The passage of SB8 in Texas and the refusal of the Supreme Court to enjoin its enforcement are important legal victories for the pro-life movement. We are grateful to God for all the unborn lives that will be saved as a result of the bill’s passage. 

The passage of the bill also creates an enormous opportunity for the pro-life movement to further demonstrate that it is also a Pro Abundant Life movement that not only saves babies from abortion, as God honoring as that is, but also builds strong families, and introduces people to the transformational power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

In crafting its Pro Abundant Life approach, Care Net was inspired by John 10:10, in which Christ says that he came to give us not just life, but abundant life as well.  For this Pro Abundant Life strategy to work, various life-affirming partners must work together. 

Accordingly, Care Net supports a network of 1,200 affiliated pregnancy centers that provide compassion, hope, and help to women and men considering abortion. In 2019 alone, Care Net-affiliated centers in Texas provided women, men, youth, and families with $8.8 million in services to empower their life-affirming choices.

But with the passage of SB8, the number of Texans – both women and men – who need help will undoubtedly increase.  While abortions will be much more difficult to get, unplanned pregnancies will still happen, and the demand for abortion will unfortunately remain. Accordingly, it is imperative that Christians and their churches take on a major role as providers of compassion, hope, and help to the women and men in Texas who will need “life support” to make, and then carry out, their life decisions.

To come alongside the Church in providing this needed life support, Care Net developed Making Life Disciples (MLD), a training that equips “first responders” in a church to provide compassion, hope, help, and discipleship to women and men considering abortion. To date, thousands of churches, through their small group ministries, have been equipped with this paradigm-shifting ministry model.  The new law in Texas makes it critical that thousands more join them.  

Care Net is working to ensure that Texas-based churches and pregnancy centers have the support they require to meet the need that SB8 has created. We will continue to provide state-of-the-art training and resources to our affiliated pregnancy centers. We will also help them introduce Making Life Disciples to their church partners so they can become full partners in their life-saving work. And we will engage churches across the state to adopt an MLD-based approach to serving their communities, working arm-in-arm with their local pregnancy centers to serve women and men in need of life support.   

Finally, Care Net will ensure that pro-life people in the state of Texas are connected to the life-affirming efforts that Care Net and other organizations are undertaking in their communities. Pregnancy centers need volunteers. Churches need lay leaders to implement a Making Life Disciples program. Care Net will help further fuel and mobilize Texans’ pro-life passion into Pro Abundant Life action so women and men who need help with a pregnancy decision have a variety of places to turn for compassionate, loving, Christ-centered support.  

For more information on how you can start a Making Life Disciples ministry in your church, visit makinglifedisciples.com.

To find a pregnancy center in your community, use our Find a Center tool.