I’m getting married in less than five months. Cake, dresses, colors, rings, vows, songs … you name it, I’m talking about — and planning for it.
And all that marriage talk has got me babbling baby talk. And not the “Right after the ‘I do’s’ let’s start working on having a baby.” It’s more like “How on earth are we going to embrace this ‘marriage = getting to have sex’ thing without making a baby?”
I joke, but that’s where we are. “Family planning.” I call it “making a terrifying decision about the future of our family.” My fiancé, Michael and I have embraced God’s plan for intimacy only within marriage. We’re active in our church and we’re starting pre-marital counseling soon. We seek the advice of godly couples in our lives. We’re trying to do things right.
But when it comes to family planning, we can’t find the “right answer.” Birth control? If so, what kind? Does it take abortive measures? If no birth control, what kind of protective measures will we take? What if we end up with a bunch of kids? The godly couples in our lives are all over the map when it comes to answers.
On one hand, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if we had a baby. God calls children a blessing, a heritage from the Lord.
Psalm 127:3-5 says:
Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.”
But Michael and I will be newlyweds. He’s still in school and I’m still trying to figure out what I want to do with my post-college life. Having a baby in the next couple years would be tough and, well, inconvenient.
As Christians, Michael and I believe life starts at conception. So where does contraception fit in? We are excited to have kids (we want four) and already have names picked out for most of them. But we’re scared … scared to make a decision about how and when our family is going to get started.
Bottom line — We don’t want our selfishness to defer one of God’s greatest blessings.
Unfortunately, the Bible doesn’t give us a time line or a rulebook when it comes to having babies. In “Beyond Bath Time: Embracing Motherhood as a Sacred Role,” author Erin Davis puts it this way: “There are layers of questions related to this topic that are worth asking. For example, are there good reasons to prevent childbearing through the use of birth control? If so, when? … How many? As many as possible? …”
“Let me be honest at this point and say I don’t have all of the answers to your questions,” she continues. “While I do think that God calls us to mother and values parenting … I can’t tell you exactly when you should have children, how many children you should have, and if there is ever a reason why forgoing motherhood, even for a season, is the right choice.”
The truth is, there aren’t answers to all our questions. And, we could seek the advice of a million godly couples and probably never come up with the same answer. The Bible may not say much about when to have kids, or how many to have, or if we should or should not use contraception, but it does say that when we pray according to His will, God hears us (1 John 5:14).
I have to believe that if God is good enough to bless me with a husband-to-be as awesome as Michael, He’s going to bless us with some pretty great kids, when He says the time is right.
What about you? How did you approach the “baby topic” before you got married?
