We Don’t Love Children, We Love Drywall

My brother and his wife just announced that they were expecting their third baby.  (Welcome to the world of “the large family”, bro!)

Someone asked about our parents’ reaction to the news.

“Oh, they’re very excited!”

To which the (Christian) someone responded,

“They have 50 grandchildren and they’re still excited?!” (That was sarcasm, by the way; they have 14.)

We know the reality behind the joke–“more is only better if you really value the thing multiplying in your life“.  Money, accolades, vacations–we can’t get enough.  Cavities?  No more, thank you.

We say we love children, but we don’t put our money where our mouth is. “How do  you afford all those children?” Is that question an attempt to relieve the conscience?  Or do we really dislike multiplication so much we want to make the parents feel guilty? All the while, we’re borrowing money for bigger houses and get high fives for that.  As Kevin Swanson says:  “We LOVE drywall!”

“The very analogy of Christian marriage is to demonstrate fruitfulness just as we expect the church to multiply and fill the earth.  How can we wish for our churches to grow and our families to shrink?”

I’m not talking here of splitting hairs over when and if it’s ever OK to prevent children; we’re way beyond that.  I’m asking, Read more »

The Case For Siblings (When Mom Has Another Baby)

Loved this article…every word resonated.

“But everyone else seems to think that a new baby is bad for the other kids. Dozens of times, I’ve had strangers peer around my enormous belly to coo at the toddler, “Aww … now you won’t get to be the baby anymore.”

Thanks, lady. Thanks for informing my child that she’s suffering. Luckily, she doesn’t know what you’re talking about—and neither do you.”

Read the rest of The Case for Siblings

Children With Disabilities-Part 2: The Christian’s Response

Image from "DSALA"

Can we fully believe that children with special needs are used by God, perhaps in the profoundest of ways, to show us our deep needs and to present us with opportunities to serve “the least of these” and therefore Christ Himself?  In a culture assuring us of our right to demand comfort and ease, we destroy ourselves as a people when we destroy these precious “imperfect” lives that keep us fully human.  And the joke’s on the “perfect” us.  Strong bodies, sound minds–yet so often spiritually depraved as a result of our bodily prosperity.  As R.C. Sproul, Jr. said of his disabled daughter, “She is my spiritual better”.

Following up from Part 1 of Children With Disabilities, I thought the subject undone without a practical look at how the body of Christ should…no, MUST respond to these children and their families.

Adoption

I have been challenged to take an honest look at the subject of adoption.  Most of us maintain that it is a “calling”, but sometimes I wonder how conveniently we use that word to relieve ourselves of any pressure or responsibility we might feel if we considered what is asked of all believers.  Of course it’s not a reality for everyone. It doesn’t seem so for us at this very moment.  But have we been open to the possibility?  Have we trusted that God, if He wills, can provide in that area just like we trust Him to provide for those He gives us through the womb?  Perhaps some were meant to adopt and others were meant to fund those adoptions.  These are merely conversations we’re having that I think we all need to have.

Bearing Burdens

Secondly, I feel certain that helping families with special needs children is a command, inclusive in the command to share all of one another’s burdens.  Frankly, the body of Christ at large seems fairly lousy at sharing one another’s burdens and the state has happily taken over that job.  Will we give an account?  I think so.

I’m an amateur at this conversation.  Most of this post is just a random musing as I have not given this subject enough thought in the past.  This would be a great time for those of you in the trenches to jump in and share what you perceive to be the most important way fellow believers can help in these situations.

Pro-Life Hypocrites

A concluding thought comes to mind about children–disabled or not–and what I believe the birth control culture within the church has done to make us “pro-life hypocrites”.

The same woman who gasped in horror at the young couple when she found out they were expecting their third child never offered a meal or a hand to relieve them.  Does she really have a right, then, to flout her staunch opposition to abortion?  If all the women in her church espouse this conflicting view, this young couple would be forced into an ethical corner were they to find out the Lord has blessed them with another child.

And what has this woman done to relieve the lives of the couple with a disabled child?  Offered her best advice on birth control methods?

I submit that it’s time we draw a line in the sand of our own hearts.  Are we truly pro-life?  If so, it’s time to act like it.

Michelle Duggar: Mother of the Year

The award ceremony for Michelle Duggar alone was worth the drive to Texas last week.  I cried again watching this gracious couple demonstrate true humility despite the public recognition the Lord has given them.  Hope you enjoy it too!  (Click the 4 arrows to enlarge, though this may cause the sound to be delayed.)

Unexpected Lessons at The Baby Conference

We have been in Texas at The Baby Conference this week with some dear friends if you noticed the blog was a bit quieter (well, except for the 90 something comments on the last post )  I pre-scheduled some posts and have hardly been on-line! (Challenging.  But very good.)

The Baby Conference was awesome and you can expect to hear some of the great things we learned over the next posts.

But today, I am processing the unexpected.  Yes, there were great speakers. There were great lessons and moments of inspiration.  But I cried.  A LOT.  I felt broken…in a good way.

I felt my deep need for humility and grace.  The cry of my heart throughout the conference was, “Lord, re-make me”.

After the second night as we met back at the house where we are staying, I was standing in the kitchen telling Robin about the serious reflections I had been having and all of sudden I looked, and she was shaking her head up and down, tears streaming.

She too, had felt a deep sense of renewal and we were both surprised at our encounter with a more honest look at our own hearts and a fresh desire to give over to the Lord some of those habits and sins in our lives that “so easily beset us”.  And unless you think otherwise, brokenness over sin is a good thing.

Mostly I think it was just meeting and listening to other women who possessed a grace and humility I do not.  There was a constant pointing to Jesus Christ as our motivation for everything we do.  I saw a clearer look at the simplicity of the gospel lived out–walking with the Lord, in humility, and allowing Him to have the glory for whatever comes to us.

The Lord showed to me child-like faith that allows us to walk steadfastly and not be moved.  To know that when we trust Him with all that we are and our heart’s deepest desire is to glorify Him, we can be sure and steady as the sun, come what may.

The Baby Conference was about babies.  How ironic that the Lord would use my babies–my role as a mother–to show me I must consistently seek to know Him more and love Him deeper.  The Christian life doesn’t end with us.  We are always making disciples.  We are ever speaking to those around us of His love.

We speak poorly, or we speak beautifully.

Reasons I Don’t Want to Have a Million Children

Interview between Holly Elliff and Nancy Leigh Demoss

Holly:

“And I remember vividly the day he (husband) came out of his study and said, ‘God has just given me the neatest mental picture of someday sitting on my front porch and looking out and seeing scores of children out there. And we have every temperament type represented. And we have every spiritual gift represented. And our children know how to relate to everybody in the world because they lived with all different types of people.’

And he had this wonderful vision of what it would be like and I immediately said to him, ‘Well, that’s very easy for you to say because I’m the one wearing the stretch pants for the next 20 years. And I’m sorry, but I just don’t want to go there.’ ”

And I really did not want to go there. It was a very frightening thing to me to think of taking my hands off that control in my life. And it took me about six months to work through what I believed the Bible said about that whole issue. And I became an avid student of God’s Word and just began to search the Scriptures for every reference to children, to children as a blessing, to God’s sovereignty in that area as far as opening and closing the womb and looking, honestly, for a way to avoid releasing that area in my life because my preference at that point was not to relinquish that area to the Lord.

As I did that, over and over and over, I found the same things: that God was the Creator of life, that God knew who He wanted to create, He knew what we were going to look like, He had a plan for every person–that it was all His business. It was not what I wanted to find in the Scripture, but that’s what I kept encountering. And I remember vividly one night sitting down at my kitchen table with a legal pad and a sharp pencil and making a list. And at the top of the list I wrote, “Reasons I Don’t Want To Have A Million Children.” And I began to make a list of all the objections I had to what I was seeing in God’s Word.

Everything I had on the list was rooted in selfishness. It came down to whether or not I was better at making decisions than God was. And it suddenly became very clear to me that this was a heart issue, at least in my life. It was a matter of me choosing, just like I said…God was Lord in every other aspect of my life.

We prayed through what to do with our money, we prayed through where we were to pastor. When we bought a car, it was a huge issue that we prayed about and trusted God to give us direction. But in this area it was as if we had said, ‘This area is ours to determine and we will make this decision.’ And for the very first time I was confronted with the fact that I had never really said to the Lord, ‘What is Your will?’ ”

Nancy responds:

“And really, again, we’re saying this is the fundamental issue of life, Is Jesus Lord of every area of my life? And I like the way you made that so practical because you said, ‘We went to the Lord and said, ‘Lord, what do you want us to do in this area of our lives?‘ And the fact is, you and I are not totally free until we have released ourselves, our lives, our future, our marital status, our childbearing, every aspect of our lives fully to the control of Jesus Christ. And somehow, when we come under His control, then we find that we really are free.