Posted in Family

(By Terese Cooper, originally published in the August 2006 issue of The Mother's Heart)

On Valentine’s Day – just ten years ago – I wrote a love letter to my husband telling him how much I loved being married to him. We had just celebrated our five-year anniversary and I looked forward to what the next five years with him would bring, “Whether we will be preparing for an empty nest or chasing toddlers and changing diapers- I’ll be happy as long as we’re together.” Little did I know that in the next five years, the Lord would answer our prayers and we would more than double the number of children had.

When I met John, we were each single parents entering our relationship with much anticipation. We had long discussions about our hopes for the future. When we discussed future children, it was bittersweet. John spoke of his dreams for a large family, which caused me to love him all the more, because I had similar dreams. But, I had a difficult confession to make. Years before, I had a tubal ligation and would be unable to have any more children. John didn’t hesitate to say that God could take care of that. My faith in having more children wavered, but John chose to love me regardless of whether or not we could have more children.

Once we married, we quickly realized the emotional and physical demands of blending two broken families into one family that would honor God. Any Christian family attempting to put together the pieces of life after a divorce has some serious challenges to face. Anger, intolerance, threats, and volatile situations from former spouses were more frequent than we’d anticipated. Explosive incidents caused us so much grief and pain, but we vowed to stand firm in our faith and be an example of Christian character. However, these months of pain and trials proved to draw us closer to the Lord, which strengthened our marriage and family.

As our faith continued to grow, God revealed to John that we should consider homeschooling our children. That step of faith has continued for almost 14 years now and the Lord has transformed our lives. Not long after we began homeschooling, I picked up a book called: All the Way Home by Mary Pride. This book sparked a conversation about our long held dream to have a large family. We started talking about the possibilities and whether it would be reasonable to try to have more children. We began praying about it together and over time God revealed how He planned to add to our family.

God provided funds for us to have a tubal reversal, and we prayed that it would be successful. It was! Our first child together, Jake, a beautiful baby boy, was such a blessing to us, and such a precious answer to our many prayers! One day we were driving along Interstate 265, going to visit John’s parents. We were just basking in the joy of God’s rich blessings upon us. That day we made a decision that radically changed the direction of our lives. John made the following statement: “I think we should just leave our family planning to the Lord.” I looked at him in awe at the moment, because it was the exact thing I had been thinking! I, too, longed to rely solely on the Lord for our family planning, completely out of a spirit of thanksgiving for God’s mercy. Also, our years of relying on the Lord for strength had taught me that I could faithfully accept His sovereign plan for our family size, and the timing of our children. When we had this brief discussion together, I felt an incredible sense of “oneness of spirit” with John. This was a unique feeling, a precious blessing from the Lord for us both to have concluded the same thing on our private walks with the Lord and to agree so readily. We were elated!

The elation turned into excitement for us as we became pregnant with Haley when Jake was not quite six months old. We became pregnant with Johnny, our sixth child when Haley was fourteen months old. This pregnancy ended in an emergency C-section, which required general anesthesia and was quite traumatic. It was at this point my faith in God’s plan began to waver. I was having doubts about whether I could handle any more. However, I always came back to Phil. 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

Our family and friends met the announcement from us with concern when we became pregnant with baby number 7 just over a year later. I was nearing 40 and having so many babies so quickly was taking a toll on my energy and my strength. At this point, I have to admit we shared our family’s concern, however we tried to be positive and thankful. We were overjoyed to have been given the blessing of a seventh pregnancy, but we were also more than just a little scared. After much prayer, I was able to have a natural delivery of our seventh baby- a precious little girl!

With 7 children, ages 4 months to 20, John and I were both feeling stretched beyond capacity. We were convinced each of these children were an incredible blessing from the Lord, but began to be concerned that we were not doing a great job of caring for all that the Lord had given us. Privately, each of us was wrestling with the idea of having no more children. We told God we would trust Him with everything, but our faith was beginning to be shaken amidst the chaos of our daily lives. At this time, we were also reaping what was sown in our earlier failed marriages. Our oldest children were now teenagers stretching their wings between two families that had very different standards. We sincerely wanted to let the Lord be in control of our family size, but we also felt that we could not handle adding any more children to our very full family. It was truly an emotional and spiritual struggle for each of us.

As we drove along Interstate 265, on another visit to John’s parents, we embarked upon this topic once again. John stated simply, “I just don’t think we should have any more children.” As he spoke a huge wave of relief rolled over me. I had felt the same leading, but had been wrestling with the guilt of that decision for a while. It was amazing. We were in exactly the same spot of the drive when we made the decision to accept God’s sovereignty in the timing of our children. As we crossed the overpass, I could see the huge sloping hill behind John’s head as he looked at me and it was like a snapshot of the last conversation. That was the first time we experienced the “oneness of spirit” regarding our family size, and here in the same spot the Lord blessed us again with the same event, almost as a memorial. This was yet another gift from God, this blessed peace in the decision to consider our family complete.

Now our children are: Blaise 20, Rachel 19, Lacy 19, Jake 6, Haley 5, Johnny 3, and Maelyn 18 months. As you can imagine our lives are never dull, with three children in college it is challenging to keep up with their lives and activities and of course, the four little ones at home keep us hopping around too! We continue to homeschool our younger children and we are just so thankful for the size of our family. While we still struggle at times with energy and resources, we know that the Lord provides daily for us, as we lean on Him. We will never regret that we let Him be in charge of the timing for each of our pregnancies. Our faith is strengthened and renewed each time He reveals His provision for our lives.

Terese Cooper is married to John and is a homeschool mom of seven, with four children still at home. She is active in her local homeschool community; is the listowner of HomeForHisGlory, a network of 500 homeschool families in the Kentuckiana area; and is currently involved in the start-up of HomeForHisGlory-Enrichment Co-op, which will serve over 80 families.