Children Are A Heritage From The Lord

"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." Psalm 127:3-5

That's right, baby Phillips is on the way!! Looks like May 1, 2010 is the due date for now! Perfect timing, baby P, I am pumped to eat like crazy at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Even though, the thought of 99.9% of foods that exist currently make me want to vomit, I am hoping that I will be fat and happy by the time the holidays roll around.

And, for this first post, I think I am going to follow the same format as the last one...questions that are undoubtedly on most people's minds:

1) Whoa! Sounds like you had a honeymoon baby!
Close, but not really. Baby Phillips was conceived around two weeks after our cruise. Too much information? Oh well, just pretend you didn't read that, then.

2) Wow, pregnant AND your first year of marriage? How miserable! I don't think I could have survived...
Well, not many years ago, you wouldn't have had the option whether you got pregnant or not in your first year of marriage. Therefore, more people than not have been pregnant their first year of marriage and have survived just fine! Don't worry, we're not miserable. Have my mood swings already started? Of course. Is John the most laidback guy I've ever met and puts up with me without thinking about it twice? Absolutely! He has been so crazy awesome through all of this so far. Getting up and going to Publix first thing in the morning to buy my random craving for the morning. Picking up around the house when I am to exhausted to even think about it. Taking his lunch break at work to make me (or buy me) whatever I can stomach for lunch that day. If anything, this process has brought us so much closer together already! It just feels so natural to have a baby on the way. We love each other so much and now we are going to have a baby to share in all the love!

3) Buuuut, you're so young? Don't you two know how these things are made? Don't you two know how to prevent these things from happening?
This thought process is always the one that makes me laugh the most, especially from people that have children. It's almost like they're saying, "I hate my children, why on earth would you want any?". But, if I said that to them, they would deny it instantly. Well, if you enjoy your children, then wouldn't you want as many as you could have? If they bring so much joy to your life, then wouldn't it be great to start that joy as soon as you can?

Birth control...the big question we have been getting since before we were married. And, one of the things we discussed very early on in our dating life, that was actually dealbreaker for me. This is a very long, drawn-out thing to discuss, that I would love to sit down with you and talk about if you're interested in hearing our point of view. We are absolutely NOT saying that everyone should have our opinion or that it's the only right way. We both know many Godly families that differ on this topic and we do not think any less of their opinion than ours. For us, at least for now, we have decided that any form of contraceptive would not be following God's will for our life. We had discussed some natural family planning and might use it in the future. We did decide very early on, before we really knew what to think, that I would not go on any type of horomonal birth control. I was on it for a year in high school because of lady problems and I hated the way my body reacted to the horomones (which is one more reason why I think the first year married and pregnant horrified reaction is ridiculous, birth control is horomones and provides mood swings just like pregnanacy, although, so far, birth control gave me worse mood swings than pregnancy has so far). So, after the horomonal therapy was out, we began to talk through different options, which finally led us to our current philosophy.

We really do trust that God is in control and that every time He provides us with a child, He is going to provide us a way to take care of that child. (This is where a lot of people roll their eyes because we've all known a family that said this and turned out with tons of kids, tons of welfare, and giving the rest of us a bad rep). But, all in all, we looked at Scripture and saw verse after verse talking about children being a blessing...talking about the parents of children to favored from the Lord...etc...etc... We never found any verses talking about it being okay to decide how to run your own life and pick when to have children. That probably seems a little blunt, but personally, we couldn't find any Scripture (or a peace from the Lord) to have any type of birth control. Our encouragement to people is to just pray a lot!! That's what we did! We just kept praying that God would show us what to do with this issue and He did. It was not easy for me. I still remember, through tears, about 2 months before our wedding, in the car, saying to John, "I just really want to be like Jesus," and he responded with that he does, too. And, then I said, still teary eyed, "I have tried everything to figure out a way to make birth control okay, but I just can't get a peace about that. I think we're supposed to not go on a birth control and not go out of our way to try and have a child either. We just need to completely trust the Lord and see what happens". Then, John responded saying the Lord had been showing him the exact same thing! And, that he was like me, not sure what to do with that, but God has spoken and we need to obey.

So, there we are! A precious baby Phillips is on the way and we are so thankful to our beautiful God above for giving us life.