/15, 4/24), Oklahoma State Univ. (4/23) and Univ. of North Texas (4/24-25). We’re looking forward to seminar and outreach events at UCLA in Los Angeles, CA on May 19-22. Please join us or pray for us!
Outreach with Cowboys for Life at Oklahoma State University - April 23, 2019
JFA just released a lesson plan for K-4 elementary school students called, “The Baby’s Heart Beats Like Mine.” Whether you teach kids at home, in a church Sunday School, or in a traditional school environment, be one of the first to try this lesson and give us feedback. During the lesson, K-4 students identify with unborn babies through a series of experiences, including feeling their own heartbeat, seeing the unborn baby in the womb, naming similarities they share with unborn babies, making a bracelet that reminds them of when the heart begins to beat, and narrating what they learned to their parents.
(You’re required to “Sign Up” to access this “Member Only” content. That’s free!)
(Note: This resource was our “Featured Resource” for April 2019 and May 2019.)
Paul Kulas (center) traveled to South Dakota in the dead of winter (!). He reported an outdoor temperature of 3 degrees the afternoon of the workshop he led. Good thing the SDSU students reserved indoor space for the outreach event!