It was a beautiful day early last spring. The kind of day that beckoned me and my four children to come outside and enjoy the glory of God’s creation by taking a “P.E.” day at the park. As homeschoolers, meeting the needs for our children’s physical education remains our biggest challenge, so park days are always enjoyed by all.

The children played with other home educated children, and I enjoyed the company of fellow members of a rare breed indeed…the stay-at-home-mom, who home-schools, and has more than 2.4 children ! As I fellowshiped with these mothers I was encouraged, validated, and reminded that God’s favor and blessings are upon me.

Soon it was lunch time. My children had participated in a reading program which had awarded them coupons for free pizza, so we excitedly decided to cash them in. My children and I were sitting in the restaurant, laughing and enjoying each others company when “the question” that I have come to dread, came. It was asked by my waitress, with a tone that might be similar to one used when asking the question, “Is it true that you have an incurable disease?” She looked at me with all of the pity she could muster and asked, ” Are all of those yours ? ”

I’ve been asked “the question” so many times that I wish I could afford a billboard that would read: YES ! THEY ARE ALL MINE. YES: I DO KNOW WHAT CAUSES IT. YES: I ACTUALLY WANTED ALL OF THEM.

Considering the world view (as opposed to the Biblical view) of large families, I really am not shocked by the question. Saddened, yes, but not shocked. What bothers me is when this question is asked with pity, disdain or even disgust in front of my children. They are not even referred to as people, but as “those”. They constantly hear comments like, “I’d be nuts if I had that many children.” And when I was pregnant with my last child, my children overheard a comment by a fellow Christian who said, “Whew! Was this one planned? Better you than me!” as if I had fallen under some kind of terrible curse or something.

Now, I expect for the heathen to act like heathen. But these comments are tough to take from members of the body of Christ. As a pro-life Christian, I believe that life begins at conception, and that life is precious to God. He is the sovereign author of life and His Word states in Psalm 128 that fruitfulness in terms of fertility is a blessing, and that children are a reward from God.

For many years I have been curious as to how the body of Christ has strayed so far from this basic principle, and has allowed all forms of deception and worldly thought to creep in and be embraced as truth.

Before I go any further I want to say that it is not my intention to judge anyone. I do not want to be a hypocrite. I need to share my personal experience.

At the age of nineteen, previous to my conversion to Christ, I aborted my first baby. As a result of that horrible “choice” I suffered permanent damage to my reproductive organs that caused problems in my next six pregnancies. Five of my children were born prematurely and one of them died. The other one died in-utero early into the pregnancy.

When I was pregnant with my last baby, my husband and I made a decision to surgically alter our reproductive capabilities. The decision was a hard one because our basic belief was that God should be in control of how many children we were to have. But because God had not healed the problems that caused my babies to be born too soon and suffer serious, life threatening health problems, we took matters into our own hands. Our motivation was to prevent any more losses, but in looking back, I wonder what God would have done if we had just trusted Him. Would He have healed me? Would I now have more children ?

My husband and I have looked at our eight year old and sighed, “Our babies are grown up. He’s our last one.” Whenever I’m out and there’s a baby around, I love to just hold him. Sometimes I feel as if I have empty arms. God only knows what blessings I may have missed.

There are other ways in which we can deceive ourselves by taking control of our fertility. I was recently confronted with this situation when a friend, a pro-life Christian, after years of heartbreaking attempts to become pregnant, decided to participate in an in-vitro fertilization program.

This method of becoming pregnant puts at risk several fertilized eggs, human beings if you believe that life begins at conception, at a great risk of death or perhaps even worse, experimentalization, by those who do not view them as precious.

It should not be considered permissible by pro-life Christians to artificially inseminate human eggs in a petri dish and then begin a program of “selective breeding” for some, while others are frozen and put at a very high risk of death during the thawing out process. We must realize that just as we should not be permitted to take the life of an unborn child in a pregnancy for which we have not “planned”, neither should we be allowed to abort embryos in order to have a “planned” pregnancy. Perhaps we shouldn’t be “planning” things at all, but allowing God control over his creation. The whole notion of Planned Parenthood, the notorious pro-abortion organization founded by Margaret Sanger, has crept into the church unaware. Sanger believed that all social ills could be avoided if women could simply have control over their reproductive organs. We have bought the lie.

Both my friend and I justified our actions by what seemed right to us at the time, and we both have to live with them. God alone is the judge. But it seems to me that as Christians, we should be concerned about these matters that are so close to God’s heart.

I believe that our families, the way they function, and the way we live our lives, express to the world our faith and relationship with Christ. He has called us to be salt and light, and an example to the world. He has called us to be in the world, but not of the world. Can the world see His light in us? Are we expressing His values, in matters of family and childbearing, or are we still no different than the world ?

Many Christians when asked, “Do you believe that children are a bless- ing?” would not hesitate to exclaim, “Of course.” But do their other words and actions support their answer? Most of us want to be blessed financially, spiritually, physically, and would never consider telling God that we do not desire to be blessed in these ways. And yet when it comes to the area of being blessed by fertility, most do not consider it a blessing but something to be avoided.

Christian couples have unknowingly used contraceptive measures that have caused the deaths of their unborn children through abortifacient action, such as oral contraceptives, and intra-uterine devices (IUD) and many have had to live with the heartwrenching consequenses of eventual infertility.

As Mary Pride has stated, “As ever, God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility go together. If you cherish your fertility, God is more likely to bless it. If you squander it, (on waiting forever to have kids) or wound it (through surgery or drugs), God is likely to let you have your own way which sometimes turns out to be not so great when you get there.”

Before I convince you that I really wasn’t telling the truth when I said I didn’t want to be a hypocrite, I’d like to try and offer some insight into why I believe that we have been so deceived. Scripture says that we are not to be ignorant of Satan’s schemes, and I think we can all agree that Satan hates children, and wants to prevent them from being born into Godly families. Perhaps by taking a look at the way our society normally handles the birth of a new baby into a family, we might get some insight into where we have become side-tracked in some of our attitudes, and hopefully, by God’s grace, change them.

Generally speaking, our technocratic society views pregnancy and birth as abnormal, or in extreme cases, as a disease. To quote Mary Pride again, “Medical orthodoxy and even just plain nastiness have precedent over the family’s natural authority. Am I trying to tell you that modern hospitalized childbirth is not the best way to deliver babies? Precisely. In fact, it’s weird.”

I agree with Mary. For most families, having a baby means giving up their control over a normal, life-changing, intensely personal and emotional event to people who view the whole process as an emergency that they need to be rescued from.

Many women, myself included, have been traumatized by events during hospital births, such as depersonalization by the staff, separation from our babies, and being subjected to “mandatory procedures” such as routine episiotomies, and unnecessary C-sections. When you consider all of these things, and add to it societal cow-towing to the feminist belief that motherhood is a lowly profession, it is relatively easy to understand why women do not want to have babies.

O.K. I’ve effectively cursed the darkness. Now, how can you and I light a candle? I think that it begins with an absolute commitment to seek God through prayer and His Word and to be obedient to His will. I believe that we need to ask Him to change our hearts, and that we must have a sincere desire to be purged of any thought or belief that is in opposition to His will for our lives. We can ask Him for an attitude that is evident in our actions and manners of speech concerning the value of motherhood and the blessing of a “full quiver”. We can encourage family centered maternity care, in which couples have choices about birth attendants, and environments in which birth can be a time of celebration and worship of our Lord, who is the life-giver. We can consider the education of, and ministry to our children as a high priority, and we must highly honor and respect the estate of parenthood. We can be messengers of love and grace and edify one another.

The Lord sent a messenger of love and grace to me.

The same week that my children and I had been subjected to “the question” by the waitress, and a bag-boy, I must admit, I was feeling a bit defensive. I was once again in a public place when an elderly gentleman caught my eye. He was coming down the aisle of the store, and watching me shop with all four of my children in tow. He got closer and opened his mouth to say, “Are all of them yours?” I noticed an unusually warm, happy tone to his voice, and before I could answer, he added sincerely, “Congratulations!”