My friend Valerie wrote the following beautiful passage in an email lately. I couldn't resist posting it here as it epitomizes the attitudes we should have towards the children God gives us:


Imagine with me a perfect world. Suppose that we can enjoy our children without any expense or trouble or inconvenience.

Suppose that there is no such thing as painful pregnancy; there is no morning sickness and no labor.

Imagine what it would be like if we were fabulously wealthy and living in spacious homes on beautiful grounds with no concern whatsoever for our future provision. What if we had no shoes to buy, no clothes to make, and no need to shop sales or cut coupons to feed our children?

What would it be like if they never needed to visit the doctor, never got coughs or fevers, and never threw up in the middle of the night?

What if they always obeyed, never cried, never whined, never complained and never pinched each other? What if they always praised Jesus and had no other attitude but love for God and His People, including their parents and siblings?

Wouldn't life be lovely? Wouldn't it be beautiful?

If my picture were reality-based, how many children would most Christians want? More than one or two? More than they have now? I'm guessing so.

There are many aspects to life with children that *are* precious, some that are almost pure bliss, so I suspect that if the difficulty and sorrow were removed, if life with them were nothing but unadulterated joy, Christians would have more children. I suspect that we would be pursuing Biblically mandated fruitfulness with a grand and intense passion.

But alas, we are sinners, our children are sinners,and we live together in a fallen world. Here, bringing up children is nothing if it's not hard! More than hard, it can be painful, expensive, heart-breaking, frustrating, and even exasperating.

Isn't it these trials and sacrifices of bringing up children that make parents think twice about relaxing and fully enjoying the marital bond, trusting God to give His full measure of newborn blessings and maybe even hoping that they will be abundant? Isn't it this difficult and painful side of life that makes us wonder about the prudence of standing by and meekly watching God fill the quiver?

But think about it.

The perfect world that I proposed *is* reality-based! It is coming--and it is not long away for any of us! Life with our children will someday be just like I described: pure bliss.

The Bible teaches that God's Providence and our faithful labor to bring up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord do work together to secure the salvation of most of our children, if not all of them. Someday, you and I will cast crowns before Jesus' feet and have the great joy of watching many or all of our children do the same.

Together with our children, we will sing hymns of praise to our wonderful, awesome, holy God Who has shown us such abundant, completely undeserved love and mercy! What a day that will be, praising the Lord with our children and our children's children after them!

I am convinced that most Christians make their childbearing decisions based on a spoonful of the ocean. They focus on these 9 months of getting through pregnancy or these 5 years of getting a child reasonably trained or these 20-or-so years of financial provision--or even these 50 to 70 years (at most) of watching, counseling, and praying.

Forgetting the full picture almost entirely, they set their thoughts on the 9 months or the 70 years or somewhere in between and they forget that when we've been in Heaven ten TRILLION years, we and our children will have no fewer days to sing God's praise than when we first met Jesus face to face!

"Set your affection on things above and not on things on the earth." Colossians 3:2

"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Matthew 6:19-21

Every plan, every action that is not focused on our future in Heaven with Christ is worthless, useless, bound to be lost and destroyed. But when we pour out our lives to receive, love, teach and train our children for *Jesus' sake*, we are making an investment that Eternity will give us no cause to regret!

"And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it." Mark 8:34, 35

Losing our lives here for the sake of Eternity is the way to save our lives *for* Eternity. Apply this!

Our children are conceived in us microscopic but eternal, fragile but indestructible. If God pleases and we bring them up in the admonition of the Lord, their lives are treasures destined for Heaven.

Our fertility is a talent. To some God has given a little, to others much--and none of us have a guarantee for the future.

To whom much is given, much will be required. The Spirit does not say that much *might be* required; He says that much *will be* required.

We will either spend our fertility for the glory of God, with our eyes on Eternity, trusting (and maybe even *asking*) God for the increase--or we will live with our hearts firmly fixed on these few fleeting moments of earthly life, bury our talent and concentrate on what is most comfortable for this short day.

We have such little faith! God has never once ceased to be in control of the creation of new life, not in any family ever. (John Calvin called the idea that children are conceived without direct, divine intervention a "preposterous error," based on Psalm 127:3.)

As the Child-giver blesses our homes with children, it is never with any other object but our immediate and eternal good. It is His design to conform us to the image of Christ, for His glory.

God does not at all require or demand or instruct us to provide Him with birth control. Isn't it incredible that any of us should be so presumptuous and illogical as to think that our *omnipotent* God requires or appreciates our feeble attempts to compel His hand?

Infinite power cannot exist apart from absolute self-control. We do not need "birth control" when the Creator, who is supremely wise and Good, has impeccable *self-control*. God's self-control, governed by His perfect wisdom, cannot ever fail to hold His Creativity to the limits that He Himself set in eternity past. (Ephesians 1:4)

Have children--invest in Eternity!