I overheard a lady at a small shop this morning say, "Can you believe Mrs. Duggar? (The famous large family who live in Arkansas and are on "TLC")? She is pregnant with her 20th baby and she's 45!!! And this, after Doctors said she could die if she has another baby!" Well, I have no idea if this is true or not; however, I stepped out of my comfort zone and announced (across the shop), "I'm pregnant with my 12th baby and I'm 42!" The lady looked at me as if I had two heads (I get that often when some people find out how many children we have)! She walked over near me and said, "I just don't know why anyone would have that many children and risk her life to have children." I told her that all children are a blessing! She agreed...I went on to express the following...
When we decided to give our family size to the Lord, my husband and I had a conversation about what he would do if mine or the baby's life were in danger in delivery, etc. I told him that God has given us this conviction (God gives different convictions to each of us) to trust Him with our family size and that if it came down to a choice between my life or our newborn's life (of course that's a choice we wouldn't want anyone to have to make!), I would want him to choose our baby's life over mine. The bottom line is, God is sovereign. He doesn't want us to make any decision out of pure "practicality," or out of fear. He wants us to make every decision out of obedience to Him. We can also be sure that His Presence will be with us in every decision we have to make.
None of us have any idea what tomorrow will hold for us...could be a job loss, news of serious illness, death of a loved one, etc. What we can be sure of is God's faithfulness. He will bless our obedience to Him. That doesn't mean that things will be easy. Because more often than not, His path is a hard one...but, taking the "road less traveled" also means God is strengthening us...He is growing our character and drawing us into a deeper relationship with Him. Now...that is priceless!
With so many horribly behaved and angry children inthe world...... I hope and pray we get at LEAST a bakers dozen from ur family!!!!! Ur kids r well behaved, intelligent and most importantly full of God!! I know ppl with ONE child who constantly miss the mark!
ReplyDeleteThere is no doubt in my mind that this is A hard hard hard time for u all....... But...... With eyes on the future..... It's easy to see that the blessings will be abundant!!!! Ur quiver is full!!!!
Thank u thank u thank u for being an amazing and awesome example!!
I don't care what the world says...... U r getting it right!!!!!!!!