Bible Discussion Thread

What a precious promise God made to preserve the earth until the end. Mankind cannot end the earth until it is God's time. For us today, when people say things like, "The earth is going to end in --years unless we do such and such" it is best to believe God, not humans.

God also gave the animals and Noah and family the same command He gave to Adam and Eve. "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth."

When I was younger-around 18 or 19, I was considering how many children I'd hoped to have. Knowing that God had never rescinded this command, I had to ask myself, "How fruitful am I willing to be in this regard?" I am from a large family of 10 children and I saw how my parents trusted God to provide a way for each new child to be cared for. We were very poor, so this trust in God impressed me. We always had food and a home. My parents sacrificed more than most people of the day so that we would have these basic needs.

So, I remember considering these things and praying, "Lord, give me a pro-life heart like yours, not like the world."

I knew that one look at the world in both animal and human populations that God was exceedingly generous in bringing forth new life. So, I had to expand my thinking and consider having more children than most people my age at that time. A few years later when I married after completing college, my husband and I agreed on this subject and were willing to follow whatever God wanted of us. We ended up having only 3 children,( I had thought we would have had about 6) but I had serious complications with each pregnancy and/or births. We prayed for a year after our third child was born to get a lead from God. His lead was to stop at 3. Deciding to stop at 3 children was one of the saddest days of my life. But I am glad God taught us to be open to as many children as HE wished for us to have, not just what we wanted. It's a challenge to think this way and cooperate with God on this rather than against Him. But I highly recommend it. Pray!