NFP from what I’ve heard contradicts 1 Corinthians 7:5 – “Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.”

To God be all glory,
Lisa of Longbourn

NFP – I’m still considering the overall implications of this technique, but for the most part I think it fails to answer most of my moral inquires concerning ‘family planning’. The biggest issue that contraception poses is the way it causes us to view children – not first and foremost the technique that is used. NFP is a great answer to the Catholic moral framework, but currently I am not convinced of its adequate answers to the question of the proper dominion of man, and the overall heart of the parents present in my own Reformed Protestant framework. If parents do not value children as gifts from God, then whether they are using technology to take a pill, or using technology to monitor fertility cycles – neither have the proper “heart”, either in principle or in practice.

Vasectomies – Again, the root of this question is not a matter of number of kids or age. We must first answer whether or not God has revealed that we are EVER to permanently sterilize ourselves in the context of marriage. It would be extremely hard for one to reconcile a biblical understanding of children, and yet an intentional rejection of any children the Lord would seek to give you from the natural (and assumed) union of man and wife.

Having the gift of child rearing – Of course, for some women mothering may come more naturally than others. However, as with many things, God may not give the grace for mothering until the ‘actual need’ is there. Feelings of inadequacy are not evidences of a need to ‘family plan’ – rather they are a healthy realization that “unless God builds the house, those who build it labor in vain” (which, btw, is verse 1 of Psalm 127, which continues a few verses later to say:

“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.” – Ps. 127:3-5)

Although some families may be blessed with more children, no child will ever come into a marriage without the accompanying grace to “bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Eph 6:4). Of that, we can be certain.

Militarywife, I think you are right when you say God does not want all families to be the same size, small or large. But I think we find out the size our family should be not by the amount of annual income or our chosen lifestyle, but by the amount of children God gives us. This can be a test of faith, but our lives should be formed around God’s sovereignty, not the reverse.

To me, I would not consider birth control an act of pro-active faith, and the most convicting verse in my life is in Romans 14: “whatever is not of faith is sin.” So if all my decisions were really made by that, my life would be radically counter-cultural. I might not be able to afford cable TV, new clothes, my own car, or even my computer once I have the kids God chooses to give me. But I’d rather have what God gives than have normal. There is a long history of God providing for families that logically can’t afford to exist. And sometimes there is hardship, but I trust that is God’s plan for refining individuals. He knows.

I don’t know what it’s like to have kids. I do believe that God is sovereign, that God can open and close the womb, and that He is too good to give me children for which He will not provide.

But I believe there is a lot about Him and His plan for me that I have not learned yet, and that He mercifully blesses me when I try to follow Him in good conscience, like the “weaker Christian” of Romans 14. I thank God that He didn’t teach all the Christians only one little piece of truth at a time.

To God be all glory,
Lisa of Longbourn

Thanks for the interjection. I don’t know how you got passed my spam filter….lol, jk.

Jonnymac-

I’ve been pondering upon the relation of birth control and God’s sovereignty for quite some time – almost since the first day I ever considered the issue. And I actually think the doctrine of God’s sovereignty may be one of the most powerful arguments in opposition to the use of birth control of all my arguments.

Now of course, both camps can claim the support of this doctrine, but like most things, only one of them will be doing justice to the truth and the biblical picture of the family. If there is any “hyper” to be found, it is definitely on the side of birth control advocates whose ever-present argument is that God can bypass their birth control means to accomplish His divine ends if he chooses to do so. But unlike haircuts and farming (as Piper addressed) God never placed mankind under Adam’s dominion. The command in Genesis is to “be fruitful and multiply”. Now whether or not you see this as a command, or permission is beside the point here. What is important is that the “dominion” is not given until later in the verse, and neither fertility in specific or mankind in general is in view there — rather it is everything except dominion over himself – “subdue it [the earth] and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” The very fact that we see God, one chapter later, giving an express command to Adam and Eve should further prove that mankind’s dominion was not intended to be unlimited, rather it was necessarily limited to creation (which is one of many reasons it is a sin to kill a man, and not a sin to kill a calf). And the pattern continues throughout the rest of biblical revelation. From God’s cursing of childbirth (showing once again Who has actually dominion there), to allowing the barren to conceive, and on and on. If we take the Bible at face value, the picture we get is anything but mankind being given control over the ends of procreation or the means whereby God fills the womb. God reserves both for himself, with great intentionality.

Natural families (what I believe)- God is sovereign over all. He opens and closes the womb (Gen 30:2). God gives children as a blessing (Psalm 127:3). He causes the conception of each child and fashions them in the womb (Psalm 139:13-16). He causes the time of delivery and birth for each child (Isaiah 66:9). One of the many (yet indivisible) purposes for marriage is the possibility of bearing children (Gen 1:28). Since man knows this is true from both experience and Genesis 1:28, he has no right to strive against this purpose, either by active (Gen 38) or passive (1 Cor 7) forms of birth control. God’s established means by which he gives us children is the act of sex (by his will), in the context of marriage. By knowing this, and yet intentionally circumventing those means in order to pursue a marital relationship that fits our own purposes and plans, we spurn the sovereign rule of God over our marriages, families, and children.

Pastor Phillip Way has a posted a great resource on this issue entitled, God’s Purpose for Children. He links to a great article by John McArthur entitled, “A Plan for Your Family: God’s vs. the World’s”, as well as Charles Spurgeon’s commentary on Psalm 127, “The Treasury of David”.

We agree on cloning.

As far as abortion, if we understand (as I’m sure both of us do) that abortion is not something other than murder, rather it is merely a different type of murder (much like drowning, or suffocation), then the Bible does explicitly speak to the issue in saying “Thou shall not kill”. Furthermore, there are some interesting principles laid down in passages such as Exodus 21:22 and following, which further clarify the reality that the unborn are indeed children deserving of protection.

Birth control – You’re correct in so far as birth control does not involve the soul of the child, but of course it involves the souls of the parents, and those are the ones who must shoulder the responsibility of accepting God’s will for their family. The very language of “trying to prevent a pregnancy” is extremely troublesome in regards to the high view of the ‘life’ that you are espousing elsewhere. If life is so precious, and children are such a blessing, and if you conceived despite the use of birth control you would joyfully keep the child — then where is the distinction? It is difficult to see this mindset as anything other than “God, if you find a way around my ‘plans’ then I will trust in you” instead of trusting in his plans from the beginning. Because again — we must not presume upon children, lest they cease bearing their sense of ‘begotten-ness’ from the Father and start bearing a sense of ‘created-ness’ being fashioned in the exercise of our wills.

Bible principles – I don’t have time to elucidate this point here, but suffice it to say that a quick survey through nearly every patriarchal family from Adam to Zacharias saw children as supreme blessings that (and this is of utmost importance) were given to them (ie. conceived) outside of their immediate control. Mary is the greatest of all these examples in that she was on the best birth control known to mankind (abstinence) and still got pregnant! (not that the incarnation will ever happen again) But the point is that biblical revelation paints a very clear picture of Who is in charge of planning families, and it is not the husbands or the wives, it is the Lord God.

Pre-20th century – This is both your weakest and most dangerous point. You are making judgment calls on the “doctrines of family and marriage” of some of the greatest theologians of the Christian church — and it seems, chalking up their differences to mere geography, medical technology, and economics. These men were no dupes, nor were they just ignorant to the possibilities of family planning. Nearly all of the major theological figure heads of Protestantism weighed the balances of birth control and found it wanting. It just won’t do to reject their positions out of hand on the argument of human progress alone. The quote by Luther I posted earlier addresses this fact quite succinctly. If we are to disagree with them, we must first agree reckon with their conclusions.

is it possible that your stance is “hyper” on this issue? is “God is sovereign, so He will plan my family apart from my use of means” analagous to “God is sovereign, so He will save people apart from my use of means”?

i can already see a counter-argument, though. evangelism is a biblically-mandated positive injunction whose means are actually delineated in Scripture. “family planning” is nowhere biblically mandated; in fact, the term is misleading because it makes it sound like a positive activity, when in reality is a negation of an activity. no means for family planning are delineated in Scripture.

i don’t know. i’m confused on this issue…

The Bible also never explicitly condemns abortion (in saying, “thou shalt not abort”) which some pro-aborts tend to cite as a reason to why God isn’t opposed to abortion being legal. Yet they fail to see that all throughout the Bible got upholds the santictity of life.

Cloning is messing with a human soul. Stem cell research is likewise, creating people apart from God’s design for some unknown purpose.

Yet Birth control involves none of this. With non-abortifacient birth control we are not messing with a human life. We are simply trying to prevent a pregnancy from occuring because a child wouldn’t be wise at the moment. There is no destruction of human life in true contraception, therefore we cannot say it violates God’s laws the way cloning would.

I cannot see any explicit statements in the Bible that condemn a man for practicing birth control (aside from the Onan, which was God’s disobedience) or that celebrate a man for refraining from it. God does want us to have children, this is Biblical. He wants us to love our children, raise them the right way, and lead them to him. However, I believe God intentionally left blank how many children he wanted us to have. That is where I believe personal responsibility comes into play.

Many couples before the turn of the 20th century believed in not using birth control, aside from just the reformed theologians, because there was no real method of birth control (other than the Onan method, which isn’t very popular). Also, there was a larger rural community in that day in age. Children were often beneficial to a family in terms of an extra pair of hands to help out. Also, most children were not having any prospect of college, so not many families had that aspiration for their children. Another important topic to consider is that infant mortality and child mortality was much higher in that day in age due to the prevalence of tons of different diseases (which are most often vaccinated for now) and illnesses which were uncurable.

Nowadays the tide has changed significantly. Nearly every baby that is born, thank God, now stands a good chance at living a healthy life for the next 80 years. Vaccines have eliminated the spread of deadly diseases that would take countless children. Our economy, and those economies around us, has transformed from a rural one into a more industrialized economy placing much more emphasis on the white-collar, college-degreed workforce.

I don’t take the grace you’ve shown for granted either. I like being able to talk to someone I can disagree with on one issue civily.