Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Why I'm AuntieB, Part 1

When I found out my sister was pregnant, I thought the world was going to stop.

See, I'd already been married for 5 years. And when you grow up in church under the watchful eyes of your pastor's wife and deacon's wives, you must understand the way the "older" generation thinks about the "natural order of progression".

Step one: get a good education. (Good idea.) Step two: find a "good christian man" to marry. (Yes, those are their exact words, and I agree with those.) Step three: get married. (That's the easy part.) Step four: have babies. (Sometimes it's not as easy as it sounds.) Step five: do some work in/for/at the church. (Despite how much you've got going on at the house.) Step six: grow old with your "good christian husband". (Ok. Whatever.) And step seven: die. (Graduation day! I like that!)

For the most part I can agree with this philosophy, but somewhere on some level, I disagree.

Background for this thought:

I heard a sermon from Chuck Swindoll about people, their ministries, and their families. He said that there are some people who remain single that will have the least "distractions" while serving God. I agree totally. Then, there are the people who are married and don't have kids - for whatever reason. The only "distraction" is the spouse and maybe the job. Otherwise, they can commit themselves more to God's work. I agree. Then, there are the people who are married and have kids. They have the most "distractions" but can commit some time to God's work - mainly because they have the spouse, job AND kids to attend to. This causes more time restraints than the other 2. I agree. Then, dear Mr. Swindoll said something that I'll never forget: "You people who have kids, get off those couples backs that don't have kids. Leave them alone! It's not God's will for everybody to get married and have kids!". And at that point in the sermon, the congregation laughed and took it in stride.

I could've reached through the radio and hugged that man. I'm married and don't have kids. Right now, we kinda think we can't have them. This totally upsets the whole philosophy from earlier - and there's nothing I can do about it.


Stay tuned for...........the rest of the story. Yup - just like Paul Harvey.

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