As many of you know, I write one blog and then post it on several different sites. At one of these sites, a woman posted this response to my quiverful article. I have chosen to reprint it with answers:-)
I can't believe this b*******. Can you imagine a god who blesses some and condemns others?? I can't believe intelligent people fall for this b*******. I spent 15 years in a full gospel, evangelical church. I WAS BRAINWASHED into believing their lies. There are children all over the world starving to death ! Dying children. God does not provide for them. I served God, I served my husband and he left and god left and now I am completely alone. Alone in this world with a pregnant daughter who had to leave her abusive husband. I can't afford to eat or live. God provides for NOBODY, I make my own money and have to pay my own bills and GOD has NEVER helped me….
I am so sorry you have had such a hard time. The world is evil and life isn’t easy.
God blesses all who serve Him. Some He blesses in different ways than others, but He blesses all. For example, my hubby and I are blessed with 8 wonderful children. My brother, who loves the Lord as much as I do, has not been blessed with any birth children but has been blessed with a very good paying job and a very nice house. He also is in the ministry in a mega church while ours is very small. We both feel very blessed, but in our own unique way. God knows what is best for each of us, and more importantly for His kingdom. Does this mean some of us may have to suffer a little to further His work? Yes. But it is worth it.
God is eternally, perfectly good. He gave us laws to live by to protect us and our neighbors (including “Love the Lord your God with everything you have.”). Breaking these laws is called sin. Sin makes God ANGRY! He HATES to see people hurt, whether by themselves or by others. Thus He set in place punishment for sin. Some punishment happens in this life and some in the next. only those who choose to obey His rules will be allowed into heaven.
“Bad things” that happen are always the result of someone not obeying God’s laws. Earthquakes, floods, etc. are the result of Adam’s disobedience. Murder, stealing, and, yes, single mothers who can’t afford to eat are often the result of someone else’s sin.
God sees and He knows. But God is a gentleman. He will not barge into our lives and start changing things without our permission. If you want Him completely out of your life, He will spend time trying to change your mind. But ultimately He will leave you alone to make your own way. Right now we have one world; partly absent and partly present with God. there is some good and some evil. In the afterlife there will be two worlds; one where God is in everything and is everywhere and one where He gives the sinner his wish; total absence of God (this is known as hell) If He is not helping you right now it is because you are not letting Him, though I would argue that He is helping you. You evidently have a job. Not everyone can say that. Are you so sure that that is totally your doing?
God has a different perspective on children dying than we do. He knows the future and I honestly believe He will sometimes take a child to Him early instead of letting the child grow to the age where they are eternally lost. This sounds mean I know, but it isn’t really. Not when you know that this life is just a blink of the eye compared to eternity. Most of those children starving today are in countries where they would likely grow up to be either Muslims or Hindus. God loves them so much He is insuring their salvation by not giving them a chance to sin. A life time suffering in a few short years and then PARTY!
The Bible says a man that does not take care of his family is worse in God’s eyes than an atheist. It is a worse sin to let your own family go hungry and without the things they need (and I believe this includes spiritual training) than it is to not believe God exists. Your hubby and son-in-law WILL answer to a vengeful, just God.
… I feel sorry for these poor people and those poor children. 18 people in a household, how can you possibly provide all the love, attention, guidance etc to 18 children?? It is ridiculous to think that god controls the birth of children. The fact of nature is that women reproduce and that happens by natures will not gods. If you don't protect yourself against pregnancy - guess what, you will get pregnant. That's the law of the jungle. Now these people will get rich and rake in the fame and fortune because they are stupid enough to believe that god gave them all these children. it's like couples who are infertile, take drugs to correct it, have multiple children and thank god for it. WRONG !! Women are not meant to carry litters. But I guess that's another topic.
I am assuming you are referring to the Duggers. I don’t think I have ever mentioned them in any of my blogs, but I do know who they are.
The Duggers are not making any money off of the attention they are getting. God provided for them long before they became known and they don’t need it.
I can understand how it would be hard to comprehend one mother providing all the emotional needs of 18 children. This is because the only samples of child management in our country are 1) our own very small families where mommy is the be all and end all of the child’s care and 2) classrooms filled with 30 or more children all the same age. You are absolutely right that one person can not provide 18 children of the same age with the care and attention they need (which makes me wonder why anyone thinks traditional school is GOOD for any child. Obviously they are not getting their emotional needs met. But I digress…) A large family is very different from either one.
A good example is my own much smaller family (I sure don’t get to say that very often, LOL!) I was my oldest child’s only source of company, love, training, guidance, and care (until my very tired hubby got home from work anyway). This was hard work and required lots of time and energy.
My eighth child has eight people with her every day (we homeschool) ranging from me to my 4 year old who love her and want to teach her. If I wasn’t breastfeeding, I might not ever get to hold her! My oldest children, in an effort to practice being grown, are constantly teaching the younger ones, freeing time for me to continue teaching the older ones. The younger ones have the example of the older ones on how to behave. So the fact is that while I may be more stretched, personally, than I was 16 years ago, I have been multiplied by eight to my littlest one! All children should be so lucky as to have seven older siblings! That “poor” Dugger child that is due in January will have, essentially, 19 mommies and daddies loving, caring, guiding, and training him!
“If you don't protect yourself against pregnancy - guess what, you will get pregnant”
Hmmm. Really? Tell that to my brother. He is also quiverful and has been married 13 years.
And “PROTECT yourself against pregnancy.” There is that evil disease again- PREGNANCY. You would think it was worse than cancer to hear some people talk:-( it is the only area of life where we intentionally break a perfectly working body and think it is a good thing. How can we with a straight face possibly say we like children when we speak of getting them as the worst calamity that could happen to a woman?
The fact is that the Bible is plain. God can and does control the womb. He always speaks of children as blessings and everywhere He talks of blessing a people, He begins by saying they will have lots of babies. We, in our arrogance, think we are controlling it. As I said, He won’t push His way in uninvited and so lets us have our own way most of the time. But do you really think the epidemic numbers of infertility in this country are just a coincidence? The book of Deuteronomy tells us that if a country as a whole keeps God’s commands, they will be blessed with lots of babies. If they don’t, their wombs will be barren. This does not necessarily mean barrenness is a punishment on the individual couples (though occasionally it is). It is a curse on a nation.
I agree that women aren’t meant to carry litters any more than horses are. But a good horse will give her owner one foal a year for some 10-15 years! And there is increasing research showing that it is healthier to have a large number of children than not.
• Fetal stem cells are left behind after birth and often heal ailing parts of mommy’s system.
• Having a period every month for thirty or more years is being discovered to cause cancer. Pregnancy naturally protects from this.
• Breast feeding prevents breast cancer. Hmm, use it the way God intended or loose it?
• Men who have lots of children and take care of themselves physically live to over 100 more often than those that just take care of themselves.
I understand your bitterness and am prying for God to show Himself to you. He WILL care for you if you let Him. I also hope you do not take your hard times out on your precious new grandchild. The Bible says grandchildren are the crown of their grandparents:-) It just might be that God is sending you someone full of love and innocence just in the time you and your daughter need it. Accept this child as the blessing he is meant to be. You may not always see the blessing part, but it is there and you can depend on it.
Wow! I was a bit put off with your comparisons between "horse" and "woman". :-( Children are indeed a blessing from God, every single one of them. So how is it then, that you feel you are doing God's will be neglecting the hundreds of thousands of children out there who do not have loving mommies and daddies? Those children who need a warm home, loving arms, an education, etc... God brought those children here too and you are choosing to believe only PART of God's will. He asks that our hearts be open to him and his will... you're interpretation leaves out all of the children whom God may have meant to be in your home. You have strayed from the HEART of GOD into the Dogma of the church. My heart cries for you. Dear child of God, I am praying for you.
ReplyDeleteI compare women to horses because we can learn a lot about ourselves and God's will from nature. If God intended children to be raised in peer/classrooms, for example, He would have had them born in litters, like dogs, not singly as horses.
ReplyDeleteYou speak you know not of. I am VERY open to adoption. I always have been. My parents were foster parents for a short time, my brother just adopted three boys, one of my best friends just adopted four from Africa and is seeking foster status for three more (this in addition to the five bio children God has blessed them with!)and my church supports missionaries who care for orphans. I would love to adopt. But God has not allowed us to do so. I know this due to circumstances in our lives it wold not be appropiate to go into here. If He ever changes these circumstances, we will certainly pray about adopting.
Why does it have to be either/or? Why can't more Christians truly love children enough to take all the bios they can AND adopt?
The fact is that most Christians aren't doing either one. They treat children as much like some evil disease as the world does. How many Christian families do you know that only have two children? That is my point; Christians are not loving children any more than the world, bio or adopted! We need to change this! The Heart of God loves children and we, as a church whole, are missing His will!
I'm sorry but I am of the mentality that God gives us everything we need on this earth in order to functions as He designed. One of those God given gifts is common sense. Common sense dictates that we are women do release an egg each month and that it takes a sperm to fertilize the egg. Just because this is capable of producing a pregnancy, that doesn't mean we should take all common sense and toss it to the wind.
ReplyDeleteWe have a responsibility to our children to provide for them and to see to their needs. God does not expect us to just stand around and wait for the means to do so to fall from the Heavens. He gave us a back to work, legs to move, and a brain to solve. Blindly expecting God to care for you is an insult. He does care for us, by providing us the means to earn for ourselves.
This does not mean that we should rut around like animals having as many children as possible. This means practicing common sense. This means that although having faith is necessary in Christianity, we should also have common sense.
For the family whose dad's company has been laid of and whose mother is working minimum wage because that is the only job she can get. Are they to throw caution to the wind and just to keep having kids hoping everyone else will provide for them supposedly because it is God's will?
I can tell you from my own experience. I got pregnant at 19 and have been homeless, moved around from 5 different states, gone hungry and gone to the park for free lunches just to feed my daughter some days. We have lived off of stale hamburger rolls and ketchup at times. I have struggled and to get pregnant again would have been an absolute disaster!
So does quiverful only work for families with the means to afford these children? Does quiverful mean that we are to just rely on the generosity of others and become beggars? Does quiverful mean that we should decide which kids get new coats and which ones freeze during the winter because the baby needs diapers?
Common sense is lacking here. Animals procreate on instinct but God has blessed us with something called common sense which makes us different than animals. Why even give us common sense if we were to just behave on instinct? It's unnatural unless you see yourself as an animal in the wilds expecting your young to be killed off by predators.
Plain and simple, quiverful only works for those who have the money to make it work. The rest of the world is in a recession right now. If any of this quiverfuls were to actually have to go to a homeless shelter with their kids, and welfare office for food stamps, and the salvation army for school clothes shopping, they wouldn't be excited about bringing more mouths to feed into their homes.
I might also add that there are plenty of families where children and family services has had to step in and take children out of their homes because of their unfit families. These kids are taken away bruised, molested, and broken. After the kids are taken away, the mother starts to have more and it is a never ending cycle. She has more, they take them away. My cousin is on her 7th child and they all have different fathers who are all in jail and all of the kids are in and out of the cps office. Just because things are good for your family because you are Pastor's wife and aren't touched by the realities of the lower sector, doesn't mean that your point of view is adequate for all situations. Sure God may bless your family and you may have enough to provide for your children, but take away your support network and your husband's income (which happens to plenty of people) and guess what, things won't be so cut and dry anymore.
ReplyDeleteGod has given us everything we need on this earth; with that I agree. In fact, that is why the whole idea of over population is ungodly. God knew before He made this planet how many people would be here and He supplied for them.
ReplyDeleteGiving our wombs to God and asking Him to give us those children we need, however many or few that be, is a far different thing from "throwing it all to the wind."
For example; we spent seven months living in a 32' camp trailer with four children (during five weeks of which my hubby was looking for work and we were living on savings). Being prego in this atmosphere would have been very difficult for me what with morning sickness, small quarters and all. I diligently asked God to not let me get pregnant until I had had a month to settle into our house. My fifth child was born ten months after we moved in, almost to the day!
After the birth of my 7th, I admit I was a bit tired. I told God I could really use a rest. Say three years or so. Without using birth control, baby eight was born three years and two months later. God hears and answers prayer.
I have friends who felt God call them to adopt from Africa. They had to sign papers saying they were not pregnant or the deal was off. They prayed and left it in God's hands. When it came time, they signed their papers with clear conscious...and one week later (when it was too late to matter anymore) she began showing signs of pregnancy (her fifth bio child was born three months after their four African children arrived home. This baby has been the tool God has used to bind them all together.)Trusting God is very different than being careless, though they may look the same to outsiders.
My brother and his wife were married 13.5 years ago. Though they are "quiverful" they have had no birth children. They finally felt release from God to pursue adoption. Next month they will sign the legal papers to become the permanent parents of three boys, the 5th, 6th, and 7th children of someone just like your cousin. These children were not "accidents." God allowed the mother to get pregnant with them in order to give children to a loving couple who the fall had made infertile.
Our pastor was raised by a very abusive and mentally ill mother in extreme poverty. He had a very hard time growing up and went hungry often. This experience has made him one of the most compassionate, hard working, intelligent men you could ever meet. He was the fourth in their family. Are you saying he should never have been born?
I wholeheartedly agree that God expects us to work. Paul said "If a man does not work, neither should he eat." and "If a man provide not for his own, especially those of his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an atheist." But follow my logic here: no matter how hard we work, if God does not bless, we will not succeeded. He is our ultimate supplier, no matter what. In fact, I believe well paying jobs to be a direct gift from Him. Now what you are saying is, though we can depend on God to supply our needs for 1.8 children if we work hard, we can't depend on Him to supply for five, or eight, or twelve. Do you really think it harder for God to give a man a job capable of paying for ten children than two???? We must do our part and work, yes. But the Bible says to "Trust in the Lord with all your Heart and lean NOT unto your OWN UNDERSTANDING. In ALL your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight." We are not to lean on our own understanding, our own common sense in any area of life, but lean on God. Use your common sense, definitely (Please do! so few bother!). But when the rubber meets the road, trust GOD, not your common sense.
"to get pregnant again would have been an absolute disaster!" And you didn't either, did you? whether because you followed God's command to chastity outside of marriage or because He closed your womb (or allowed birth control which doesn't always work to do so), you didn't get pregnant. God gave you one little one who, if you are like those I have known in similar circumstance, saved your life by giving you something to live for and making you be responsible where you wouldn't have been otherwise. You learned a lot from that experience. I hope you are using it to help others.
I too had a time of, shall we say, "less than middle class" living. We lived in hotels for five weeks when I was prego with number three. It was a hard time, as was the above mentioned seven months in a trailer. We have never quite ran out of food, thank the Lord, but it has been close a few times. You see, you have done the same thing many people do. You assume that because I view children as blessings, as the Bible does, that I must be rich. The truth is, that though we do pay our rent and buy food, we are by no means rich. In fact the official government numbers say we are living well below poverty level (I think these numbers are nuts, but that is another post:-). A wise woman using her common sense, knowing she we likely have many children, never has to choose who to buy coats for. She simply buys neutral colors for her first every year and hands the others down. I will admit I have had times I didn't know where I would get the money for clothes. Always when this happens, someone cleans a closet and begs our church to take the clothes and find someone who can use them. "Anyone, just don't throw them away." People who have never laid eyes on me or my brood. Every time, the clothes are exactly what I need in the exact size. Every time. This is not begging. I don't tell anyone I have a need but God. But He knows and supplies. He even gave me a $1000 vacuum totally free! I sure didn't NEED that vacuum, but He likes to spoil me occasionally.
So does quiverful only work for the rich? hardly! When God guides, God supplies, whether it is through great jobs or good jobs plus the little miracle here and there. We can depend on Him.(By the way, my hubby is the Assistant Pastor and doesn't get any pay. Our church is too small to even pay the Senior Pastor a salary. He lives off his retirement and my hubby works 50 hours per week in the construction industry.)
You know, the Bible is pretty cut and dry, no matter what the economic situation. His truth is not relavent to the situation. It is consistant and universal.
I have had relatives and close friends in very dire straights. Applying for assistance is humiliating whether you have one child or ten. But I have seen miracle after miracle of God's provision. He will provide. And He can provide for many just as easily as few
But we must truly trust Him and step out on faith to follow Him. We must diligently seek His Will and read His Word. We must "Let this mind be in you that was in Christ." We can't hold back ANY part of our lives from Him.
"Are you saying he should never have been born? "
ReplyDeleteI personally believe that because we exercise free will, that anyone can have a child if they are healthy.I believe God knew who would be born before He created the world, but that because we have free will, we also have control over pregnancy.
Take my mother for example. She was 13 and raped by her father. She ended up pregnant. Are you telling me that God personally reached down and facilitated that pregnancy? Absolutely not. It was His will how babies are made, but our free will that causes it. God does not force us to have sex, He just made the science possible to do so. Because we have that free will AND a working mind, AND a knowledge of cause and effect, that using all three in conjunction of eachother is, in my opinion, not thwarting God's will, but using the blessings He has gave us to follow the path set before us.
"And you didn't either, did you? whether because you followed God's command to chastity outside of marriage or because He closed your womb (or allowed birth control which doesn't always work to do so)"
Actually I DID get pregnant from one slip up of not using protection- still wasn't married mind you, and was in dire straights trying to still take care of my child. I miscarried at 11 weeks. I see this is God didn't want me to have a child at that point, but I was still able to conceive. Get it? If my womb was "closed" as you called it because it was God's will, then I shouldn't have been able to get pregnant, but once again FREE WILL and all and SCIENCE being constant, I got pregnant.
Now I am married and we had a son and then my fertility went haywire. I am now infertile. If I were to just put this all as "Gods will" then it would be discouraging to know that I could have children out of wedlock but once married become infertile. Imagine that. I return to Church, I change my ways, I turn my life around, I finally have the money to support a child and now can not. I could take medicine mind you to facilitate a pregnancy, but choose not to. Because I am "able" to have more children with medical help doesn't change the fact that I do not WANT to have another child. I am happy the way things are.
I think your logic that God will provide for your family and your faith is great, but the way things work out for you doesn't happen to everyone. Unless you are saying that God only blesses those who believe in Him and then turns His back on those who don't. That would be a punishment to those children and make Him seem to be a God whose love is conditional.
I see what you are saying, but I disagree on pregnancy. I rely on the fact that God has blessed us with knowledge and with that knowledge how pregnancies happen.
So what would you say to your daughter, say some day she decides to go against your teaching and engage in intercourse before marriage. Would you tell her children are a blessing and to let what happens happen, or would you say " Please don't do this, but if you do, please use protection"? This is hypothetical, but your children are of their own minds and may someday do things you don't approve of, but would you guide them to be safe or not?
What do you say about children being blessings if they are born outside of marriage? Do you advocate teenagers not using protection and possibly getting STDS?
Just curious.
Great questions! I love these kinds of discussions as they make me think and keep me in the Word.
ReplyDeleteWe absolutely do have free will. This does not mean, however, that God does not have a plan He wants us to follow; a plan that would make our lives better or, more importantly, further His Kingdom. We have the choice to follow His plan or not.
Obviously, we do have some free will in pregnancy or birth control wouldn’t work. This does not mean that God doesn’t want to guide us in this area.
I believe a young man leaving high school with the money and grades needs to decide if he will go to college or not; if he goes, where will he attended, what will he study, what job will he apply for. He can just make these decisions on his own criteria, or he can pray and ask God to guide him to the best choice. After God answers him, he can still choose to ignore God if he wants to. But if he wants to be the most effective for God, he will listen and obey.
A couple fixing to get married will generally pray about jobs and houses and ministries. But when was the last time you heard anyone ask God about babies and birth control? “No, thanks God. We don’t need your advice. We will go to the doctor instead.” Why do we give every other area of our lives over to Him but not this one?
I have heard of many couples that have prayed about what kind of birth control to use or when to have children. With only two exceptions, God has given everyone the same answer; Trust Me. (Those two exceptions were women who already had more than the average number of children and were facing severe health concerns such as cancer. They felt God tell them it was ok for them to use birth control for the time it would take to treat the illness. I do not argue against this. These couples honestly sought God’s will. I also won’t tell a woman whose hubby tells her they will not have any more children to disobey (or nag or manipulate) her hubby. The Bible is plain that children are blessings but even plainer that a woman is to obey her hubby.)
I don’t have all the answers of course of why things happen. I would speculate (and that is all it is) that a teen incest victim’s pregnancy may make their violator’s sin so public that it has to quit and he be prosecuted. It may also be God giving that woman a precious, innocent comfort to help start her on the road to healing. I don’t know. I do know that God is way smarter than any human being I have ever met:-) He knows better than we do what is best in every area of our lives.
“I see this is God didn't want me to have a child at that point, but I was still able to conceive. Get it?”
The fact is that you did have a child then. He had a very short life, never sinned nor got hurt, and is waiting for you in heaven. God wanted a child from you, but knowing you couldn’t handle it right then, He simply took him home early. I have had two miscarriages myself and know the pain. But I also know without a doubt that my two babies will be in heaven with me.
“Because I am "able" to have more children with medical help doesn't change the fact that I do not WANT to have another child. I am happy the way things are.”
Don’t you think that God knew you would be happier with just two? Don’t you think that is why the haywire fertility? Just because I believe children are blessings doesn’t mean I believe they are the only blessings God gives. I am sure He has blessed you in ways He hasn’t me, probably financial and with more time to pursue “your” things. I know it must have hurt at the time you discovered the fertility problems, but I am sure God helped you through those.
You know, in this country we think any child not born to a middle class family is being abused. This would mean that by our standards of living EVERY child born before the 1900s was abused. This simply is not so. Children don’t NEED that standard of living. They can grow up with a good deal less and be just fine. Again, I don’t know why everything happens that happens, but I simply can’t believe that something so important as the creation of an Eternal Soul is left up to chance.
When I was in high school I was in the agriculture program and owned a sheep. Sheep are the stupidest of all farm animals. And they are stubborn and curious to boot. A truly deadly combination. If I were to try to explain to my sheep how to make instant pudding she would have looked me in the eye and said “Baaaaaaa.”
The Bible compares us to sheep….repeatedly. This is how our intelligence stands up to God’s.
I don’t know why God gives some people children and doesn’t others. I find the idea that because we don’t approve of His selections, He must be ignoring this area a bit self-indulgent. We simply aren’t smart enough to understand.
God is a gentleman. He won’t force His way into our lives. Those who receive His blessings (babies, jobs, health, etc.) and then tell Him to get out, well, what can you expect? I believe He is still there for those children even though we can’t see Him (Ever heard the song “The Little Girl”?)
If my children choose to walk away from God’s wisdom, I would tell them to rely on man’s puny intelligence; I would tell them to use condoms to lower the risk of STDs. If they were to get pregnant before marriage I would assume God was using the baby to bring them back to Him, and would pray to that end. Of course my grandchild would be welcomed as a blessing even if the circumstances of his birth was less than ideal. It isn’t the child’s fault his parents aren’t serving God. And I have heard of more than one pre-marital pregnancy causing the parents to come to God. The baby is always a blessing. The parent’s choices of circumstances are not.