A while back, my mom loaned me this little book called Be Fruitful and Multiply. I picked it up again to encourage myself that having babies is the right thing to do.
Oh, it's encouraging, all right, complete with reams of Bible passages about how God blesses a nation and a family by giving them lots of kids. And how our mentality of "let's wait a while before we have kids" is straight from Satan, and how the church has fallen for it.
And I'm sitting here with a baby in my lap, pettily lamenting, "I'm fine with lots of kids, but why does labor have to hurt so much?"
Another thing that I found encouraging is that God first blesses with children, and then he blesses with material things. I worry about our financial situation all the time (who doesn't?), but it's right there in loads and loads of verses: God blesses with the fruit of the womb, and increases their flocks and herds afterward.
I've kept an eye out to see if this principle actually does hold true in real life. I've been fascinated to see that in many people around me, the birth of another child in their home precipitates some kind of success in the father's place of work, enabling him to feed this new arrival.
One colorful example has been the adventures of Rhett and Link. They're a couple of internet comedians over on youtube, and we've all enjoyed their videos for years. Anyway, they're both in the process of having kids. When Link's fourth one came along, they got this deal to do a commercial for McDonalds. And now they have a contract to do a TV show about making their hilarious local commercials for people.
As their families are expanding, their oddball internet-tainment business is taking off. (I don't know all the internal details, of course. This is gathered mostly from their videos and observing the timing of things.)
I don't know if they're believers or not (their videos are always clean). But God is certainly blessing them.
So I'm waiting to see how God is going to provide for us now. However he does it, it will be unique and fascinating. I just wanted to get my thoughts down, so I can look back and go, "Yeah!"
My field of experience isn't very wide at this point. Have you seen this principle of expanding family leading to God's expanding provision?
3 comments:
Yes, it is true, I used to tell people that Dad's income rose every time we brought a baby home. I wasn't of course having babies for that I was having babies because God was leading us to do that. It sounded crazy then as it does now. We felt that having a large family was a way we could honor God by trusting Him to be the provider. IT was always hard though to trust God with our fertility It was always like stepping off a cliff and it would always be in the arms of a loving Father.
We couldn't get into the place we wanted when we got married. So we got our first apartment (right next to the hospital, no less) and then we had the boys. Ben got that second job that dropped out of the sky right when we needed it. It gave us the extra income to move to the duplex, which dropped us right next to Derek who, bad as he was, introduced Ben to machining which increased our income. And then it all fell into place for him to leave working with Derek and go to where he is now, which increased our income again, and led us be able to buy a house.
All because we had the boys.
It's really weird, bizarre, and pretty stinkin' awesome looking back on it.
Oh, you are so very precious! And YES, we have seen it in our own lives!! When God told us to adopt our two Siberian sons, I asked Him where would we put them, how would we feed them, etc., etc., etc. But there has never been a time that it has been a problem to care for two more, plus the five we already had! HE IS SO GOOD!!! And He always pays for whatever He asks us to do.
You are so wise to write it down. One of my favorite verses in the Psalms is from Psalm 78:1-8
My people, hear my teaching;
listen to the words of my mouth.
I will open my mouth with a parable;
I will utter hidden things,
things from of old—
things we have heard and known,
things our ancestors have told us.
We will not hide them from their descendants;
we will tell the next generation
the praiseworthy deeds of the LORD,
his power, and the wonders he has done.
He decreed statutes for Jacob
and established the law in Israel,
which he commanded our ancestors
to teach their children,
so the next generation would know them,
even the children yet to be born,
and they in turn would tell their children.
Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds
but would keep his commands.
They would not be like their ancestors—
a stubborn and rebellious generation,
whose hearts were not loyal to God,
whose spirits were not faithful to him.
That's what you are doing! You are documenting your godly heritage for future generations so that they will believe!! :)
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