Need

There is so much need in the world. Children are sent to institutions to die. People spend their lives without families. Parents kill their own children before they even see the light of day.

As Christians we are called to do something about it... but it's hard to know what.

Please pray with Pete and I as we seek God's will about how to do our part in God's plan to change the world.

Considering Adoption

I have always wanted a big family. So far, God has blessed us with just two children on Earth—Hannah, 3, and Peter, almost 1 ½.

Before Hannah joined our family, we weren’t sure I would ever be able to have a child. For years we wanted kids, but God did not so bless us. We were very open to adoption, and had just gotten physicals as part of our home study the day before when we learned we were pregnant. We loved her. I was terrified God would take her away. I don’t know if I really believed I would have a healthy baby until I held her.

I would have been open to pursuing adoption while pregnant, but our agency did not allow couples who were expecting or had added a child in the past year to begin adoption. So we forgot about adoption and welcomed Hannah, and nineteen months later Peter.

I was hopeful that we would continue to welcome a new baby every 18 months or so, but Peter reached his first birthday without being a big brother. Five months later or so, I saw a picture in an adoption magazine of 3 little kids who needed a family, with the youngest having special needs. I also thought the middle girl’s face looked like Hannah’s, and the baby boy’s face looked like Peter’s. After praying a week or two, we decided to inquire about them. They were already spoken for. I had thought they might be ours. But now I had remembered adoption. And I still wasn’t pregnant. I filled out a form so we could look at other waiting children with special needs—but their needs all seemed much more severe. We weren’t sure how much we could handle with two active little kids already. We didn’t want a child who was too old to be ours, and we felt like we didn’t know much about school age children, so we put our limit at 4 or 5 years old. I wanted to adopt a sibling group. I knew I couldn’t handle legal risk—not when falling in love with a picture does a number on me every time. We have been trying to figure out where God will lead us.

I started looking at waiting US kids. They were older or had very significant needs. I looked at waiting international children. Some of them looked so much like my boy they could have been my son (like Kyle). Some of them I hurt so much for their needs, but felt like I didn’t know if we could handle them (like Dmitriy). Some of them desperately needed a family so that they could get proper medical care (like Vanessa). I left some pictures open to show my husband. One was a picture of Mason. We decided to pursue his adoption.

For a week I threw myself into research and paperwork. I scoured the internet for people who had visited him, got in contact with a woman whose son had a similar condition, found an agency to do our homestudy, looked again and again at the pictures of this handsome little man Reece’s Rainbow sent me—what a smile! Then we learned he had been adopted by a family in his own country. That’s wonderful for him, and a great sign for his country. But I had thought he was going to be my son—he had been waiting so long, and then as soon as we started pursuing this—maybe before—someone else adopted him.

We are considering Ethiopia. There is need for adoption from Ethiopia, where traditional family safety nets—the care of orphaned children by aunts, uncles, and grandparents—have been devastated and overloaded by the AIDS epidemic. That’s the direction we were leaning before we saw Mason. But adoption is a hard process. It’s a long process. We may have to avoid conceiving in order to pursue adoption—and I don’t like the idea of telling God no to a child of my womb so I could say yes to adoption.

And sometimes it is so hard just to take care of my two kids! Some days it seems like one is lying on the floor whining “I can’t do it” while the other is taking nosedives into furniture and bleeding all over his clothes, while the laundry and dishes (let alone less urgent housework pile up). And how could we consider adding to our family? But we could afford to do it. And if not us, then who? What about our situation is so difficult it we cannot take on one or two more kids who really need a home? Are we really that much worse off than everyone else with problems and kids and jobs?

But in the end, the question is only this: What would God have us do?

Hospitality

I am not required to feed a stranger who comes to my door. I am not required to make sure he has a place to sleep for the night and that clean clothes when he wakes up in the morning. If my husband left with the stranger, and they made less money than I did, I wouldn’t have to send them checks in the mail. Indeed, implying I have that level of responsibility for a stranger is ridiculous. It might be kind and generous to do some of these things, and one could argue that if I do not feed a hungry stranger I am going against Biblical teaching. I would certainly feel awful if that stranger died because I had not given him a hot meal and a warm place to sleep.



Suppose the person who comes to my door is not my stranger, but my son.



If my son came to me hungry and wanted to eat, I would feed him. To never feed my son would be illegal. To not ensure he had a safe place to sleep would not be merely inhospitable, but criminal. Making sure he has clothes to wear is not a touching act of kindness, but a requirement. If I give shelter to a stranger, I am doing charity–but if I refuse shelter to my son, I am guilty of child abuse. Even if my son were in my husband’s care and not mine, I might be legally obligated to help pay for his needs.



Abortion is not evicting an ungrateful tenant; it’s putting one’s offspring out of his or her home before the child can survive on his or her own. And it usually involves not just eviction, but dismemberment–something it is illegal to do even to strangers. If the person a woman is pregnant with is her son or daughter, she has an obligation to that child she would not have to a stranger.

Vaccinations

So today I found out that it is, apparently, no longer possible to get the ethical version of the vaccine for mumps or measles.

The vaccine that is offered is the combined MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccine. In terms of ethics, the rubella vaccine is the worst offender. It was derived from the cells of two children whose mothers were advised to abort them because the mothers contracted rubella, which could cause complications for unborn children.

No more children will die if I did choose to vaccinate my daughter, but that's not something I'm willing to participate in. I don't think it's okay to benefit from murder.

I was actually kind of impressed by the doctor. When we were first deciding we had a list of ethical versus inethical vaccines put in Firstborn's folder. Well, I had just assumed they were following it until at her last visit they tried to give her MMR, which I knew was not ethically produced. Since then, though, they did try to get the ethical versions, even trying to order them from out of the country, but apparently they are no longer made and won't be for at least 2 years. The doctor would really prefer she were vaccinated, because Firstborn would apparently be at risk if she came into contact with children from other countries. And measles and mumps are bad. Apparently there haven't been any cases in our area recently, though there have been 2 in the US this year. So it doesn't seem like it's really risky....

I also refused chickenpox, but apparently a lot of people do that, and they didn't push too hard on that one. She did get Hib, pneumococcal, and dtap.

Firstborn is on antibiotics indefinitely for urinary reflux to prevent a UTI, which kills me too, and I know it can't be good for her. This is something she's likely to outgrow and they didn't test for up until recently. If she gets another UTI they want to do surgery--for a condition that will likely correct itself within a couple years.

I'm glad that we don't have to contend with epidemics. But I don't agree that it's okay to kill a child to prevent an epidemic. I don't think that my daughter needs to be on antibiotics--but I took drugs for more than half of my pregnancy that may well have saved my other little one's life.

Where is the line between the part of medicine that is a blessing, and overmedication?

Well, I guess that's something the government will be deciding....

Day 21

I miss my babies. And I don't know what to do with that.

And I know part of it's hormones... but that doesn't invalidate it. It isn't going to go away; there's not going to be resolution, and it won't be okay, while I am on this earth.

God be with them.

Day 19

Firstborn did something new yesterday--she pulled herself up on an inanimate object. I caught her on camera, too! She was quite pleased until she wanted to get down, and then things didn't work so well. But mommy helped.

The nice thing about being pregnant is that when Firstborn does something new, it's not bittersweet at all; it's okay that my baby is growing up.

I've already had a prenatal appointment rescheduled. I'll be going in on the 5th of May--5 weeks exactly. It's nice that they will be earlier, although I hate the way that they end up rescheduling almost every prenatal appointment I have. It's also probably too early to find a heartbeat (although there will be a heartbeat (or maybe several). They'll probably do a dating ultrasound, and that would probably give me a number for sure, so M'Love will meet me there.

I need to start buying more food for Hannah; she eats quite a bit sometimes.

She'll be walking before I know it... and God willing, perhaps even using silverware.

I have been worrying a little more about the baby... at this point, I have gotten as much reassurance as I could possibly get, but... I still worry some. I don't want to lose another child ever again. I don't care how many drugs I have to be on, how many times I have to get stabbed with needles, whether I can eat chocolate again before menopause.... my babies matter more. I'm hoping that something I've done--whether the diet or the drugs--has given me a better chance. So that I can just do the drugs and the diet and the stabbing in the future, and have more healthy babies.

Today's sign of pregnancy: insomnia (Apparently (according to reliable sources) the inability to sleep through the night happened with Firstborn before I even realized I was pregnant, as well as lasting throughout the pregnancy and several months postpartum (due first to my body and then to the baby :)

Day 18 (on breastfeeding)

I tried to cut Firstborn back to 3-5 times a day breastfeeding, but it seems like my milk is drying up completely. I don't know if it's because I cut back, because of the progesterone, or because of the pregnancy.

It is kind of sad it's over--especially because she tries and then cries when there's not enough, and she still isn't into cups. Cups are sometimes interesting when she feels like it, but they aren't a major source of liquid, in her opinion. I guess she will learn... but I feel like I'm not giving her what she wants and what is good for her, when she is very clearly making it known. When she wants to breastfeed, she claws at my shirt and buries her head in my chest. I never expected to feel this way when it ended, but I suppose I expected it to be more gradual too.

On a lighter note, she's started pointing and is closer to using words for things. However, she's just not there yet. She points at Dada and says, "Dada!" We say, "Yes, what a good girl, that is Dada!" Then she points out the window and says, "Dada." Um, no. Sometimes she seems to call me Mama... and sometimes she seems to call me Dada. Her babbling sounds more wordlike too.

Today's sign of pregnancy: waking up in the wee hours of the morning every day, even when I haven't gotten enough sleep.

Day 17 (the numbers game)

My hcg numbers:

4/8 11dpo 15
4/10 13dpo 47
4/13 16dpo 321

The upside is, the numbers are really great, according to the doctors. So I guess they are at least not suspecting anything like molar pregnancy. And I read somewhere that (in a small study) 96% of those over 300 on day 16 carried to term. So that's nice.

It seems like conventional internet wisdom, though, is that numbers going up really fast could mean multiples.

My numbers more than tripled in 44 hours, then more than sextupled--almost septupled--in 77 hours.

Anyone want to shed light on this?

I know I shouldn't get my hopes up too much so soon, but those numbers are on fire! They offered me another test, but I asked if it was necessary and they said no, so I said I'd skip it unless there was a reason.

Am I crazy for wanting multiples?

I like not knowing how many children I am gestating more than not knowing how many children I failed to gestate, though!

(Multiples aren't an effect of metformin that I know of; anyone know different?)

Today's sign of pregnancy: M'love says the hormones are affecting me. He means I'm irritable.

Day 16

I finally got my second set of hcg levels back. They're supposed to double every 48 hours or so... well, they just-over-tripled in a little under 48. Aside from assorted very rare scary awful things, this could mean that I am gestating more than one baby. At very least, it's a very good sign that I will remain pregnant for the next 8 months or so. I called M'Love to tell him. He is not as joyous about it as I am... he knows I get my hopes up too easily :)

They also told me to get another hcg level this week (hmmm... why would they do that unless... oh, yeah, because my numbers are still "low" unless, oh, maybe I really did ovulate when I say I did? Yes, they seem to think I might just be either stupid or a pathological liar. Next time maybe I will just lie about my LMP date.) Anyway, my father-in-law told me today was good so I got to go feed the vampires again. Will find those results out tomorrow.

As we left, a car turned down my street. (You must understand that where I live, more planes fly over my house than cars drive by it. I live on an old dirt road a few miles from a small airport). So we stopped to say hi, and it was my future neighbors. (They bought land across from us before Firstborn was born, and it must have been almost a year since I saw them.) Anyway, as we left after chatting about their plans to someday build a house across from mine, she commented (Dad had told her I was pregnant): "By the time we move in, you'll have 3 kids!"

Hmmm.

A girl can dream, can't she?

Firstborn was asleep when I got home, and stayed asleep as I removed her from the carseat, and woke up only twice and briefly on her way upstairs to bed. Still napping. She had a big brunch: cheerios, sirloin tips, pork roast, butternut squash, French toast, and peach yogurt. She kept finishing stuff, so I kept giving her more :)

I still have to clean back up after a busy weekend--the less we're home, the more there is to do. I did clear the coffee table Saturday, so all that's left in the living room/kitchen area is the shelves and the magazine rack. (Well, and a whole bunch of stuff you can't see, but I'm going to get the visible stuff first).

Saturday I also made brownies with Easter candy-decal-hardened-frosting-things (courtesy of the discount rack last Easter) and two kinds of chocolate chip cookies (big peanut butter chips and mint/chocolate swirl chips with walnuts). We brought them to share on Easter. I actually did end up eating a tiny bit of cookie dough and crumbs yesterday, and today after I packed them up to send to work with M'Love, I ate the leftover brownie crumbles. I guess I am paying for that with more sugar cravings, but I broke open some diet cream soda to combat them.

Anyway, all is well. And I should probably stop putting off my housework now. Or maybe go check message boards.

And, oh yeah:

HE IS RISEN! Praise God.

I have officially made it through Day 14

Now that I am on day 15, I am even more optimistic. Hopefully my second HCG results, which I can't get until Monday, will be good as well. I think I am going to wait till after week 3, though, to tell the rest of my side of the family.

M'love wanted to tell people right away, so since we were telling my parents first this time, I called them Thursday night (but my mom thought we should tell my dad, so he didn't find out until yesterday). So he's already told people at work, and will probably be telling a lot of relatives today.

This baby is keeping me warm already, something Firstborn never did. So maybe this is a boy? Or maybe that's the progesterone.

The latest test results

So none of my loyal following have asked how my test results were?

Okay, fine, I'll tell you anyway.

I'm 13 days pregnant. And I couldn't be more thrilled. I would really appreciate prayers for the baby, still, but I'm not worried at all. There are so many things that are different--I'm having no sugar and very little carbs, I'm on metformin and progesterone (my progesterone is at 8.8 and should be 10, but I'm hoping that's not too bad). So there are 4 different things that might help this time and weren't a factor the other times (including for Hannah, who is of course perfectly fine). I have told Firstborn, of course, but seeing as her receptive vocabulary includes only kitty, daddy, mommy, Hannah, no, nose, and tummy--and I'm not so sure about those last 6--I'm pretty sure it's not real clear to her. But M'Love and I are thrilled.

This is, by my estimation, my 11th (or maybe 9th?) pregnancy. I don't know; I wish I did.

This is my third pregnancy that has been confirmed, and the second confirmed by the medical establishment.

I'm glad I'm not worried, because it wouldn't help anything. I am enjoying it right now. I'm hoping it lasts about eight more months, but if it doesn't, I don't want to spend the intervening time afraid and worried.

I need to figure out what I need to be eating and how to get Firstborn to consistently drink from a cup. She'll do it for a while, then lose interest for a week or so, it seems like. I don't really want to wean her, but I know it's likely to happen during pregnancy anyway. There was already a time when she seemed uninterested in nursing for a while. So I would like her to be able to drink when that time comes.

Today's signs of pregnancy: Hungrier and peeing more.

Blog Identity

So, I haven't posted in a while.

Therefore, I should post.

Firstborn continues to get bigger, curlier and teethinger.



My blog seems to have a bit of an identity crisis. Sometimes I post about moral issues (with political ramifications, but my focus is not on the political). And sometimes I post about my real-life issues and frustrations and joys.

Hmm. I thought for sure that would go somewhere, but it didn't.

So I guess this blog is about issues of morality in reproduction, and about early miscarriage, and about the struggles of a quiverfull mom who doesn't actually know anyone else quiverfull except her husband.

Babies

Firstborn is, as always, gorgeous. She enjoys pulling up on someone's hands, nursing, and chasing cats (followed by tormenting them if she can catch them. She crawls by using her left arm and right big toe. Her hair is getting curlier.

I'm on metformin and looking into progesterone. I'm having no sugar and have drastically slashed carbs as well (trying to have them only at dinner, sometimes lunch). I've been having goat cheese omelets for breakfast, which is working very well, though there is more prep time.

Hopefully I will be getting a blood test this week, and then, if I am pregnant, I may be able to get progesterone.

I would appreciate prayers. Not for me to get/be pregnant--only that if I am, my son or daughter lives.

Ebenezer

I had really hoped, after Hannah, not to have a period again. I didn't really think too much about why. After all, no one wants to get periods. They're messy and inconvenient.

I thought that getting pregnant with Hannah fixed everything--that it meant I worked now. That I wouldn't have to go through all that stuff any more. My depression was healed. I figured my infertility was healed. The same people that said "if you adopt, you'll get pregnant" (not that I believed them, or it influenced my decisions) also said "once you have one, you'll have more" with plenty of anecdotal evidence to back it up. And I did believe them.

When my period started coming back I looked at the bright side--at least it meant I was probably becoming fertile again. I didn't think about the possibility it might happen again. I don't know why, really. I guess I just figured that I was fixed, that everything worked.

I have been trying to enjoy Hannah. I know there's no guarantee I'll have more, and that even if I do I want to enjoy her. She's getting so big, and it would be so much harder if I thought I might not have another. That thought had occurred to me.

Even when it started I didn't think that's what it was. I passed some tissue. I looked at it. It didn't look like a baby--but at 10 days it wouldn't. It wasn't much--but how much would there be at ten days? There wasn't a lot of pain, like with Ruby--but Ruby was 21 days. I ended up calling the nurse hotline from our insurance.

She was using some sort of diagnostic tool (like WebMD). She was very nice and very talkative. I asked how I could tell the difference between a very early miscarriage and a heavy period. A blood test, she said, or maybe having the tissue analyzed. She said she'd send me more information in the mail. She said it sounded to her like I probably had a miscarriage. She also thought I might need medical care right away. I told her I'd had these symptoms before, and I didn't think so. She said to get care if the symptoms got worse or I felt faint.

I called my doctor's office yesterday. I talked to a nurse. She didn't know how you could tell an early miscarriage from a heavy period. She would talk to the doctor and get back to me. There is no way to tell. A blood test wouldn't show anything--not at ten days. I asked the nurse if there were other explanations for what I'd seen. She said it could be uterine tissue. But there's no way to tell.

I cried last night. I think it had finally sunk in.

The internet says that Metformin might help with recurrent early miscarriage associated with PCOS. My doctor had mentioned it for insulin resistence, but not for this (and she knew that I had a history of possible early miscarriages, I think). Presumably she didn't know about those studies. So I have emailed her about that. I have decided to cut refined sugars out of my diet, cold turkey. That's the only thing I can think that might have been different with Hannah; I might have been off candy then. I'm also going to get back to exercising more, but that's a seasonal thing. I don't know what might or might not help. But if I can give my babies a better chance, I want to.

I am so grateful for my baby girl. Maybe she's just a miracle; maybe she will never have biological brothers and sisters on this earth. At timees it still seems unreal, after more than 18 months since her conception, that I could have a baby. A daughter. I am sad right now. I am so afraid of losing her. I love her.

I don't know how I can keep going through this. But what choice do I have? To risk never holding another newborn is a greater risk than to risk losing another baby. To love at all is to risk loss. I can't think what form of birth control I could justify, because I am not at any physical risk. And I think God knows more than I do, and I wouldn't want to thwart His will. And my children--God knows them. He created them, and He is infinitely capable of caring for them. I do not even know how many I have, but he knows how many cells were in their tiny bodies. I have never seen them, but I think--more likely than not--they are gazing on His face. I will never hold them, or teach them; I will never know their voices or their gifts. They will know nothing but being loved by their Father in Heaven. No, it is certainly not better for them never to have existed. There is no loss for them. And someday I will know how many children I have; I will hug them and love them.

But for now I have grief and pain, and the awesome responsibility of training up a single, beautiful miracle. To die is gain, but to live is Christ. God, use me.

He is my Stone of Help.

Ebenezer Cooper
2/21/09-3/2/09

Eugenics

This article was shared in the comments on another blog:
http://www.slate.com/id/2208633/?gt1=38001

If you don't want to read it, it's a take on a couple who screened IVF embryos for possible genetic cancers. The article is pro-life. There were 11 children conceived in a dish. Six had the gene for breast canceer. Three had "other defects." These nine children were put to death, and their remaining siblings were given a chance. One of these died (likely also a casualty of the IVF process). The remaining daughter then became an infant, thus gaining some civil rights.

The family will now know they are not passing on the cancer gene.

Obviously, I find this abhorrent. If there were a way for me to take those nine little girls and boys myself, I would do it in a heartbeat--cancer, other defects, and all. After all, most of us don't have any guarantees. I can deal with "might get cancer someday," and I'd rather have "will definitely have cancer some day" than "was killed at the instruction of her own parents."

I am reminded of a Star Trek episode, the Masterpiece Society http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/The_Masterpiece_Society_(episode)
The Enterprize is trying to save a colony of people who have genetically engineered the perfect society. Geordi (the chief engineer, born blind) is able to come up with a solution based on the technology that allows him to see. Throughout the course of the episode, though, it also becomes clear that Geordi would never have been allowed to be born in that society. (There are other themes and subplots too, which I am ignoring).

And I am wondering, how many of us are perfect enough that we were worthy to be born? I have weak eyes, as does my husband. His back is bad. I probably have the "fat gene," and I have polycystic ovaries. My husband has mild hypoglycemia, and I had gestational diabetes. I imagine most have a similar list. And of course, we all have a sin nature. We have caused pain to others. There was only one perfect human being--and he caused his mother just what those parents of the eleven were hoping to avoid: watching her child die at a young age.

Mary saw the child who had been a miracle beaten until he was unrecognizable, tortured, and stabbed. She saw her son die through no fault of his own, but because of the Fall and mankind's sin.

Wouldn't it be better if he didn't have to go through that?

Today's sign of pregnancy: hormones, insomnia, hormones, warmth, hormones, libido, hormones, and hormones.

Less kids to focus on ministry

I promised to post about those who say they want only a couple kids to focus on ministry. This post ignores the fact that I find all forms of birth control unacceptable, because that would obviously be another reason not to contracept. I just want to challenge this mindset.

First of all, that's rarely the reason. It just sounds more Christian than "I don't wanna drive a minivan" or "I hate being pregnant" or "I need sleep." Are there some couples who decide to really throw their lives into ministry, or go to dangerous places, and decide that they can't bring a child? Yes. But most people who say this are probably talking about teaching Sunday School and leading a Bible study. And to those going to situations where there is poverty and danger? There are children there. In most of these places, if American culture hasn't contaminated them, children are welcomed and valued--as Scripture states they should be. That part of the culture is one missionaries should be encouraging. I can't conceive of going into long-term ministry in a place and saying, explicitly or implicitly, to people with children, that they are better off not having children at all. How can they model Christian family life to those people without any children? The idea that children should have everything and never work and never be in a difficult situation is not found in the Bible. That may be a cultural value, but my understanding is that being a missionary isn't about propogating cultural values, but Biblical ones. Granted, I have never been a missionary (at least a long-term missionary). But I don't trust the theology of people who deliberately sterilize themselves, so I don't know why anyone who believes openness to life to be a positive good would trust them on other matters of theology either.

Secondly, parenting is a ministry. Not only is it a ministry, it is one of few we can be certain God has given to us, specifically. The Bible is very clear that God creates children. If a person, using the normal biological act, gives birth to a son or daughter, God intended parenting that child as a ministry for his or her parents. I've done nursery, and Sunday School, Pioneer Clubs, and even been a Sunday School Superintendent. I never felt called to it. I was filling a need, and that is good; I'm not saying one should only do ministry when one feels called. But there can be no doubt God intended me to be Firstborn's mother. When I feed her and play with her and read to her and walk with her, when I teach her and love her, I know with certainty I am doing something God intended me to do. How could I leave her with someone else and a bottle of something made by scientists so that I can teach someone else's children, when I am sure God means me to care for the first baby and not at all sure I am called to teach the others? Maybe in some other season of my life, when I don't have a very young child, I will teach Sunday School again. I still take a turn in nursery often--I would do it every week if I could. But if my baby and another are both crying, who do you think I will comfort first? When I have left Firstborn in the nursery, I have trouble concentrating anyway. My ministry in my home, to my family, must come first. I have no business teaching Sunday School when my living room looks like it was hit by a Christmas tornado. If I can get my home under control, and Firstborn can get through it without nursing, I would teach Sunday School if I was needed. But if I do these things to the detriment of my own family, my priorities are misplaced.

Third, children are not a hindrance to ministry or spiritual growth, and the insinuation that they are is a lie straight from hell. I'm convinced that any ministry God wants me involved in during this season of my life will be one where Firstborn fits in. Are there ministries that would be more difficult with children? Absolutely. But the church is a body with many parts. Single people, childless couples, and couples who no longer have young children are all important parts of the body that can participate in these ministries--and ministries that really can't be done by someone with children, even many children, are fewer than most probably think. At the same time, mommies are part of the body. Nursing mommies shouldn't be prevented from participating in church functions, or made to feel unwelcome. They should try and keep themselves modest, and their children from being a distraction, but the church needs to be open to all its members, from the one-month-old to the ninety-year-old. I love hearing babies cry during the service. Even in my struggles with infertility, it seemed such an affirmation of life. I like that my church has a "parents' room" where those with young children, babies, or children with disabilities who might distract others can sit and still hear the sermon. I don't like that the sound quality is awful and no one makes fixing it a priority. I don't like being told I can't go on a women's retreat with my nursing daughter. I don't like the expectation that my husband and I cannot be ministered to at the same retreat, or that my spiritual growth depends on seperation from the family unit God has designed. I think that there should be more effort to minister to the body rather than its parts. I think that families with children of all ages, families without children, nursing mommies, the elderly, and single people should all feel like part of the body. And I think that the body's best work can be done when the whole body is present, and that the body can be best cared for when we care for the whole body.

Lastly, the couple that wants to "focus on ministry" is also focusing on themselves. It may not seem that way, but think about it--they are only considering the ministry they can do. If they have only two children, they may do more. But if they had 11, how much more would those extra nine do for Jesus? And if those nine had an average of six children each (the average before birth control was widespread), that would be 54 more souls, and 54 more workers for the kingdom. If Christians were to have all the children God wanted us to, we could see some very big numbers. And if God wants that couple to only have two, he can make that happen as well, without the use of birth control. But what would it say to the world if we trusted in God enough to give Him control of the future? And just think, in the next generation, they'd be voting. The liberals are already concerned about the fact that we have more children. I can't wait to see who my future children are--missionaries, lawyers, politiciana, artists, builders, pastors; single people devoted wholly to God, or mommies and daddies raising up a new generation of soldiers for the cross.


Today's sign of pregnancy: Joy! and hormones.

The problems of different types of birth control

This grew out of a post still in progress, but the tangent was getting longer than the main point.

The Bible does not prohibit birth control flat-out. Well, there is that part with Onan, but no one is sure that's necessarily what it means, and it doesn't necessarily speak to all kinds of birth control. So, I will.
I don't necessarily see birth control as wrong, but all forms of birth control have problems that make them unbiblical.

Hormonally based birth control carries the possibility of killing babies. No, I'm not making this up. Everyone who isn't pro-life and everyone who's pro-life and Catholic seems to be aware of this. But somehow right-leaning evangelicals have missed it--probably because they didn't want to hear it. It can prevent a blastocyst (that is, baby) from implanting in the uterine lining (that is, living--continuing to grow and thrive). If you can't see how that is intrinsically evil, I recommend you study Exodus 20:13. I actually think these should be illegal, just like abortion. I don't intend to make all birth control illegal, just those that harm someone other than the user. The rest of these are between the user, their partner, and God. But hormonal birth control is wrong unless your life depends on it.

Some forms of birth control mutilate God's temple--our bodies. Cutting or removing parts of our bodies which God created and which are working fine should not be something Christians do. There are people out there who think that getting a nose-ring is disrespectful of their bodies but have had a fully functional organ removed or made nonfunctional by cutting. Really, hormonal birth control can fall under this category as well--it changes what God has made and made well into something other than what he intended. So even if there were no chance of hormonal birth control killing a child (for example, the pill for men) it is seeking to change something which God designed that is working fine. Killing sperm (or, if they design some other drug or device, killing an egg) seems questionable for this reason as well. Again, I am not referring to removing a defective body part to save one's life. It is like the difference between removing an arm because it is gangrenous and removing an arm for no good reason.

What's left are sexual practices and barrier methods. Barrier methods come between a husband and wife in the act of marriage. It just seems weird that anyone would want a piece of rubber between themselves and the other person. From what I've heard, no one does, but for the "danger" of getting pregnant or the danger of getting a disease (not present in monogamous marriage). I can't say from experience, but it seems that this would alter the experience. And even if it didn't, I am not romantically intereested in a piece of plastic. My objection to sexual practices is about the same. If a couple does something non-reproductive because the regular act doesn't work at the time, or on occasion for another reason, that's one thing. But if it is regularly occuring to stop reproduction--that's not God's design for marriage. The couple is defrauding each other. And I don't think NFP (for prevention) is any better. The basic premise is that the couple does not have sex when they are likely to conceive. The problem is that this is also when they are most likely to want sex, and when sex will be most enjoyable. God designed us that way. I say they are defrauding each other. Paul allowed abstinence for prayer--he did not talk about abstaining so that you wouldn't have kids so long as you pray. And the verse in Ecclesiastes about "a time to embrace and a time to refrain" is not about NFP--it's actually probably about abstaining during infertile times (during menses and a week after).

And if a pregnancy were really so grave a risk that it was worth defrauding each other or mutilating God's temple, why would one use a method that had "failure" rates? Even sterilization can "fail." Wouldn't abstinence be better?

For me, unless there were a very good chance pregnancy would kill me, I can't see myself using birth control. This doesn't mean that no Christian anywhere should use birth control. If I lived in China, I would use birth control. If I lived in such poverty that my children could starve to death, I would consider it. But that's not an issue for me, nor is it an issue for anyone in this country, or most industrialized nations. And if I were talking to someone in a desperate situation--oppression or poverty--I would hope I could find better ways to help them than helping them decide whether using condoms was within God's will.

So when God said "the whole world," he meant....

Suppose when you were watching a special about Billy Graham, someone said, "When God said to evangelize the whole world, He didn't mean that Billy Graham should do it all himself!"

How would you respond to that? What does the attitude make you think?

It certainly seems to be saying that evangelism isn't always good. That God doesn't always want it.
Which would make me wonder about the speaker--where did he or she get that idea? Presumably, if the speaker is a Christian, he or she thinks that evangelism is sometimes good--but why would it be possible for there to be too much? Perhaps too many new converts would prove too great a strain for the church. You have to disciple them, teach them, train them... not that anyone was worried about that at Pentecost, but this is modern times. It just isn't normal now for the church to get whole bunches of new believers now. Just think if your church held an outreach, and so many people were saved that it doubled in size. You might need a bigger sanctuary, or more chairs, or another service. It might be expected that almost everyone would take a newbie under their wing--even those not involved in the outreach! And updating the directories, the birthday lists... these would be a logistical nightmare.

Maybe Billy Graham should start practicing disciple control. He could just stop preaching each time after he got a reasonable number of converts. Or if he wants to keep preaching, at least take the gospel out, since that would solve the problem. Practically everyone has already heard the gospel--maybe we have gone forth into all the world and made disciples, and we're done now. And if you're nodding your head right now, God help you, 'cause I can't.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm making an analogy. Quite a while ago, I heard a comment very similar to the one above. It went something like, "When God said to be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth, he didn't mean that [person in question] had to do it all himself!"

Let's take a moment to compare and contrast Genesis 1:28 with Matthew 28:19-20.
Because I know I'd be too lazy to look them up if I didn't know them:

God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

Both commandments occupy special places in the Bible; Genesis 1:28 is God's first command and first communication with human beings, and Matthew 28:19+20 is Jesus' last words before being taken up to heaven. Both commands are about creating followers for God, dedicating new lives to Him. So why are many churches concerned about one, while most ignore the other?

Oddly enough, the best argument I can come up with against birth control rests on the similarity of these two verses. Basically, under the old covenant we are to multiply, but under the new covenant we are to make disciples. And to some extent that is true. Paul said that to remain single and work for the kingdom of God was better than to marry. But, he didn't say anything about marrying and remaining childless. The change there is that once, marriage was normative, now, singleness is considered better. That's the difference there. Even if there were a form of birth control that were biblically acceptable (I'll post about that seperately, 'cause it just turned into a huge tangent), I don't think that couples should contracept to "focus on ministry" either (and I think I'll have to save that line of reasoning too).

And while the two passages in question are similar, they don't contradict each other. You can go forth with children, you can make disciples with children, you can teach with children. More difficult? Maybe. But not impossible. It's not explicitly or implicitly overwriting the old commandment.

So why is it that people are still trying to make disciples, but not trying to breed them? People do make excuses--
"Evangelism isn't my gift."
"I don't know any unbelievers."
--but we all recognize that those aren't good enough reasons to avoid spreading the gospel. We don't all have to be Billy Graham or Jim-Bob Duggar, but God expects us to take the opportunities presented to us. If someone doesn't go into the streets every weekend to share with everyone they can find, that's okay. But if they avoid meeting or interacting with non-Christians to keep from sharing the gospel, it's not. If someone is asked the reason for the hope that is given, and refuses to give an answer because they are afraid, and are already mentoring someone, and have already made a convert or two, and they don't have time to take this person to church on Sunday mornings--that's a problem. And you may have noticed how ridiculous that sounded.

Because we don't make converts. And we don't make children. God does. Only he can change a heart--or create one. I know I can't make children, no matter how much I try and pray. And no matter how much I try and pray, I can't convince someone to trust in Jesus.

All I can do is refuse to be used.