Contemplating about the quiverfull lifestyle

[solagratia79]

Hello guys,

I am a 31-year-old married Lutheran woman and currently childless. We are from Germany a country with a very low birthrate.
I am the oldest of three. Many people considers this a big family in our country.

I think we are not the typical couple prone to a quiverfull lifestyle, because we both believe in college for women (in fact I did graduate from college), I wear trousers and short hair and we both believe in public schools. There is not much choice about this for German parents. Homeschooling is not allowed in our country, but if it was I still think public schools would be the better option. We also do believe in evolution.

Ever since I heard about the quiverfull movement it has fascinated me and I have done a lot of research about it. My husband is less interested in it. He believes that the number of children a woman wants should be up to her, because she is the one who stays at home raising them... however he also thinks financial aspects should play a role.
I wish he was more enthusiastic about having kids, but I think he started looking forward to being a father a bit lately.

I, on the other hand, have been wanting children for a long time. The time however has never been ideal.
Still conditions are not ideal. My husband wants to be a tax counselor, a job that requires extensive training and he has to undergo this training while working a full-time job. This means he is away from home a lot. Also there a tax counselor acceptance test and my husband might or might not pass this test. If he does not pas that test... well our financial situation probably will not be bad, but it probably also will not be as good as he is hoping or other people are expecting it.

Personally I do not care that much about money, but I do not want to put my selfish desire above my husband wellbeing. I know his parents are not exactly positive about having children. His father has advised me not to start having children right now, he also has told me to think of stopping at one. Both of his parents have a fairly good income, but because of their lifestyle (they hired a cleaner and a gardener, had expensive cars, went on expensive vacations) they are indebted now and they fear we might end up indebted too.

My husbands workmates also lead that expensive lifestyle with hired helps and fancy vacations.
I am currently a homemaker, but I know a lot of people expect me to work, because I am a college graduate and everybody expects me to put my education "to a good use". Also I know a lot of people in my country do believe it is wrong for a middle class women to want more than one or two children.

I would love to have many children, but I do not want my husband to be looked down upon by his workmates, I want the children we are going to have to enjoy the material comforts their classmates enjoy (back in school I was teased because of my hand-me-down clothings and I hated it) and I want to please my husbands parents.

Please excuse my rant, I just wrote down what was on my mind. I would love to talk to a woman, who has been in a similar situation.

 

[Sabertooth]

Welcome Solagratia...

You offered a lot of conflicting concerns. Many of us who are convicted of the Quiverfull lifestyle do not hail from large families. We simply got to a point where we saw that claiming the right to number our children --quite often at the detriment of our health-- was at odds with the Christian's call to place their lives at God's disposal.

Specifically, no one can be conceived, without God deliberately bringing a father's available sperm to a mother's available ovum, so...

You can only get pregnant, when God intentionally wants to create somebody, so...

To actively resist possible pregnancy (for other than medical concerns) is to deliberately resist the will of God.

Everyone who has adopted the QF lifestyle is convicted of this. If you are not so convicted, no one can make you abide by this. If you ARE so convicted, no one will be able to talk you out of it. Your eternal destination does NOT hang in the balance on this decision, but the quality of your Christian walk does, as with all opportunities to surrender to His leading.

Paul wrote (in 1Cor. 3:12-15),

"If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man's work. If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames."

 

[Sabertooth]

Remember also, that being QF doesn't mean you will have many, many children. It is just leaving the number and spacing up to God, whether it be many or few (or even none...).

 

[SiyoNqoba]

^Yep. Just because you're trusting God with the number of children you have, doesn't always mean you'll have 18 kids. It's not actually that easy to get pregnant, especially as you get older. A woman under the age of 25 only has a 25% chance of conceiving at any given cycle. After 25, this drops to 15%. Past the age of 40, a woman only has a 5% chance each cycle.

If your husband doesn't want children yet, I would advise you to wait. You won't be doing yourself any favours to force fatherhood on him before he's ready, as he's likely to resent the baby.

I struggled for quite awhile because I wanted to trust God with our fertility, but my husband - who is usually the one pushing me to trust God - wanted me to continue taking the contraceptive pill. I was torn between trusting God and respecting my husband. Eventually, I decided that if God wanted us to trust Him completely with this aspect of our lives, He would let my husband know. I talked to my husband about it once, explaining my convictions, and then I shut up about it and prayed. In November of last year, my period didn't arrive, making me think I might be pregnant. So I stopped taking the pill until it could be confirmed. Once we discovered that I wasn't pregnant, my husband said "Why don't you just stay off the pill?" so I did. I fell pregnant with our first child in May, and my husband is totally excited and ready.

I felt like trusting God to change my husband's heart was just as good as not taking contraception. It was saying to God "I'm happy with whatever You want to happen, and I'm not going to interfere with Your will."

 

[akmom]

It sounds like your in-laws' vision for your family is different than your vision for a family, so you will have to decide whether having children or their approval is more important to you. Biologically speaking, you are approaching an age where that decision should be made soon. Just remember that it's a decision between you, your husband and God. Extended family and society have nothing to do with it. There are many challenges in parenting, and I would say that deviating from the cultural norm is not the biggest one. Just figure out what specifically is a concern for you, and consider how you will address it. I mean, you are not living in China where practicing "quiverfull" is a serious risk. And to be realistic, you don't actually have to figure out the logistics of a large family right now. At first you will likely only have one, and only need to plan for one. Later you can plan for how to accommodate an addition. After that you can consider the changes you'll need for a potential third child, and so forth.

 

[Sabertooth]

^Yep. Just because you're trusting God with the number of children you have, doesn't always mean you'll have 18 kids. It's not actually that easy to get pregnant, especially as you get older. A woman under the age of 25 only has a 25% chance of conceiving at any given cycle. After 25, this drops to 15%. Past the age of 40, a woman only has a 5% chance each cycle...

PR 16:33 The lot is cast into the lap,
but its every decision is from the LORD.

 

[Just4Jesus]

Remember also, that being QF doesn't mean you will have many, many children. It is just leaving the number and spacing up to God, whether it be many or few (or even none...).