PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | Episode 84 – WHEN’S THE BEST TIME TO HAVE A BABY?

FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell

Episode 84 - WHEN’S THE BEST TIME TO HAVE A BABY?

Rocky Barrett: Welcome to the podcast, From Our Home to Yours, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Hello ladies. I have Alison Hartman with me again today. It’s going to be so exciting to talk together.

(Daniel and Allison Hartman’s children are Makenna 21, Eden 17, Halle 15, Ethan 14, Asher 12 Levi 10, Emily Kate 8, Annalee 5, Solomon 4, Ezra 2 and baby girl coming in March 2020. And now Makenna is engaged to be  married to Josiah Crevier).

Before we get chatting, I just want to share a Scripture with you. Do you remember listening to my New Year’s podcast where I gave you a wonderful promise for this year?

It was Deuteronomy 11:12: “ . . . the eyes of the LORD thy God are always upon it . . ..” That’s talking about the children of Israel, but I believe that is a promise for us for our home.

It says that “ . . . the eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.”

I just love that, don’t you?

But I’ve just been reading another Scripture that’s really challenged me, especially as we are going into this New Year. It’s found in Genesis 13:17. It is God speaking to Abraham, but of course that’s the literal word.

But the first thing we do when we read the Word of God is, we take it literally, but then we also take it personally. What is God saying to me personally? Listen to these words personally as I read them: “Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.”

God was saying to Abraham to go through the land. Walk through it. Walk through the length of it. Walk through all the breadth of it. I want you to know everything about this land because I am going to give it to you and to your descendants.

Of course that was the land of Israel which God gave to them and which belongs to Israel. It was given to them as an eternal and everlasting possession. Even though there are so many countries in the world that would like to take Israel off the Jewish people and they want to wipe them off the face of the earth, God has said that land belongs to them.

As we read this word personally, I believe God has given a land to us dear wives and mothers.

It is the land of His precious Word that’s filled with all the truth and all the promises and all the revelation of God’s plans for us. His purposes for us. His promises for us and what He has for us because of His great salvation

Our salvation is so much more than Jesus dying for our sins and through His incredible suffering and death upon the cross so that we can have forgiveness of sins. But it’s more than that. He died but He also rose again, and He now dwells within us and wants us to walk in victory. He wants us to be conquerors in His name. He shows us how to in His Word but most of us never walk through it. We just hang around the edges. We know a little bit. We hear God’s Word spoken at church. But do we ever really walk through the length of it? Do we walk through the breadth of it? Do we find out all that God has for us?

I think that’s a challenge. It is a challenge for us personally and as families. If we would together as a family walk through the land of God’s truth and revelation and not just know a wee little bit of it, but to discover it.

We go over to Joshua 18:1-10 and this is where the Israelites went into the land and conquered the Canaanites. They had conquered most of their enemies but there were still seven tribes who had not taken possession of the land. So Joshua said to them in verse 3: “ . . . How long are ye slack to go to possess the land, which the Lord God of your fathers hath given you?”

He said, “I’ve given it to you, but you’ve got to possess it!”

He told them, “I want you to pick out certain men and they shall arise and go through the land and describe it.” Joshua 18:8: “ . . . and Joshua charged them that went to describe the land, saying, Go and walk through the land, and describe it, and come again to me . . ..”

The men went through the land and described it by cities into seven parts in a book and came again to Joshua.

Hey, do you notice that in that little passage that the word “describe” is mentioned four times? What does it mean? Well first of all, I noticed that there are three things that Joshua told them to do in order to possess the land.

No. 1. THEY HAD TO ARISE

Once again, ladies, it comes back to that affirmation I love to say: “Things don’t just happen, you have to make them happen.”

Nothing happens unless we arise and do it. We have to get off our apathetic butts--now that’s being pretty raw, isn’t it—but it’s true!

We’re so apathetic. We just let things happen and if we just let things happen, they never happen. We’ve got to make them happen.

We have to arise personally and as families, getting our families together each day and say, “Okay, we’re going to walk through a little bit more of the land today, children. We’re going to discover more of what God has for us.”

You see, when you’re having that time in your family life where you’re gathering your family to read the Word to them, you don’t just say, “Okay children, time to read the Bible now.”

That can sound so boring, can’t it?

No, you’ve got to let them know what you’re actually doing! You’re going to say, “Hey, children, come! We’re going to gather together and we’re going to find out a little bit more of the land today! We’re going to walk through a little bit more and find out what God has for us.”

We can never ever walk in what we don’t know. If we don’t know what we’ve got, even though God has given it to us, we can’t walk in it.

Let me tell you a little story! A dear friend of mine was looking after Above Rubies in the UK for many years. She is a New Zealander as I was originally. I still am but I am also a US citizen now too.

She said her brother who still lived in New Zealand bought some land. He bought over ten acres and he was hoping that it would be something that would help provide for his family. But somehow the land really wasn’t good enough, but he used it as a hobby land.

The years went by and his family grew up. He thought, “Oh well, I think I’ll sell this land. It never really was able to give me what I bought it for.” When the time came to sell his land, he found he had ten acres that he didn’t know about. He didn’t know it was part of the land he bought. Those ten acres were so fertile and could have been the provision for their family.

The neighbor was working the ten acres and so he went to this neighbor and he said, “That was my land!”

His neighbor said, “Well you never came and told me, so I just kept working it.”

Because he didn’t know, he missed out!

Dear ladies, that’s like a lot of us, isn’t it? We don’t know and we’re ignorant of what God has given us. That’s why we have got to walk through the land, the length of it and the breadth of it.

No. 2. THEY HAD TO ARISE AND WALK

Yes, they had to actually walk through it.

No. 3. THEY HAD TO DESCRIBE IT

Now that word in the Hebrew means: “to write about it.” They had to write. They had to go with their book, and they had to check out all the hills and valleys and mountains and plains.

They had to check out all the good parts and all the challenging parts. They had to check out every aspect of the land and they had to write it down in a book and bring it back to Joshua.

That’s what they did. I think that’s a very good thing for us to do to, to write down what God says to us.

I love to do that personally. When I have my own time in the Word of God, I have my journal beside me, and I always write what God says to me.

As I’m walking through the land, I don’t just keep to my favorite parts. We’ve got to walk through every bit of the land, ladies. That reminds me of one time when Colin and I were staying with a family in Holland when we were ministering there. We arrived off the boat because we had come from England on the boat this time. We usually fly.

We got off and we had breakfast with this family. They had all their little children around them, and they were reading through the Word of God.

They started in Genesis and they were up to this chapter and I couldn’t believe it because it was all the “begets.” I have to confess; I would have passed over the begets. I would have thought, “Oh goodness, my children couldn’t stand that.” I’m sure I would have left out the begets. I might gloss over them in my personal reading although I have to confess that sometimes I completely leave them out.

One time someone said to me, “Now if you’re name was there, you’d read it every day.”

But anyway, I couldn’t believe it: this family went through all the begets with their little children, with their three and five and seven-year-olds. They were sitting there listening to the begets; but they weren’t missing out on one part of the land.

In my personal time I always like to write.

Do you know what? That word “describe” is the same word that is used when God wrote the Ten Commandments and it says: “They were written by the finger of God.” The same word used of God writing.

I’ve just been doing a study recently about all the books that God has, and all the things God writes. It’s unbelievable! The only problem is that my book that I was writing it all out so I could complete the study— I’ve lost it. Oh, I’m so sad. I’ll have to do it all again.

But it is amazing. It’s just amazing all the books God has. He writes everything that we do. Goodness! He writes the whole story of our lives written in a book. I think Heaven is going to be filled with books!

Today in our social media age, people hardly write. They just do a little message through text. We’re even forgetting how to write, aren’t we?

Even if you don’t write anything else, at least write what God shows you as you’re walking through the land of His Word.

Can you take that challenge this year for you personally or as a family? That you’re going to really walk through that land— the length of it and the breadth of it so you will be a family that is not estranged to the Word of God and all His truths but you’re familiar with it and your children are familiar with it. Amen?

Okay, now Alison’s here and I’m talking too much because she’s got so much to say!

Now last week we were talking about all the things that can hinder us in our families of being together. What about what’s happening at the moment? Here you are, you’re pregnant with baby number eleven and this baby is going to be born in your busiest time in your family business. Your baby will only be about three weeks old when you’re going to be running this big family camp.

How are you going to do it? Did you plan it? Or did God plan it?

Alison Hartman: Definitely not. I’m 45 years old so it definitely was not a planned thing. It’s interesting, what you were just saying related to what I was thinking about.

Just yesterday you were saying that there’s never a convenient time to get married and there’s never a convenient time to have a baby. I think all of us can talk ourselves out of a baby very often as in our marriage it’s never really convenient.

We often joke that all our babies are all in January and February because that’s our slow season. This is the middle of March, which again is our big money season and our busiest season with Easter pictures.

We’re going to have to be creative on how we do it but thankfully we’ve gotten to where my big children are almost to where they can take it and run and I can kind of sit back and do some behind the scenes. If we weren’t in that position, I don’t know what we’d do; but again it’s who are we asking for advice?

A couple years ago I shared this story with you, and I thought about it just now. I was reading a post that someone had made on Facebook. I didn’t know this person well, she was a past customer of ours, but it caught my attention. She was young; she might have been in her late twenties or early thirties.

She said, “When does everyone think I should get fixed?  How and when should I get myself fixed from having children?”

NC: Fixed or broken?

AH: Broken in my opinion.

First of all, my thought was, is she asking Facebook. She doesn’t even know all of these people. Some she did, obviously. Any way, it was a day-old post and when I finally read it there was over 190 responses.

One hundred percent of them were telling her to do it this way or that way. Not one of them had encouraged her to maybe consider not.

I read the post out loud and I shared it with Daniel. He really isn’t into Facebook, but he said, “You have to make a comment. You have to say something.”

I said, “I’m not going there, no way! Not against 190 other people.”

He said, “Just write www.aboverubies.org and that’s it. Just write Nancy’s website.”

It ended up we fought all the way home about this, and I said, “I can’t do this” and he said, “No, no, no, you’ve got to do this.”

So I ended up saying something to this young girl. I said, “You don’t know me, I don’t know you that well, but I want to encourage you that maybe you aren’t to stop having children. Maybe you are to consider another alternative of maybe letting God choose the size of your family.”

I got a couple backlashes from friends of hers.

Interestingly enough, this young girl messaged me privately and shared how touching my response was. It’s going to make me cry because she said she stayed up all night on your website. She had never heard of Above Rubies.

What is interesting is she said to me, “You know, I am a Christian and I never considered what does God think about me getting fixed.”

I thought, “Wow!”

And it’s so true. Goodness, I wish I had a dollar for every person who says, “What! You’re pregnant at 45 with your eleventh baby! Why would you do that to yourself?”

I was sitting here thinking of why?

At the bottom of my email it says: “Children are a blessing. Debt is a curse. But in our society, we apply for curses and we reject blessings.”

We personally are not in debt and we don’t live in debt.

In the same way, we feel very strongly that if children are a blessing then who are we to decide what age they’re a blessing. Are they only a blessing when we’re in our twenties or in our thirties or when our doctor says they are?

If the Author of life is God then why are we asking Facebook, mothers-in-laws, friends, acquaintances, and total strangers what they think as far as what we should do concerning our age of fertility?

Thankfully, we found out about your ministry years ago in our marriage and it switched our mindset from “We’re going to have 3.2 children or whatever” to “We’re going to have as many children as God gives us.”

Now that may be three. That may be five. That may be none. But it wouldn’t be me that’s going to make the decision.

That takes a lot of pressure off your marriage.

It’s just so neat to see the blessing of your 13-year-old boy holding a baby on his hip , it’s the coolest thing.

Seeing my 10-year-old boy put my two-year-old on his shoulders and running him around the yard.

Seeing my 21-year-old loving on my one-year-old in a way that she will be doing very soon. It’s so special.

I grew up in a decent sized family of six children, but I wouldn’t say I was prepared for motherhood whereas I really believe my girls are.

People say, “Well what do you mean you’re leaving your children to go to Israel?”

But my 15-year-old I would believe is as capable as most mothers today. She’s changed just about as many diapers. She’s dealt with issues and discipline.

Then you get critical people who say, “Oh a teenager should never have that responsibility.”

Well why? What are we raising them to be? Are we raising them to be children or are we raising adults?

NC: Exactly ,and when you think about it, we’ve just been celebrating the most amazing event in the history of the world when a young teenage girl became pregnant by the power and overshadowing of the Holy Ghost.

She was probably no more than fifteen and God believed that she was mature and ready to not only carry the Son of God in her womb but also bring forth and nurture this child.

We don’t think like we’re meant to really think, do we?

AH: You know, if we really waited around for the perfect time, we would have stopped a long time ago because there’s nothing easy and convenient about having a baby in your forties.

NC: I remember reading that statement when I was a young mother and thinking, “How true. There is just never a convenient time to have a baby.”

Maybe you’re listening to that verse and you know you’d like to have another baby, but oh goodness me this is happening in your situation.

I know you think, “Oh wow, we better wait.”

But listen, God knows so much better than we do and He’s the One Who has the most perfect timing. Just leave it with God because you think there will never be a convenient time.

But it’s amazing, because you conceive and you think, “Oh help! How are we going to fit this baby in!” but you always do. The baby always fits in and it’s always perfect.

As you mentioned, I had just thought about it yesterday that it’s true with babies, but you know that can be true with marriages too.

There is often not a convenient time to get married, although you’re going to want to get married. But we see today so many of them waiting till they’ve got this together and that together and they think, “Oh we better wait for this time because it will work out better then.”

So they arrange their marriage all around situations and circumstances when really, it’s a bit like having a baby. When God brings a couple together and you know its God (I’m not just talking about any situation), you know it’s God and the parents know its God, why wait around?

When we go back to Biblical times, they didn’t do that. They didn’t do what’s even happening in the Christian church today where couples will wait and wait and wait and what for? They’ve got to finish their college degree. They’ve got to finish that, do that, and wait for that.

No, that’s not how it’s meant to be. If God brings you together, He brings you together to be married.

Two are better than one. Two are more powerful than one. Can you imagine? What you accomplish as a husband and a wife and a family is so much more powerful than just on your own.

We all find that the power in a marriage and a family is how God intends it. This is how we take dominion of the world for Him to bring His revelation and the image of God into the world.

AH: That’s right. I think our culture is very big on speaking to women to have, especially in our later years, our forties, to have “me”-time.

You hear a lot about “me”-time and having relationships with other women whose children are about half grown.

I’m seeing a huge trend in this and I try to be careful because I think to have girls as friends is wonderful. It’s great to have good girl friends but I’m also seeing a trend in divorces later in marriage.

I really think there is a connection there between “me”-time and hanging out with other girls, not with other married couples. Maybe the conversation goes to being negative towards their husband.

I can’t even imagine right now having “me”-time because I am just so absorbed with my family. I think that having idle hands isn’t a good thing. It’s very clear in the Bible.

Being busy and being busy with your family and being pregnant and that kind of thing is almost like it’s saved me from a lot of what I’m seeing. I just recently had someone contact me. The wife is being unfaithful to him and they’ve been married about as long as we have.

I was thinking, “How could this happen?”

Well, she has two children that they had early in their marriage and she basically has spent the latter part in their marriage focusing on herself. She takes care of herself and her body. Again, I think there is nothing wrong with taking care of yourself. We shouldn’t be walking around looking frumpy and say, “Well all I care about is my family.”

You can have both. You can look nice and you have can have a nice-looking house and not be self-absorbed.

NC: That is so true.

You said before about how people ask Facebook questions. There is another question that I saw coming up on Facebook from a girl that I know very well, and she asked Facebook. Like you said, they don’t know who they really are asking because they have so many friends on Facebook.

She asked, “Now what do you think: is it okay to have a friend of the opposite sex apart from your husband?”

Well, goodness me, when I read that all my red flags went up and I was ready to write, and I did. I really laid down the riot axe and said, “No! You cannot do that!”

But just about every other reply was, “Oh yes, that’s fine. You can do that.”

No you cannot. It does not work.

I find that Colin’s and my friendships are with other couples and other families. It’s just so rich and so wonderful. There may be the odd time where I go out with other ladies; but really it is not as satisfying because we’re in a different realm now.

These women have to have their “ladies’ nights out” and their weekends away with their lady friends, I think, what is wrong with their marriage? Isn’t it more exciting to be at home with your husband? Oh goodness me, and when they are doing that, as you say, often someone who has negativity about their marriage will say something.

I have always found that when someone says a negative word about something or maybe about their husband or about some situation or some person, do you know what happens? That negativity builds. You will find that someone else will think of a negative thing about their husband. Then someone else does and the whole conversation goes spiraling down negatively.

It’s just something that happens whereas if you say something positive you will find that people will think of a positive thing to say.

AH: That is so true because we want to encourage one way or the other.

NC: Yes and it does happen that way. I’ve had to learn myself: “Oh shut your mouth, Nancy!”

If you can’t say anything positive, don’t say anything at all because one negative goes from another to another to another and the opposite happens in the positive. This happens, I think, with some of the ladies’ nights out. It can go to the negativity about marriages.

Once again, every decision we make we must think: Will this build my marriage? Will it make my marriage stronger or will it weaken my marriage?

We choose to do what will build our marriage, don’t we?

AH: It’s so true and I think we’re careful about who our children play with, but sometimes I think we’re not so careful of who we hang out with.  I think that’s why it is so important that we be careful who we hang out with.

That’s why we would like to invite everybody to the family camp because even though it is only a weeklong, those friendships that you will make will last for years.

It is so helpful in our marriages and in our family life to have other friends who will say, “I think it’s awesome that you’re pregnant at 45!” That’s encouraging instead of hearing, “Oh my goodness, what are you thinking?”

NC: Tell me, you’re in your mid-forties and how is this pregnancy in your mid-forties compared to your other pregnancies when you were younger?

AH: I honestly, and I’m not just saying this, because you and I haven’t rehearsed this at all, but it’s probably been the easiest. It’s honestly because I have so much help, I really do.

We were talking with your guests here at your house that as our girls get older, it’s kind of embarrassing to say how little amount of cooking and cleaning I do.

I don’t ever use my dishwasher or my laundry room because my girls really have taken over so much of that willingly and happily. Then they delegate. My oldest is very much a delegator.

NC: She’s an organizer like you are.

AH: Yes, yes. But they take care of me. They make sure I’m not doing too much. They really spoil me whereas when you’re young and pregnant and you just have toddlers running around, it’s trying. It’s hard.

So many people quit during the tough times and they don’t reap the benefits.

It’s so neat, my oldest was delivered in the hospital, but she helped deliver the last couple of babies. You can’t appreciate and enjoy that experience if you quit having children in your early thirties.

NC: I think that is so true. I think that so many young mothers, oh dear precious young mothers, if you are in that time with maybe two or three little ones around you and no help, this is the most challenging and overwhelming time of motherhood. Of course even in that time, God is with you and He helps you through it.

I look back to when I had three under 17 months and then four under four; they were the most challenging times. But oh wow, I would do them all again. They were so amazing, too.

Many mothers think, if I keep having children it’s just going to get harder and harder. No!

AH: They don’t stay that little.

NC: No, they grow up!

Often this question comes up at Above Rubies retreats. You know, “What about older mothers having children?”

I say, “Okay, let’s find out from the mothers. Hands up those who have had babies or are having babies in their forties.”

It’s amazing how many will stand up and I will say, “Okay, come and share your testimonies.”

The testimonies are the same as you have shared right now that their best births and their best pregnancies are in their forties. God just puts that beautiful specialness upon older mothers. Plus you have all of the help; your children are grown.

You can sit in the rocking chair while they serve you and look after you. You’re the queen. It’s just so amazing.

AH: If you’ve done it right and you’ve kept your family intact.

I’ve had people say to me, “Well my children would never stay and help me. They’re off with their friends.”

Well then, you’ve got to back up and you’ve got to make sure you have trained them where they want to serve you and it’s not begrudging and they grunt and say, “Oh, I’ve got to get Mom coffee. I just got myself coffee.”

No, they want to. My 15-year-old is just so sweet. She brings me coffee every day and you can tell she looks forward to bringing me coffee. We bought her a fancy coffee maker and she loves to make these coffees.

NC: She’s already been serving everyone here!

AH: Yes, she brought it all the way here!

NC: Yes, she’s just amazing.

I should just say while we are on this point, how that we are, as females, mothers in our childbearing years until we reach menopause. Some reach it earlier than others. The statistics are that many women are infertile by the time they are 45 but some will continue until they are 50.

You think, “Help! Can I have babies till then?” Well yes. We are meant to. If God intended us to stop having babies at 35, He would have caused us to go through menopause then.

But He planned the time. He gives that special anointing to those who are in their forties and as you say, if you train your children right, they are going to be waiting on you and blessing you.

Then you’ve got so many hands who are wanting this baby when the baby is born! Goodness me, you have to nurse your baby, or you’ll never hold your baby because all the family is just besotted with these new babies that come in. It’s just so glorious and it’s how God intended it.

The other thing is, is that now you are getting to the end of that time and you maybe, you may not have another baby; but then your oldest daughter now has a young man and she will be getting married. Then her babies will come along. There are always babies. There is never is never meant to be that empty nest syndrome. That has not ever been in God’s intention.

God’s ways are so beautiful, aren’t they?

AH: And when people will say to us, “Oh the more you have the less time you have and the less love you have to give them.” It’s so, so false.

NC: Some women can only have two children but some women choose to only have two children so they can give them quality time. It actually doesn’t work like that because when you only have two children, well, what are you going to do with your life when they’re grown up? You’ll get bored and go to work and then you end up having less time with them and they become more independent.

But I see these babies that come into big families and every member of the family is besotted with this new baby. They are not only getting the attention from the parents but from all the children in the family. The first and second children can never ever get the attention that these younger babies have. They are overloaded with attention!

It’s amazing, isn’t it?

AH: It’s so true. It’s so true.

NC: Any way, I think we are over time again so let’s pray.

I hope that you have enjoyed us chatting with you today. Let’s think about coming to the family retreat in Florida in April. Check it out on the Above Rubies website: www.aboverubies.org

“Dear Father, We thank You that we can talk about these beautiful things of motherhood and the way You have planned for us to live. It’s so glorious and so beautiful and so amazing.

“Oh Lord, I pray that You will bless each wife and mother and their husbands and their families.

I pray, Lord, that You will strengthen their families and that this year their families will become stronger together.

“Help them to t make it a commitment to gather their families and to daily walk through a little bit more of the land, the glorious land of revelation and truth that You have given to us so that we would not be ignorant people of Your ways, but we will know what You have given to us and that we will possess it. Lord, I ask that we would all be possessors of the land in the name of Jesus. Amen.”