Well said... I think

Edmund, I think you must be too smart for me, as I must say, I'm a little confused with parts of your blog which seem somewhat contradictory, but then again, it's been a long day. On a whole, I'd say I agree. I don't think that either side can say that one position is 100% solid Biblically either way. On that note, if you're reading this and frustrated from the different viewpoints we've all expressed, take heart. As Hank said, healthy theological discussions are winners for all involved. At the very least, it gets us thinking about the Bible, something that I think we'd all admit we don't think nearly enough about. And if you get frustrated that we can't say definitively one way or another, ask yourselves this: if we could know everything perfectly, then why would we need faith? By definition, faith is simply believing in what we can't exactly see or fully understand with our senses.

I think Edmund did hit something on the mark unless I horribly misread his post. The whole birth control discussion isn't even entirely about birth control. Think of all the things that all of us have used to support our viewpoints: stewardship, faith, God's sovereignty, etc. Not to mention that try as we all might to be entirely objective, we all shape what we see and hear based on where we are coming from, and for better or worse, that includes our interpretation of scripture also.

This conversation is about something deeper that gets at the heart and core of who we are. John Eldredge and Brent Curtis say this:

"From one religious camp we're told that what God wants is obedience, or sacrifice, or adherence to the right doctrines, or morality. Those are the answers offered by conservative churches. The more therapeutic churches suggest that no, God is after our contentment, or happiness, or self-actualization, or something else along those lines. He is concerned about all those things, of course, but they are not his primary concern. What he is after is us- our laughter, our dreams, our fears, our heart of hearts."

Really only God knows the motivations for all our perspectives on these issues because as Jeremiah says in chapter 17:9-10,

"The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful,
a puzzle that no one can figure out.
But I, God, search the heart
and examine the mind.
I get to the heart of the human.
I get to the root of things.
I treat them as they really are,
not as they pretend to be."

So at the end of the day, I guess my position is not that we should use birth control or that we shouldn't. My position is that we shouldn't have a position. We should try to follow His Spirit into finding His position and make it our own for His glory. And ultimately, that's where prayer and study are so vital. I've heard this analogy of prayer.

For those of you who have ever fished from a boat, many of you have accidentally cast a line into the shore or something near it. As a result, when you begin to reel it in, it appears you are bringing the shore towards you. Actually, you are bringing yourself to the shore, but prayer is the same way. While praying for His will, we pull our own thoughts into line with His.

So with this and every other debatable issue, do what you can to glorify God and give him your very heart, very marriage, very everything.