The specific judgement you’re asking for requires someone to know you well and requires dialogue. I don’t see how even a well-explained yes or no could be right for your situation, not in such specifics.
Such big decisions like avoiding too many children should be made with advice from others, hopefully others who really know us. For me, I’ve committed to not changing jobs without seeking advice from my father and the men in church who know me best. That’s a place in life where I don’t trust myself.
Delaying children to later in marriage is stupid advice. At best, it’s evidence of weak faith. Are you happy you didn’t heed it? It sounds like you have done well. Faithful couples will spend most of their marriage as active parents, as you’ve noted for yourself. Spending a few years to “get to know each other better” leads to setting bad habits and is ill preparation for children and the rest of marriage. It is most helpful to jump in, commit. Trust God and trust and encourage each other. Siblings, roommates, spouses, children, bring out the worst in us. And that’s good, to get it out and grow and heal. If we don’t hide and bury it. If we have the support that God intended for us. Then it brings out the best in us. When God said is is not good for man to be alone, I extend that to mean it is also not good for man and wife to be alone.
The above communities (within a family and also without) are very hard to do in a church without lots of others doing the same thing, particularly without older men and women who are ahead of you in the process. When such “elders” speak honestly of the overwhelming work of raising children and demonstrate the good of this particularly fruitful work, younger families may gain faith.
Sounds like you’re modeling a life which is abnormal where you live. And you’ve encouraged others to consider the more faithful path. That is great.
But, please don’t think you’ve gone even nearly far enough. Yes, maybe for you. Maybe for your context. Please consider that those younger couples can go further, be more faithful, more strong. In many areas of life, not just this one.
Consider how abnormal we are in light of human history and the Bible. That was already mentioned above. In this day and age, family size is just one thing among many, where we can reform our ways and work toward the younger generations continuing that reformation beyond our own capabilities.
I know some ordained men here have supported and suggested contraceptives, in specific cases. I imagine it’s rare and temporary. I also know a smaller set that have encouraged a divorce. I see these issues as quite similar. I know there’s no laid-out and repeated prohibition against contraceptives in the Bible, like there is for divorce. But there are also no laid-out exceptions to the command for fruitfulness, like there are for the prohibition against divorce. Many women and men in the Bible went so far as to sin in order that they might have more children. I can’t think of anyone who faithfully avoided more children.
I don’t expect anyone here to qualify their statements about divorce with exceptions: marriage is for life. The exceptions are rare and loaded with context, and it’s not helpful for a couple to keep them in mind while making their marriage. There’s no out, go forward. With family size, it may be even harder to lay out well-explained exceptions. Fruitfulness is a command given without exception to all men, and the blessing of children is (I think) unqualified.
If a couple has to consider contraceptives, then deal with it carefully (with wisdom and discretion, as you’ve noted). But seek the advice of others. Have a life of being known by others, so you can seek advice from people who know you.
The general explanations you’ve given sound like the beginning of a reasonable justification. Feeling overwhelmed, physical weakness. But they also sound like common things which women have been experiencing forever. The difference is in the specifics. Even if you were to write an deeper explanation here, we’re just not going to really know you and your family like your own church should.
My parents stopped after their second. Mom was overwhelmed, Dad was a traveling salesman (sorta). I will always consider it a sad tragedy. But as I’ve gotten to know them more, understand their situation, realize how young they were in their faith, I’ve learned to let it go. They take joy in my sister’s many children. And this is simply one place in life where I won’t seek advice from my father.
My unordained, bachelor answer to your question is of course you could have done better. Should have done better. It may have been partly your fault (isn’t everything?), it may have been partly the fault of the people who raised you or the pastors and others around you early in your marriage. Jesus only has sinners to choose from when he calls out, “good and faithful servants.” So the obvious answer is always that we could have done better. And yet, thank God my parents had two. Thank God, you married! And have five!!
Joel, you married later in life. I’m older than that. I’ll (Lord willing) marry some day. Despite the joy and gratitude on that day, I’ll always say I should have married earlier. And others should marry earlier. It’s better. That’s a general statement. Of course there are exceptions. Lord willing, I’ll make good in the end, but I don’t want that to ever weaken the rule of marrying relatively young in life. Thirty ain’t young. People shouldn’t wait so long to get married. You probably agree. I say the same thing for having lots of children. Which I think you also agree with.
I apologize for the many words. In this online forum, I can’t say you did right or wrong. But I do beg you not to let exceptions get in the way of the rule.
I hope you can stand against the advice for couples to delay kids. Honeymoons are nice, but not two-year sorta-honeymoons. Couples should begin practicing hospitality before they have a nice house. No one’s ever actually prepared for marriage, and they’ll also never actually be prepared for kids. That’s no excuse, even though there are people who ought not to yet get married.
Here’s a simpler example of what I’m trying to get at. Families should practice in-home hospitality. The house should be clean and welcoming, and the children should behave. Families should practice hospitality, even when the home isn’t clean enough, even when the kids are acting up like crazy. Sometimes, if the house is way out of order, yeah, don’t invite people over, maybe even cancel plans. It’s fine to cancel plans, sometimes. But I don’t want to define this exception. Have people over. We should admit that the house and children ought to be in order. And we should have people over regardless, knowing it’s never perfect and often not as in order as we’d like. Because we’re simply supposed to have people over. 1. I can think of lots of people who should have people over more often. 2. I can think of some people who could do better at having a well-ordered home. Hospitality isn’t one of my weaknesses, and I’m often in both of the above categories. But I can’t think of anyone whom I would suggest to have people over less often, because their house isn’t clean enough.
I’ve classified my Christian coworkers into two groups in my mind. Those who don’t talk about inviting me over to dinner but rather just ask me what night I can come over. And then those who say they will have me over some time, and say it again, and again. I eat lunch with both types and have helpful Bible studies and prayer time with both types. But with the second group, the promises for invitations become accompanied with excuses like the house isn’t clean enough, or the kids are in a bad way recently. I’ve come to learn these don’t have anyone over for dinner, hardly ever. The problem isn’t a dirty house.
Keep encouraging those younger couples to have more than they thought they would want.
