The life of JaVale McGee, one of the most talented basketball players in the NBA, was just 72 hours away from being aborted when his mother decided God wanted her to keep the child.
Breitbart is reporting on the story of Pamela McGee, mother of Denver Nuggets player JaVale Mcgee, who was also a professional basketball player when she found out in 1987 that she was pregnant. Just 24 years-old at the time, she felt she could not handle a baby at the time, especially because of her international travel schedule. She just couldn’t imagine dragging an infant around with her and parking its stroller next to the player’s bench in the gym.
She decided to abort the child and made an appointment at a local abortion facility.
A few days before the termination was to take place, she found herself sitting in the sand at Dockweiler State Beach in Los Angeles, wondering if this was the right thing to do.
“I prayed and prayed and prayed and felt like I heard a voice from God,” McGee says. “He was telling me, ‘This is your gift’,” she told Sports Illustrated.
The next day, while attending services at Faithful Central Bible Church in Inglewood, the pastor delivered a sermon about not aborting one’s blessings.
“O.K., God,” McGee thought. “You don’t have to beat it into my head.”
She went home and cancelled the appointment.
On January 19, 1988, she gave birth to baby boy who would grow into a seven foot-tall basketball superstar.
Yes, it was hard. JaVale was only nine months old when she moved to Parma, Italy and played ball while her son slept in a stroller next to the bench. Over the next few years, they moved to France, Brazil and Spain as Pamela switched from team to team. She negotiated a nanny into every contract along with a seat on the plane for her son and homeschooled him until he was 10.
Every step of the way, God provided for her and JaVale.
A brief marriage to Reverend Kevin Stafford in 1994 brought a second child into her life – a daughter name Imani. The couple divorced two years later and, after a brutal custody fight, the Reverend was granted custody of their daughter. He cited Pamela’s travel schedule, saying it made her an unfit mother.
JaVale and Pamela made a life for themselves both on and off the basketball court. When she retired in 1999 and was diagnosed with breast cancer, it was her son who cared for her, fixed her meals, and remained at her bedside until she was back on her feet again.
Through it all, Pamela never told her son how close he came to being just another abortion statistic, but that moment finally came a few years ago when JaVale called her early one morning to say he wanted to go to church. She took him to the same church where she had made the fateful decision to bring him to life.
During the pastor’s sermon, JaVale looked at his mother and was surprised to see tears streaming down her face.
“Why are you crying?” he asked.
She finally told him the story of how she intended to abort him but changed her mind after hearing a sermon in this very same church.
Looking at her tall and now famous son, she couldn’t help but admit: “For me, you’ve been such a blessing.”
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