This Substack Note recently became our first truly viral post. Most of the response was beautiful, but as it reached more people, the accusations followed: selfish, irresponsible, too old, bad for the planet, a burden on society.
And that revealed something much bigger than disagreement over family size.
A month ago, we shared a simple truth:
We have seven children, and we refuse to apologize for a single one.
That Note became the first thing we had written on Substack to truly go viral. Most of the response was beautiful.
But as it reached more people, the accusations began.
Selfish
Irresponsible
Too old
Bad for the planet
A burden on society
And that response revealed something much bigger than disagreement over family size.
The culture does not merely want Christians to reject God’s blessings. It wants us to feel ashamed of them.
We will not.
We are not telling every family to have seven children. We are saying that we will not apologize for welcoming ours as blessings from God.
A culture that calls children burdens will always be unsettled by a family that calls them a heritage, and the God who ordains it.
This Is Not a Family Scoreboard
Hear us clearly, because this matters.
If you long for children and that longing aches, we are not writing to add to your grief. We pray with you, and we grieve with you.
If your road has looked different for reasons we may never know, we are not here to condemn you.
And we are not ranking families by size.
We respect the personal decisions of others. But we cannot pretend that the celebration of intentional childlessness as a cultural ideal reflects God’s vision for humanity, family, or the church.
Truth is, God never commanded that we all have children. Otherwise, Jesus and the Apostle Paul would have been married with kids.
That’s why this is not a demand that every household look like ours. It is an invitation for Christians to stop apologizing for whatever God has clearly called good.
And that’s something EVERY believer should get behind.
The Question Behind the Question
If you have kids, you have probably heard it too.
Maybe from a stranger in the checkout line. Maybe from a relative across the Thanksgiving table.
Maybe from a friend at church who meant it kindly.
“Are you done yet?”
And for those of us with larger families:
“You know how that happens, right?” [wink wink]
Then comes the flinch. The urge to explain yourself.
The apology that starts forming before you have even opened your mouth.
Somewhere along the way, apologizing for God’s blessings became the polite Christian default. We are expected to soften them, qualify them, and make sure no one feels uncomfortable about the gift God handed us.
We never agreed to that.
The real question is not whether we are “done.” The real question is whether we will let the world set the terms for our convictions.
And that’s really the heart of the matter because that mindset sets itself against the new false “gospel” that is diluting God’s Word.
The Comfort Gospel
Many Christians learned to reject the prosperity gospel, the lie that God owes us wealth, ease, and success. Others reject the health gospel, the lie that God will miraculously heal every one of all sickness and disease.
Good.
But many swallowed a quieter false gospel in its place.
Let’s call it the “comfort gospel.”
The prosperity gospel says God owes you wealth. The health gospel says God owes you healing.
The comfort gospel says God should never ask you to sacrifice it.
It treats convenience, autonomy, pleasure, and an undisturbed life as the highest good. It tells us the ideal life is one with uninterrupted sleep, disposable income, no pregnancy complications or painful childbirth, early retirement, minimal responsibility, and a calendar entirely our own.
Measure children against that scoreboard and, of course, they look like a cost. They interrupt sleep.
They stretch budgets. They rearrange Saturday mornings and five-year plans.
But that scoreboard was never handed to us by God.
We picked it up from the culture without noticing, and then we started grading our own lives by it.
Children expose the comfort gospel because children require the one thing it cannot tolerate: self-denial. But self-denial is a tenet of the Christian faith.
“If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.” — Matthew 16:24
Truth is, children cannot be streamlined into total convenience. They need us when we are tired, stretched, distracted, and unsure.
Anything that demands sacrifice will look like a threat when comfort has become your god.
So here is the question worth sitting with:
When did the very thing Scripture calls a blessing become something Christians feel compelled to justify?
“I’m grateful to be here, receiving encouragement, recipes, and whole-body transformation. Even after trying times, I trust you and Mama Z. The spiritual aspect completes the system: body, soul, and spirit.”
— Ellen D.
God Calls Children a Heritage
Open the Bible and the picture could not be more different.
“Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them.” — Psalm 127:3-5
Heritage. Reward.
Arrows in the hand of a warrior.
That is not the language of burden. It is the language of wealth.
And every child is formed on purpose.
“For You formed my inward parts; You knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” — Psalm 139:13-14
Not one child is an accident to God. Every one is known, formed, and loved by Him.
The problem was never the children. The problem is the lens we were handed to see them through.
Change the lens and everything changes.
What looked like chaos starts to look like discipleship.
What looked like a cost starts to look like a calling.
What looked like an interruption starts to look like an assignment from God.
Beautiful, isn’t it? :)
We Did Not Plan Seven Children
The truth is, we did not sit down while dating and plan a family of seven.
“The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.” — Proverbs 16:9
That verse is our story.
We knew we wanted a family, and we tried to keep our hands open to whatever God had for us. Even through difficult seasons, including financial hardship, we kept them open.
We counted the cost and continued saying yes.
Next thing we knew, God had given us seven living children and one waiting for us in Heaven.
And He has provided every step of the way.
This life was never built on convenience. It was built on covenant, on trusting God and saying yes again and again, even when obedience stretched our comfort, our plans, and our budget.
Faithfulness Does Not Mean Financial Ease
Some people claim to support large families, but quietly attach a condition: have as many children as you want, as long as you can guarantee that you will never need help.
We know that judgment from the inside.
When we had three little ones, there was a season when we received food assistance. It was hard, but there is no shame in it.
Dr. Z’s family also relied on government assistance in the early 1980s, when there were only two children at their table.
Thank God the help was there when our families needed it.
Most parents receiving assistance are not trying to game the system. They are mothers and fathers walking through a hard season, feeding their children, working toward stability, and using a bridge that exists for exactly that purpose.
There is no shame in needing a bridge.
Sometimes faith looks like a full pantry. Sometimes it looks like praying over an empty one and trusting God to provide through the people and resources He places in your path.
He did that for us, and if it’s your heart’s desire to have children, He’ll do that for you as well.
“Thank you so much for everything you all do, and especially today for the Scriptures. I really needed those today.”
— Mary G.
The Enemy’s Strategy Is Renaming
The enemy does not always have to attack a blessing head-on. Sometimes he only has to rename it.
God calls children a heritage. The world calls them a burden.
God calls sacrifice worship. The world calls it oppression.
God calls marriage covenant. The world calls it a contract.
God calls the body a temple. The world calls it a product.
God calls obedience freedom. The world calls it restriction.
Once a blessing is renamed, people begin to resent it. Once obedience is renamed, people begin to fear it.
Once sacrifice is renamed, people begin to avoid it.
The battle often begins with vocabulary.
That is why we refuse to let the world define what God has already called good.
What This Has to Do With Bible Health?
Everything.
Most people hear the word health and think of food, supplements, exercise, and medicine. Those things matter.
But Biblical health goes one layer deeper.
“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.” — Romans 12:2
Before the world tells you what to eat, take, fear, avoid, or believe about your body, it first teaches you what a good life is.
If its definition of a good life is comfort, convenience, autonomy, and consumption, every decision will eventually serve those gods.
You cannot out-supplement a worldview.
The surface problem may look like sugar, stress, exhaustion, or a medicine cabinet that keeps filling up. Go underneath it and you often find something older: a mind quietly conformed to the world’s assumptions about what a body is for, what a family is for, and what a life is for.
Renewal must reach the place where decisions are actually made.
The same reflex that makes a believer apologize for a full quiver can make that believer surrender every health decision to an industry that profits from confusion. Both begin when we trust the world’s scoreboard more than God’s Word.
We Will Not Apologize
This is about more than children.
Believers have started apologizing for all kinds of convictions Scripture never apologizes for.
For wanting a marriage that lasts.
For gathering the family around a table instead of scattering to screens.
For protecting children’s innocence.
For mothers who desire to build their lives around the home.
For fathers who lead with humility, sacrifice, and love.
For putting Christ before career.
For praying before a health decision instead of outsourcing every choice to whoever has the largest marketing budget.
The world does not merely pressure us to disobey. It trains us to become embarrassed by obedience.
We refuse.
The next time someone asks whether you are “done yet,” you do not need to become angry. You do not need to debate.
And you do not need to explain your entire life.
Stand straight. Smile.
And tell the truth:
“We see our children as gifts, and we are grateful for every one.”
You are not defending a mistake.
You are refusing to apologize for a blessing.
And a church that stops apologizing for what God calls good becomes very difficult for the world to disciple.
A Prayer for You. 🙏
Father God, thank You that children are a heritage from You and a reward.
Thank You that every life is fearfully and wonderfully made, and that You knit each one together with purpose.
Give me a heart that welcomes the people You bring into my life, and the courage to follow Your plan for my family, wherever it leads.
Bless the families around me with joy, strength and faithfulness, and let our homes carry Your love to the next generation.
Amen.
Upgrade and learn what God’s Word says about every area of life
and how to live it. That’s what Bible Health is all about.
Walk each 6-week live group study the day it opens.
Get the Blueprint and every weekly Swap.
Follow Jesus, not trends, in every area.
As always, our hope and prayer is that you experience the abundant life.
~ Dr. Z & Mama Z
Oh how I love the words and the wisdom in this post! My husband and I have 6 living children and I am open to add many as YHVH allows me to have! Thank you for sharing, may Yah bless your family!
from all the pictures I have seen of your family, the smiles on all of them...and from reading you posts, your work ethics, your values, your morals, your strength and your humility when you are weak...ALL I can conclude is that you have brought 7 children in this world, who will turn out to be very decent souls a very good addition to society...something much needed in this degrading world...Keep up the good work you two...God is with you and your adorable family...I love all your pictures...wishing my life had turned out better...but I look forward to the restored paradise when I will start all over again...and we will be surrounded by love and ZERO EVIL...Awesome indeed!