motherhood/family/parenting

It inevitably comes up, whenever there is a discussion of birth control, the question of the rare cases…the cases where the mother is sick, or has been told if she gets pregnant her child will be born with a birth defect, or some similar hardship.

Please understand, that I want to be sensitive to those who have gone through, or are going through such circumstances. At the same time, I feel it worthy of discussion, because, like so many other areas, our thinking can so easily get tainted by the world’s message, or just from our own sin nature.

This whole birth control issue really comes down to trusting in God’s sovereignty. If we are not careful, we can totally lose the real focus of children, life, and the sacredness of God’s hand. Children are not for the purpose of making us happy, or comfortable, or any other selfish gain, although God is gracious to allow us to partake of many personal gains and joys of our children. Understanding that dramatically changes our whole view of the womb. Children, like any other area of God-breathed institutions (marriage, etc.) are to make us holy…they are for the purpose of glorifying the Creator…and only He can decide just how that is to be accomplished. That’s the beauty of giving Him charge over the womb…we can be fully confident that whatever He brings is His perfect plan.

Whether it’s the possibility of a birth defect, financial hardship, persecution from family members, etc., our limited human wisdom just cannot possibly ascertain the future; we don’t have enough information, regarding the present, future or eternal purposes of God to make decisions about what lives should be allowed to live and what lives should be prevented.

It’s a multi-pronged thinking process:

• Are my reasons for “exercising wisdom” in preventing a child rooted in selfishness? (i.e. “this will be hard”…”this will cost money”…”this will make people talk about us”…”this will prevent me from pursuing something I want”…”this will cost me emotionally”…)

• God delights in demonstrating His power through weakness (“for when I am weak, He is strong”.) If we go around trying to prevent hardships in our lives, going to the degree of surgically dismantling our bodies because we think we know better about conception, I submit that we could be guilty of thwarting the very plans of God in our lives…robbing ourselves of blessing…dwarfing the spiritual growth that could have been ours. Perhaps the hardest thing for us to swallow as believers is, God cares more about our souls than He does our physical comfort. I don’t mean that He desires us to be miserable, physically; I simply mean that often the path He chooses for us may not be the one we would have chosen for ourselves…but we can be sure, that if we are being obedient, whatever path He chooses is His perfect will, and will ultimately fulfill His perfect purposes in our lives. (“Straight is the way, and difficult is the path that leads to life; and few there be that find it.”)

• We must guard our thinking concerning birth defects, illness, etc. It is the Margaret Sanger camp, Planned Parenthood, and the euthanasia mindset that insist the world be rid of “the weaker ones”. And that frightening mentality is gaining popularity, already causing millions of deaths of aged citizens with illness, abortions of children detected to have birth defects, and other horrendous atrocities. You may not believe it, but I have read stories of mothers who aborted their babies who were discovered by ultrasound to have an extra finger! If we begin preventing children just to avoid possible abnormalities, we fall dangerously close to the school of thought just described.

• And again, do we really believe in the sovereignty of God? Moses’ mother did; if ever there was a time in history where a couple could have been justified for making a “wise” decision to prevent pregnancy, surely it was during Moses’ time. The people were poor, oppressed, and now Pharaoh had given the order to kill all the males under two years of age. What was she thinking getting pregnant at such a time??? And yet, consider the marvelous miracle of Moses’ life, and nothing more needs to be said. If God is truly sovereign, He knows all about me, what I “can handle”, what the future holds, and everything in between. Can I not rest in that?

Sometimes I think we forget who “causes children”. Maybe if we could just wrap our brain around that one concept…”I do not choose to have a baby; I can only choose not to have one.” It is God that allows life to spring forth from the womb.

We would do well, too, to consider more recent examples of God’s sovereignty. Beethoven, many of you know, was the fifth child born to a mother with Tuberculosis. ALL of her prior 4 children had severe birth defects. Surely, four handicapped children born in a row would have been reason to practice “wisdom” and restrain from having more! But what the world would have missed (and no doubt those parents!) The world is full of such examples…we simply do not know what the Lord is going to do with the next life!

This post is for the purpose of causing you to think…really think. I guess you know by now, my favorite phrase is “slippery slope”. How easily our thinking can lead us in the wrong direction! We must keep a close check. That’s why I write on this blog…not to anger people, or to judge motives, or to make people feel guilty. I simply desire to kindle a burning passion for finding the truth, regardless of our cultural persuasions.

And I close with this incredible story, sent by a reader, Daja, a few weeks ago, as an example of how puny, and untrustworthy our “wisdom” can be. Click the link to read this heart-warming miracle…

“A Story of Hope”