WSJ's Pro-Human Ethic

“My editors made it clear they were guided by a very different idea: that human beings ought to be seen as minds rather than mouths.” That’s journalist William McGurn writing in today’s Wall Street Journal about his bosses at the editorial pages, explaining what makes them different from most papers and news outlets culture-wide. McGurn learned that idea well, adding his voice to “the hopeful writing about human possibility” being done by a handful of economists.

In his farewell column as he heads to the New York Post as editorial-page editor, the value of optimism about new life, or rather the implications of the “humans as mouths” view, is on display in another article three pages away. In “Slowing Birthrates Weigh on Europe’s Weak Economies,” we read the story of a city in Portugal where ongoing austerity measures are in view in Every area but one: birth incentives. “The awards of up to $1300 to new mothers, as well as free nursery services and tax breaks on homes for young couples” will continue in a desperate effort to encourage babies. Why? More people are dying there than being born and there aren’t enough young workers to support those aging out of the workforce.

Back when we were making our excuses for delaying starting a family, our professor Hubert Morken challenged our notions of what’s financially responsible:

“Budget for everything but babies,” he said. “Babies are wealth!”

I’m thankful for newspapermen like McGurn who see the reason for his exuberance for new life. (Dr. Morken was bullish on family for many reasons beyond the pragmatic, but that’s another post for another day.)

We wish you well in your new endeavor, Mr. McGurn, and hope your move will mean another newspaper that understands the good gift of human potential and possibility. We may have to add another paper to our morning routine.

(McGurn’s full column, “The Education of a Newspaperman,” is online)

She Wants a Baby

Early in our marriage, Candice and I used to take long walks in our neighborhood to discuss the week ahead. Sometimes we talked about the future, but there was always a clear line between immediate tasks, like “get the oil changed in the car,” and future plans, like “get rich and build our dream home on five acres.”

One day in the middle of a walk, Candice said, “I want to have a baby.” I thought, in this particular instance, that she meant a hypothetical baby set somewhere in the future. So I agreed that it was a good idea. Then she clarified that she wanted a baby now.

Helen Hunt Falls

At that point, I suspected she was just having an emotional flare-up. There was simply no logic in what she was saying. She knew the status of our bills; she knew we couldn’t afford to have a baby. Besides, we had only been married a little more than a year and still had a lot of exploring to do as new residents of Colorado.

I realized I had to play the role of crisis manager. I had to talk her back from the ledge and encourage her to abandon the dangerous leap she was contemplating. Reasoning from logic, I talked about our finances not adding up. I reminded her of the dramatic adjustments a baby would require to our social lives, our living arrangements, and our concept of free time.

She nodded her head a lot, but I didn’t seem to be getting through. My reasons weren’t working. She wasn’t taking no for an answer. But I knew I wasn’t ready to say yes. The impact of this decision just seemed too significant to be made during a casual walk around the neighborhood. I wasn’t against having kids—I just didn’t think this was the best time. I had to find a compromise. Knowing she wouldn’t accept no, I said, “Yes … but … let’s just wait a little longer. Let’s pay off some bills, squeeze in some more adventures. Why hurry? We still have plenty of time.”

I waited for her response. She seemed to be considering my counteroffer. As she nodded her head in consent, I knew I had done it—I got her to hit snooze on her biological clock.

That is, until we went on another walk—this time with an older couple that had mentored us when we were dating.

Hubert and Mary Morken are action people. They like their walks brisk and over rough terrain if it’s available. My breath ran short several times as we climbed hills and dodged rocks with this couple the age of our parents. A sign along the path we hiked read, “Beware of rattlesnakes,” but I was more afraid of the conversation taking place between the women in front of me. Mary and Candice were talking as intensely as we were hiking. I couldn’t hear everything they were saying, just an occasional word—fertilitybaby and money—among them. I knew the issue of having kids was, once again, front and center.

(From the prologue of Start Your Family)

Further Reading

Cultural Changes in Approach to Starting FamiliesBarbara Dafoe Whitehead, "Life Without Children," State of Our Unions 2006, The Social Health of Marriage in America

Christian Apologetic for Family Formation Albert Mohler, "Does the Family Have a Future? Part 2" Albert Mohler, "Can Christians Use Birth Control?"

Biblical Guidance for Having and Raising Children John MacArthur, "A Plan for Your Family: God's vs. the World's" John MacArthur, "God's Pattern for Children, Pt. 1" Kenneth Boa, "Perspectives on Parenthood"

Financial Resources Ellie Kay, Financial Resource Center Money Saving Mom, moneysavingmom.com

Dealing with Loss The Story of Audrey Caroline, Bring the Rain Hope for the Journey of Grief, String of Pearls Candice Watters, Grieving Miscarriage

What Size Family?

Is it possible to have too many babies? That's the question I answered this week on Boundless. The woman asking wrote,

My older sister is pregnant with her fourth baby and excited about growing her family. She and I were talking last night about family size, and it got me thinking about how many children are too many and if that is even possible — to have “too many” children.

If we believe in a completely sovereign and good God, what are the implications of that on determining how many children are in a family? Many say we are to use wisdom in determining the size of our family, but how is that consistent with completely trusting God's sovereignty in every area of our lives? I struggle to understand this, and I really want my perspective to be the same as God's and not tainted by my own preference or opinion.

God is in control of all things, especially which eternal souls are born into the world and when and to whom. Just like He can keep some from ever conceiving, can't He determine when a family has the right amount of children and close the womb? If so, why don't we trust Him to do that?

The rest of her question, along with my response, is over at Boundless.org.

The Hope and Heartache of Babies

"Do you really want to bring a child into this crazy world?" That's the opening sentence of our "Hope" chapter in Start Your Family. We go on to say,

News stories constantly tell us how unstable our world is--our global relationships, our economy, our political processes, our environment. Closer to home, couples everywhere face concerns in their corners of the world--they worry about their jobs, their health, their neighborhoods. Many worry about family relationships--especially those who have experienced the shrapnel of divorce. These concerns cause anxiety even among couples that are expecting healthy babies. The prospect of a problem pregnancy, miscarriage, delivery problem, still-birth, or a baby born with any number of health challenges or disabilities can almost paralyze a couple. ... While fear and anxiety are a natural emotion for would-be parents, the choice to be fruitful is an eduring and courageous encounter with hope.

We had our own share of reasons to be anxious about becoming parents. But nothing like what many couples go through. In the past week, Sarah and Matt Hammitt (of Sanctus Real) began walking out an extreme version of challenge with their newborn son, Bowen. A few weeks ago I blogged about Matt's song "Lead Me." Lately I've been following their family blog, reading about their faith in the midst of great challenge and the ups and downs of a critically ill newborn.

Their courage is inspiring, their journey far from over. Please read their story and join the many believers who are praying for Bowen.

UPDATE

I love what Matt wrote this morning on Bowen's blog, with the dawn of hope, about the messiness that can come with new life:

This morning is the last time I’ll get to peer through the window to Bowen’s beating heart. I can’t believe, that in such a short amount of time, it’s become normal for me to look down at my son with his little chest wide open. A friend told me that I’ve seen too much, but I’m realizing that I might not see enough. Everything I’ve watched happen in this hospital, all the pain I’ve felt, is deepening my faith, strengthening my marriage, and molding my character. As I lovingly stared into Bowen’s eyes just before midnight, my face only inches from his chest, I thought, “this love is an awesome mess.” I know I’m not the first person to think or to say something like that. ... I believe it’s because tension is the place where the worst of life and the best of true hope meet to unveil our eyes to God’s artistic work of redemption.

Hope for Couples Who Are a Little Behind

Big-clockNot everyone who hears the Start Your Family message is encouraged by it. We hear from people who've said we're overlooking a biblical call to be childless for the kingdom (more on that in another post), that we're insensitive to infertile couples and that we offer little hope to those couples who already have waited. That last concern came most recently in an email from Stacy. She wrote,

I just wanted to write and say that I read your blog and feel very discouraged. My husband and I are 33 and 35 and we just now feel as though we want to start a family. God has softened both of our hearts towards children just over the past few months after praying for a heart change. Everything you write in your blog is very true and I would encourage the same mindset to couples in their early twenties but what if, as a couple, we have missed that boat?

We are trying to catch it now but reading the information on your blog was disheartening, not to mention polarizing. Even though I’m sure it wasn’t your intention, it made me feel as though we missed God’s call as a Christian couple to start a family when we first got married (27 and 30). And by your standards we were too slow in tying the knot as well. I really think you are doing a good thing but can the couples who are a little behind not at least get a little blurb on your blog?

This blurb is for Stacy. And all the other couples who (like us) got married a little later.

I'm actually really glad to be able to address your concerns and agree that some posts on this subject would be very helpful. I think it's easy to misread our message, especially if you haven't read the whole book (or know our story). We, too, married at the average age of 27 (just a month before turning 27, to be exact) and didn't start to think about babies till we were 28. We have a lot of encouragement in the book for couples like you who have waited.

We wrote to young couples as well, hoping to spare them the heartache many couples face when they wait, but that wasn't the entire purpose of the book. It's our heart to inspire couples to open their hearts to the possibility of children, to extol God as the wonder-working, all powerful savior who opens wombs and blesses us with children. You have every reason to hope that babies will come and I pray that is the case! I'm just sorry you read our message to be a discouragement.

That's the gist of what I emailed back to Stacy. She's awesome. She wrote back to say,

Thank you so much for writing back. I really didn't expect to get a response! I really do not mean to come across as super critical and will admit that I didn't read every single thing on your blog. I just feel remorse that our desire for children is just now happening, you know? I wish I could go back and put in my 27 year old heart what's in there now. I feel so behind and like if I'm not able to conceive, its because I missed what God's intentions were for us at the get-go. I know that God is sovereign and that if He wants us to have healthy children (even 3 or 4!) that we will but in searching for encouragement in the Christian community, I mostly get dismayed.

If, like Stacy and her husband, you got married later or you just decided you weren't ready to have kids back when you first got married, there's still hope. Lots of it. That's a big part of why we're doing what we do.

Men Should Consider Biological Clock as Well

In Start Your Family, I (Steve) talk about the strong urge Candice felt to have a baby and how I got her to "hit snooze on her biological clock." It's those potent emotions about having children, as well as a broad range of headlines about fertility and the timing of babies, that make us so aware of a woman's biological clock. Increasingly, however, news reports are explaining that men also have a biological clock to keep in mind.

"It wasn't all that long ago that any suggestion that a man had a 'biological clock' like a woman, and should father children sooner rather than later, would have been given short scientific shrift," says a new article by U.S. News and World Report. "Not anymore. Today, a growing body of evidence suggests that as men get older, fertility can and does decline, while the chances of fathering a child with serious birth defects and medical problems increase."

The article sources Dr. Harry Fisch, author of the book The Male Biological Clock with the finding that after age 30, testosterone levels decline about 1 percent per year. Fisch doesn't come out and recommend an ideal age for men to start a family, but where men have a choice in the matter, Fisch suggests "the sooner, the better."

The Spiritual Part of Babymaking

In telling about his harrowing journey to Ethiopia to adopt four children, Motte Brown talks about the challenges (that's putting it mildly) that he, and his wife Beth, encountered along the way. The details brought tears to my eyes as I imagined what it must have been like to endure everything from lost luggage, to formula and diaper shortages, to the near death of one of their nine-month-old twins. But as bad as all those visible hardships were, what really struck me about the 3-part-post was the trauma of the invisible:

With the benefit of hindsight, I now know I was too cavalier about the "Are you ready?" question. I expected it to be painful. But not so much that we would question the very decision we made to adopt. That is where we were. And that is exactly where I believe Satan planned for us to be. John Piper has a sermon on the power God allows Satan in this world.

The fact that Satan has such power in the world should give a kind of seriousness to our lives which unbelievers don't have. It ought not to make us paranoid or fearful, but sober and earnest in our prayers and persistently conscious of needing God's power. When the enemy is supernatural, so must the weapons be.

The enemy was undoubtedly not happy about a loving Christian family saving the lives of four children, both physically, and by God's grace, spiritually. They saved them through adoption. But aren't Christian couples who conceive and bear children and then, according to Ephesians 6, bring them up in the training of the Lord doing the same thing? When believers conceive new life and plan to become parents for God's glory, they are no less in need of spiritual protection than the Browns were in Ethiopia.

Whether you're thinking about starting your family, already pregnant with your first baby, or like us, in the midst of raising your kids already born, it's important to follow Paul's urging, later in that same chapter in Ephesians, to:

Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. (Ephesians 6:10-18)