This post is part of an on-going series on the Blessings of Childlessness. For an introduction to the series, click here.
Having already considered Marriage, the second overarching area of our childless lives where Paige and I have experienced the benefits of being without children is the area of Ministry.
All Christians are called to be a part of a local assembly of Christians and to serve the needs of those within the church (Romans 12:4-12, Hebrews 10:23-25). But as the Apostle Paul reminds us, the church is like a body made up of various parts (1 Cor. 12:12-30). Each part of the body plays a different role, and all body parts function to serve the good of the whole body. The point is this: Each body part must do its part to serve the whole body. For us, we experience a freedom to obey the call to serve the local church and our neighbors in a way that couples with children may not as easily experience.
Focus in Worship, Freedom to Serve
I was recently speaking with a close friend of mine who is married with children. This friend and his wife are committed church members. By "committed church members," I mean that they are there at the church whenever the doors are open. If there's a church function, they are usually there. If there's a church retreat, they are usually there. If there's a fellow church member in need, they are usually there. And they do all these things with children.
In my experience over my years in church (translated: my entire life) and based on my current observations, they are the exception, not the rule.
In our family we realize the opportunity we have at this time in our lives to serve the body of Christ even more easily than those who have children. While children are a blessing—not just to parents, but to a local church—they require great expenditures of time and energy. The time and energy required to parent young children can obviously inhibit a church member's ability to serve the local church. (Again, this is no moral judgment against the parent with children, nor an excuse for parents to shirk their responsibilities to be good church members; it is simply an observation of reality.)
We see parents with either one or multiple children struggling to make it to church services. Once there, we see parents struggling to focus on participating in worship, struggling to listen to the Word preached, struggling to participate in God's ordinary means of grace. If these parents simply struggle to make it to the stated meetings of the local church and focus during worship, of course they struggle to serve before, during, and after the Sunday services.
Of course this is only a natural struggle, especially for parents of young children. But being currently without children, Paige and I currently have no such inhibition in our lives. Therefore, we experience a greater sense of freedom to serve the Lord by serving the Lord's people and to focus on worshiping Him in Lord's Day gatherings. In fact, one way we’ve been able to do this from time to time is to help some of the couples who have young children by sitting with them and helping them focus on the message. (As a unique byproduct of this service to our friends, our friends teach us what parenting looks like so that should God someday answer our prayers for children, we will have observed and learned lessons from others.)
Sometimes, though, the freedom to serve for a childless couple requires a quick response and the sacrifice of small comforts; like sleep, for instance.
Not long ago, some good friends experienced a traumatizing event when they had to take their 2 year old son to the hospital for emergency surgery. It was almost 1:00 AM when my phone rang. Their 4 year old who was with them at the hospital needed to go home and go to sleep, but both parents needed to stay at the hospital.
At a moment's notice, I was able to get up and go and take care of their older son. The result was a tremendous relief and blessing to our friends, even beyond what I could have expected.
Truly, a father with young children could do the same if his phone rang at 1 in the morning, provided his wife was home with the kids. But I consciously recognize the freedom God has given Paige and I at this time in our lives without children to be able to get up and serve a brother or sister without the slightest hesitation.
Divided Interests
I think we see this principle at work in the Bible too. The Apostle Paul writes about the difference between the interests of a single person and a married person: "I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided." (1 Corinthians 7:32-24a)
We see here that the single man is concerned primarily with his own welfare (and ideally, interest in the things of God); the husband, on the other hand, is concerned with not only with his own welfare, but also the welfare of his wife. Paul says that the married man's interests, thus, are divided in more ways than the unmarried man's.
I think the same logic applies to those with children. A parent has different responsibilities than a non-parent. A husband who is also a father has more to give account for than the childless husband. I appreciate the way that Pastor John MacArthur comments on 1 Corinthians 7:
All marriages have difficulty, hardship, sacrifice because you have two people who are human, who are fallen and they're pressed so tightly together.
Then they have children, and you know what happens? More little sinners and you crush them into the mix. ...[W]hen you press all these sinners into the same environment there is an immense complexity. I think of that as a father. I not only have to deal with sin and temptation in my own life, but I have to shepherd my wife and all my children, and now all my little sinning grandchildren. And I'm telling you, when they're all together, parents, children and all the sinners in one place at one time, it is a ministerial monstrosity. You can just about ask anybody who is married if they've ever had trouble, and they will...if they're honest...tell you of course, it's part of married life.
So while marriage carries with it greater complexity, stress, and hardship than singleness, parenting carries even greater difficulty than marriage by itself. And while we look forward to tackling the impending challenges of parenting someday if God wills, we recognize the relative ease and freedom of childless married life right now. We are be grateful for this time in our lives to minister to each other and to others outside our home.
Instead of using this "lesser division of interests" for the childless married couple as an excuse for lesser ministry, I think the opposite is required. Less division of interests equals more freedom equals more ministry to others. Paul's point is that all Christians need to be devoted in their service to the Lord, no matter the chapter of life in which they find themselves. We all should be investing ourselves in the Kingdom of Christ.
And two practical ways we can invest in the kingdom are through financial means and through our relationships with others.
Investing in the Kingdom Financially
I once heard someone refer to my wife and I as “DINK’s”—Double Income, No Kids. The moniker wasn’t something I was familiar with, but I can’t deny it’s validity.
Both of us were raised in families where both our parents worked for the majority of our upbringing. Both our dads were pastors (and still are, by God’s grace!), and since our dads didn’t earn hefty paychecks, our moms both worked to support the family with extra income. But neither of our families were well off. We were fine, as far as we could tell, but we were never the kids with the newest, coolest toys or shoes or clothes, etc.
But even with a smaller household income than our friends' families, our parents taught and modeled for each of us the importance of giving to the Lord financially. So when we got married, it was normative for both of us to want to give at least 10% (if not more) of what we earned back to the Lord. This was a practice when we committed ourselves to when we began our marriage, even when we were barely paying the bills and had almost nothing to give to the Lord. But we have been so encouraged by the Lord in the ways that He has been faithful to us as we've sought to be faithful to Him. There was more than one time early in our marriage where we were at a loss for how we would pay our next bill. But we remained committed to glorifying God with the little that we had. And more than once God has surprised us by His generosity through unexpected financial blessings. Those blessings from God have served to fan the flames of our desire to honor Him with the first fruits of our wealth.
I'll discuss the importance of money and giving back to the Lord in the next post, but for now I want to leave you with this principle: Whether you are a childless family or not, whether you earn $10k, $50k, or $100k+ a year, make investing in the local church a priority in your life, and God will be honored.
Investing in the Kingdom Relationally
I’ll end with this unique blessing of childlessness because it may be the most important: Relational investment.
In John Piper’s book, Momentary Marriage (which I don't wholly recommend due to Piper’s errant views on divorce and remarriage, among other small differences), I appreciate how Piper emphasizes the opportunity for disciple-making through the vehicle of marriage. Piper places this thought within the context of procreation, and he encourages married couples to think of starting a family in more than just physical terms. He points couples to consider not just the importance of biological childbearing, but the the importance of spiritual childbearing as well. Piper writes, "So I conclude that among Christians, mothering and fathering by procreation is natural and good and even glorious when Christ is in it. But it is not absolute. Aiming to bring spiritual children into being is absolute. Marriage is for making children. Yes. But not absolutely. Absolutely marriage is for making children followers of Jesus."
So discipleship should be the primary aim when raising children. And for those of us who don’t have children, discipling others should still be an aim in our lives. In fact, one of the opportunities I believe God has given me in this time of childlessness is the opportunity to spend time with others, evangelizing and discipling them. I look at Titus 2 and I see the shoulder-to-shoulder, one-another living promoted within the context of the church family unit. You have the older and younger of both sexes encouraged to set and follow the example of Christ-like living, but all of this necessitates a relational dimension of church life. For us as a childless couple, this other-mindedness is not only required by God and good for the church, but it's healthy for our sanctification too.
~David
